Latest news with #Legs
Daily Mail
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
ZZ Top star performs with a VERY bizarre instrument in Perth as the band tour Australia for the first time in 12 years
Texas blues rock icons ZZ Top took to the stage in Perth on Thursday, wowing fans with a very strange instrument. The Legs hitmakers were rocking Langley Park on the Australian leg of their Elevation world tour, with fellow rock veterans George Thorogood & The Destroyers. Partway through their headlining set, bass player Elwood Francis, 63, whipped out a guitar that had the crowd doing a double-take. He was rocking a bright yellow bass guitar that featured a whopping 17 strings and a body that almost obscured his entire torso. The standard electric bass guitar has four strings, there are also five-string and five-string models. Elwood, who replaced original member Dusty Hill after he died in 2021, looked like he was struggling to wrap his hands around the instrument's gargantuan neck as he stood in front of a large stack of amplifiers. The Legs hitmakers were rocking Langley Park on the Australian leg of their Elevation world tour, with fellow rock veterans George Thorogood & The Destroyers. P:ictured: Billy Gibbons Speaking about the bass behemoth to Guitar World in January, Elwood said that it wasn't his favourite instrument to play, and despite bearing the Fender name on the headstock, did not come from the iconic guitar company. 'I hate playing that f***ing bass,' he said. 'I found it late at night while internet surfing on one of those Chinese websites. I couldn't believe they were making something like that.' The rocker added that he saw immediate comic value in the oversized instrument. 'I found this guitar, took a screenshot, and sent it to Billy, saying, "We should order one of these, and I'll play it. It'll be hilarious."' Aside from the imposing instrument, the iconic showmen did not disappoint when it came to the sartorial stakes either. Frontman Billy Gibbons, 75, complete with his trademark beard, wowed the crowd with a very ornate jacket. The black jacket featured a colourful cactus and rose design, along with a Dia De Muertos-style skeleton for good measure. Elwood, who replaced original member Dusty Hill after his death in 2021 looked to be struggling to wrap his hands around the instrument's giant neck as he stood in front of a large stack of amplifiers He matched this with a pair of sequined black pants and a pair of black boots. Finishing his stage ensemble, Billy went a little overboard with the headwear, wearing a bandana and a grey beanie underneath a battered light grey fedora. While it was barely visible from behind the imposing bass, Elwood also wore the same eye-catching jacket and sequinned pants combo. He did mix things up with a pair of ruby red suede shoes while sorting a shock of grey hair and a full beard. Amongst all the rock and roll, both Billy and Elwood found time to switch out their jackets for an equally colourful matching bright purple number that also featured an ornate floral design. Elwood had also swapped his monstrous yellow bass for a much more manageable black four-string version. The Sharp Dressed Man rockers continue their Australian run in the Hunter Valley and Wollongong this weekend as part of the Red Hot Summer regional mini-festival. They will then head to Melbourne's Margaret Court Arena on May 7 before rounding our Red Hot Summer on Queensland's Bribie Island, and finally at the ICC Sydney Theatre on May 13. The black jacket featured a colourful cactus and rose design, along with a Dia De Muertos-style skeleton for good measure Amongst all the rock and roll, both Billy and Elwood found time to switch out their jackets for an equally colourful matching bright purple number that also featured an ornate floral design ZZ Top formed in Houston Texas in 1969 and for 51 years kept the same line-up of Billy Gibbons, Dusty Hill and Frank Beard, until Dusty's death in 2021. Responsible for a swag of blues rock hits including La Grange, Gimme All Your Lovin', and Sharp Dressed Man, the Rock and Roll Hall of Famers have sold an estimated 50 million records. During an appearance on US Radio show Ultimate Classic Rock Nights, Gibbons discussed the origins of the band's unusual name. 'We had a little apartment, a little hangout room that was lined with those rainbow-coloured blues posters you'd say nailed to the telephone poll, [listing] who was coming to town,' Gibbons recalled. As the guys looked at the posters, Gibbons said they realized 'it was odd how many current names had initials - O.V. Wright, D.C. Bender, and of course B.B. King - he was down on this end of the alphabet, then it was Z.Z. Hill.' 'Jeez, ZZ and King, that's a good combo,' Gibbons remembered saying, but decided that ZZ King was too similar to B.B. King.
