Billy Gibbons Goes To The Desert

How ZZ Top legend Billy F. Gibbons and his band (guitarist Austin Hanks and former Guns N’ Roses drummer Matt Sorum) headed to the California High Desert to seek Rock ’N’ Roll inspiration — with a side of “mystery”

- By Alan Paul

Last year, Billy F. Gibbons found himself with a lot of time on his hands. Like most musicians, the sudden cancellation of touring hit the ZZ Top guitarist hard, so he was wide open to drummer Matt Sorum’s suggestion that they get together in a studio in the California High Desert near Joshua Tree National Park to kick around some ideas with guitarist Austin Hanks. The three of them had also worked on Gibbons’ 2018 album, Big Bad Blues.

“The sessions started with what we suspected would be a 30-minute have-a-look-around-the-studio, and we walked in and didn’t leave for three months,” Gibbons says.

The result is Hardware, Gibbons’ third solo album in six years. Unlike the previous two, which leaned heavily on blues and Latin music, this one is almost all original material that leans heavily toward greasy, grungy rock. “Holing up in the desert in the heat of the summer — that in itself was pretty intense,” Gibbons says. “We let off steam by letting it rock, which is what Hardware is really all about. It’s a raging rocker but always mindful of the desert’s implicit mystery.” We caught up with the good Rev. Gibbons by Zoom.

Most of the album features you, Matt Sorum and Austin Hanks. How does your collaboration work? Is everything a group effort?