17" in Dallas. ZZ Top Gibbons formed ZZ Top in late 1969, and quickly settled on bassist/vocalist Dusty Hill and drummer Frank "Rube" Beard, both members of the band American Blues. After honing their trademark blues-rock style, they released ZZ Top's First Album on London Records in 1971. Although all three members were born in 1949, Gibbons was the youngest member of the band. Solo career On July 31, 2015 it was announced that Gibbons' solo project will be named Billy Gibbons and the BFG's featuring musicians Mike Flanigin, GG Maartine (née Martine GuiGui), Joe Hardy and Greg Morrow. Their debut album, Perfectamundo, was released on November 6, 2015. Gibbons' second solo album, The Big Bad Blues, was released on September 21, 2018 via Concord Records. At the 40th Blues Music Awards in May 2019, the album was named as 'Blues Rock Album of the Year'. In a 2019 interview with Guitar World, Gibbons said that he was already starting to work on his next solo release: "I think we're going to call it Hardware, and that's in tribute to Joe Hardy, our stalwart engineer for four decades. He recently passed on, but in his wake he left the instruction manual -- 'Here's how to do it.' We're still trying to get to the back chapters. It goes deep." The album was released in 2021. Other music-related appearances Gibbons added guitar to the track "Dias Raros" from Diamante Eléctrico of Bogotá, Colombia. Gibbons played the first slide guitar lead on the song "Dead End Streets" on Al Jourgensen of Ministry's side project Revolting Cocks album Cocked and Loaded. He wrote, played guitar on and sang "Willin' for Satisfaction" from Def Leppard guitarist Vivian Campbell's 2005 solo album Two Sides of If. Gibbons collaborated with the Queens of the Stone Age on the song "Burn the Witch" from the album Lullabies to Paralyze. ZZ Top's "Precious and Grace" was recorded with lead vocals provided by Mark Lanegan as a bonus track for the album. Gibbons has claimed this was one of his favorite collaborations and "Precious and Grace" was later added back into ZZ Top's set lists. Gibbons was selected to guest the follow-up album Era Vulgaris but was unable due to scheduling conflicts. In 2007, Gibbons was featured in the documentary feature film The 1959 Burst alongside Les Paul guitar legends like Slash, Rick Nielsen and Eric Johnson Together with