ZZ TOP - La Futura

“Nothing new on the Southern front!”, that’s what an uninformed bystander would say, hearing the latest ZZ Top. Nothing farther from the truth! "La futura" is Spanish for “survival”, it has nothing to do with “future”, and this is for the better! For the band to survive, La Futura had to go back in time, to the exact place where the story ZZ Top stopped in 1983! It’s just a small detail for the uninformed, but a much awaited move for any lover of ZZ Top! Again responsible is producer Rick Rubin, the wizard who dug down in the soul of many bands to bring out their true essence that we believed long lost. This time, Rick Rubin took the Tres Hombres from Fandango through Tejas and dragged them through Rio Grande Mud until the beard-men Gibbons and Hilland and the drummer Beard (!) came out with songs that were worthy of the Deguello spirit (in a very loose translation from Texas Spanish: “Come at me bro!”).

So, instead of synthesizers, glitter and other MTV crap we have 10 pieces so simple that if they weren’t Blues, they would surely be Zen! Fortunately for our years, they are blues, and quite a lot of it! Just listen to Heartache In Blue, and you’ll see what I mean, or Chartreuse, or Consumption, such a great continuation (perhaps a bit too obvious!) of the famous Tush. And, while Over You will give you the impression that it is written in the spirit of the classic Blue Jean Blues, La Futura is still a pretty varied album, even containing a song (Flyin' High), that resembles popular songs of the 80s without containing anything artificial within it.

The new ZZ Top album peaks with It’s Too Easy Mañana, which, in my opinion, is its piéce de résistance. The lyrics will induce a state of happiness because they describe total freedom, so far for all of us: “Just a one room country shack / Lyin' here on my rack / It's too easy, it's too easy to feel good / Bootleg whiskey, feeling fine / It's good reason out of mind / (…) / Oh this life is such a scene / Ain't no worry mo manana / I don't care maybe if I could / Deal the shuffle in the cards / Don't have to work that hard”. Billy Gibbons also gives us the price of such freedom: “Will you miss me? I'm all wrong / You hardly know I'm gone /  (…)  / I spent bad luck times in jail / I've been blowing out spitting nails / I pack my sack and vanish when I could / It's too easy, it's too easy to feel good”. So, nothing new: the price of total freedom is to always be “On the road”, to give a nod to Jack Kerouac. But don’t be scared! You don’t need to be Dean Moriarty to appreciate ZZ Top’s music! From what I can remember, my most recent encounters with this band occurred in a rather family-like atmosphere, and I’m thinking here about the show at the Polivalenta Hall (anyone who’s been there must have seen all the generations of rockers), and the first listen of this new album, seasoned with a bottle of Bourbon… it's too easy to feel good!

And this is how, 42 years into their career and after 14 albums, that little ol' band from Texas returns to its roots and sounds better than ever!

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