ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons Releases Solo Album

ZZ Top’s guitar wizard honors his childhood roots on Perfectamundo—his first solo record ever—with a mix of Afro-Cuban beats, rumbling Hammond B-3, and plenty of gritty, greasy, growling guitar. “The opportunity or raison d’etre presented itself with a probable underlying pre-determined idea,” Gibbons explains. Roughly translated, that means the notion of cutting a solo album was simmering for a while when something happened that brought it to a boil: an invitation for ZZ Top to play the December 2014 Havana International Jazz Festival.

“We thought it appropriate to work up a set to make contextual sense in the midst of Havana,” he continues. “Which catalyzed thinking about Afro-Cuban beats and breaks, and how that relates to what we could do: a little bit blues, a little bit hard rock, and a lot of Straits of Florida feeling. One beat led to another and Perfectamundo started shaping up.”