CALGARY - If anyone needs a reminder of ZZ Top's timelessness, all one has to do is check out their performance of Gimme All Your Lovin' on the '80s British music show, The Tube.

Being the mid-'80s -- and England -- the audience was made up largely of eyeliner-wearing, wedge haircut-sporting Spandau Ballet fans.

You wouldn't think this type of crowd would be much impressed by a trio of ugly, bearded Texans playing a strange boogie rock-disco hybrid.

But, and you can see for yourself on YouTube, the new wave-loving kids found their inner hombre and rocked out.

Last night, the band from Houston proved yet again why after 40 years they are still winning over new fans.

Out of the 6,000 fans who flocked to the Saddledome, there were several who looked as if they had started growing their beards the same year as singer-guitarist Billy Gibbons and bassist Dusty Hill.

But the band also attracted a large number of people whose parents were probably just kids when ZZ Top's first platinum-selling record, Tres Hombres, was released in 1973.

One thing was clear, everyone wanted to have a good time.

Since their early days, ZZ Top has comfortably situated themselves as that good-time rock band.

The trio came storming out of the late '60s and into the '70s with their own interpretation of their blues and rock 'n' roll influences.

ZZ Top was able to capture the rawness of blues, the energy of garage rock and blend it with the melodicism of British Invasion groups.

Like Aerosmith -- with whom they toured earlier this year until singer Steven Tyler fell off a stage and injured himself -- ZZ Top was a '70s band that was able to update its style and sound the next decade with enormous success.

Their 1983 album, Eliminator, spawned three hit songs -- Gimme All Your Lovin', Legs and Sharp Dressed Man.

It's no surprise tracks from this album received the loudest cheers of the evening.

They were performed with the same metronomic precision as the original album, yet as rigid as the beat was the rhythm was loose and swing-y. There was no way the crowd could stop themselves from getting up and dancing.

However, those who came just for the Eliminator tracks may have been disappointed as the group played older songs and more jammy material for most of the show.

In fact, as the first 45 minutes of the concert wore on, the crowd started to lose its energy. It's not that they weren't appreciative of the performance, but it was perhaps too laid back for what they were expecting.

The band finally kicked it up with an excellent version of the Jimi Hendrix rocker, Foxy Lady.

However, the most impressive examples of ZZ Top's fine musicianship came during renditions of earlier classics La Grange and Waitin' for the Bus from Tres Hombres, as well as the loping I'm Bad, I'm Nationwide and Cheap Sunglasses from their 1979 record, Deguello.

Here, Gibbons showed off his tremendous talent as a guitarist, while the rhythm section of Hill and drummer Frank Beard proved they were no slouches either.

Staying true to their meat 'n' potatoes roots, the stage set-up was minimalistic to say the least.

The only special effects the band utilized was the odd puff of stage fog. A large screen above the drum kit projected images of wheels, wrenches and other car-related things, but for the most part, all eyes were on raspy-voiced Gibbons and Hill, who still had those synchronized moves down pat.

Local blues veteran Tim Williams opened the show with a competetent, classic blues set in the vein, which touched upon many of the genre's greats, in particular the Butterfield Blues Band and John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers.