Eliminator

The best blues rock band precisely because (unlike the Brits) they realized they couldn’t do it better than the originals, ZZ Top spent their first decade perfecting the art of sleazy, sunburnt low-tech boogie. Then the eighties happened. They threw out their tin cans and replaced it with a sleek silicon kit, found a mascot in the form of a souped-up hot rod, and shed their beard hair all over the nascent MTV. Unlike similar roots rockers like Foghat, this Texan trio succeeded in their New Wave move because they had the same respect for pioneers like Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark and Depeche Mode as they did for Lightnin’ Hopkins and Howlin’ Wolf. The three mega-singles still kick it into overdrive, but “Under Pressure”’s imminent explosion may be the low-key gem here.