ZZ Top - Tres Hombres · Riffology: Iconic Rock Albums Podcast

Neil0:13 Do you know what it reminds me of? What's that? I've been watching the last one. Laughing. Oh, that is really funny. A load of comedians in a room and they make them. So I'm adjusting my microphone, which will send you mad on it. So a load of comedians in a room and they have to not laugh. And they all try and make each other laugh and they'll try and not laugh. And one of the things they did was they got a opera singer to come in and sing the opera. Sing singy bits like kind of. Oh. And then they had to do it as well. And they were. It was. It's very funny.

Chris0:41 I don't know how they managed it.

Neil0:43 Normally. We're Riffology.

Chris0:45 Riffology.

Neil0:47 Because you just sang the beginning.

Chris0:48 Yes.

Neil0:48 And that's what we are. And I'm Neil.

Chris0:50 Chris.

Neil0:51 And you're Chris. And we're doing Tres Hombres. Although my eldest tells me it's Trey.

Chris0:56 Trey Hornbre. Trey Hombre.

Neil0:58 Another dude. I don't care.

Chris0:59 Yeah. Tres Ombres. I don't know. Really. Yeah. I. I don't know if they'd be that bothered either, really, how you pronounce it.

Neil1:07 American. I. Yeah. It's like one of my favorite things ever. That's aluminum. Something that somebody said to me was. There was. And I might get the politician wrong, but I'm pretty sure it was a British politician called Ted Heath.

Chris1:19 Yeah.

Neil1:20 Now, Ted Heath was fluent in French.

Chris1:22 Yeah.

Neil1:22 But he refused to speak it in a French accent.

Chris1:25 Right.

Neil1:26 Wow. So he delivered. He delivered these French speeches.

Chris1:32 Bonjour, mesme.

Neil1:33 Yeah. Proper, properly flat British accent. And I just. And I thought no one could only. Honestly, all of that.

Chris1:42 Yeah.

Neil1:42 Trez Tres Hombres. Loads of that. I. I want to confess a little bit about why we did this album. You know, I kind of blurted this out last. Last time we did it. I was like. Because there wasn't context did, you know. So the context behind it is I'm watching a TV show called Landman.

Chris2:00 Right.

Neil2:01 Which is dead good. I like. I like TV shows about people, really. Or sci fi or spaceships or racing or Anyway. But I really like them about when, you know, the kind of people. Ish. You know, they were about the character. Yeah. Interesting characters.

Chris2:14 Yeah.

Neil2:15 And Landman's like that. It hooked me from the first few minutes of it, say, in Texas, in the oil industry. Like.

Chris2:21 Yeah.

Neil2:22 Pumping oil out of the ground and all of that kind of stuff.

Chris2:24 Oh, I better like that. Because I like There Will Be Blood. I like that film.

Neil2:27 Yeah, you might like it. You might. You might enjoy this. It's quite. It's quite interesting. There's lots of kind. It's. It's. It's good. There's lots of like.

Chris2:33 Well, it's an Apple TV one.

Neil2:35 I can't remember. No, might be. I'll find it until it feels like it should be. Yeah, it does feel like it should be an Apple. I don't think it is Apple tv. I remember where I got it from, anyway.

Chris2:44 Yeah.

Neil2:46 Billy Bob Thornton's in it.

Chris2:47 Is he?

Neil2:47 Who's also in a band.

Chris2:49 Yes.

Neil2:49 He's really cool. I saw him in his bag. Very cool. Anyway, there's lots of, like, diatribes in there where he. It's just too clever and so the writing is clever and he. I. I like it reminded me a little bit, the writing. A bit of Boston Legal, if anyone's familiar. There's that kind of cleverness to it. It's quite cool. Anyway, there's a lovely bit in there, either. That's very funny. That's William Shatner.

Chris3:13 Is it?

Neil3:13 And he's. It's. God, this has gone so off piste already. He's got. His character name is Denny Crane.

Chris3:18 Yeah.

Neil3:19 And he's. He's like a lawyer who used to be amazing. Like the best lawyer. The most, like, just. Just in. In, like, undefeatable lawyer. And now he's just a bit mad. Yeah. So, like, he. He went. When asked about how things are going, he just says his name. So he's like Denny Crane. And then. And he's like. He's. He's proper Republican. He's got like. His answer to everything is just shoot people. Very funny. But then James Spader is in there, who plays like a super sharp lawyer, does these, like, closing speeches. So each episode follows through some case.

Chris3:56 Yeah.

Neil3:56 And you kind of never show. The case kind of ebbs and flows and you never show which way it's going to go, if they're going to win or they lose or what. And then at the end, normally, James Spade will stand up and deliver this, like, kind of monologue out to people. And it's really clever and there's lots of that. And there's lots of that in Landman too. Lots of kind of, you know, clever kind of monologue bits in there.

Chris4:15 It's the same writers.

Neil4:16 No, I doubt it. Yeah. Boston Legal is ancient, isn't it? Yeah. 20 years ago, Boston Legal. You can't even. I was. I've been trying to find a good copy of Boston Eagle. Like a Even a DVD version of it and I can't find them. Oh, sorry. That's if you heard that. That's my cat going out. The cat flap, is it? Actually, I've got a smart cat flap because it's going to go so off piece, isn't it? I've got it. I've got to get back from Boston Legal, back to this album now. Oh, God, my brain, really.

Chris4:44 Notification about your cat flap.

Neil4:45 Yes. You are such a nerd. So good. I've also completely automated it so that it locks at sunrise and sunset and I can see when the cats are in or out. And so they've got to go to the vets. I can keep them in. And it's. Wow. Honestly, it's so good.

Chris4:58 Yeah.

Neil4:58 I feel really powerful because I can press a button.

Chris5:00 Yeah.

Neil5:01 And that cat can't come in or out. Catman. Yeah, Catman. Oh, the cat. God. So let me backtrack. The cat flaps are done.

Chris5:08 Yeah.

Neil5:09 Boston Legal, we've done Land man, so Inland Man. Yeah. And I got really sucked into. It's really cool. Set in Texas. It's just. It's just cool. It's just like, you know, we're from a tiny little village in South Derbyshire in. In England. I always find America, like, just immense. It's just incredible. Yeah. It's just like everything about Into America, have you. Wow. Every. Every bit. Even like the shitty bits of America, I think, are just fascinating and incredible. They're all just massive or just so different or so weird. And I. I don't know, there's just something about it. Anyway, I really like just this TV show really hooked me in cool characters. Billy Bob Thornton and it's just. It's just interesting. It's cool. There's a bit in there in, like episode like four or five, where they have to get one part of Texas to another. And Texas is enormous. Texas is like. It's like bigger than all of Europe or this is enormous place, Texas. So they've got to get from one end of Texas to the other end of Texas. And they're in two different cars.

Chris6:06 Yeah.

Neil6:07 And one of the characters, she gets in this Bentley and then Lagrange starts.

Chris6:11 Yeah.

Neil6:13 And then you just think, oh, that is.

Chris6:15 And that set you off on this.

Neil6:16 That's it, isn't it? Yeah, that's it. That is. Do you know that kind of.

Chris6:20 Yeah, yeah.

Neil6:21 And then I. I thought, I wonder how many times that track has been used, like, for that kind of. And that's what set me off. That sort of.

Chris6:29 That Lawsuit thing wasn't there with the writer, John Lee Hooker.

Neil6:32 Writer, yeah, because they nicked it. Totally. They're totally. It's not even their song. And what I love about it is, is didn't he call on record saying

Chris6:39 I didn't serve wrote it?

Neil6:40 You know, given like that's just like. So.

Chris6:51 About to check outside again.

Neil6:55 You know what I'm talking about? Just let me know if you wanna go to that whole mile on the range. They got a lot of nice girls. Well, here it's fine if you got the time. I have nothing to get yourself in now. The hair is tight. I'm all staring back. But no, I might be mistaken. It got kicked out of court in like 95, didn't it? Because it did go to court.

Chris10:05 Yeah, yeah.

Neil10:05 And they were going to have to pay all of the royalties and it got kicked out and I can't remember why they got kicked out for like a weird reason. Just like, oh, it was so old. It was in public domain.

Chris10:15 That's right. It's public domain.

Neil10:16 Yeah, yeah. And yeah. So it's just like. Yeah.

Chris10:18 So there's no case because it's. It's no longer copyright, but it's epic.

Neil10:22 There's just something about that song. It is that, isn't it? It's like road Trip, you know, But

Chris10:26 I think that's the same. The same thing with that was. I might be wrong, but Moby Play, you know, when he had all the blues kind of something.

Neil10:35 Yeah, yeah, same thing. Eminem too. There's all of them sampled a bunch of stuff, didn't they? And Eminem sampled Dido, didn't they?

Chris10:42 Yeah.

Neil10:44 And there was like. I think Dido was kind of up for. It was okay. But there's a bunch of clips and samples that they used that would not. Yeah.

Chris10:51 I think the one with Moby with Play was that it was if. And I don't know if you know if there's a copyright recording, but certainly the copyright, the sound, the song.

Neil11:00 Yeah.

Chris11:01 You've got two sides of copy.

Neil11:02 Yeah, yeah.

Chris11:02 Well, the copyright of the actual composition to the right.

Neil11:05 That's the writing.

Chris11:06 Yeah.

Neil11:06 Credits.

Chris11:07 Yeah. And then you've got the composition of the. Of the kind of the recording.

Neil11:10 Because that's what Taylor Swift did. Taylor Swift sold her recordings.

Chris11:14 Yeah.

Neil11:14 But not the rights to the songs, which meant she could go and re record them again, which is what she did.

Chris11:18 Taylor's version.

Neil11:19 Yeah, yeah.

Chris11:20 So with that, it was out of. So after so many years after. I think it's after the composer's death.

Neil11:26 Yeah.

Chris11:27 So many years after their death. Or there's the record. There's the recording copyright, which is for a certain amount of time in general. Which is why you have reissues, of course, remasters and all that. Because they'll pull the others from sale.

Neil11:39 Yeah.

Chris11:39 And then re release the record.

Neil11:40 Is that why. That's why I get grumpy. Because you can't play the originals. Yeah, I don't like it.

Chris11:45 So they'll do the reissues.

Neil11:46 Yeah.

Chris11:46 And that. That kind of puts the copyright of the recording back, if you like, or something like that.

Neil11:51 No way.

Chris11:52 Yeah, yeah.

