{"id":2233209,"date":"2026-08-19T07:49:56","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T11:49:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/?p=2233209"},"modified":"2026-08-19T07:49:58","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T11:49:58","slug":"frank-beard-zz-top","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/2026\/08\/frank-beard-zz-top\/","title":{"rendered":"Frank Beard, ZZ TOP"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Frank Beard<\/strong>, the longtime drummer whose unmistakable rhythm helped power ZZ Top for more than five decades, has died.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Beard, 77, died August 17 following a stay in hospice, according to the Fort Bend County Medical Examiner,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tmz.com\/2026\/08\/18\/frank-beard-dead\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">TMZ<\/a>\u00a0reported on Tuesday, August 18.\u00a0His death came shortly after serious health problems forced him away from the band\u2019s ongoing tour.\u00a0 ZZ Top confirmed the news on Instagram, sharing a tribute from\u00a0<strong>Billy Gibbons<\/strong>, ZZ Top\u2019s frontman, guitarist, and lead vocalist. alongside details on how the band plans to move forward. \u201cToday, Elwood and I lost a great friend and collaborator, and the world lost one of the most naturally innovative drummers and a great and true son of Texas. His signature backbeat was key to keeping ZZ on top,\u201d Gibbons wrote. A cause of death was not immediately known.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Details surrounding Beard\u2019s final illness remain limited. The drummer had stepped away from performing in recent weeks as concerns about his health grew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">His condition reportedly led to ZZ Top\u2019s August 5 cancellation at the Hollywood Bowl.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Frank Beard, the longtime drummer whose unmistakable rhythm helped power ZZ Top for more than five decades, has died.&nbsp; Beard, 77, died August 17 following a stay in hospice, according to the Fort Bend County Medical Examiner,\u00a0TMZ\u00a0reported on Tuesday, August 18.\u00a0His death came shortly after serious health problems forced him away from the band\u2019s ongoing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2233209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2233209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2233209"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2233209\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2233211,"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2233209\/revisions\/2233211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2233209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2233209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wioe.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2233209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}