USA Today
26-04-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Vernon Broughton is the Saints' first true connection to former college coach on staff
Vernon Broughton is the Saints' first true connection to former college coach on staff The New Orleans Saints used their first third round pick to select Vernon Broughton. Broughton was the first defensive player drafted and the first piece of true connective tissue to the new coaching staff. First round pick Kelvin Banks Jr. also played at Texas, but where Broughton stands apart is he played for a coach on staff. When filling out the defensive coaching staff, the Saints brought in a number of former collegiate coaches under Brandon Staley. Two of those coaches, Bo Davis and Terry Joseph, have Texas ties. Davis joined the Saints from LSU, but he spent the previous three seasons as the Texas defensive line coach. All three of those seasons were spent coaching the defensive tackle directly. It wouldn't be surprising if Davis pounded the table for Broughton. With the history between the two it was befitting that Davis was the one who called Broughton to let him know the Saints were drafting him. "What's up 'Chicken Legs'," Davis affectionately greeted him. What is noteworthy is Broughton had his best season when Davis left for LSU. After 2.5 career sacks, the tackle racked up 4 sacks in 2024. He also recovered a few fumbles in addition to his 5 tackles for a loss. This uptick in production likely had to do with the road finally being cleared for Broughton to play. Texas produced Broughton and Alfred Collins in this year's NFL draft and Byron Murphy and T'Vondre Sweat the year prior. The team was stacked on the interior. Broughton had to wait his turn and took advantage when the opportunity arose.
Sydney Morning Herald
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
‘It's gotta save your soul': ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons on longevity and that famous beard
The blues are about sex, of course, but the songs are also good-humoured and, at their best, suffused with a generosity of spirit. The band's early radio hit, La Grange, was a hymn to a Texan house of ill repute. The band broke through with the ineffably named Tush, a good-humoured but bruising guitar workout that turned a nonce word into a bawdy crowd-pleaser. 'That has a rather interesting backstory,' Gibbons says. 'We were warming up for a show, way down in Alabama in a rodeo arena with a dirt floor. It was hot, and I started cranking out a warm-up guitar riff. The lighting director came running up and said, 'Keep at it, whatever you're doing is resonating!' 'We returned to the dressing room and grabbed a piece of paper. At the time down in Texas, the word 'tush' was kind of a slang word meaning fine or 'the ultimate' or 'rico' [Spanish for rich.] I said, 'Well, let's use this word – it means 'the best!' ' It is suggested to Gibbons that 'the best' probably is not what most people think the word means. He chuckles. 'There are other connotations as well, which we'll leave to one's imagination.' After the records in the 1970s that forever cemented the band's reputation, ZZ Top pulled off a coup in the 1980s. The two frontmen created a signature style, turning their beards, like their volume, up to 11, with whiskers down to belt buckles. In the 1980s, the trio brightened their sound on singles like Legs and Sharp Dressed Man, and became comfortably cartoony MTV stars. Hill and Gibbons later paired the beards with a variety of outlandish headgear. The decades since have flown by, and time, of course, has taken its toll on ZZ Top as it has on the music as a whole. Hill died of bursitis four years ago. 'It was a good run,' Gibbons says soberly. (Hill's place is now taken by his longtime guitar technician, Elwood Francis, who has grown out his own beard.) Along the way, Gibbons became a guitar hero. His conversation is peppered with reminiscences of this or that star. Ask Gibbons how it felt to play on stage with Eric Clapton, and he'll note that he'd been talking to Clapton on the latter's 80th birthday the week before. He's crossed paths with many others, including Bob Dylan. 'One of my proudest possessions,' Gibbons says, 'is a recording of Bob Dylan singing [ZZ Top song] My Head's in Mississippi. He was playing in Mississippi. He turned to his band and said, 'I hope you know it, because we're going to do it!' ' His inspirations go back to when his mother took him to see Elvis Presley at the age of five. Rock and roll, he assures the interviewer, will continue as long as he has anything to say about it.
