Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).
Cheap Sunglasses (1979)
Long before they had flashy videos on MTV and were spinning their guitars, the guys in ZZ Top were touring the country playing their own brand of gutbucket blues and hard rock.
The band formed in Houston in 1969 after the breakup of singer-guitarist Billy Gibbons' previous band, Moving Sidewalks. He was joined by bassist Lanier Greig and drummer Dan Mitchell; Greig was replaced by Billy Ethridge and Mitchell by Frank Beard. The band was signed by London Records; Ethridge wouldn't sign the contract so he was replaced by Dusty Hill.
The band's third album, Tres Hombres, came out in 1973 and featured the hit "La Grange," about a brothel; the album went to #8 on the Billboard 200. Gibbons' guitar tone made the band stand out, and both he and Hill traded off lead vocals. Their next album, Fandango!, was half live and half new songs, one of which was "Tush," which hit #20 on the Billboard Hot 100.
ZZ Top made one more album, Tejas, for London Records before going on hiatus in 1978 while Beard was dealing with addiction issues. Gibbons went to Europe, Beard went to Jamaica and Hill went to Mexico; Hill later worked for three months at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport because he wanted to feel normal after spending several years touring the world. The band reunited in 1979 to make a new album, with Gibbons and Hill both sporting the long beards that would become synonymous with ZZ Top.
The band signed with Warner Bros. and released Deguello in late 1979. The first single was a cover of Sam and Dave's "I Thank You," which was a minor radio hit. The second single was an original that was a good encapsulation of the ZZ sound: Gibbons singing about his love for inexpensive shades, combining swampy boogie riffs with a unique guitar sound thanks to the fake Fender Gibbons played through a Marshall amp with a blown tube.
"When you wake up in the morning/And the light is hurt your head/The first thing you do/When you get up out of bed/Is hit that street a-runnin'/And try to beat the masses/And go get yourself some cheap sunglasses/Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah."
Gibbons said in a Guitar World interview that the song's three verses came to him while the band ws driving through La Grange, Texas.
"Spied a little thing and/I followed her all night/In funky fine Levi's and her/Sweater's kind of tight/She had a West Coast strut/That was sweet as molasses/But what really knocked me out was her cheap sunglasses/Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah."
The album version features an almost 2-minute instrumental break, and the song closes with another 90 seconds of funky vamping, punctuated by Hill's thumping bass. The single version is 2:40, more than 2 minutes shorter than the album one.
"Now go out and get yourself/Some thick black frames/With the glass so dark/They won't even know your name/And the choice is up to you/'Cause they come in two classes/Rhinestone shades/And cheap sunglasses/Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah."
The song only went to #89 on the Billboard Hot 100 but it got plenty of FM radio play and the album hit #24 and went platinum. While in Europe on the Deguello tour, ZZ Top played the BBC's Old Grey Whistle Test, where they shared time with electronic act Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark; Gibbons was a fan and started adding synthesizers to ZZ's sound starting with the next album El Loco. The electronic influence really came through on 1983's Eliminator, which was a monster hit thanks to singles "Gimme All Your Lovin'" and "Legs" and their accompanying videos. Engineer Linden Hudson worked closely with Gibbons, using drum machines and synths to replace much of Hill and Beard's work. Hudson didn't receive credit for his co-writing work and ended up suing after the band used his song "Thug" without permission; ZZ Top ended up paying him $600,000 after he proved he had the copyright.
Still, the band became big stars thanks to the videos, which featured them in cheap sunglasses, trench coats and the long beards (except for Frank Beard, of course). Their 1985 album Afterburner was also a smash, with four top 40 hits. By 1990's Recycler, the band cut down on the synths and went back to a guitar-based blues sound, but it didn't have the same success as the previous two albums (although it did go platinum). The next 30 years found ZZ Top still touring regularly and releasing the occasional album.
In July 2021, Hill had to leave the tour with a hip injury and was replaced by his guitar tech Elwood Francis. Five days later, the band announced Hill had died at home at the age of 72. The band cited Hill's wish for them to continue on with Francis on bass. And they're still touring, cheap sunglasses and all.
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