A title we all can get behind…
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[6.00]
Al Shipley: A lot of rockers turn in their cool motherfucker cards by the time they’re sexagenarians, and trying to engage with hip hop in any way is one the easiest ways to do so. But ZZ Top come correct, in their own clattering, gravelly way, paying tribute to a regional classic that even the track’s producer, Rick Rubin, wasn’t familiar with.
[7]
Jonathan Bogart: I don’t imagine their pitch for the song was “Tom Waits meets Biggie Smalls (with backing music by, uh, ZZ Top),” but that’s where they ended up.
[5]
Brad Shoup: How cynical can you remain at an album which grants writing credits to Gillian Welch and Al B. Sure!? As ambivalent as I am about the concept, DJ DMD’s original would seem to be the definition of termite art. Now it’s been modified to run on shitty liquor and give off a beguiling croak. The Top’s always arced wry, and in converting DMD’s Cadillac to a shuddering, clattering jalopy, they’ve pulled off a pop-cultural trick that not even Bob Dylan could manage.
[8]
Patrick St. Michel: I do not dislike “I Gotsta Get Paid” by ZZ Top because it’s an example of “rock band covers rap song.” I dislike this song because dude’s voice is wrecked.
[1]
Alfred Soto: Still chuggin’ after all these years, ZZ Top show Black Keys how it’s done, even though Billy Gibbons sounds a lot like Al Jourgensen these days. Closer to Dylan too – imagine this bluesy stomp on Love & Theft and you won’t blink.
[6]
Edward Okulicz: There’s not much more than a gruff reverence for the source material, but the guitars are awesome — no surprise for a ZZ Top song even 30 years post-Eliminator. They give you reason to keep listening once you’ve admitted to yourself that yes, you are listening to ZZ Top covering a rap song. By the time you’ve listened to it a few times, the stilted, awkward delivery sounds valiant and triumphant whereas initially it sounds weak and croaky.
[6]
Katherine St Asaph: Any rockers-covering-rappers caveats still apply, sort of; there’s probably some appropriation, but this isn’t for youth or buzz (-feed or otherwise) so much as Houston pride. The state of ZZ Top’s musicianship doesn’t apply, really, unless you think Southern rock doesn’t accommodate scruff. A potentially terrible idea, executed fine.
[6]
Anthony Easton: There is pleasure in something well-crafted because of decades of work — nothing fancy, just the same job done efficiently and with much skill. Something that the Stones could learn from, frankly.
[9]