New ZZ Top Album Could Contain Song They Started 50 Years Ago
Billy Gibbons reported that ZZ Top are preparing to start work on their 16th album, which could contain a song they’ve been trying to complete since the band formed.
The follow-up to 2012’s La Futura, set to be produced by Rick Rubin, may include a guest appearance by old friend Jeff Beck.
“We’re getting ready to go back in the studio,” Gibbons said during a LIveSigning interview, available below. “[A]fter five decades of attempting to record and complete a song that we started when the band first got together, maybe this go-around we’ll have some success.” He added that the revised version of his memoir Rock + Roll Gearhead had “given us some real impetus to get back in the studio and start peeling the onion.”
Asked if Beck might be involved in ZZ Top’s album plans, Gibbons replied: “Now there's a guy that not only is still doing it like we'd like to do it [but is also] inventing things on the guitar that probably wasn't really designed to be done.” He described Beck as “a great guy” and noted, “I had a chance to see him last summer while we were over in London, and we've been in touch ever since. Chances are once we get back in the studio, he's sitting on the ready. So I think we ought to try it.”
Earlier this year, Gibbons said he’d been in contact with Rubin about the project, adding that the producer had already offered “a few ideas that he threw into the mix." He continued, “[Rubin] likes to work on the West Coast, so it’s between Texas and California where we dream this stuff up. So it’ll be coming up, probably in the next few months, I hope. It’s a bit premature for a proper announcement, but it’ll be forthcoming.”
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