Published: January 06, 2009 10:34 am      

At Random: Radcliffs think Billy Gibbons is Tops

Brian Radcliff didn’t think twice about the thin man with a red beard who walked into his store, Radcliff’s Buffalo Nickel Antique Mall, around 5 p.m. last Tuesday night.

After a few moments, he said he realized the man looked familiar.

“The sun was very bright when he walked in and I couldn’t see him at first. I didn’t even recognize him. I finally got around to telling him, ‘Man, I know you,’” Radcliff said during an interview at the antique shop he and his wife, Sue, own on U.S. Highway 82 in Gainesville.

It turns out a lot of people know him. The visitor was Billy Gibbons — a guitarist for the band, ZZ Top.

“When he told me who he was, oh my gosh. I couldn’t believe it,” Radcliff said.

The trio was in town to perform a New Year’s Eve concert at WinStar World Casino.

The band is known for their slightly risqué song lyrics and twirling guitars and songs which include “La Grange,” “Sharp-Dressed Man” and “Cheap Sunglasses.”

Sue Radcliff said she was also in the store when the musician and his companion — a “tall, pretty blonde haired woman” — came in.

“I’m not sure if it was a publicist or his girlfriend or who it was. She was pretty, but she wasn’t movie-star pretty,” she said of Gibbon’s female friend.

Gibbons charmed the couple with his pleasant attitude.

He didn’t seem like an arrogant, spoiled rock star.

“He was very nice, very sweet,” Sue Radcliff said.

The Radcliffs admit they weren’t really ZZ Top fans before they met Gibbons.

Their friend and coworker, Bobbi Irwin, wasn’t in the store when Gibbons and his companion came in, but she said she’s known about ZZ Top for a long time and is a fan.

“They’re all from Texas. They started in the Houston area,” she said.

The Radcliffs said Gibbons looked at the store’s supply of antique items including saddles, jewelry and both western and primitive Indian artifacts.

Sue Radcliff said he did buy some things — a necklace for his companion, an antique pistol (Radcliff’s Buffalo Nickel does not stock or sell working firearms), a small painting and some postcards.

Before the couple left in a chauffeured vehicle, Gibbons pulled a little notepad out of his jacket pocket and scrawled an autograph for the Radcliffs.

“He keeps a notepad just for autographs. It’s got his character on it,” Brian Radcliff said.

Gibbons also apparently took part in a local tradition.

Outside the door of the shop, there’s a statue of a buffalo. According to the Radcliffs, visitors who stop and rub the buffalo’s nose find their luck improved.

“We got a picture of Billy rubbing the buffalo’s nose for good luck,” Sue said, laughing.