Billy Gibbons confirmed that the death of ZZ Top drummer Frank Beard will not bring an end to the band.
Beard passed August 17, at the age of 77 after spending 57 years in the trio, mostly with Gibbons and Dusty Hill, who died in 2021. The bass guitarist was replaced by Elwood Francis.
Beard hadn’t been on the road for some time as a result of his illness, with Michael Monahan taking his place on their current tour. The trip resumed in Eagle Pass, Texas, on August 21, after a handful of cancellations..
“Elwood and I lost a great friend and collaborator, and the world lost one of the most naturally innovative drummers and a great and true son of Texas,” Gibbons told Variety in a statement. “His signature backbeat was key to keeping ZZ on top.
“The band which he was part for six decades is going to keep on keeping on, as he had wished.”
The fact that Beard was the only member of ZZ Top without facial hair has been commented on for decades, with some unaware that the drummer always used his birth name.
Ultimate Classic Rock reported that, in their early years, neither Gibbons nor Hill had grown whiskers. The change came when the band returned from a two-year hiatus in 1979.
“I had a beard, but it wasn’t near the beard[s] they had,” Beard said. “I shaved it right after we got back together when I saw.”
Added Gibbons, “Frank didn’t mind being beardless. After all, he had the name – and he could go in the shopping mall without being interrupted.” In a separate interview he admitted: “We’d gotten really, really lazy. Nobody had bothered to shave. In simple terms, that’s exactly how it started.”
Hill’s death leaves Gibbons as the group’s only surviving original member. Asked in 2018 about the secret to their longevity, the electric-guitar slinger told Rock And Roll Garage, “There are two lingering questions. One of them says, ‘How does the guy with the name Frank Beard end up playing between you two guys with two-foot chin whiskers?’ We still don’t know!
“And the second question is, ‘Gosh, you guys have held it together longer than most marriages.’ The secret is, of course, two words: separate buses.”