Neil11:52 But if you've still got a copy of the original recording there. Yeah. Like is that. Or okay, can you. Is that your. Can you just go and use that?

Chris12:01 Yeah, probably. But. But if the songwriter's still alive, you have to pay the songwriter. I think it might be 30 years after songwriter death.

Neil12:09 Yeah.

Chris12:10 Because in between the time it goes to their estate and then after that it. It goes out. Something like that. It might be 50 years, I think. Depends where in the world you as well, actually. Because they'll have different laws in different countries, which in today's age is crazy, you know, with the technology that's available. But yeah, there's a. There's a certain amount of time and then it goes into the public domain.

Neil12:27 Right.

Chris12:27 Which is where you can then use it. Which is what happened with that particular thing. Because they didn't use the recording.

Neil12:32 Yeah.

Chris12:32 The recording was probably still in. But it was to do with. Perhaps it was. It was a certain amount of time after the songwriter.

Neil12:38 It was quite old, wasn't it? I can't remember. It's in the blog. The date of it. I wonder if it's in the. Where's the table at the end?

Chris12:44 We'll come to expect to be sort of twenties or thirties.

Neil12:47 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We can come to this at. When we do Facts.

Chris12:53 Yeah.

Neil12:54 I wonder if it's in the. Oh, I can't find it. Oh, I can't even find it in the. In the. In the facts. I thought it would be in the facts. But anyway, we'll look at it somewhere in the blog.

Chris13:07 Riffology code.

Neil13:08 Yeah, look at that. You can do comments now. Yeah, I guess I switched on comments in the blog so you can do comments.

Chris13:14 That wasn't a swear word.

Neil13:17 I don't know whether it will do swear. I think you're allowed swear word. I don't know.

Chris13:20 What's the test? That.

Neil13:21 I just don't care. What does it say? Oh, yeah, it says, oh, no, I thought. I thought this was in it. And it's not. It says musically the song is non apologetic reworking of John Lee Hooker's Boogie Chillin with a generous nod to Slim Har Pose. Shake your hips. Yeah. Gibbons never pretended otherwise. But I thought I'd put in there the date of the original.

Chris13:47 It's in there somewhere.

Neil13:47 Oh, 1905.

Chris13:48 There we go.

Neil13:49 Oh, no, that's the Chicken Ranch. We'll talk about that later. That's a brothel. I know that, but. Yeah, that's. That's that. Yeah. All right. We'll figure this at some point. There'll be a. A gap where you can have a wee or something. Yeah, quite.

Chris14:01 They're quite a mysterious band, I think.

Neil14:03 I love them.

Chris14:04 Like there's a mythos there, isn't there?

Neil14:05 I do. Do you know, they're. They're a band that I just think are just like so straight and like. Do you know what I mean? You can just imagine conversations with record label going, oh, you can do like some hit singles or whatever. Yeah, I don't know.

Chris14:19 No, this is what you got. I've done this because the other thing about them is that it's, you know, around this time and. And probably into the. Sort of shortly after there were all these bands that were doing stuff that had, you know, loads of session musicians and people playing strings.

Neil14:34 Yeah, yeah, yeah. And this wasn't, was it?

Chris14:37 This was the.

Neil14:37 This was.

Chris14:38 Was just those lads.

Neil14:39 This was just the Three Boys and then. And cracking on.

Chris14:42 And I think that's interesting because I thought that about Led Zeppelin. I thought that Led Zeppelin had like a ton of, you know, session players, but it was all the band members and they were multi tracking. Like there was, you know, played it, you know, multiple instruments. But in general it was. It was just the band members doing. Doing their thing without loads of session players and extra people.

Neil15:03 I think they did after this. Yeah, I think. I think they were bringing people in. But there was a lot of uncredited stuff. Yeah. After this point there was a lot of people doing a lot of things that were just never credited anyway. It's funny, isn't it? And there's a lot of mistakes on the. I'm not saying mistakes. There's a lot of G, like gags on the sleeve notes and stuff where people have got different names and things where they're just doing it for a laugh. I don't think you get away with that so much these days.

Chris15:29 Because the thing I always remember about ZZ Top was flying V's and big beards. Yeah, they're the two, the two kind

Neil15:34 of things, Cadillacs and all of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They, but they weren't here. No beards. But at this point, if you had Frank Beard, who didn't have a beard, and then, and then the others didn't have a beard. There's a picture in the blog which I think is really I, I, I

Chris15:52 without beards, sans beard.

Neil15:53 Yeah, they've got no beards and they got the beard.

Chris15:57 So the beard thing was good because to get beards that long, it's going to take a while, isn't it?

Neil16:02 Yeah. Look, look, I'm going to show you, I'm showing, I'm showing us a picture of things.

Chris16:04 Yeah, yeah.

Neil16:06 And then, and then you had like. So Frank Beard had a mustache, not a beard. And then Dusty had a beard, but it was like a, A, I don't know how to describe it. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like a smaller beard, bushy beard.

Chris16:22 Yeah.

Neil16:22 Not a long pointy beard.

Chris16:24 Yeah.

Neil16:25 And then Billy Gibbons was completely clean shaven, pretty much. So they didn't, they didn't look like that at this point in time. We started zz Top in 1969. We carried on without stop up until the bicentennial year of 76. And at that time we were looking at an invitation to join the ranks of the Warner Brothers Group. And it was the decision by management to take a brief break. Literally 7 years of non stop touring, maybe a 90 day hiatus would give us a little breathing room, which turned into 120 days later. It was one year and we all kind of scattered, keeping in touch only by telephone. Now it's two years running and all the machinations to join the ranks of Warner Brothers were still underway. Meantime, as I mentioned, the word lazy came in. Now there's one telltale photograph. Our first official release for Warner Brothers contained a photograph on the little sleeve inside the 12 inch long playing album. Actually, the only evidence of Frank Beard with a beard is hiding inside of that Deguello record. He quickly grabbed the razor and went to town. But Dusty and I, what started out as a disguise turned into a trademark. ZZ Top was touring through Europe and there came a three week gap in the break. The stopping point was in Vienna and the young lady that was representing Juan Warner Brothers at the time was best friends. Her girlfriend was the Austrian consulate to the African country of Cameroon. I stayed in Vienna thinking, well, it's a lot to pick up sticks and go back to the States. So the girl From Warner Brothers said, gee, I'm making a trip with my girlfriend and some of the. The dignitaries from Vienna to the country of Cameroon.

Chris18:46 Would you like to go?

Neil18:48 I said, sure, we'll hop in. And being good Texan, I had my 10 gallon Stetson on. And on arrival, the chief breezed past the Minister of Foreign affairs, the Minister of Arts, the Cameron consulate walked straight up to me and he said, I like the hat. And I got the elbow. Give the chief the hat. I said, no, wait a minute. We're from Texas, Chief. We do a little horse trading on these matters. Sure enough, he got it. Sent somebody scurrying about. Next camp, I could get another 10 gallon hat. This I'm not so sure. You have my. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well when you could not be lost. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which way are you coming from? Going up or getting down? We'll have you found a balancer? I'll help you put it down. Oh, About heaven. Sam. If you have dear brother. Help you help oh yeah Help you Help you Heaven oh yeah help you. It's funny what they grew up into, isn't it? Like here you had like. I mean, you were saying this out. I, I really like this record.

Chris22:23 Yeah.

Neil22:24 One of the things that I really like about a. The dynamic range and recording I think is really cool. So there's a lot of scope. If you, you, you. When we talk about dynamic range for records, basically it means you need to turn the volume up. Because it doesn't sound like if you

Chris22:38 go and it's not slammed with compression.

Neil22:39 No, if you go and put like, there's a new Shinedown album 8. It's really cool. Brilliant. Love it to pieces. My God, it's loud.

Chris22:45 Yeah, right.

Neil22:45 You. If I put that on and then put this on, this sounds like it's.

Chris22:48 Yeah.

Neil22:49 Like not even playing. It's just. Yeah. The difference is phenomenal. But this one I think is really curious. You know, you, you, you put it on, you have to turn the volume up. But you then start to hear these details, subtle details in the playing that you just don't hear. You're very analog. Very. I don't know. This is like very honest. Yeah. Recording. And, and I like that, the song structure. I like the way that you, you go from. I don't know, you, you go from like some, some pretty fast songs. So like, like Beer drinkers and Hellraisers. It's pretty, pretty banging. And then Lagrange is pretty banging. But then you've got like. Is it hot, blue and righteous.

Chris23:36 That's my favorite. I think.

Neil23:37 It's kind of really slow, isn't it?

Chris23:40 It's really super slow.

Neil23:42 Yeah. It's kind of. It's kind of. And there's like swamp music in here. It's kind of very southern blues and then. But then there's like. There's bits that I can hear that almost. You can connect this record to Van Halen.

Chris23:56 Yeah.

Neil23:57 You know, and an Aerosmith. Where they would.

Chris24:00 Hair metal thing.

Neil24:01 Yeah. And it's. But it's not all like that. There's bits of it in there.

Chris24:04 There's like a little moments.

Neil24:05 Little fragments. Yeah. There's like. Gibbons kind of do these kind of raging guitar solos that are just like mad, you know, like you wouldn't expect out of a 70s. Yeah. No album.

Chris24:17 Absolutely.

Neil24:18 You know.

Chris24:18 Yeah.

Neil24:19 And then. And then they. Yeah. But then bizarrely all kind of just seems to hang together. Yeah, it's. It's. Yeah, but it's cool. It's. It's not an album that all sounds the same, but. Yeah, it's. It's. It's interesting. Doesn't sound like anything they've done before, I don't think. No. Because the records previous to this were pretty. Pretty poor performance wise. They didn't really find.

Chris24:45 Which is incredible because it's. This is so well performed. Like they can obviously. They can obviously all play. And at this point they can all play really tight together. I think like, subsequently to this, the sort of. The gain went up a little bit and it started to use kind of rock and distorted sound. Guitars and fuzz.

Neil25:00 Yeah.

Chris25:02 At the minute it's still quite crunchy. It's quite like. You know, it's the.

Neil25:05 For me, it's the bits. It's the kind of. It's the Beer Drinkers and Hell Raises and Lagrange. It's these kind of big pop hooks with rock guitars.

Chris25:15 Yeah.

Neil25:15 And they. I think they were just like. Yeah, we. We're good at that. Or, you know, maybe. Actually this stuff goes down really. You know, when they're out playing live, this stuff is bouncing Omega.

