Frank Beard, the drummer for ZZ Top and, yes, the one member of ZZ Top who famously did not have a beard, has died at age 77. CBS News confirmed his death Monday, with the band's publicist saying he passed away at his ranch in Richmond, Texas, surrounded by family, while in hospice care. The last original member of the band's founding trio is gone, and an era that smelled like Texas, sounded like the blues, and looked absolutely insane is now fully in the past tense.
The Man, the Mustache, the Myth
Let's get the obvious thing out of the way, because Beard himself clearly had a sense of humor about it his entire career. Billy Gibbons grew a beard down to his belt. Dusty Hill matched him hair for hair. Frank Beard, the guy whose literal name is Beard, went clean-shaven for most of his life, occasionally conceding to a mustache. The universe is not subtle.
Beard was born in Frankston, Texas on June 11, 1949, and raised in Irving. According to the band's publicist, it was Beard himself who, at the end of 1969, suggested to Gibbons that he audition Dusty Hill on bass. Without that phone call, there is no ZZ Top. The band that would sell 50 million albums, score six No. 1 Mainstream Rock singles, and earn a Diamond record started because the drummer made a recommendation. He was, in the most literal sense, the guy who put the whole thing together.
Fifty Years of Keeping ZZ on Top
Gibbons said it plainly in his statement posted to social media: "His signature backbeat was key to keeping ZZ on top." That is not a throwaway quote from a grieving bandmate trying to say something nice. That is an accurate description of what Beard did for five decades.
ZZ Top's sound, which CBS News describes as a hybrid of rock, blues, and funk mixed into what the band called a "steaming-hot Houston stew," only works if the bottom holds. And Beard held it. Through "La Grange" and "Tush" in the 70s, through the MTV video trilogy and "Eliminator" going Diamond in the 80s, through the band's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 2004, through Dusty Hill's death in 2021 and his replacement by bass tech Elwood Francis, Beard was there. The Associated Press notes that eleven of the band's albums went Gold, seven went Platinum, and "Eliminator" alone moved more than 10 million copies. That backbeat was underneath every single one of those records.
The Rehab, the Ranch, and the Road Back
Beard's career was not without turbulence. After the band's commercial success in the 70s, he ran into serious problems with substance abuse that forced a three-year band hiatus. He entered rehab, the band scattered, and the question of whether ZZ Top would survive hung in the air.
Gibbons answered that question when CBS News asked him directly whether he had considered replacing Beard during that period. His response: "No. There is no other drummer. There's one guy." That is the kind of loyalty that keeps bands together across half a century. Beard made it back, got clean, and showed up. The beards, incidentally, were an accidental byproduct of that same hiatus. Gibbons told the San Luis Obispo Tribune in 2010 that he and Hill had simply "gotten so lazy" that they forgot to shave during their time apart, and when the trio reunited, the iconic image was just sort of there. Frank Beard, needless to say, had not made the same mistake.
From Dazed and Confused to Armageddon
Part of what made ZZ Top's longevity possible was the band's genuine willingness to be in on the joke. Rolling Stone wrote in 2021 that they "reveled in the humor and ridiculousness of it all, busting their synchronized dance moves and spinning their white-fur guitars," adding that "these guys always got the joke, at a time when other bands were still just nervously lip-syncing in front of brick walls."
That sense of humor made their music weirdly timeless and endlessly usable. Hollywood agreed. According to CBS News, ZZ Top songs turned up in "Dazed and Confused," "From Dusk Till Dawn," "I, Tonya," "Armageddon," "Happy Feet," and several others. A band that formed in Houston in 1969 playing two-chord blues about Texas brothels somehow ended up soundtracking Bruce Willis saving the planet from an asteroid. That is a career arc. When Keith Richards inducted them into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, his joke was that their disguises would not fool anyone. He was not wrong. Nobody was ever confused about who they were.
The Tour Goes On
The band canceled its upcoming shows in Salt Lake City and Colorado Springs out of respect. But according to CBS News, the tour will continue this weekend at Austin City Limits, which the band described as "one of Frank's favorite venues and in a city that had been something of a second home for him."
That is the correct call, and it is probably what Beard would have wanted. The man spent more than 50 years showing up and playing. Gibbons and Francis playing Austin in his honor is the right send-off for someone who helped make that city a spiritual home for a band that always described themselves, with total accuracy, as a "Little Ol' Band From Texas."
The Dingo Take
Two original members of ZZ Top are now gone in the span of four years. Dusty Hill in 2021, Frank Beard this week. Only Billy Gibbons remains from the trio that walked into a club called The Catacombs in 1969 and played one song for three hours straight. At some point the math on legacy becomes undeniable, and we are at that point.
What Beard built with those two other guys is genuinely rare. Not the fame, not the Diamond record, not the MTV rotation. The rarer thing is a band that lasted more than 50 years, sold 50 million albums, and never stopped being exactly, recognizably themselves. Synchronized guitar spins. Cheap sunglasses. A drummer named Beard with no beard. They found the joke early and never let go of it, and the music underneath the joke was serious and rooted and real.
Frank Beard was in hospice care at his ranch in Texas, surrounded by family, when he died. He was 77 years old. He spent most of those years behind a drum kit, holding down the bottom for one of the greatest American rock bands ever assembled. The name thing was funny. The drumming was not a joke at all.
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