Blimp Time-Hop: ZZ Top's Expect No Quarter Tour At CCCC In 1980

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We’re celebrating another great show that came to Portland, once upon a time. 41 years ago today, WBLM welcomed back ZZ Top to the Cumberland county Civic Center Center on April 6, 1980.

It was 3 years after they were the very first event and very first rock concert in the new building. This was the second of 11 ZZ shows at the CCCC from 1977 to WBLM's 30th Birthday concert in 2003.

Billy Gibbons, Dusty Hill, and Frank Beard were touring in support of the album, Deguello. That one features the songs I’m Bad, I’m Nationwide, I Thank You and Cheap Sunglasses. It was called the Expect No Quarter tour.

April 1980 also marked ZZ Top’s first appearance in Europe, performing for the German music television show Rockpalast.

Watch that 'Little Ol' Band from Texas' perform a wicked killah Tube Snake Boogie (a year before it's release on the El Loco album) on the Rockpalast show in the video below.

They've been real good to us over the years with plenty of tour stops in Blimpville. We count 20 Maine concert appearances from the 1st show at CMYC in Lewiston on May 16, 1975 to their last trip here on September 4, 2016 at the Maine State Pier in Portland. I'm pretty damn proud to be able to say that my first concert experience ever was with ZZ Top and Sammy Hagar in the summer of 1983 at the CCCC. I was off to a very great start of attending live music performances.

In 2019, ZZ Top is marked 50 years in boogie business and they are still hottah than a Texas chili faht! Let's all hope we get to be in a ZZ Top crowd at least one more time someday.