Chris25:24 Yeah.

Neil25:24 Yeah. And then they just kind of grew into this, you know. And then as they went through the late 70s, they kind of grew into the. The, you know, the. The beards and the. You know, and. And I don't know, it almost feels. And I wonder if. I don't know. I'd always kind of thought that like hair metal really had come out of Aerosmith.

Chris25:41 Yeah.

Neil25:41 From.

Chris25:41 Yeah.

Neil25:42 This era.

Chris25:43 It was about this sort of time, wasn't it, with Aerosmith it was like.

Neil25:46 Yeah. 70. Yeah. Yeah. It was mid. Late late 70s, wasn't it? But actually listening to this album, I think I'd argue that it's like almost the genesis of the Sunset Strip and kind of Motley Crue and all that.

Chris26:00 This is the birthday song.

Neil26:01 It's. Yeah. I. I think that. I'm sure people are screaming at their TV shows. Wherever. Wherever you're listening to is on. Oh. It's not that old Mrs. Album. But it felt like. It felt to me like I could almost, like, draw that line, you know, There were bits in. In this album that I felt. Yeah. Almost had like, a lineage to. To where hair would go. Yeah. And this held its roots in blues and gospel and other stuff that had come before it.

Chris26:29 You know?

Neil26:30 Do you know what I mean? Like. But there was new. There's new stuff here.

Chris26:33 Y.

Neil26:34 Do you know, the thing I hadn't realized and until I sat down and listened to it was just how proficient Gibbons.

Chris26:40 Yeah.

Neil26:40 Was like, incredible player. Yeah. Really cool.

Chris26:44 Unbelievable.

Neil26:44 And like, it's. Do you know, the other thing as well with this record is the. They quite clearly paired back.

Chris26:55 Yeah.

Neil26:56 The songwriting. Yeah. The. The records that came before. I think the playing was still excellent, but they were. There's two. There's always way too much going on. There's like, you know. Or. There's like, Led Zeppelin and gospel and all of these different things all smashed into the same song here. It's like. There's, like three chords.

Chris27:15 Yeah.

Neil27:16 Do you know. I mean, there's like. There's like three chords. There's like, you know, some. Some cool melodies, some cool hooks, cool guitar solo. And you're out. And it's like this. So the song has a. I don't know that It's. It's got a personality. Yeah.

Chris27:31 Yeah.

Neil27:31 Do you know what I mean?

Chris27:31 Immediacy.

Neil27:33 Yeah. An identification. It's got that riff Carrier plays the song through and the solo is, like, hooked on the riff and it. And. But each song has got that. Whereas previously, I think their work was just a little bit too. Just. I Just uber complicated, you know? So you. But you got too many. The Wild Hearts do this for me. Where there's like eight different ideas. Yeah. Like just glued together in the same song.

Chris27:57 Yeah.

Neil27:58 And like. Like Ginger manages to make that work for the Wild Hearts somehow.

Chris28:02 Yeah.

Neil28:03 Whereas I don't think many people. People.

Chris28:04 No.

Neil28:05 Could. He manages to make it feel okay. Whereas I think in the previous ZZ Top records were a bit like that, but they just would not. They're just kind of desperate and didn't connect very well here. They're like getting one idea or one. Yeah. And they're like, do you know what? Let's. Let's just develop and work that and push that through. So you ended up with like a simpler, like more ACDC esque sound, you know, where it's kind of a simpler kind of stomp.

Chris28:29 Yeah.

Neil28:30 But then you've got the, you know, the, the solo and the hooks and the melodies and stuff and off you go. Yeah, but I think that's what makes this album like. That's what made. That's what allowed people to connect to this one.

Chris28:41 And they did, didn't they? Yeah, yeah, they really connected with this.

Neil28:44 Yeah, they did. It's. It's. Yeah. I think it's interesting. The other interesting thing I don't think ever did, particularly in the uk, this album. I don't. It wasn't like a big, like in the us it landed really strongly. But I was a bit shocked because I, like, I knew about this record, but not. It would have been the late 80s.

Chris29:05 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil29:05 That I knew about this record and, you know, I think I knew about this record from TV shows.

Chris29:10 Yeah.

Neil29:11 Playing Lagrange.

Chris29:12 Yeah.

Neil29:12 In, you know what. In late 80s TV shows. Yeah. You know, and it's. It's funny that I think that's what hooked me with it. When I saw, When I. When I heard it in Landman, I was just like.

Chris29:23 When you said, when was it? 19. 73.

Neil29:26 3.

Chris29:26 So it's early 70s, you see. I don't. It's strange, isn't it? Because I don't associate ZZ Top with that. Early.

Neil29:35 No, Aerosmith is like that for me.

Chris29:39 Exactly the same. Yeah.

Neil29:40 The.

Chris29:40 The. It's strange, isn't it? Because that, because even the album doesn't sound. To be fair, it has got a 70s thing to it.

Neil29:47 Bits of it. Yeah, that's the bit for me. There are bits in here that, that I think you like. Like you could. You could copy and paste into an 80s hair metal album and it would be fun. There are bits in here that I think you could take back into a 1950s gospel album and it would be fine. And it's like this. It's just this, like, incredible. And that's what I think. You know, the albums that came after, like, the older stuff steadily kind of got dropped and they, you know, morphed and did more of the kind of what we would get to know as the modern and hard rock and stuff. But yeah, it's it's funny to me. This is the magic one where you can. You can. Like.

Chris30:23 It's always all glued in.

Neil30:24 You can see the source material. You can see that's where they came

Chris30:27 from, and you can see what it would influence. You can see what would come next.

Neil30:29 Yeah. Yeah. Very, very, very, very. Call me sad. Hot Blue and righteous. Said stick by me and I'll be your God. I heard the word as I close my eyes down on my down on my bended knees. That fell like blood and I realize. Something good happening to me. Sam Blue and righteous. Coming down Call me your side. It was first album Rio Grandma. Followed with the release of Tres Hombres, including the tracks Waiting on the Bus and Jesus Just Left Chicago, which still being performed by ZZ Top today. That this particular record, not only is it a favorite of Between Me, Frank and Elwood, everybody seems to think that this was one of the standout releases from TV Top in the interviews that you dug up. I just love listening to them talk. They're so, like, matter of fact and down to Earth and just a proper Southern. Yeah, they just. They're what you'd expect, like. Because I might be wrong, but I don't think they came from Texas. I think they're recorded in Texas.

Chris34:13 Right. Okay.

Neil34:14 And that kind of became their, like, de facto home.

Chris34:17 Yeah. Yeah.

Neil34:17 Y. Yeah. But for me, they're. They're what I'd expect of you people of that age from that area of the world. That. That's exactly what I would expect them to sound like. And they say the attitudes are exactly what I'd expect them to have, you know, And I just. I don't know. I just think they're brilliant that, you know, that you could. If you were in a room with them, there'd be no pretense. There'd be no judgment from them. They'd just be chilled and. Well, in my mind, that's what they'd be like. They probably like, who are you? What are you doing? What are you doing in here?

Chris34:46 Yeah. Yeah.

Neil34:47 But it's funny, isn't it? They give off that Persona of just being like, this is what we do.

Chris34:53 This is who we are.

Neil34:54 Yeah. In that same vision of my mind, I can imagine Axl Rose calling security. Axel Rose would just be like, you're right. And then immediately he'd reach for his phone and goes, security, I need to get rid of this weird dude. Whereas I imagine there's easy Top guys who'd just be like, yeah, you're right. Yeah, cool. What Are you doing?

Chris35:10 Have some potatoes. That was the one, wasn't it? Who was it you had potatoes. Potatoes with?

Neil35:16 Oh, that was Rock City, was there? Yeah, it was Banante. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was, yeah. No, no, no. So I was interviewing Bernante. It was Scott Ian. He's. He. He was chicken. Chicken and potatoes. It was like, johnson, dude. I was like, I have some potatoes. Cool, dude. And it was. It was just the most bizarre. Like just the two of us. No one had ever. And I never met. Met. Yeah, just got in before, like. It wasn't like best mates or anything.

Chris35:46 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil35:46 He was just, you know. Yeah, all right, all right, yeah. Johnson. Yeah. Okay.

Chris35:50 I think these, like. These lads would be all right with that.

Neil35:52 Yeah.

Chris35:52 Sort you out.

Neil35:54 They would, wouldn't they? Yeah, they'd be up the moonshine, giant Cadillac. It'd be great.

Chris35:59 The. One of the best parts of the. The blog was talking about one of the guys, German shepherds, having their food off the table.

Neil36:05 We should talk about that.

Chris36:06 Yeah.

Neil36:07 Because it is.

Chris36:07 It's quite. There's some quite fun. Fun things on the gatefold, isn't there?

Neil36:10 I just think it's nuts. So when you open the album, out in the middle is a. Like a Mexican. Like a Tex Mex spread.

Chris36:20 Yeah, yeah.

Neil36:20 That's photographed in the middle and there's a massive story behind it. So they wanted to show, like, where they came from and stuff. They want. They wanted something that showed that in. In, like, visual form. And so they went off and. And basically got all of this Mexican food and then took a photograph of it. And it was from Leo' Mexican Restaurant. It was photographed by Galen Scott. And the meal cost 2.99. And it's a massive kind of spread. And there are two things that I think are really interesting about it. One is that before they could actually photograph it, the German shepherd, someone's dog ate it all. So they couldn't take the photograph of it. The second thing is that the record company cropped it. Oh, I didn't read that version of it. The record company cropped it fairly heavily, so it looked like, you know, I'm showing Chris the thing. You see, that one goes right to the edge. Yeah, that's the later version. Right. The early version. It's got like a border around it. So it looks a bit like a magazine spread. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And apparently they got really upset about it.

Chris37:29 They've been cropped.

Neil37:30 Yeah, yeah, I know. Of all the things to be upset about, I. I'd see that's blowing the yeah, that. That's kind of blowing my mind a little bit that it's the thing. That's the thing that upsets. Easy top that. They were angry that the. It was. It was. It was cropped. But. But it was. And then the versions afterwards were not. Which is. Which is quite cool. So I'm sure if you've got an original version of that, which is cropped, I'm sure on discogs it's worth £7 million. Everything else on Discogs, but have you

Chris38:01 got any final reason recently?

Neil38:02 Oh, I've got. Recently. Oh, I pre. I pre ordered the Shinedown album.

Chris38:07 Yeah.

