Frank Beard, the drummer for ZZ Top since 1969 and the rhythmic heart of the legendary Texas rock band for more than half a century, has died at the age of 77. He was also famously the only member of the trio who did not wear the long beard that became part of the group’s iconic image — despite his surname being Beard.
The rock world is mourning Frank Beard, the longtime drummer of ZZ Top.
The band announced his death on social media in a message signed by Billy F. Gibbons, who remembered Beard as a great friend, a naturally innovative musician and a true son of Texas.
His precise, stripped-back and instantly recognisable style was one of the defining elements of the ZZ Top sound.
With ZZ Top since 1969
Frank Lee Beard was born on June 11, 1949, in Frankston, Texas.
He joined ZZ Top at the very beginning of the band’s history in 1969, completing the classic line-up alongside Billy Gibbons on guitar and vocals and Dusty Hill on bass.
For more than five decades, the trio became one of the most recognisable and enduring groups in rock history.
Beard also retained one of the band’s great visual ironies: he was the only member without the long facial hair that became synonymous with ZZ Top.
The groove that defined the band
Beard’s playing was never about unnecessary showmanship.
His strength was a tight, dry and powerful backbeat that perfectly supported the blues-rock style of Gibbons and Hill.
During the 1970s, ZZ Top established their identity with albums such as Tres Hombres and songs that became rock classics, including La Grange.
Then came another transformation in the 1980s.
With synthesizers, memorable music videos and the release of Eliminator in 1983, the band reached an even wider global audience.
50 million albums sold
Over their career, ZZ Top sold around 50 million albums worldwide, including about 25 million in the United States.
The band scored multiple major chart hits and won three MTV Video Music Awards.
On March 15, 2004, Beard was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame alongside Gibbons and Hill.
It was recognition for a band that managed to span generations without losing its identity.
Tour dates cancelled
Following Beard’s death, ZZ Top cancelled scheduled performances in Salt Lake City and Colorado Springs.
The The Big One! tour is expected to resume over the weekend with two shows at Austin City Limits, a venue Beard particularly loved in a city that had become a second home to him.
A life built around rhythm
Frank Beard was never the most visually flamboyant member of ZZ Top.
That was part of what made him so important.
Behind the drum kit, he built the rhythm, held the band together and allowed the groove and music to do the talking.
After more than half a century with the same band, his sound remains inseparable from the story of ZZ Top.
Rock has lost one of its most solid and distinctive drummers. ZZ Top has lost the rhythmic engine that had been there from the beginning.