ZZ Top Finds Inspiration in a Houston Crack-Rap Anthem
"I Gotsta Get Paid," the new single from ZZ Top's first album after a decade-long hiatus, may sound familiar to fans of 1990s Houston crack rap. That's because it's a cover of Texas rapper DJ DMD's much beloved "25 Lighters," an ode the practice of gutting Bic lighters to hide crack cocaine in them. ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons said that he became interested in redoing the track ever since DJ DMD recorded it in a studio Gibbons owned:
"I became fixated with this ‘hypnotic chronicle of the toil of a ghetto hustler'," says Gibbons, "and I was determined to use it as the basis for something ZZ Top could record." 14 years later, Gibbons, Hardy and Moon, inspired by DJ Screw's ‘chopped and screwed' technique for deconstructing hip-hop, worked out how to adapt 25 Lighters into a new song. "It's a combination of hip-hop and the blues of Lightnin' Hopkins, a homage to these heroes of the Houston ghetto."
Does this mean that ZZ Top drinks Purple Drank?