Neil38:09 Which I'm excited about. I've also pre ordered the Pretty Reckless.

Chris38:12 Oh, yeah. There's some interviews and stuff flying around.

Neil38:15 Bloody love the Pretty Reckless. I've interviewed them, shot them on tour like three times now. They're Taylor Momson is she got a lot of grief in the press.

Chris38:23 Yeah.

Neil38:24 And we're going to go off on a bit of a detour now. Yeah, they got a lot of grief in the press.

Chris38:29 Just as you're wearing a Commodore 60 64T shirt.

Neil38:31 Do you like it? That's amazing, isn't it? Yeah, I like the Commodore 64.

Chris38:35 Yeah.

Neil38:35 So I'm repping the Commodore 64 today. Yeah. The press gave her a really hard time. Like. I know she's just me pretending. She's just like, you know, she's not really into this kind of stuff that she can absolutely whale. She's so good. Her vocals are exceptional. The band that have been put together, there was like a lot of, you know. Oh, it's just a bunch of session musicians behind her and I'm pretty sure it's like the same band that did the first album together there.

Chris39:00 Oh, that's interesting then. So they've gone down this. Oh, it's not authentic, is it?

Neil39:03 Yeah. And. But. But to see, like to. Into. I've interviewed. I've interviewed them and shot them on tour and she blew me away, Abs. I wasn't expecting a great deal. I think she was support. I think they were supporting somebody and, you know, she's just there, you know, shooting and they blew me away. Absolutely. Became an absolute lifelong fan of. Of them. She's epic, you know, that kind of line wave. She's got that dusty, dusky, like. Like. I don't know how to describe her voice. It's like. Like powerful but quite airy at the same time. And they do these things in the live set where they'll do. They'll do some of those Particular tracks where they're kind of tightly miked and it'll be an acoustic guitar or something. And. Yeah, just. Anyway, dead good. But, yeah, so I pre ordered that. Yeah. I've been mostly buying CDs, yeah. From Porsche, because my course has got a CD player and so I've mostly been getting old CDs. I found a lovely site that has got loads of old CDs for £2.

Chris40:03 Oh, really?

Neil40:03 So I bought loads. I bought Skid Row. I bought. I bought loads of kind of old 80s and 90s. Well, mostly 90s CDs. Yeah.

Chris40:11 See, I sold on mine.

Neil40:13 Yeah. I'm being careful because I'm already. I've already got more CDs than I've got storage space for.

Chris40:17 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil40:18 Because of two quid.

Chris40:19 Yeah.

Neil40:19 I'm just like. That's acceptable for me. Yeah. I'm totally down with paying two pounds for. For a whole album because it would

Chris40:25 have been £12 or £13 back in the day. They've nearly all got like 16.99, I

Neil40:29 remember, but they're like. They're like 15 quid now. 16 quid for a seat of a compact disc? Yeah. Just get over yourself. But, yeah, but that's so. That's good. Yeah, but I've not got. I've not got much vinyl, really. No, not lately. I've been quite well behaved. Yeah. Been busy.

Chris40:47 Yeah. I think that's it. I think when you're busy, you drift a bit, don't you?

Neil40:50 Yeah. I've not been dicking about as much. I've been like. I've been getting the old. The old. The old compact discs. We've been into it. I was really tempted to get a compact disc writer. Get a cdr.

Chris40:58 Yeah.

Neil40:58 My children still don't believe me. You can create. Well, a. They don't believe me. That CDs worked. That was the first thing. They're like, how does that work?

Chris41:05 Yeah,

Neil41:09 and then. And then. Yeah, and then they don't believe me that you can create one.

Chris41:14 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I used to teach kids that, like, how it works.

Neil41:17 Did you?

Chris41:17 Yeah, the sort of pits and lands and the.

Neil41:19 Yeah, yeah.

Chris41:20 How it translates it through light.

Neil41:23 And did you. I always remember that. Do you remember Tomorrow's World? I always remember the beep. There's a BBC show.

Chris41:30 Look around you.

Neil41:31 Tomorrow. That was so much better. But Tomorrow's World, I remember. I still remember watching this and I'm sure you can find it on YouTube. So if you pause this podcast now, go onto YouTube, search for. For Tomorrow's World CD jam.

Chris41:47 Right, okay.

Neil41:47 And what she. I've forgotten the name of the presenter, but she was epic. And she basically was talking about, in like uber British cut glass, British accent, seriousness, how CDs were going to change the world because you could spread jam on it and it would still play. And I remember, I don't know how old I would have been, but just like, why would I spread jam on it? Do you know when you like that age, you're like, I don't understand why.

Chris42:15 Make any sense at all. Yeah.

Neil42:16 Why would I spread jam on my cd? I get this. That's going to taste terrible. Yeah. Am I supposed to lick it off or what? I get it. But then they demonstrate it. They, like spread jam all over it.

Chris42:27 Yeah.

Neil42:28 And then they, like wipe it a bit, put it in. And I'm sure the inside of that cd, CD player was like, manky and

Chris42:35 jammy, but they go, yeah, I didn't know. I didn't know that.

Neil42:38 No.

Chris42:38 Look around you. I still quite. I quote, look around you most days. Funny that no one is. No one understands.

Neil42:44 That's on YouTube, isn't it?

Chris42:45 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil42:46 I like.

Chris42:46 Yeah, yeah, yeah. When everyone says thanks.

Neil42:48 Yeah.

Chris42:50 And I do it every time I do it and no one understands. It's like, they don't get it.

Neil42:55 I. I'm a bit like that with. I'm gonna get all the.

Chris42:59 Anything like that. Black had a Red Dwarf. Look around you. Like, there was a clap, like. Yeah. Era of British comedy. I. I love it. I love it.

Neil43:05 It's a bit mental, wasn't it? It was a little bit out out there. There's a. Do you remember there was a. Was it 2021? Oh, it was 2020. It might have been a British TV show about the Olympic Games, putting the Olympic Games on. And it's very corporate, but it's like making fun of corporate culture. Yeah. And I use. I use lines from that all the time and nobody gets it. And like, they just look at you, like as if that's normal animal. Yeah. So there's like, there's these bits in there whether, like, something absolutely bonkers will happen. And it's just like somebody like, you know, something crazy and then. And then the guy who's called Ian Fletcher and he'll go, well, yeah, so that's good then. And then they just move on. And sometimes when you get that, I'll do that. Oh, yeah. So that's good then.

Chris43:53 Yeah.

Neil43:53 And everyone looks at you a little bit like, what? I like that about Comedy.

Chris44:00 Yeah. Is that what. What is there now that you. There isn't anything now.

Neil44:05 Last one standing is crushing me at the minute. That is killing me, that last one. LAUGHING that's.

Chris44:10 Yeah, I mean, that's great. Yeah, but it's not a comedy show, is it?

Neil44:13 No, that's more like comics, I think

Chris44:15 there was that one that Greg. What's his name did as well, that tall man. Oh, God. Greg Davis.

Neil44:21 Oh, which one?

Chris44:23 The one where Taskmaster.

Neil44:24 Yeah, I like that.

Chris44:25 There's a lad from Derby called Dan. Gerry.

Neil44:27 Yeah.

Chris44:28 And they've done their own version of Taskmaster that they do just in Derby.

Neil44:31 Yeah. And it's.

Chris44:31 Right. It was a. It's a quite a big thing.

Neil44:33 Is it?

Chris44:34 Yeah, they like film it and they, you know, they do a proper job with it.

Neil44:37 Big indoor.

Chris44:37 Yeah, no, it is. Honestly, I like that.

Neil44:40 Do you know where that kid. It was your mate Emma, that. She did a talk at once and she said, I'm big in Derby. Yeah, Emma's brilliant. She's big everywhere. But I just love the fact you've got it. You've got to like, specify. Yeah, you've got to specify just in case anybody thinks you're getting ahead of yourself, you know. But I like. You know, there is good comedy, I think, but. But it's.

Chris45:00 It's not the same. It's not like that. Like, I loved the. The. The episodic sick homie type, you know, that kind.

Neil45:06 I like, I like. So the things.

Chris45:07 The IT crowd was great.

Neil45:09 Things that have stuck with me over the years.

Chris45:10 I'll tell you what, that was even. That's a long time ago now. Yeah, but the one, the one toast like that and, and then the. Oh, God, what's in the Matt Berry, like, anything that he's done is great.

Neil45:20 Yeah, yeah, yeah. The one that stuck with me a long time. I still go back to his peep show.

Chris45:24 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil45:25 That one I really, really like.

Chris45:27 Yeah. But still, I mean, they're probably 15 years old now.

Neil45:30 Oh, good. Yeah. And then. And then it was the. It was the Vic and Bob and, you know, again, that comedy absolutely killed me as well. That was really good.

Chris45:37 Yeah. We read even now Shakamoto just. Absolutely. Yeah, it's just great.

Neil45:43 It was different era. You can. That you can get away. You could get away with a lot of things then that you just can't do anymore.

Chris45:50 Even the Office, though, that. I mean, that's a long time ago now, but at the time that was. That was really great.

Neil45:56 Pulled. They've pulled and I say they pulled it, but there's a bunch of episodes of the Office that can't be shown.

Chris46:01 Really?

Neil46:02 Yeah, because people get offended. There was this big discussion about faulty towers offending people and people not allowed to watch it. And you just like. It's like, I don't know, like, I have a real problem with this stuff, really. Like, on one hand, I think no one should be offended. You should be able to go about your life without, like, somebody abusing you and offending you. Right. But if somebody is not trying to offend, you know that. You know what I mean? There's like, the, the intent behind it isn't malicious. Right. It's. I. You know, it's like, especially with some of the comedy back in the 80s and 90s, it was like, ignorance, it was lack of awareness and education and, you know, and all. Loads of those comics are on record so saying, you know, like, Jimmy Carr is on record saying, the thing that will get me canceled, I said 15 years ago, I can't undo that now. So, you know, I, I just go about my day and, you know, I'm more educated and more aware now, but that doesn't matter. But the thing I said 15 years ago, that's what's going to get me, you know, canceled in the future. And I think that's. It's. I don't know, I think it's interesting because you, like, comics are trying to make you laugh. They're trying to come up with. With scenario that is. Is just genuinely funny. Right. It's either. It's either something that you're not supposed to think or, you know, it's trying to. But it's really rarely intended to hurt somebody.

Chris47:24 Yeah.

