When ZZ Top got around to recording their third album, 1973’s Tres Hombres, they’d already found their sound, thanks to engineer Robin Brian, who had guitarist Billy Gibbons overdub and double-up his guitar parts when producer and manager Bill Ham was out of the room. This time, the trio cut short their sessions at Robin Hood studios in Tyler, Texas, and headed to Ardent Studios in Memphis in hopes of expanding their oeuvre. With Terry Manning at the board, the group made an album that was, in the words of Gibbons, “big and bold” and definitely a “turning point” for ZZ Top and their trajectory. Tres Hombres, their first platinum album, was also mixed in quad. Over 50 years later, Rhino has enhanced that mix for its Quadio Blu-ray Disc series. Stand back and take cover.
If you thought Tres Hombres was already a kick-ass slab of hard-edged Texas blues, prepare to have your senses popping and flaring to the Quadio mix. “Waiting On The Bus” and “Jesus Just Left Chicago,” in all their sumptuous sonic deliciousness, serve as teasers for what follows. Gibbons’ guitar and Dusty Hill’s bass, along with their back and forth vocalizations, unleash their fury on the rowdy roundhouse kick of “Beer Drinkers & Hell Raisers.” Then a slight shift, as the dynamics and interplay comes to the fore on “Master Of Speaks.” Frank Beard’s syncopated drums ricochet from the front to the back, while the guitar and bass swarm the four channels like hard-bitten puzzle pieces tracing a mysterious map to a funky, blues-swamped bayou.
If you’re not on your feet and bouncing off the walls when the thundering groove of “Move Me On Down The Line” circles the space, check your pulse and seek immediate therapy. Why it was never a single remains a mystery, though that honor fell solely to “La Grange,” which, of course, became a defining moment for ZZ Top. Here, in all its quad glory, the song explodes in between Gibbons’ guttural mumblings before galloping off into the sunset. You’ll be prompted to blast it three times in a row just to let the neighbors know who owns the airwaves.
The wind-down of “Shiek” and “Have You Heard” sums up the short and curlies of Tres Hombres is in its own simple and cut-to-the-chase way. It was designed to transcend “Southern Rock,” while giving hard and heavy British bands like Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath a run for their money. That we’re still marveling at its punch and power, tempered throughout with subtleties of grace and reverence to the blues form, a half-century later speaks volumes of its place in the pantheon of American rock and roll. The Quadio mix turns Tres Hombres into an immersive, all-encompassing sleighride — a steady mid-range crunch of Gibbons’ multi-channeled guitars wrapped around blues-based melodies and the unbreakable low-end chug of Hill and Beard. Even the album’s classic gatefold photo of a traditional, messy Mexican meal isn’t as tasty as this mix. You put the two together, and you have all the makings of an all-out fiesta salvaje.
~ Shawn Perry
