Welcome to another edition of From My Collection. Those who have been following this series know that all to often it serves as a tribute to a fallen metal legend. This is unfortunately one such case. This past Sunday, March 5, 2023, after years of health ailments, founding Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist Gary Rossington passed away. He was 71 years old. Being the proverbial southern rock band, it may seem strange for a metal site to pay tribute to Rossington’s storied career. However, when you consider Skynyrd’s songs have been covered by everybody from Metallica and Armored Saint to The Obsessed and Buzzov•en, not to mention their undeniable impact on the sound and aesthetic of bands like Pantera and Corrosion of Conformity, their metal credibility is more than set in stone. Today, we pay tribute to Rossington, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and the timeless southern rock n’ roll platter that is their debut, (pronounced ‘lĕh-‘nérd ‘skin-‘nérd). “Fly high free bird!”
Like most great 70s rock n’ roll bands, the Lynyrd Skynyrd story goes back to the 60s. The members got their start in ’63 playing in various garage bands, right on the cusp of the British Invasion. Allen Collins played in a band called The Mods. Ronnie Van Zant sang in a band called Us. Us beat The Mods in a battle of the bands competition, yet little did Van Zant know that in a few years time, he’d be playing alongside Collins in a band of their own. Meanwhile, Gary Rossington, Bob Burns, and Larry Junstrom formed a trio called Me, You, and Him. The three eventually befriended and started jamming with Van Zant, who in turn approached Collins about joining the fold. Together, these five determined rockers made up…My Backyard.
Yes, you read that correctly. My Backyard, who then became Conquer the Worm, who then became The Noble Five, who then became The One Percent. Are you keeping track here? Good. Come 1969, the band settled on the moniker that would stick for the rest of their lives: Lynyrd Skynyrd. The name was a joking homage to their high school P.E. teacher, Leonard Skinner, who was a real stickler for long hair, so much so that Rossington dropped out over the school’s primitive policy. Now THAT’S rock n’ roll.
The name change worked. Despite a few personnel changes, one of which included a brief stint from future Blackfoot founder Rickey Medlocke on drums, Skynyrd quickly earned a reputation as the biggest live draw in Jacksonville, Florida. They opened for national acts small and large, and soon became a headliner on their own. Their rigorous touring regiment, coupled with a handful of demos recorded in ’71 and ’72 that would be posthumously released on Skynyrd’s First and…Last (1978), caught the attention of svengali Al Kooper, who signed them on the spot to his MCA imprint, Sounds of the South. Fast forward a year later and the band released their debut album, (pronounced ‘lĕh-‘nérd ‘skin-‘nérd).
In hindsight, there couldn’t have been a better time in rock history for Lynyrd Skynyrd to make their mark on the music scene. It was the early 70s and the creative well was endless. Black Sabbath and Deep Purple were tending the fire of heavy metal. Genesis, Yes, and King Crimson were blowing minds both on stage and off with their musical prowess and lengthy compositions, later to be branded as progressive rock. Johnny Winter, Rory Gallagher, and other axeslingers revitalized the blues boom of the prior decade. The Who and The Rolling Stones were proving to be more than yesterday’s news with landmark releases of their own. And in the thick of it all lie Lynyrd Skynyrd: America’s premiere southern rock band.
(pronounced ‘lĕh-‘nérd ‘skin-‘nérd) opens with one of the greatest first song off the first album attacks of all time, “I Ain’t the One”. This hard rocking jam embodies everything brilliant about Skynyrd in just a little under 4 minutes. Ronnie Van Zant’s vocals lie somewhere between husky growls and southern soul; often imitated, never duplicated. There’s a driving groove that dares you to bob your head, but to also beware, as you never knew what this band was going to do next. And then there’s that classic guitar interplay between Rossington and Collins. Mind you, this was the early 70s, and rockers were just getting used to the twin guitar attack of Wishbone Ash. “I Ain’t the One” ups the ante tenfold, with its crushing riffs and lethal duel melodies.