Neil47:25 You know, and that's the bit, I think, where the kind of the, The. The Clash. Right. So on one hand, I think that you. You shouldn't be, you know, you shouldn't be offended by stuff.

Chris47:35 No.

Neil47:36 But on the other hand, you know, if somebody's telling a joke and it's not aimed at you, it's not meant to make you feel miserable. I. I don't think you should feel. Even if it is, you know, I don't think you should feel offended by it. No. And. And that, I think, is the bit that's the disconnect for me.

Chris47:49 Yeah.

Neil47:50 Yeah. Like, I kind of. And you can see the impact on comedies.

Chris47:53 Yeah.

Neil47:54 Is extraordinary. You know, the. I suppose people would say it was cheap comedy.

Chris47:58 Yeah.

Neil47:58 I mean, yeah.

Chris47:59 Yeah.

Neil47:59 But, yeah, back then. But. Yeah, but I did like, a lot of that, but I liked a lot of the bonkers. I liked. I liked the Bob Morton, but I don't think Bob Morton's ever offended anybody. Well, I don't know. He might have offended people, but I just. I love how way out. Yeah. Yeah, it was.

Chris48:12 Yeah. Absolutely fantastic.

Neil48:14 And no fielding. Yeah.

Chris48:15 Yeah.

Neil48:16 That's why he's really, really funny. He's a bit bonkers. I do worry sometimes whether the American audience connects to that comedy.

Chris48:24 Yes. Yeah. Do you know, it is something that's quite uniquely British because there's a lot.

Neil48:27 But there's a lot of my friends that love old. Like, a lot of my American friends really like. Yeah. Old British comedy. And I really like Faulty Towers and like, oh, Dead army and, you know, they love all of that kind of stuff.

Chris48:40 And Horses.

Neil48:41 Yeah. Only for. Yeah, they love all of that kind of stuff. Off. But I wonder if the. The no Fieldings and the. And the. The Bob Mor. I wonder if that would connect.

Chris48:51 Yeah.

Neil48:52 Because it just doesn't make any sense. But, Lizzy, we watched last. Watched last one laughing last night, and. Bob Mortimer takes a piece of lard and forces it through a picture of Jimmy Carr's face, and the lard comes out of his nose and eyes and then makes a funny noise. I was like. I was on the floor. I was like, I can't breathe.

Chris49:19 Yeah.

Neil49:19 And she was like, I don't get it. It's not. This is not funny. This is, like, just absolutely juvenile. What are you. And I do think there's a little bit. There is a disconnect. A little bit.

Chris49:29 Yeah. Yeah.

Neil49:30 You know, with. With comedy. But.

Chris49:31 Yeah.

Neil49:32 But it's all rubbish now, which. I'm Gen X. You're millennial.

Chris49:35 Yeah.

Neil49:35 And comedy was better when we did it.

Chris49:37 Yeah.

Neil49:38 When you were allowed to be a. Yeah.

Chris49:40 Bottom.

Neil49:41 Bottom.

Chris49:42 Bottom was wonderful. Bottom. Live. They were just some of the greatest things.

Neil49:45 Oh, that again. That. That was. I remember them two saying, this is going back a while now, but that was kind of like, you know, you

Chris49:52 wouldn't get away with this now.

Neil49:53 But it was. It was the fact that the thing that will get us taken off, the thing that will get us absolutely canceled, is some stuff we did.

Chris50:00 Yeah.

Neil50:01 You know, probably 20 years ago. Yeah.

Chris50:02 Yeah.

Neil50:02 10 years ago. Before we knew what we did. I think that's the sad thing, isn't it? You know what I mean? When somebody digs something up, you do. Unless it's like pedophilia. I think that's okay.

Chris50:13 Yeah.

Neil50:13 I'm saying, if you told a joke 20 years ago, I kind of don't think you should be hung out to drive for it.

Chris50:18 No.

Neil50:19 Can we imagine, like I might say something like. I don't know, I'm trying to think, like I might say Prince isn't a very good guitar player.

Chris50:27 Yeah.

Neil50:28 And then in 20 years time that might be illegal and I'll now be in prison because. Do you know what I mean?

Chris50:35 Yeah.

Neil50:35 And so I don't. If you see me walking down the line with my favorite honky tonk in my life, well, I'll be here around suppertime with my can of dinner and a bunch of. In Hellraiser yeah, baby, don't you want to come with me? Crowd gets loud when the B gets right through the night Trying to cover up the corner. Yeah, girl Baby, don't you want to come with me? Sam. Hell, Baby, don't you want to come with me? We used to make a big thing about it. Everyone said little old man from Texas. And it was kind of a byline that has just stuck for so long. I. I think that of recent times we've become more of an American band than peculiar to Texan. Even though we still got the big sound from the big country.

Chris54:02 So what we are.

Neil54:03 We really didn't have a choice about it. You know, we were born in Texas and proud of it and I know my roots. You know, I like to be in Texas better than anywhere else.

Chris54:16 We had. We had a mid podcast. Normally we do faffing before the podcast.

Neil54:20 We did. We did mid podcast faffing.

Chris54:23 So like. Well, that was a good. I reckon that was three quarters an hour.

Neil54:25 And can I also say that we, We. We are. It feels like a completely different podcast because we're doing it early on a Sunday.

Chris54:32 Yeah.

Neil54:32 So we did it early. We know we did it late.

Chris54:34 There's no. No bongo Cokes.

Neil54:36 No bongo Cokes and no.

Chris54:37 No free pastels.

Neil54:38 No free pastels. We had a cup of tea instead.

Chris54:40 Yeah.

Neil54:40 Which reminded me the old dog house day days.

Chris54:42 Yeah. That's what we used to do, wasn't it?

Neil54:43 I used to have a cup of tea and. Because apparently I. I have a problem with rheumatoid arthritis or they think I've got rheumatoid arthritis. When I eat anything that tastes vaguely pleasant, I get pain in my joints and stuff. And they've been giving me exercises for forever about you. Like you. I do remember I told you before, like that you have to put your arms out and do this twiddling right around and you have to kind of Wobble your arms. And I do. I've said my office is downstairs. During the day, I work from home.

Chris55:09 Home, yeah.

Neil55:10 And people can walk past and see what I'm doing.

Chris55:11 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil55:12 And a large part of the day I've got my arms out like this. Now I'm doing my roti rotating. And it just hurts. It's really unpleasant. Yeah. And apparently they've decided that it might not be that. And it's something to do with sugar and my body eating my own joints, which is really pleasant.

Chris55:28 If there's something you don't want.

Neil55:30 No, it's bad.

Chris55:31 That's what you don't want.

Neil55:32 But the bad. I'm okay with that. I'm like, all right.

Chris55:34 Yeah.

Neil55:35 But then they're like, so you can't eat sugar anymore? I was like, what? Does that include fruit pastels? Apparently it does.

Chris55:41 That's. That's going to be problematic to the future of our pocket. Because that's quite like.

Neil55:45 That's just. Is the only reason I come.

Chris55:48 Well, that's four months of. In jokes that we can't. We can't do that.

Neil55:51 What I'm thinking is this, what are we gonna do? Well, I've got a plan. I can have an ibuprofen afterwards. Because we normally do it quite late, don't we?

Chris55:59 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil56:00 So what I'm thinking is, like, we can still do that.

Chris56:02 Yeah.

Neil56:03 I just won't tell anybody. No one will. No one. No one listens to the show. Yeah, well, they're a few hundred people did. But over the few hundred, none of them know my doctor.

Chris56:11 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil56:12 I hope I don't. No, I don't think anybody knows my doctor anyway. We'll have them and then I'll just have an ibuprofen and go to sleep. That'd be brilliant. And then I'll wake up in the morning, be great and it'll be lovely.

Chris56:21 Yeah.

Neil56:21 So I. I think, like, nothing changes.

Chris56:23 Yeah.

Neil56:24 Be great.

Chris56:24 Okay, that'll be fine then.

Neil56:25 So I've just solved that.

Chris56:26 Yeah. Job done.

Neil56:27 Yeah. Kids. Listen to your doctor's kids. They're brilliant. That's a very Gen X. Yeah. Thing. It's very my job. I don't know about the millennials.

Chris56:36 What's that? Like?

Neil56:36 Don't do yourself. Yeah. Don't tell me what I can't do.

Chris56:39 Y.

Neil56:39 Do not. Like, it's properly, like, you know, like Millennium Falcon. That kind. You don't tell me what I can't do because I'm gonna go and do it and so like, you tell me I can't eat fruit pastels. That's it. I'm gonna live on fruit pastels. My mum's a bit like that as well.

Chris56:53 Really?

Neil56:54 Yeah. She's obviously much older than Gen X. She will be a baby.

Chris56:57 So maybe it's genetic.

Neil56:58 Maybe it's.

Chris56:59 Maybe it's genetic disobedience.

Neil57:01 She's terrible. She's. I, I remember, I remember at school, your parents. Evening at school.

Chris57:05 School.

Neil57:06 I really didn't go on with one of my teachers and I said to my mom, like, my mom's really kind of quite. She's quite wise. You know what I mean? You go to her with. She's a bit sage. You go to her with an issue.

Chris57:17 Yeah.

Neil57:17 And she'll probably give you a, you know, a rational response back to it. So that's what I was expecting. And I said to her, look, I, I'm. This teacher hates me. And then she, she was like, well, I'm sure she doesn't. You know, let's, let's just go. Anyway, my mum fell out with her as well. My mom was giving her. Don't you tell me what I can't. Blah, blah, blah. And it's just, I've never ever seen her do that before. But, but that's, that's what she's like. Yeah, it's absolutely fine. Very sage, very wise. Until you tell her what she can and can't do. The other thing that my mum did, which is really funny. I was taking her dogs for a walk. She had dalmatians. Can we go on off? Peace already?

Chris57:55 Oh, mate, this is.

Neil57:56 Yeah, so. So I was taking my mom's dogs. Oh my God. This is two, two really funny things about this. She had dalmatians and it's one of my first proper girlfriends.

Chris58:05 Yeah.

Neil58:05 Yeah. She probably like. And she was really pretty. She was really. She was. She became an underwear model. Really, really, really pretty, really good looking. We'd have been about 18. 17. 18, yeah. First proper kind of, you know, grown up girlfriend kind of thing. And anyway, we were going out and she used to wear these quite short skirts and we'd gone to my mom's and she's gone, you've got lovely dogs kind of thing. Anyway, she sat down and dalmatians are what my mum used to describe as crotch dogs.

