The No. 1 Rolling Stones Song That Inspired One Of ZZ Top's Signature Hits

By the time 1983's "Eliminator" rolled around, you'd never know that ZZ Top had once been considered "southern blues rock" (although "La Grange" prophesied their future sound). Taking inspiration from dance and club music, ZZ transformed into a full-on party band during the '80s. They also took inspiration from another legendary band that had undergone a similar, radical overhaul: "The Rolling Stones." It's the Stones' 1980 hit, "Emotional Rescue," that inspired ZZ Top's "Gimme All Your Lovin'."

The Rolling Stones had rambled far from their mid-60s origins and songs that sound even cooler today, like 1966's "Paint It, Black," by the time ZZ Top took inspiration from them. 1978 saw the Stones go full disco with the absolutely irresistibly groovy "Miss You" from "Some Girls," a song that defined rock that year no matter how removed from the Stones' roots. Riding the danceable wave of this success, the Stones next released 1980's "Emotional Rescue" from the album of the same name. The song isn't nearly as hooky and unforgettable as "Miss You," but the Stones being the Stones, it still reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100. The album, however, reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and stayed there for a stunning seven weeks.

Danceability was the secret sauce here. As the tale goes, ZZ Top lead singer Billy Gibbons headed into a nightclub around this time while on tour and saw folks dancing to "Emotional Rescue." Then, he set about musically Sherlocking his way to "Gimme All Your Lovin'." 

Billy Gibbons was keen on figuring out exactly what made folks get down to the Rolling Stones' "Emotional Rescue." We're talking nuts-and-bolts songwriting, not imprecise statements like, "It's funky." Sure, people had always danced to the Stones, as evidenced by the music video for 1968's "Sympathy for the Devil" (spot John Lennon rocking out, if you can), a classic rock song we'll be blasting 'til the day we die. But as Ultimate Classic Rock cites ZZ Top's engineer, Terry Manning, Gibbons wanted to know why ZZ Top wasn't played in clubs like the Stones. He figured it boiled down to rhythmic chops and dispatched Manning to crack the dance code.

A drum machine, a BPM of 120 (two beats per second), and some synth work later, ZZ Top had a track in the chamber internally called "Stones Rip" that would become "Gimme All Your Lovin'." The lyrics came later and were also inspired by the Stones. You can hear it, too. Forget the music to "Gimme All Your Lovin'" and just read the lyrics: "I got to have a shot / For what you got is, oh, so sweet / You got to make it hot." The rhythm and word placement sound eerily reminiscent of Mick Jagger.

ZZ Top might not have topped the charts with "Gimme All Your Lovin'" (it reached No. 37 on the Billboard Hot 100), but they crafted a certified banger. "Gimme All Your Lovin'" isn't just one of their most recognizable, signature songs; it's one of the reasons why 1983's "Eliminator" granted the band staying power well beyond the '70s. Thanks, Jagger and company.