ZZ Top
Chrome, Smoke & BBQ (2003)
FLAC LOSSLESS 16Bit-44.1kHz
Contains Album Art & ID Tags
allmusic...
Prior to 2003's Chrome, Smoke & BBQ, ZZ Top's catalog was crying out for a comprehensive retrospective. Not that the band hadn't been anthologized before: they had two hits collections, with notably different track listings, and in 1987's Six Pack, they even had a makeshift box set, but all three of these were hampered by limited focus and haphazard execution. Chrome, Smoke & BBQ addresses both of these concerns by focusing on the trio's 20 years at Warner -- from 1970's ZZ Top's First Album to 1990's Recycler -- picking the best 70 or so songs from these ten albums and spreading them over the course of a lavish four-disc, 80-track box set. This is the first logical approach to ZZ Top's career yet, and while it isn't a perfect collection, it comes tantalizingly close to that ideal. The primary problem is that by the time the fourth disc rolls around, the collection has lost considerable momentum -- and that's without even touching any material from the forgettable albums the band waxed for RCA in the '90s. With its robotic beats and flattened production, Recycler pointed the way toward those RCA records, yet it did have some excellent songs -- "Give It Up," "My Head's in Mississippi," and "Doubleback" -- that harked back to the group's strengths, something that would have been more apparent if these songs appeared at the end of disc three, after the Afterburner material. Instead, they're stranded on the fourth disc, along with four other songs from Recycler, for a grand total of seven of ten songs from that album, to which are added six "Medium Rare" tracks -- the obligatory obscurities that are included on each box set, this time being a pretty cool Spanish version of "Francene," an OK live take on "Cheap Sunglasses" from a 1980 promo single, and four 12" remixes, none of which are very good. This disc is required listening only for diehards. Fortunately, the other three discs are damn near perfect, containing six to seven songs from each of their albums except their debut (nearly all of those records had a mere ten tracks, making this a very generous sampling) along with three tracks from guitarist/vocalist Billy Gibbons' first band, the Moving Sidewalks, and a single, "Miller's Farm"/"Salt Lick," from the "embryonic" ZZ Top, before bassist Dusty Hill or drummer Frank Beard joined forces with Gibbons. All the hits and classic rock radio staples are here, of course, along with a wealth of album tracks that illustrate that even if the band didn't have much range -- whether the production was raw and greasy as it was on "La Grange" or clean and sleek, like the Police playing the Rolling Stones, as on "Pearl Necklace," they rarely strayed from either fast blues boogie or slow blues -- they did have strong songwriting chops, witnessed by such buried treasures as the raucous "Brown Sugar" and "Just Got Paid," the monster groove of "I'm Bad, I'm Nationwide," the sweet "Leila," the crawling "Blue Jean Blues," and the unspeakable sleaze of the oozing "Mexican Blackbird" and smirking "I Got the Six." All this and more (including a radio commercial for Deguello) spread out over three addictive discs that truly do condense ZZ Top's records to their very best. It would be nice to have the good Recycler songs sandwiched onto the third disc and top the set off at three discs -- it would have been a nice symmetry, with one disc for each band member -- but it's easy enough to ignore the last disc and revel in how good the rest of the set is. Basically, Chrome, Smoke & BBQ is all the ZZ Top you'd ever need.
Tracklist:
CD 1
01. You Make Me Shake (The Moving Sidewalks)
02. Joe Blues (The Moving Sidewalks)
03. Crimson Witch (The Moving Sidewalks)
04. Miller’s Farm
05. Salt Lick
06. Brown Sugar
07. Goin’ Down To Mexico
08. Just Got Back From Baby’s
09. Francene
10. Just Got Paid
11. Ko Ko Blue
12. Chevrolet
13. Bar-B-Q
14. Sure Got Cold After The Rain Fell
15. Whiskey’n Mama
16. La Grange
17. Waitin’ For The Bus
18. Jesus Just Left Chicago
19. Beer Drinkers & Hell Raisers
20. Master Of Sparks
CD 2
01. Precious And Grace
02. Shiek
03. Thunderbird (Live)
04. Jailhouse Rock (Live)
05. Nasty Dogs And Funky Kings
06. Heard It On The X
07. Blue Jean Blues
08. Mexican Blackbird
09. Tush
10. It’s Only Love
11. Arrested For Driving While Blind
12. El Diablo
13. Enjoy And Get It On
14. She’s A Heartbreaker
15. Asleep In The Desert
16. I Thank You
17. Cheap Sunglasses
18. I’m Bad, I’m Nationwide
19. A Fool For Your Stockings
20. Degüello Album Radio Spot
21. Manic Mechanic
22. She Loves My Automobile
23. Leila
24. Tube Snake Boogie
CD 3
01. I Wanna Drive You Home
02. It’s So Hard
03. Pearl Necklace
04. Heaven, Hell Or Houston
05. Gimme All Your Lovin’
06. Got Me Under Pressure
07. TV Dinners
08. Sharp Dressed Man
09. Legs
10. I Got The Six
11. Dirty Dog
12. If I Could Only Flag Her Down
13. Sleeping Bag
14. Stages
15. Woke Up With Wood
16. Rough Boy
17. Can’t Stop Rockin’
18. Planet Of Women
19. Velcro Fly
20. Delirious
CD 4
01. Concrete And Steel
02. Lovething
03. Penthouse Eyes
04. My Head’s In Mississippi
05. Give It Up
06. Doubleback
07. 2000 Blues
08. Reverberation (Doubt)
09. Viva Las Vegas
10. Gun Love
11. Francene (Spanish)
12. Cheap Sunglasses (Live)
13. Legs (Dance Mix)
14. Viva Las Vegas (12" Remix)
15. Give It Up (2,800 Mile Remix)
16. Velcro Fly (12" Remix)
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