Chris58:32 Okay.

Neil58:32 So they run up to you and smelly penis.

Chris58:34 Yeah.

Neil58:34 Without. They're straight up.

Chris58:35 Yeah.

Neil58:37 Anyway, she was sitting down with a short skirt on and my mom's dog Dell just went straight up the skirt as she squealed and jumped up and anyway, we carried on going out with two years. That was. That was a long one. Relationship. Yeah. Quite good. The other thing that the dogs did, I took. I was taking my mom's dogs for a walk and there was this like incredibly nice, like really nice looking Jaguar was a green. Like a dark green Jaguar and it was gorgeous. Really, really pretty car and I really like cars.

Chris59:11 Yeah.

Neil59:11 So I've got the two dogs with me and I walk over to have a better look at the Jaguar.

Chris59:15 Yeah.

Neil59:15 So there I am, I'm looking at a Jaguar and. And. And there's no man in it.

Chris59:19 Yeah.

Neil59:20 And I'm looking around thinking, oh, God, this is really nice. I'm looking for the badge. I thought it was brilliant. Anyway, then. Then I turn around and Delboy is. The dog is urinating. Oh, no. Up the Jaguar just as the man. Just as the man approaches.

Chris59:35 Oh, God.

Neil59:35 So I'm having to like drag the dogs.

Chris59:37 Yeah.

Neil59:38 Away. And then. And then I kind of. I kind of tried to see the man offering this one. Oh, really nice comment. And try to really encourage. Yeah. Not to see the dogs pissing up his car.

Chris59:47 Yeah. Yeah.

Neil59:48 And I don't think he noticed.

Chris59:49 He didn't know it.

Neil59:49 No. So I got away with it.

Chris59:50 Wicked.

Neil59:51 But it was brilliant. I'm sure he would have noticed until

Chris59:53 the sun bleached it.

Neil59:54 Yeah, I'm sure he did notice eventually. But. But they're my two dog stories.

Chris59:58 That's very good.

Neil59:58 I've only got two dog stories.

Chris59:59 Naughty Dalmatians.

Neil1:00:00 They're very funny dalmatians, but. They are. Yeah.

Chris1:00:03 Don't see them so much anymore.

Neil1:00:04 Anymore. Not cool, are they?

Chris1:00:06 I suppose they were very popular when Cruella Deville.

Neil1:00:08 Yeah, that. Yeah. I don't know what my mom got. I don't know what your. But she'd always wanted. Darn. She'd always wanted. Like when she. You know, like. I bought a Porsche and you bought a motorbike. That. Midlife crisis.

Chris1:00:19 Yeah.

Neil1:00:19 My mum got two Dalmatians.

Chris1:00:20 Right, okay. Yeah, yeah.

Neil1:00:21 So they. And a horse.

Chris1:00:26 As you do.

Neil1:00:27 Yeah, yeah, yeah. But there you go.

Chris1:00:29 I was with my friend the other week and she. Gone down the horse route.

Neil1:00:31 Has she?

Chris1:00:32 Midlife crisis, same sort of thing.

Neil1:00:33 It's like, it's like. It's. It's like your motorbike, you know that. That was a properly, you know.

Chris1:00:38 Yeah. Convertible.

Neil1:00:39 After the convertible. Yeah. Are you out. Have you come out of the other end of that yet? Are you still in it?

Chris1:00:43 No, no, I don't think I Ever will.

Neil1:00:44 Now I'm the same. Now I'm. That's it. I'm just, you know, that's. I, I've just settled into it.

Chris1:00:50 I think the next one's a faster motorbike. I think is the next, the next

Neil1:00:53 one my neighbor has got. I might give a CBR 600 sounds. Oh and my other neighbor's got a Kawasaki. Is it. I want say it's a ZX9R but it sounds like phenomenal. It doesn't sound like a. It sounds like a.

Chris1:01:11 That's awesome.

Neil1:01:12 It's like a race car, you know that kind of like the Porsche engine is like kind of really fast, revs really quick. That's. It's like that. It's a proper super revy bike engine. It sounds lovely.

Chris1:01:22 See I like, I like the V twin. I like the talkie.

Neil1:01:24 Oh the, the kind of.

Chris1:01:25 Yeah, yeah.

Neil1:01:26 I thought you'd have had like a you know, the kind of laid back, the cruiser. Yeah, yeah.

Chris1:01:31 I kind of look at my mind every day though. So one day I want one of them and then one day I want one that I'm like, you know, like

Neil1:01:37 a. I was like that with Porsches forever really. So like I think from when I was about five. Yeah. That I, I kind of just knew that's. That's what. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I want.

Chris1:01:46 Oh no, I definitely know which. Which one I want.

Neil1:01:48 Yeah.

Chris1:01:48 I don't think you can get them anymore though. In the same way that there's a Honda Blackbird is the bike that I always wanted.

Neil1:01:53 Oh really?

Chris1:01:54 Yeah, that's the one I always, always wanted.

Neil1:01:55 Yeah. Well like so for me I, I knew exactly which. For me it was always the 930 Turbo. Yeah, that's the, that was the car. It was called the Widowmaker and it was always the one I loved and it was, I just loved the shape of it. It was like I didn't care if it didn't move. I mean I just like adored the shape of it. Those cars got quite cheap. The air cooled Porsches got to a point where you could almost give them away.

Chris1:02:17 Really.

Neil1:02:17 Yeah, they were in the, in the. I think late 2000s my friend bought one one and it was like 18,000, 20,000 quid they were, they were like, you know, for, for a super high spec portion. They were giving them away. Those cars now are150,000 pounds. Wow. And you know, and you're like I could, I should have.

Chris1:02:36 Yeah. Yeah.

Neil1:02:37 I've like lusted over these things for forever. And then. And then now you just can't afford them. So buy them, kids. That's what I say. Do you know, Warren Buffett said. I always think what. Warren Buffett's advice is really good. Like when he always, always used. He always. It's meant for investing. And he said if. If everyone else is like dead confident in something, you should be like the opposite of that. You should be a little bit cautious. And if everyone's being cautious and selling stock, you, that's the time to. To buy. And I think the same is true of. Of midlife crisis cars. Just buy them all.

Chris1:03:10 Just get them all.

Neil1:03:11 I do. I. I just. I look, I look. It's not the same now.

Chris1:03:14 No, no.

Neil1:03:15 Do you know what I mean? Bikes and cars from the 90s and they were so much better.

Chris1:03:21 Yeah.

Neil1:03:22 Than they are now.

Chris1:03:23 Yeah.

Neil1:03:23 It's all electric and I like electric cars, but they're not. No, like, I like them because they're quite uneasy and they don't break.

Chris1:03:30 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil1:03:31 They want no connection to them. They're not excited. Like, the albums of this generation, I adore. I go back and listen to them and they mean something to you. Like, you know what I mean? There's memories attached to them and they just mean something. And they're like, like they're mega.

Chris1:03:48 Yeah.

Neil1:03:48 And the cars did as well. Yeah. But like modern cars, I'm sure they're better.

Chris1:03:54 Yeah.

Neil1:03:54 But I just.

Chris1:03:55 Yeah. I think everything I go back to is that late 90s, early 2000s, everything, every vehicle that I ever lost over

Neil1:04:01 exactly that era, it's all just better. Saab 9000.

Chris1:04:04 Oh, God. Yeah. Yeah.

Neil1:04:06 It's all of that stuff that's just like. I keeps. Like, Barney goes out with me. He's a bit of a car. Car dude. We saw a 360, a modern Ferrari 360 60s at the other day and he, like, they just look perfect. Do you know what I mean? The Porsches of that era and the lamb that's been Lamborghini were mega.

Chris1:04:22 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil1:04:23 This is a music podcast, isn't it? Sorry, I got a bit. I got a bit carried away with that. But that was when. That was when Lamborghinis were scary. And yeah. Didn't you know, you Diablo, you would get in your Lamborghini and it would break down before you'd close the door and it would. And if it did work, it. It would scare the crap out of you. It would be. Do you know what I mean? It was a proper theater, proper event. And now Audi Own it. And it just. I don't know, it's just like getting into a. A five or so. It's just. Stop making everything boring and rubbish. I like a grumpy. I'm a grumpy old man.

Chris1:05:02 You've done it, mate. You've cracked it. You've nailed that role.

Neil1:05:05 Should we do facts?

Chris1:05:06 Let's do facts.

Neil1:05:07 I'm gonna do. This is a long blog, so I may. I may. But I'm gonna do my best album. Tres Hombres, as we've realized, is French, I think. Three men.

Chris1:05:19 Yeah.

Neil1:05:19 Which is good. Released 26 July 1973. I was born in the summer of 1974. French, is it not? I thought Trez was three in French.

Chris1:05:29 I thought it was Spanish.

Neil1:05:30 Spanish. Unos, dos. Tres is Spanish. What's French for three, then?

Chris1:05:35 Twa.

Neil1:05:35 Twa. That's stupid, isn't it? Spanish.

Chris1:05:45 See? Cars, music and languages.

Neil1:05:46 We'll cut that. We'll. We'll. No, no, just. We'll totally clear that. Released on London Records label, although was recorded in Texas and had got nothing to do with London whatsoever. Produced by Bill Ham.

Chris1:05:58 Yeah.

Neil1:05:59 Now the production. I was looking at the dynamic range of this album. I'm going to show you. A thing like this is not going to translate particularly well, but one of the apps, what I write and look after is called audioforge.

Chris1:06:11 It's got a dynamic range Audio Forge.

Neil1:06:13 So you can go in here, look, and I can go. Tools and dynamic range report.

Chris1:06:16 Fantastic podcast material.

Neil1:06:18 It's great, isn't it? Very visual. Comes across. So it's now doing the scan and it will tell me the dynamic range. This is a dynamic range report for what's the Story, Morning Glory. And it's got a dynamic range of 8.

Chris1:06:30 Yeah. I didn't know Audioforge had this functionality.

Neil1:06:34 Your version might not. Not.

Chris1:06:35 Oh, is a new version.

Neil1:06:36 Yeah, this is.

Chris1:06:37 Have you got a special new version?

Neil1:06:38 I don't know. Yeah.

Chris1:06:39 Or have you built it, not released it?

Neil1:06:40 Yeah, I've not quite.

Chris1:06:42 Oh, did you say. Because you said earlier. You said, oh, we need some updates. Got some updates for.

