El Loco Songs Ranked

El Loco is the seventh studio album by the American rock band ZZ Top, released in 1981. The title means “The Crazy One” in Spanish. The band’s guitarist/singer Billy Gibbons has said that the recording of this album was the first time the three members of the band were isolated from one another in the studio, rather than recording simultaneously in the same room. It also foreshadowed ZZ Top’s synthesizer-driven direction later in the decade, with early experimentations in synthesizer backing on certain tracks. El Loco was produced by Bill Ham and recorded and originally mixed by Terry Manning. The biographer David Blayney explains in his book Sharp Dressed Men that the recording engineer Linden Hudson was involved as a pre-producer on this album. Hudson did not receive credit for engineering the tracks on “Groovy Little Hippie Pad” which were used on the final album mix. In 1987, most of the band’s back catalog received a controversial “digitally enhanced” remix treatment for CD release; however, El Loco did not receive this remix treatment and the original mix of the album has been available on CD since 1987. Here are all of El Loco’s songs ranked.

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10. Party on the Patio

“This just may be my favorite ZZ Top album and I own quite a few. I will admit that at first, I didn’t care for it much at all. But the more I listened, the more it grew on me and now I listen to it the most out of my ZZ Top collection.”

9. Heaven, Hell or Houston

“Whoever said ZZ Top doesn’t like to experiment needs to check out this album. First off, there’s very little of the distortion and bite of earlier releases. New Wave was prominent at this point, and ZZ Top fully embraced the genre on 1981’s El Loco.”

8. Groovy Little Hippie Pad

“The zany ‘Groovy Little Hippie Pad’ has a very strong main hook ‘groooooovy little hippie paaadd’ or so Billy sings it like that, is very memorable and catchy, and really grows on you.”

See more: ZZ Top Albums Ranked

7. Pearl Necklace

“El Loco is a solid album from ZZ Top, and it’d be one of my personal favourites by them. Each song on the record holds up on its own, from start to finish. The only snag to the album, is this is when ZZ Top were yet to perfect the blend between the eighties styled synth sounds and the bluesy guitar tones of Billy Gibbons.”

6. It’s So Hard

“For all those people who thought that ZZ Top started with the Eliminator album, you should really check this out. This is where the class really started to show and they began to flex their musical muscles.”

5. Don’t Tease Me

“It’s interesting that they titled the album ‘El Loco’ as the material is anything but crazy, in fact it seems as if they are playing it very safe indeed.”

See more: ZZ Top Songs Ranked

4. Leila

“El Loco is a modest little album that completely belies the expected sonic norms of southern boogie blues rock. It also gives little indication of how the band would simply explode onto the scene with their follow-up. But it is an album I keep coming back to if only because I think ZZ Top seem a much more credible unit here.”

3. Ten Foot Pole

“Wondering what they’re doing in those greasy overalls shown on the cover? They were working very hard on another sweet album! ZZ sounds more contemporary on this album than they ever had before, while at the same time throwing down some funky blues”

2. I Wanna Drive You Home

“I remember getting this album for the first time and listening to it all the time as a teenager because it was my first ZZ Top album and simply I could not understand how they could be as good as that!”

1. Tube Snake Boogie

“Typically the new sound of their 80’s period. Radically different research to make “groovy” sound. For me the most creative album from them, because of the diversity and using clear echoes sounds of guitar. Gibbons just perfect and really mature product.”