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GBThe GuardianPop and rock

Frank Beard obituary

Drummer with ZZ Top for more than five decades whose mastery of the ‘Texas shuffle’ was central to their sound Renowned for being the only member of the Texan trio ZZ Top not to wear an outlandishly luxuriant beard, in spite of his surname, Frank Beard, who has died aged 77, spent more than 55 years as the band’s drummer, appearing on all their albums from ZZ Top’s First Album in 1971 to La Futura in 2012. He was als

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Ledger record
#1054
First seen
20 Aug 2026, 13:03 UTC
Last checked
20 Aug 2026, 16:48 UTC
Version history
1 version
Current fingerprint
4e2d2989cc58...576e53
01

Publisher layer

Recorded article metadata

Publisher
The Guardian
Country
England / United Kingdom
Source published
20 Aug 2026, 12:33 UTC
Source updated
No update timestamp supplied
Byline
Adam Sweeting
Section
Pop and rock
Source-supplied excerpt
Drummer with ZZ Top for more than five decades whose mastery of the ‘Texas shuffle’ was central to their sound Renowned for being the only member of the Texan trio ZZ Top not to wear an outlandishly luxuriant beard, in spite of his surname, Frank Beard, who has died aged 77, spent more than 55 years as the band’s drummer, appearing on all their albums from ZZ Top’s First Album in 1971 to La Futura in 2012. He was als
02

Change layer

Observed version timeline

  1. 1
    Initial capture

    Frank Beard obituary

    Drummer with ZZ Top for more than five decades whose mastery of the ‘Texas shuffle’ was central to their sound Renowned for being the only member of the Texan trio ZZ Top not to wear an outlandishly luxuriant beard, in spite of his surname, Frank Beard, who has died aged 77, spent more than 55 years as the band’s drummer, appearing on all their albums from ZZ Top’s First Album in 1971 to La Futura in 2012. He was als

    Changed fieldstitlebylinedescriptionTextcontentTextsourcePublishedAtsourceUpdatedAtsectionimageUrltags
    Version SHA-256
    4e2d2989cc58...576e53
    Capture SHA-256
    e450374a026b...446200
03

Interpretation layer

Labels with declared origins

Not an adjudication.

Publisher categories are copied from source metadata. Machine signals report observable wording or format and do not determine truth, intent, ethics, or wrongdoing.

  • machine content-type Reported news observable-rules-v1 / 70% rule confidence
  • machine language-signal Death or self-harm observable-rules-v1 / 65% rule confidence
  • publisher category Music rss-category
  • publisher category Pop and rock rss-category
  • publisher category Texas rss-category
  • publisher category US news rss-category
  • publisher category ZZ Top rss-category
04

Public response layer

Reception snapshots

No reviewed reception capture yet.

Comment counts and samples remain absent until a lawful, source-specific capture method is reviewed. Absence is recorded instead of estimated.

05

Evidence layer

Capture provenance

Capture ID
#465
Observed
20 Aug 2026, 13:03 UTC
HTTP result
200 / parsed
Raw payload
480,578 bytes, private gzip evidence
Collector
news-ledger/0.1
Public boundary
metadata and excerpt