The ZZ Top origin story most people expect involves dusty Texas roadhouses and cheap sunglasses. The real one starts with a Houston kid, born in 1949 to a concert pianist father who worked at MGM Studios, being sent to New York City to study Afro-Caribbean percussion under Latin jazz legend Tito Puente. This episode traces how Billy Gibbons absorbed polyrhythmic drumming, Texas blues, psychedelia and a hands-on guitar lesson from Jimi Hendrix, then engineered all of it into one of the most recognizable sounds in American rock.

Along the way we look at the 1959 Gibson Les Paul he bought from a farmer for $250 and named Pearly Gates, the moment B.B. King asked him why he was working so hard and pushed him toward ultra-light .007 gauge strings, and how that philosophy of finesse over exertion shaped everything from spinning fur guitars in the  ...