![]() ![]() ![]() The publicity about the crash (and, to be fair, the quality of the music) made Street Survivors a success, peaking at #5 on the Billboard charts and spawning two successful singles: the raunchy “What’s Your Name” and the cautionary “That Smell.”Īfter recovering from their injuries, most of the survivors started their own bands or played with others over course of the next decade. The rest of the band, manager and crew all suffered serious injuries. Van Zant and the two Gaines were killed, along with the pilot, co-pilot and the band’s assistant road manager. On their way from Greenville, South Carolina to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, their chartered plane ran out of fuel and crashed in Mississippi. That future lasted exactly three days after the release of Street Survivors. ![]() Van Zant was enthralled by Gaines’ talent, and expressed excitement about the band’s future. Steve Gaines’ contributions to 1977’s Street Survivors rejuvenated the band. He actually auditioned onstage and got the job, appearing on the live One More From the Road, which included the epic, 13-minutes-plus version of “Free Bird” that concertgoers still yell for, no matter who is performing, and despite the fact that the joke stopped being funny decades ago. During this period, new backup singer Cassie Gaines suggested that her brother Steve might be a fit. The next album, Gimme Back My Bullets, despite the great title, was another disappointment. Album three, Nuthin’ Fancy (featuring new drummer Artimus Pyle), was a bit of a letdown, and after its release, Ed King left the band, destroying their trademark three-guitar barrage. The follow-up, Second Helping, neatly dodged the sophomore jinx, hitting #12 on the Billboard charts it featured the top 10 single “Sweet Home Alabama,” which created the myth of a rivalry between the band and Neil Young. It reached #19 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, propelled in part by the legendary “Free Bird,” a song that will be played as long as rock music exists. It set the stage for pretty much every other band that is lumped into the genre, whether willingly or kicking and screaming. The album is pure Southern rock, a mix of rock, blues, country and soul, but without most of the jazzy influences that informed the Allman Brothers’ sound. Which is what any teacher would want.) After some more changes, they were “discovered” in 1972 by Al Kooper, and the band became “Lynyrd Skynyrd.” Today’s featured album, their debut, was released on August 13, 1973, and featured Van Zant, Collins, Rossington, drummer Bob Burns, keyboard player Billy Powell, bassist Leon Wilkeson and bassist/guitarist Ed King. (He was so insistent on enforcing this critical pedagogical rule that it caused Rossington to drop out of school. They went through names and members until they decided, in 1970, to call themselves “Leonard Skinnerd,” in mocking tribute to their high school gym teacher, Leonard Skinner, who annoyed the musicians by enforcing the school’s policy against long hair. So this piece may lack a certain consistency, but if a band can tour as Lynyrd Skynyrd with only one original member, then we can still do this.ĭespite their eternal connection to Alabama, Lynyrd Skynyrd’s roots are actually from Jacksonville, Florida, where singer Ronnie Van Zant and guitarists Allen Collins and Gary Rossington formed The Noble Five in 1964. While neither of the Gaines siblings appeared on it, they certainly played its classic songs in concert, and probably even some of the lesser-known ones. We’re remembering them by giving the Full Album treatment to the band’s debut album, (Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd). A 30th-anniversary re-issue, released in 2007, restored the original image back on the front.This is a hybrid piece, melding together two Cover Me staples, “In Memoriam” and “Full Albums,” prompted by today’s anniversary of the plane crash that killed Lynyrd Skynyrd members Ronnie Van Zant, Steve Gaines, and his sister Cassie Gaines. WHAT HAPPENED AFTERWARDS: At the request of the band’s families, the fiery picture was moved to the back of the album, and a new photo from the same shoot - with the band placed against a black background - was used on the cover. The album cover featured a photograph - shot at Universal Studios - of the band engulfed in flames: an image that was hard to ignore as an unfortunate and macabre premonition of the tragedy that soon followed. On October 20, 1977, just three days after the album was released, a chartered plane carrying the three bandmates crashed in Louisiana, taking seven lives in all. THE CONTROVERSY: The fifth album from the legendary Southern rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd, Street Survivors, was, sadly, the last album recorded by founding members Ronnie Van Zant and Allen Collins, as well as new guitarist Steve Gaines. ![]()
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