Neil1:06:45 I've got tons of updates for this. So if I go and do this one. Look. So if I go and do a dynamic range report for tres hombres, it's 12.7.

Chris1:06:57 Wow. So the higher the number, the wider the difference between loud and quiet.

Neil1:07:01 Exactly, yeah. And that was for a mid-90s Oasis album versus the mid-70s album. If you go and do. So that. That's eight. I've seen modern metal releases down as low as five and six.

Chris1:07:14 Wow.

Neil1:07:15 They're just blocks. There is no dynamic range to them. They sound like massively punchy and huge, but there's no dynamic. There's no. Yeah, it's. It's bizarre for me. They sound. Actually, I think it kind of works for some metal, but they. They sound really one dimensional.

Chris1:07:33 Yeah.

Neil1:07:33 Whereas this album for me is an album that you can turn up loud and it kind of almost like sucks you in to the. To the. The universe that they were in. I. For me, I kind of feel like I've been sucked into the studio and it kind of makes me feel a little bit part of it. But anyway, thought I'd. Because obviously that's good, good, good podcasting material.

Chris1:07:52 Audio Forge. You can get on iOS, can't you?

Neil1:07:55 It's Mac OS onlyMacOS. Yeah, I. I do. So I. I'm obviously my. My day job. I. Working on Apple software mostly. So that's what I do. So we needed that for the show.

Chris1:08:08 Yeah.

Neil1:08:09 So. And we were using. If you don't know, if you remember, we were using an app in the App Store.

Chris1:08:15 Yeah.

Neil1:08:16 And the developer suddenly started charging a subscription. I'm totally cool with paying like five or six or ten quid for an app from the store if we're going to use it. I think it's brilliant and I love supporting developers. Don't like subscriptions. I don't think you should charge me. Like, like. And they wanted like $2 a month or something like that. And I was like, just get lost. I've already paid you for the app and now you've switched to subscription model and they removed the old version and it made me grumpy. So I wrote that.

Chris1:08:43 The Rage app development. That's what.

Neil1:08:45 That's how I do. Yeah. Just. I'm an absolute child.

Chris1:08:48 So when's that coming out though, the new Audio Forge?

Neil1:08:50 I don't know when I. It's already in the store now.

Chris1:08:52 Yeah. But the new version with dynamic.

Neil1:08:55 The version in the store's got Dynamic Range Report. But the. And it's got CD ripping ping. Yeah, it's got. Oh, there's a bunch of stuff in there.

Chris1:09:02 Really.

Neil1:09:02 The new version that I've got. Which isn't this version that I'm showing you here. This is the old version. It's got the off. What. What is the spectrograph.

Chris1:09:12 Oh, yeah.

Neil1:09:12 Analysis. So this would be dead good for you.

Chris1:09:14 Yeah.

Neil1:09:15 Again, this is really good and on point for facts. For Tres Hombre. So let's say you've just mastered something.

Chris1:09:21 Yeah.

Neil1:09:22 You could drag that into audioforge, get it to run a spectrograph and it would show you where the frequency responses were.

Chris1:09:29 Yeah.

Neil1:09:30 Which tells you whether it's really good. If you've got high res music you can see where the frequencies are and it's really cool. Anyway, I'll, I'll get balanced.

Chris1:09:38 Yeah.

Neil1:09:38 I will send you a copy. It's quite good.

Chris1:09:42 You know the one functionality that's missing on most things that I used to use, I don't, don't, can't use anymore.

Neil1:09:46 Yeah.

Chris1:09:46 There's one called wavelab.

Neil1:09:47 Yeah.

Chris1:09:48 I don't know if you remember wavelab.

Neil1:09:49 I can't remember.

Chris1:09:49 But that had like you could create like an algorithm album.

Neil1:09:52 Yeah.

Chris1:09:52 And you could drag your waves in.

Neil1:09:54 Yeah.

Chris1:09:54 And it would be like you would kind of put your fades in and all that.

Neil1:09:57 Yeah.

Chris1:09:57 And then you'd export it as a, as like a, an overall project at the end.

Neil1:10:01 Yeah.

Chris1:10:01 And there doesn't seem to be anything that does that anymore. You've got your multi track stuff. You've got your.

Neil1:10:05 Yeah. Audacity. Do that.

Chris1:10:08 No, not, not like that.

Neil1:10:09 Did.

Chris1:10:09 I mean it was amazing. It was, I'm sure it was Sony.

Neil1:10:12 Yeah.

Chris1:10:12 Or is it Steinberg and bought by Sony or something like that. One of those sort of things happened.

Neil1:10:16 Oh well, I'm raging. I'm going to write that for you. This album has 10 tracks and it's 33 minutes long.

Chris1:10:23 I mean that's your perfect album, isn't it?

Neil1:10:26 I, I think that's why I gel with this one a lot. It's like they, they're tracks, they're songs and I think this one, each song's got its own identity. I know where I am in the album. I, I know whether, you know, I, I know whether I am from each riff and the melodies. I, I, yeah, I like this kind of thing. It's quite a. Quite cool. Peaked at number eight on the Billboard 200 in 1974. UK Albums CH didn't peak on the first release but it was released multiple times. This I think is interesting. It was certified gold in the us it certified gold in Canada as well. Key singles Lagrange, which is about. Well come on to. This is about.

Chris1:11:11 I reckon that's French.

Neil1:11:14 It's about a chicken farm that was a ladies establishment.

Chris1:11:21 Is it, Is that what it's about?

Neil1:11:23 Yeah, there's other stories about that too. And then beer drinkers and hellraisers Beer drinkers and hellraisers I. And it's not in my notes. I seem to remember that this was a Motorhead. I think Motorhead didn't include it. Yeah, it's in your notes. They did an EP somewhere of it, I think think. Which is. Which I think is really, really definitely,

Chris1:11:39 definitely on the blog.

Neil1:11:42 Stuff that was around the same time, which I think is interesting for concept here. So the Allman Brothers. I just released Brothers and Sisters. Lynyrd Skynyrd had just released. Or they were just about to release Leonard Skinner, pronounced Leonard Skynyrd. The Eagles were six months on from Desperado, Pink Floyd's Dark side of the Moon.

Chris1:11:59 It's all great sounding music. All those albums, they all sound like. They all stand up, don't they? If you listen to all of those albums now and all those artists, it kind of. It doesn't. It's aged really well.

Neil1:12:10 It has Stones to go said Soup and Stevie Wonder did it Innovisions. I think it's really. I think it's really interesting the. Like the way this stacks up is this kind of merge of lots of influences.

Chris1:12:25 Yeah.

Neil1:12:26 And then some. I think some genuinely new.

Chris1:12:28 Yeah.

Neil1:12:29 Yeah. Stuff that would. That would come out. So I think that's really interesting. This is also the. We talked about this a little bit. This is the. The band. Only there's no other players in here. So it's Billy Gibbons on lead vocals and guitar, Dusty Hill on bass and vocals, and then Frank Beard, who doesn't have a beard, on drums and percussion. Did you know on the original sleeves of this album, Frank Beard is called Rube Beard?

Chris1:12:59 We had. What's the. What's the gag for that?

Neil1:13:01 Because he doesn't have a beard. Oh, apparently. So anyway, that's what is produced by Bill Ham. There's an interesting story here where other people say that they were present but actually were not present or were present but didn't have anything to do with it, if that makes sense. So. Which I think it's. Yeah, I think it's interesting. Later records, ZZ Top would get in all kinds of weird trouble for not crediting players on the album. So this one is just the three of them. There's nobody else playing.

Chris1:13:36 Yeah.

Neil1:13:36 And lots of the albums that came after they. There would be session musicians and other people playing and they didn't necessarily credit them as well as they should do and would later go on to credit them.

Chris1:13:46 Or not saying that though. I mean that. That's not. That's quite a normal thing.

Neil1:13:50 I.

Chris1:13:50 You know. I know people that played on Albums and haven't been credited on things.

Neil1:13:53 Yeah, well, I think.

Chris1:13:54 Which isn't. I don't think it's nice, but it's. You know, it's one of those things.

Neil1:13:58 I think it is. It's weird, isn't it? I think if it's. Yeah. I don't know. There are cases where there's a lot of the scene stuff where, you know, you'd have, like, basically three bands in the studio at the same time, or lots of members from lots of different. And only one of them was tracking. Yeah. But there'd be members all over the place and no one can really remember who played what because, like, eight different people played a version of it. And.

Chris1:14:18 Yeah.

Neil1:14:18 Yeah. You know, and then. And then the producer and the engineer would hack bits up. And so actually the bit that ended up on the record, no one can really remember who did it. Yeah, I'm kind of okay with that. Yeah. It's where, like. Great gig in the sky.

Chris1:14:34 Yeah.

Neil1:14:34 Right.

Chris1:14:34 Where it's a key moment in the song.

Neil1:14:37 Yeah. And it's like. It almost makes the song. And yet she wasn't credited appropriately and till a long way afterwards. So, anyway, that's that. Let me get down to my table. I need to get to the bottom of my blog so I can see the table. So. Things you might not know. Billy Gibbons has for 50 years played live with either a US quarter or a Mexican peso as a flat pick. Which one is on a particular night reportedly depends on what he found in his pocket that morning. Well, you think it's bonkers, isn't it?

Chris1:15:14 It.

Neil1:15:17 Gibbon's 1959 sunburst Les Paul is named for the green Packard he had bought from an aspiring actress. She had nicknamed the car pearly gates. First, rube beard. We talked about this. The original 1973 jacket credits Frank Beard as Rube Beard, a Bill hamgag at the expense of press writers who assumed the surname described face. Beard in 1973, was the only Clean Shem Shaven member of the band. The Fiat county brothel celebrated in Lagrange was closed by a Houston television expose in August 1973, weeks after the album reached record shops. Gibbons has always denied that they were responsible for it. During a break in the Gatefold photograph shoot, which we talked about, Galen Scott's German shepherd jumped onto the table and ate the entire Text Mex spread. They had had to order a second Tex Mex spread from Leo's. The going rate for the platter in the gatefold was reportedly $2, 99 cents in 1973. Got a lot for your money back then.

Chris1:16:18 Yeah.

