ZZ Top Four decades can't stop

ZZ Top guitarist vocalist Billy Gibbons (right) and Dusty Hill rock the MTS Centre Tuesday night.
Sure, you can play the blues with long beards, but when you actually want to get down and dirty, the right hat you still need.
And sunglasses. The cheaper the better.
Before ZZ Top launched into some authentic Delta blues at the MTS Centre Tuesday night, bearded guitarist vocalist Billy Gibbons changed into a fedora like his evenly hairy partner Dusty Hill in order to properly perform a cover of Willie Brown's Future Blues.
The shtick got a few laughs and added to the over all feel good vibe that the veteran Texas blues rock trio created during their 95-mintue set for a crowd of 4,000 fans.
The group -- Gibbons, bassist-vocalist Hill and drummer Frank Beard (you know, the one without any facial hair) -- mainly stuck to favourites from the 1970s and singles from the '80s, avoiding any material off their last studio album, 2003's Mescalero, and almost avoiding everything post 1983 entirely.
Not that anyone minded. It was the hits the audience wanted and the hits it got, along with a few covers from the likes of Brown, B.B. King and Jimi Hendrix.
The group took to the sparse stage and launched instantly into boogie-rocker Got Me Under Pressure, from 1983's Eliminator, ZZ Top's most successful album.
Next it was a double shot of tracks from 1973's Tres Hombres, with the mid-tempo Waitin' For the Bus and fuzzy sludge of Jesus Left Chicago, before 1994's Pin Cushion, a gravelly rocker that sounded like a Motorhead homage.
After four decades together, the band is perfectly in synch and there are no surprises. Gibbons and Hill even have some minimal stage moves down, moving their instruments and shuffling their feet together in time. They aren't the most dynamic group to watch, but it's about the music with ZZ Top, and these guys can still play -- Gibbons isn't considered a blues guitar God just because of his collection of customized axes.
The music isn't overly flashy and neither is the stage setup, which featured two sets of speaker cabinets strung together to look like they were tumbling, and a video screen behind the band showing a variety of images from car parts to girls.
The pace picked up during the end of the main set, when the trio of Eliminator hits -- Gimme All Your Lovin', Sharp Dressed Man and Legs -- followed each other in quick succession, with Gibbons and Hill playing their famous furry white instruments during Legs.
They returned for a three song encore, throwing out a version of Viva Las Vegas before the one-two punch of La Grange and Tush.
Straight from the "Those-guys-are still-a-band!?" file, Saskatoon's Wide Mouth Mason warmed up the crowd with a decent, if pedestrian, set of funkified blues based rock highlighted by an electrifying mid set guitar solo from Shaun Verreault.
The frontman announced that the group was about to begin work on a new album with ex Big Sugar/Grady leader Gordie Johnson, who was handling bass duties for the trio.

The blues have legs, ZZ Top proves

For all their simplicity and self professed lack of skill, pretty well manage ZZ Top.
It helps that their catalogue is among the best in the rock biz. Last night at the Save on Foods Memorial Centre, in what was their maiden Victoria appearance, the trio from Texas trotted out, among others, four hall-of-fame hits of their own, a pair of blues standards (Willie Brown's Future Blues and B.B. King's Rock Me Baby), an all-world classic (Jimi Hendrix's Hey Joe) and an Elvis tune (Viva Las Vegas).
Hard not to hit home runs with big bats like those.
The band, which frontman Billy Gibbons described last night as "three guys, three chords," uses every trick in the showbiz book, from jokes tailor-made for the host city to extending their big hit way past the point of usefulness (that would be La Grange, which fell flat).
In the hands of a lesser band, such sins would be unforgivable. But with ZZ Top, that little ol' band from Texas, it came across as canny craftsmanship.
There's something to be said for 40 years of service, and ZZ Top, which got its start so long ago that it can speak first hand about playing shows with Hendrix, has clearly learned how to perform during that time. That hard won experience covered up a few rough spots most of which revolved around Gibbons's at times frail voice and made the 19-song, 90-minute concert cook.
Power trios are driven by their rhythm section; without the bottom end locked and loaded, all the frontman firepower doesn't mean a thing. ZZ Top, which is anchored by bassist Dusty Hill, the band's secret weapon, and drummer Frank Beard, is proof of that. So, for argument's sake, is Wide Mouth Mason, which opened last night's concert. The group offered a 40 minute set that was both solid and solid sounding.
The latter was due to the band's killer bass- combo of Safwan Javed and Big Sugar's Gordie Johnson, who was sitting in for absent bassist Earl Perreira. The sound quality was great, unusual for a warm up act, and the songs were strong. All in all, a nice return to form for one of Canada's unsung bands.
The headliners had likely faced a similar situation before — solid opening act on its home turf before a favourable crowd — but seconds into ZZ Top's opening number, Got Me Under Pressure, the battle was over. Hill and Gibbons dropped their signature footwork, on cue and in time, and the crowd of 4,000 lost it. Game, set, match.
The fun never let up. As a segue into Future Blues, Gibbons was serviced with a "blues hat" by his "technician," who in typical ZZ style was a leggy dame in a cocktail dress. Never missing a step, he said, "This one is from1932. We wrote it."
The lead up to the encore was impeccable. A riff-heavy Just Got Paid was followed by two of the best songs of the night, Gimme All Your Lovin' and Sharp Dressed Man. Both sounded great, better than the recorded versions, which had a lot to do with Beard and the absence of electronic drums.
ZZ Top has brought its sound up through the ages. Remarkably, they're still like a little ol' band from Texas. And everybody knows you don't mess with Texas.