Sydney Morning Herald
22-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
'It's gotta save your soul': ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons on longevity and that famous beard
The blues are about sex, of course, but the songs are also good-humoured and, at their best, suffused with a generosity of spirit. The band's early radio hit, La Grange, was a hymn to a Texan house of ill repute. The band broke through with the ineffably named Tush, a good-humoured but bruising guitar workout that turned a nonce word into a bawdy crowd-pleaser. 'That has a rather interesting backstory,' Gibbons says. 'We were warming up for a show, way down in Alabama in a rodeo arena with a dirt floor. It was hot, and I started cranking out a warm-up guitar riff. The lighting director came running up and said, 'Keep at it, whatever you're doing is resonating!' 'We returned to the dressing room and grabbed a piece of paper. At the time down in Texas, the word 'tush' was kind of a slang word meaning fine or 'the ultimate' or 'rico' [Spanish for rich.] I said, 'Well, let's use this word – it means 'the best!' ' It is suggested to Gibbons that 'the best' probably is not what most people think the word means. He chuckles. 'There are other connotations as well, which we'll leave to one's imagination.' After the records in the 1970s that forever cemented the band's reputation, ZZ Top pulled off a coup in the 1980s. The two frontmen created a signature style, turning their beards, like their volume, up to 11, with whiskers down to belt buckles. In the 1980s, the trio brightened their sound on singles like Legs and Sharp Dressed Man, and became comfortably cartoony MTV stars. Hill and Gibbons later paired the beards with a variety of outlandish headgear. The decades since have flown by, and time, of course, has taken its toll on ZZ Top as it has on the music as a whole. Hill died of bursitis four years ago. 'It was a good run,' Gibbons says soberly. (Hill's place is now taken by his longtime guitar technician, Elwood Francis, who has grown out his own beard.) Along the way, Gibbons became a guitar hero. His conversation is peppered with reminiscences of this or that star. Ask Gibbons how it felt to play on stage with Eric Clapton, and he'll note that he'd been talking to Clapton on the latter's 80th birthday the week before. He's crossed paths with many others, including Bob Dylan. 'One of my proudest possessions,' Gibbons says, 'is a recording of Bob Dylan singing [ZZ Top song] My Head's in Mississippi. He was playing in Mississippi. He turned to his band and said, 'I hope you know it, because we're going to do it!' ' His inspirations go back to when his mother took him to see Elvis Presley at the age of five. Rock and roll, he assures the interviewer, will continue as long as he has anything to say about it.
The Age
22-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
'It's gotta save your soul': ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons on longevity and that famous beard
The blues are about sex, of course, but the songs are also good-humoured and, at their best, suffused with a generosity of spirit. The band's early radio hit, La Grange, was a hymn to a Texan house of ill repute. The band broke through with the ineffably named Tush, a good-humoured but bruising guitar workout that turned a nonce word into a bawdy crowd-pleaser. 'That has a rather interesting backstory,' Gibbons says. 'We were warming up for a show, way down in Alabama in a rodeo arena with a dirt floor. It was hot, and I started cranking out a warm-up guitar riff. The lighting director came running up and said, 'Keep at it, whatever you're doing is resonating!' 'We returned to the dressing room and grabbed a piece of paper. At the time down in Texas, the word 'tush' was kind of a slang word meaning fine or 'the ultimate' or 'rico' [Spanish for rich.] I said, 'Well, let's use this word – it means 'the best!' ' It is suggested to Gibbons that 'the best' probably is not what most people think the word means. He chuckles. 'There are other connotations as well, which we'll leave to one's imagination.' After the records in the 1970s that forever cemented the band's reputation, ZZ Top pulled off a coup in the 1980s. The two frontmen created a signature style, turning their beards, like their volume, up to 11, with whiskers down to belt buckles. In the 1980s, the trio brightened their sound on singles like Legs and Sharp Dressed Man, and became comfortably cartoony MTV stars. Hill and Gibbons later paired the beards with a variety of outlandish headgear. The decades since have flown by, and time, of course, has taken its toll on ZZ Top as it has on the music as a whole. Hill died of bursitis four years ago. 'It was a good run,' Gibbons says soberly. (Hill's place is now taken by his longtime guitar technician, Elwood Francis, who has grown out his own beard.) Along the way, Gibbons became a guitar hero. His conversation is peppered with reminiscences of this or that star. Ask Gibbons how it felt to play on stage with Eric Clapton, and he'll note that he'd been talking to Clapton on the latter's 80th birthday the week before. He's crossed paths with many others, including Bob Dylan. 'One of my proudest possessions,' Gibbons says, 'is a recording of Bob Dylan singing [ZZ Top song] My Head's in Mississippi. He was playing in Mississippi. He turned to his band and said, 'I hope you know it, because we're going to do it!' ' His inspirations go back to when his mother took him to see Elvis Presley at the age of five. Rock and roll, he assures the interviewer, will continue as long as he has anything to say about it.