Neil1:16:19 The cathedral radio on the gatefold in. In on the Tex Mex spread is tuned to 1570 on the AM dial, a Mexican border blaster frequency the band would commemorate two years later on Heard it on the X, which is quite call the Seamless. Waiting for the bus into Jesus just left Chicago. Transition is a Terry Manning tape splice. They do this live as well. So they play this as if it's one seam. Do they do that not live now? It sounds like it's live and smooths through on the record. But it was all done with tape splicing. So the two songs were written separately. They're in different time signatures and keys and they slice them together. So Terry Manning slices them together together.

Chris1:17:00 That's an art tape. Doing that with tape. It's quite an art form that.

Neil1:17:04 Mad, isn't it? You. They. They talk about this in Abbey Road. It used to be that this progression of like sweeping up, fetching the tapes, putting the tape on the reel, you know, working and, you know, setting the microphones up. And then eventually you'd be. You'd be like handling, recording and then tape splicing was a, you know, like a super special art that you got to go, got to go and do.

Chris1:17:26 Imagine getting that wrong. Oh, God. Because that's it. You got one shot.

Neil1:17:31 It's like when you stick. It's a bit. It's like the step up from sticking your pencil in your cassette and rewinding it back on the reel. In 1995, dismissal of Bernard Bessman's Lagrange infringement suit turned on the fact that Boogie Chillin had quietly fallen into the public domain before ZZ Top wrote the song. So they'd always said that, that like they. They were just properly, like indignant, like, so what? They were taken to court and then in the court it was thrown out because it was in the public domain for 19 years. Between 1987 and 2006, the only commercial CD edition of Tres Hombres available was a digitally remixed version with added drum machine and recut guitars. Terry Manning's original 1973 mix was withdrawn and produced presumed lost. I don't like it when that happens. I think it's rubbish. Although it was analog and probably never really meant to be remixed. I. I quite like it when this is one thing I do like. When they go back to the original tapes, don't dick about with them. They just run them back through the scanning tools and kind of, you know, suck off as much detail as they can get from the tape.

Chris1:18:42 Yeah.

Neil1:18:43 And then put that in a digital master somewhere that you can. You can take and reuse or could.

Chris1:18:46 Yeah, you do. Because one thing you do get with tape is degradation.

Neil1:18:49 Yeah.

Chris1:18:50 So you're almost capturing the pure. The pure sound. Yeah.

Neil1:18:53 He needs to come off there and get archived somewhere. Yeah, yeah. In what. In whatever way.

Chris1:18:58 Yeah.

Neil1:19:01 Despite the band's later popularity, because ZZ Top got really big here. When I was at school, ZZ Top were big. I. I remember, you know, kids with ZZ Top T shirts and stuff for this album. It didn't chart, which I. I don't know. I did not know that. And I thought. It just feels weird to me. It' someone saying that, like, you know, no one in the UK likes Metallica. Yeah. It's like it doesn't make sense. I had so many friends that were into ZZ Top when I was.

Chris1:19:27 It's interesting. Is it? Because ZZ Top is the only time where British people will pronounce the letter ZZ Top. ZZ Top.

Neil1:19:37 That's what we should call it.

Chris1:19:38 Yeah.

Neil1:19:39 I can't believe I've been saying Z. I feel a bit.

Chris1:19:43 But it is, though, in it. We. We said. We say. Everyone says ZZ Top. That's quite normal. But you never, ever say, oh, oh, X, Y, Z, Y, Z.

Neil1:19:50 Like my children says he, I have to beat them.

Chris1:19:54 Is that the YouTube thing, though? Is that because they're watching?

Neil1:19:56 Yes. They learn English. I was. I was talking to my friend. She. She. She's a languages. She does translations, language translations and stuff. And she is, like, absolutely convinced that all dialects of English will die out completely and all you will have left is US English. And it's because of YouTube.

Chris1:20:15 Yeah.

Neil1:20:15 Because the kids, like the current generation of kids who've got an attention span of a gnat, just are being brought up on American English. Yeah. So because of that, it's, you know.

Chris1:20:26 Yeah.

Neil1:20:26 They can't. They think Z is normal.

Chris1:20:29 Yeah. But that invasion has been going on since 1973, when it was Easy Top.

Neil1:20:32 You see, they think it's Easy Top fault.

Chris1:20:35 Yeah, I think so, yeah.

Neil1:20:36 Blames Easy Top, ZZ Top, ZZ Tops.

Chris1:20:42 Every time now. That's it.

Neil1:20:43 I mean, I'm going to have. I'm going to have to do, you know, things. I work for an American company and there are so many words that I have to write in American or speak in American.

Chris1:20:52 So they get. So they understand it.

Neil1:20:53 No, my brain, like, totally misfires sometimes. Like, I. I don't know the English in America. Like, I'm so used to saying that.

Chris1:21:02 Yeah.

Neil1:21:03 And I'm English, I'm British, so that must be the English way of saying.

Chris1:21:07 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Neil1:21:08 And then Liz's mom, she is an English, too. She was ahead of English. And she corrects me quite often.

Chris1:21:14 Yeah.

Neil1:21:14 In a brutal, total, like, you know, way. And honestly, I feel like I'm having, like, a, like a mini stroke sometimes when you kind of. My brain's kind of going. Which is the right way of saying this. Or it's like, enroll is enrolled got one L or two L's? In America, it's got two L's. And in British English, got one out.

Chris1:21:30 Yeah, yeah.

Neil1:21:31 Oh, God, my brain is just like, I can't. Oh, honestly, it's rubbish. ZZ Tops. Zed. I'm gonna go with Zedza Tops. First show in 1970 was played to a single paying customer at a National Guard armory in Alvin, Texas. Gibbons bought the man a Coke at the intermission to make sure he stayed for the second set. I like that. I really like that. Kind of gotta start somewhere, haven't you? Frank Beard is the only member of ZZ Top for most of the band's career who do not have a long beard. Which is funny, is it not? I think that's funny. Yeah. Trust Humbra's cover designer, Bill Naram, a Houston commercial artist who shaped the band's visual identity from the first album cover onward, died in 2009 with relatively no national obituary coverage.

Chris1:22:21 Oh, wow.

Neil1:22:22 Which I think is sad. Yeah.

Chris1:22:23 For such a legendary thing.

Neil1:22:25 Yeah. And that's all the facts. I, I, I just think this is a cool, just, just a cool album. A cool band. Yeah. And it's a cool album. And I think this was a really interesting point. This was a point in musical history where, like, you'd come out of the hippie 60s.

Chris1:22:41 Yeah.

Neil1:22:42 And it was kind of okay to, to, to experiment and do, I don't know, kind of harder music. I mean, harder music for me was like, this is where hard rock and metal was taking shape in the early 70s. It's the kind of stuff that, like, underpinned everything that would come in the 80s. And thrash and death. Death and, and all of that kind of harder music that would come through began here, I think. So, like, and hair metal particularly, I think, began through here. And, like, you had your Aerosmiths and your Van Halen and stuff, and all this stuff was kind of just starting to bubble through. Yeah.

Chris1:23:19 And every Smith kind of crossed through it didn't they?

Neil1:23:21 They did, yeah. It was funny. They got a massive backlash. You know, when we covered. Which one did we cover? Was it Toys in the Attic? There's a huge backlash against Aerosmith, against, against the fan. Early fans that loved him in, in the kind of the mid-70s era and then that kind of hard rock stuff that they grew into. Yeah, I think it's really. I've never seen this from the, the ZZ Top community, which I'm committed to saying Z. But, but, but they change. They. The first few albums are radically different to even this record and then where they would go off to. But they don't seem to get any backlash. The fans just kind of.

Chris1:23:58 You go with this journey.

Neil1:24:00 I wonder if that's just because they're uber cool.

Chris1:24:02 Yeah, it might be. Yeah. I think if you call, you can do what you want.

Neil1:24:05 You can't criticize ZZ Top.

Chris1:24:07 No. Right. What we're doing, we're gonna go.

Neil1:24:10 Zed's dead, baby. Zed's dead.

Chris1:24:12 We're gonna play what we're doing.

Neil1:24:13 Now.

Chris1:24:13 Should we do a song and then talk about next week or should we just go straight to talk about next week?

Neil1:24:17 I, I. So I got sad. So. So one of the people I work with, guy called Mike Adams. He was CVP in my organization and he's always been epic and he's always looked after me and, and he was part of the reason I ended up in the engineering team that I'm in at the moment. And he has been moved out of our org to go and find something else to do. And he listens to the show. It's big fan. So if you listen to this bit, Mike, we would like to do Ride the Lightning for you because I know that you like. It's his favorite album.

Chris1:24:44 Yeah.

Neil1:24:45 And I think I. It's probably my favorite album. I think we.

Chris1:24:48 Yeah, there's this long stand.

Neil1:24:49 We know my long standing thing. But Master. I think Master Puppets is better. Yeah, I think, I think Ride the Lightning is. Do you know, I don't. The more I listen to the tea, the influence of Cliff Burton on Ride the Lightning and some of the music theory that he brought to that which I was blissfully ignorant to until someone points it out to you and you suddenly think, oh my God. I don't know. I think Ride the Lightning might be just the pinnacle of metal records ever been done. It's such an exquisite record to go back consider how it was, how old it is. 1984. Oh, just. I mean, honestly, just such an extraordinary record. So we'd like to do that next. We've not done a big banger for a while.

Chris1:25:37 No, no. Yeah, we'll do one. Are we. Yeah, let's do that, then.

Neil1:25:40 Let's do it.

Chris1:25:41 Do it.

Neil1:25:41 So we're going to do Ride the Lightning next. I've got so many copies of Ride the Lightning, it's like. It feels like whenever I see them on discogs. And it's not expensive. I just buy. We've got, like, four copies of it, I think. And. Should we play a record and then. And then get lost?

Chris1:25:58 Yeah. Should we say. We have got to apologize at the end of the record, though? Because that's. Yeah.

Neil1:26:01 Well, should we play the record and then apologize? Yeah, let's do that. Let's do that. I hear that sound of this dark blow I wonder where it's been out where it's going say it for every time the Feeling show is fine Just moving on down the line Just moving on down the line Then I heard Ralph Roostell Styles Growing around the curl that cloud of smoke was going I see it for every time I feel this show is fine Just move me on down the line Just move me on down the line Sam. Mountain I tell you for every time the Feeling show is fine Just moving on down the line Just moving on down the line Move it on down the line. Sorry, sauce.

RIFF089 - ZZ Top - Tres Hombres

Show Notes

When a Texas Road Trip Scene Sends You Down a Blues Rabbit Hole

Episode Description

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