ZZ Top to tour UK and Europe for first time in 5 years in 2024
The group will play Wembley Arena on 11 July next year.
![[L-R] Elwood Francis and Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top](https://guitar.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/ZZ-Top-Billy-Gibbons-Elwood-Francis@2000x1500.jpg)
Credit: R. Diamond/Getty Images
ZZ Top have announced they’re finally returning to the UK in 2024 after five years.
“It’s been a while since we’ve been able to check in with our European fans, so it goes without saying that we’re excited about coming back this summer,” frontman Billy Gibbons enthused in a press release.
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The grand return comes two years after the passing of ZZ Top bassist Dusty Hill, and the show is sure to honour him. “We’re looking forward to a good time,” Gibbons says. “That goes for both those in the audience and on stage.”
The band will be hitting the UK just once to play the OVO Arena Wembley on 11 July, as well as a plethora of European countries in June and July, starting in Sweden before moving to Norway, Denmark, Germany, Austria, France, Switzerland and the Netherlands.
While the group haven’t released a fresh album officially since 2012, ZZ Top have been powerfully revisiting their roots. Their Grammy nominated 2019 documentary, ZZ Top: That Little Ol’ Band from Texas, highlighted the true charm of the band, a heart-warming foray into their history.
Soundtrack RAW saw the group re-recording classic tracks, breathing a breath of fresh life into them. Gibbons noted that the sessions were “a return to [ZZ Top’s] roots.”
“It was just us and the music, no audience of thousands, no concession stands, no parking lot social hour, no phalanx of tour buses,” he reflects. “Just us.”
“The Director suggested we find a way to illustrate the early style from the start of our five-plus decades run,” he continues. “Gruene Hall, the oldest dance hall in Texas, was selected as a fitting backdrop to replicate the look of the band’s very beginnings. When we arrived… we picked up the instruments and commenced an unplanned jam session. Fortunately, our stage engineers were on hand with tape machines in place to capture the performances that went down. That became, in essence, the soundtrack to the film and now it’s also an audio document of ZZ Top’s early beginnings. Still going strong today.”
Tickets for ZZ Top’s will go on sale on 15 December. For more info, head to the band’s official website.