{"id":860150,"date":"2026-08-18T23:30:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T23:30:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/860150\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T23:30:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T23:30:14","slug":"zz-top-drummer-frank-beard-dies-aged-77","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/860150\/","title":{"rendered":"ZZ Top drummer Frank Beard dies aged 77"},"content":{"rendered":"

Frank Beard, the drummer for Texas boogie-rock trio ZZ Top, has died aged 77.<\/p>\n

Beard kept tempo for the band’s biggest hits like Sharp Dressed Man, Legs and Gimme All Your Lovin’.<\/p>\n

Beard was in hospice care when he died on Tuesday, local time, at his ranch in Texas, with family members at his side, according to publicist Bob Merlis.<\/p>\n

Lead singer Billy Gibbons confirmed Beard’s death on Instagram, saying the world had lost “one of the most naturally innovative drummers and a great and true son of Texas”.<\/p>\n

“His signature back beat was key to keeping ZZ on top,” Gibbons wrote.<\/p>\n

\"Three<\/p>\n

Frank Beard (right) kept tempo for some of ZZ Top’s biggest hits like Sharp Dressed Man, Legs and Gimme All Your Lovin’. (AP: Chris Pizzello\/File)<\/p>\n

The statement added that the band had cancelled upcoming shows following Beard’s death, with plans to keep Austin dates, “a city that had been something of a second home for him”.<\/p>\n

ZZ Top sold more than 50 million records and had six singles that reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Airplay chart.<\/p>\n

Seven of their albums have been in the Billboard 200’s Top 10, and they earned three Grammy Award nominations.<\/p>\n

“I’ve found the people I was meant to play with,” Beard said in the 2019 documentary ZZ Top: That Little Ol’ Band from Texas.<\/p>\n

“I never wanted to quit, and never wanted to get fired.”\"Three<\/p>\n

The group became known for the flowing beards of its members, excluding Beard. (AP: Tina Fineberg\/File)<\/p>\n

How the band came together<\/p>\n

Beard, from Frankston, Texas, met Gibbons in a band called The Moving Sidewalks and later introduced bassist and vocalist Dusty Hill, who had been in several bands with Beard.<\/p>\n

The trio formed ZZ Top in 1969, naming themselves in part after blues singer ZZ Hill and influenced by British power trio Cream and Jimmy Reed.<\/p>\n

They maintained their original line-up for more than five decades.<\/p>\n

Their signature look of long, bushy beards on Gibbons and Hill and dark sunglasses for all, did not change much, either.<\/p>\n

Although, Beard’s clean-shaven appearance was a fun irony to fans.<\/p>\n

ZZ Top’s bearded bassist Dusty Hill dies at age 72<\/a><\/p>\n

Band mates of the long-serving bassist of the iconic American blues trio announce Hill’s death, saying the “monumental bottom to the ‘Top'” will be missed.<\/p>\n

ZZ Top songs, with their sly and humorous lyrics, were popular in Hollywood, which used Gimme All Your Lovin’ in Happy Feet, Sharp Dressed Man in Evan Almighty, and Tush in Dazed and Confused.<\/p>\n

Their debut release, ZZ Top’s First Album, came out in 1970.<\/p>\n

Their sound was described as a hybrid mixing elements of rock, blues and funk into a steaming-hot Houston stew. They called themselves a “little ol’ band from Texas”.<\/p>\n

Boost from MTV<\/p>\n

The band’s rock-chic cool also played well on the nascent MTV crowd and their videos, featuring models in short skirts emerging from one of Gibbons’s custom roadsters, became a mainstay.<\/p>\n

“These guys always got the joke, at a time when other bands were still just nervously lip-syncing in front of brick walls,” Rolling Stone said in 2021.<\/p>\n

Hill died in 2021.<\/p>\n

The band was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2004.<\/p>\n

“All I have to say is that most of my life has been a pleasant surprise, and so is this. Thank you,” Beard said at the induction ceremony.<\/p>\n

Beard is survived by his wife, Debbie Meredith, and three children.<\/p>\n

ABC\/Wires<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Frank Beard, the drummer for Texas boogie-rock trio ZZ Top, has died aged 77. Beard kept tempo for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":860151,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[64,63,428626,134,430170,115021],"class_list":["post-860150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-billy-gibbons","tag-entertainment","tag-frank-beard","tag-zz-top"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=860150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/860151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=860150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=860150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=860150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}