ZZ Top Continue The Big One Tour Without Drummer Frank Beard
ZZ Top will continue their The Big One summer U.S. tour without longtime drummer Frank Beard, with drummer Michael Monahan reportedly stepping in to fill his seat. The news, first reported by Billboard on 11 August 2026, comes after the band cancelled two Southern California performances citing "unforeseen personnel matters."
A spokesperson for ZZ Top told Rolling Stone that the tour will carry on with Billy Gibbons and Elwood Francis, the guitar tech who became the band's bassist after Dusty Hill died in 2021 at age 72. Monahan will handle drums in Beard's absence.
Frank Beard, 77, has been ZZ Top's drummer for more than 55 years, having joined the group in 1969. He played on every record the band released, from 1971's First Album through their most recent LP, 2012's La Futura. His absence leaves Gibbons as the only continuously touring original member on stage.
The cancellations began on 4 August 2026, when ZZ Top scrubbed a performance in Chula Vista, California. The following night's Hollywood Bowl show in Los Angeles — co-featuring Cheap Trick — was also cancelled. Billy Gibbons addressed the Hollywood Bowl date directly: "Insurmountable obstacles require canceling our Hollywood Bowl performance," he said in a statement cited by Billboard. Rolling Stone reported that Beard is facing health issues in connection with the cancellations.
Beard's health has interrupted his schedule before. He missed a Paris show in October 2022 after an emergency appendectomy. During the band's 50th Anniversary Tour, ZZ Top announced that Beard had been diagnosed with pneumonia, according to the band's official website. In March of the prior year, the band announced that Beard had "temporarily stepped away from the current tour to attend a health issue requiring his focus in the near term," with longtime drum tech John Douglas filling in. After returning from that leave, ZZ Top said Beard had been suffering from foot and ankle issues.
The Big One tour was slated to play Marymoor Amphitheater in Redmond, Washington, on 11 August and end its U.S. leg in Port Wentworth, Georgia, on 9 October before moving to Mexico and South America in November. No updated itinerary has been announced beyond the confirmation that the tour will proceed.
For a band that has spent decades leaning on the same three-piece lineup — first with Hill, then with Francis carrying the bass — losing another founding member mid-tour, even temporarily, reshapes what audiences will see on stage. Gibbons and Francis have carried the ZZ Top name forward since Hill's death, and Monahan now joins that effort behind the kit.
