William Frederick "Billy" Gibbons (born December 16, 1949) is an American musician, actor and car customizer, best known as the guitarist of the Texas blues-rock band ZZ Top

ZZ Top

ZZ Top is an American rock band, sometimes referred to as "That Little Ol' Band from Texas". Their style, which is rooted in blues-based boogie rock, has come to incorporate elements of arena, southern, and boogie rock. The band, from Houston Texas, formed in 1969...

. He is also the lead singer and composer for many of the band's songs. Gibbons is known for playing his Gretsch Billy Bo

Gretsch Jupiter Thunderbird

The Gretsch G6199 "Billy-Bo" Jupiter Thunderbird is a reproduction of a guitar designed by Bo Diddley in 1959 and produced by a former Gretsch employee. Diddley built his first guitar in 1945, it was trapezoid shaped since Diddley felt that the regular shaped Gibson L5 he was playing were...

 guitar and his famous 1959 Gibson Les Paul

Gibson Les Paul

The Gibson Les Paul was the result of a design collaboration between Gibson Guitar Corporation and the late jazz guitarist and electronics inventor Les Paul. In 1950, with the introduction of the Fender Telecaster to the musical market, electric guitars became a public craze. In reaction, Gibson...

 guitar known as Pearly Gates

Pearly Gates (guitar)

Pearly Gates, also known as "Miss Pearly Gates" or simply "Pearly," is the 1959 Gibson Les Paul owned by Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top.On the television series Bones, the character of Angela Pearly-Gates Montenegro is partly named after this guitar....

. Gibbons has a Bass

Bass (voice type)

A bass is a type of male singing voice and possesses the lowest vocal range of all voice types. According to The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, a bass is typically classified as having a range extending from around the second E below middle C to the E above middle C...

 vocal range, spanning E♭1 to E♭5, one of the widest ranges in Rock

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

.