Contrasting this is the first of a few ballads on this outing, “Tuesday’s Gone”. Whereas most rock acts of the 70s and beyond would place a ballad on an album in an attempt to score easy Top 40 radio airplay, “Tuesday’s Gone” is not that. Why? Because there was no way in 1973 that a winding, pseudo-symphonic, 7 and a half minute ballad was going to crack the charts. Although worlds apart musically from “I Ain’t the One”, “Tuesday’s Gone” proved that whether they were playing it soft or hard, a listener was to expect nothing less than sheer musical honesty from Skynyrd. Every word that was sung, every note that was played, every solo that was unleashed, was done so with integrity and soul.
Keeping this all killer, no filler affair rolling is what may very well be my favorite Skynyrd song ever, “Gimme Three Steps”. A tried and true boogie rocker with no frills, it’s no wonder “Gimme Three Steps” has released non-stop airplay on rock radio for half a century now. The riffs are smokin’, those southern fried leads are tasty as heck, and the whole damn song is a singalong and a half. I’m convinced that even people who HATE Skynyrd (We call those folks enemies of the state.) can recite this song word for word in their sleep. It’s that ingrained into our cultural landscape, and for good reason. The same can be said for the anthemic proto-power ballad, “Simple Man”. Like I said in the last paragraph, Van Zant could be singing about dancing with another man’s woman in one song and motherly advice in another, and still come off as what he was: genuine.
As we flip over to side B, we’re greeted by a cut that has grown rather obscure over time, “Things Goin’ On”. This simple, stripped down, southern blues rocker sounds less like a song written by Skynyrd and more like a song they’d grow up hearing played by their relatives on acoustic guitars, banjos, and washboards. It’s got that pure, old time, jug band vibe, albeit electrified for their dedicated throng of longhaired freakers. Ironically enough, this is followed by a similarly styled song that isn’t electrified, “Mississippi Kid”. With a co-writing credit from Al Kooper, “Mississippi Kid” pays homage to the band’s early country inspirations of the 50s. It’s no wonder the band subsequently earned a cult following among country fans in the years and decades to follow.
These down-home southern tunes are followed by one of the heaviest cuts in the Skynyrd canon, “Poison Whiskey”. With its dark, cautionary lyricism, thumping rhythm pocket, and driving, grinding blues-based riffage, this song right here is southern metal in its embryonic stage, boasting more in common with Black Sabbath’s debut than The Allman Brothers Band. I’m not sure why this one has been all but ignored by rock radio, considering it’s just as catchy a number as “Gimme Three Steps” and the closing cut that speaks for itself, “Free Bird”. What can be said about this southern epic that hasn’t been said already? I’ll be the first to admit I tend to switch “Free Bird” when it comes on the radio, simply because its been played that much. However, as a finale to this album? Let’s just say I can’t turn the volume knob on my stereo far enough to the right, especially during the infamous closing guitar onslaught.
To the surprise of literally nobody, (pronounced ‘lĕh-‘nérd ‘skin-‘nérd) took the rock n’ roll world by storm. Skynyrd landed a spot on The Who’s blockbuster Quadrophenia Tour, and the album was soon certified gold, then platinum. For the next four years, Skynyrd would continue to endlessly tour and record, becoming bigger with each studio outing, before their untimely 1977 plane crash which prematurely ended the lives of Van Zant, guitarist Steve Gaines, and his sister, backup singer Cassie Gaines. As the years and decades passed, so did every original and classic member of Skynyrd, save for drummer Artimus Pyle. When you couple this with the tragic fate of the band’s initial run, their music becomes even more haunting.
And yet it lives on. It lives through movies and TV shows and video games and commercials. Through endless classic rock radio airplay and the current tribute incarnation that features Van Zant’s brother Johnny at the helm, and Rickey Medlocke, this time on guitars. It lives through an impassioned fanbase of headbangers, country folk, blues aficionados, fellow musicians, hellraisers, and rock n’ rollers of all ages, all backgrounds, all walks of life. Skynyrd lives, man. Skynyrd will live forever…and ever…and ever.