ZZ Top celebrating 50th anniversary on Las Vegas Strip

ZZ Top is just three guys. But the famed “Little Ol’ Band from Texas” once outnumbered its entire audience.

“I think it was our first show, and we had one person show up,” drummer Frank Beard recalled during the latest episode of my R-J podcast, PodKats! “The playbill, though, referred to this little local single that we had out called ‘Salt Lick.’ The playbill had it, ‘ZZ Top and Salt Lick.’ They listed our song as the opening act.”

Then the band played the show.

“The curtains opened, and there was one person there,” Beard, seated next to band mate and guitar great Billy Gibbons, continued. “He stood there and looked at us and we looked at him, and we counted it off and started playing ‘Salt Lick.’ We played a set and bought him a Coke.”

Vocalist Dusty Hill — who was not present for the interview — has previously recalled the show was at the armory in Alvin, Texas, in 1970. The band had just formed the previous year.

“As our travels have gone global, this guy shows up,” Gibbons said. “We don’t know his name, we know him as just The Guy. He says, ‘I’m The Guy.’ ”

The Guy might or might not be back to see ZZ Top play its extended engagement at The Venetian Theatre. They opened their 50th anniversary celebration Friday and Saturday and are back Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, Jan. 30 and Feb. 1-2.

“When you think about five decades, we’re still working on learning things we’re supposed to already know,” Gibbons said. “I think we’ll get through it OK.”

Do they still rehearse?

“We visit,” Beard said.

“The first seven years, we were in a station wagon going from city to city,” Gibbons said. “We never knew what would happen. Now we take separate buses (laughs).”

As for ZZ Top’s latest set list, it has been tweaked for run on the Strip.

“We’ve dusted off — pun intended — one of Dusty’s favorites, ‘Viva Las Vegas,’ ” said Gibbons, who owns a home in Rancho Circle in Las Vegas. “It’s high on the list.”

The famous look of the band, with Gibbons and Hill wearing uncultivated beards, has been in place since the mid-1970s. All three once wore beards but Beard (characteristically the man with no beard) shaved his years ago. Gibbons says he and Hill stopped shaving because of “abject laziness.”

In their Venetian appearances, the guys are playing “Sharp Dressed Man,” a highlight of the great “Eliminator” album and a breakthrough video on MTV. The band drew the title from experience. Inspired by the Rat Pack and other famous Vegas headliners, they actually rented tuxedos to hit the town the first time they ever visited Las Vegas.

Hill once remembered that fellow tourists attempted to order drinks from the rockers as they moved through casinos.

“Were just discussing how the changes have descended over the entire community,” Gibbons said. “There was a time when you didn’t go out until you had a tuxedo. It was a rarity.

“But Vegas is still about a good time, kinda like a ZZ Top show, a good time.”

The Review-Journal is owned by the family of Las Vegas Sands Chairman and CEO Sheldon Adelson. Las Vegas Sands operates The Venetian.

John Katsilometes’ column runs daily in the A section. His PodKats podcast can be found at reviewjournal.com/podcasts. Contact him at jkatsilometes@reviewjournal.com. Follow @johnnykats on Twitter,@JohnnyKats1 on Instagram.