BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Musikfest wrapped up Sunday with an Olympic dismount that pretty much stuck the landing.
Rock 'n' roll road veterans ZZ Top brought its time-tested Texas blues-driven sound to South Bethlehem’s Steel Stage for the final headline show of the 10-day festival.
The rock trio has produced massive hits and a loyal following, recording and touring since 1969, with more than 50 years centered around three original members: Billy Gibbons on guitar, Frank Beardon drums and Dusty Hill on bass.ZZ Top history
The rock trio has produced massive hits and a loyal following, recording and touring since 1969, with more than 50 years centered around three original members: Billy Gibbons on guitar, Frank Beardon drums and Dusty Hill on bass.
Hill and Gibbons formed a tight visual duo, moving together, dressing alike and sporting massive beards.
Hill died in 2021, and his place was taken by Elwood Francis, a long-time guitar tech for the band who stepped into the role right away and provided a thundering low end Sunday night.
The 13-song set kicked off with Francis wielding a massive 17-string bass that set the bar for the theatrical notes that gave the seasoned trio some elements of freshness and surprise.
They took to the stage with a wall of Magnatone amplifiers flanking Beard’s baroque drum kit (complete with a massive gong that framed the drummer and provided a surface for band branding, but went unstruck all night.)
Those dozens of amplifiers are a perfect example of the band’s deft use of theater.
For one thing, it wasn't a wall of amps the band ever could have obtained for most of its history. They were 21st Century boutique amplifiers, and one or two would have sufficed, given modern front-of-house sound.
But why have one or two when you can stack more than 30 on the stage?
And it's not even clear Francis was using any of them. A classic Ampeg bass stack was discretely present, drawing no attention to itself at all.
Amps, aging voice, surprise songs
As the band kicked off with "Got Me Under Pressure," the 17-string string bass, the wall of amplifiers and the Mardi Gras level of rhinestoned stage wear combined with the thick sound of a well-practiced rock trio to bring the crowd to their feet.
And there they stayed for much of the hour-and-a-quarter show, singing along en mass to favorites such as "Sharp Dressed Man."
Gibbons’s voice has aged into a thick rasp that he uses effectively. He’s no crooner, but he displayed great vocal control on hits such as "Pearl Necklace," "I’m Bad, I’m Nationwide."
Also on a surprising cover of the soul classic "I Thank You," which the band played with a heavy, somewhat ominous feel, and no trace of the light touch that put Sam & Dave on the Billboard Pop and R&B charts a year before ZZ Top was formed.
Another step outside the rock canon was the country classic "Sixteen Tons." Gibbons credited guitar legend Jeff Beck for pointing them to the Merle Travis song during a jam session years ago.
Half-century old, sounding fresh
Throughout costume changes, instrument changes and a tight three-song encore, Beard and Francis provided the full and steady rhythm section that the guitarist in a rock trio needs.
And Gibbons paid it back, pulling out endlessly varied techniques… a virtual master class in roots rock guitar.
He moved between flat-pick work, hybrid finger-picking, thumb strums, single finger picking, harmonics and slide in a way that drew little attention to his virtuosity, but kept the material, some of it half a century old, sounding fresh.
The opening act was the Anglo-American band Foghat, who served up a lively hour-long set.
There were repeated shout outs from lead singer Scott Hold to the band’s American guitarist Bryan Bassett, who hails from Pittsburgh.
It was his birthday last night. The band celebrated by playing a hit song by another band: "Play that Funky Music."
Bassett had provided the infectious guitar hook on the original mid-70s recording as a member of the band Wild Cherry.
The opening set ended with what Hold called “Foghat’s industrial love song”: ‘Slow Ride’ which predictably, brought the audience to its feet.
