Band Of The Week - Lynyrd Skynyrd

Once again I wanted to remind everyone our 'Together-Gather' Year End Bloggers Party on 30 December 2006, Federal Hotel Kuala Lumpur. We still need more participants and sponsors to make this happening event more successful. The party is open for everyone (blogger, semi-blogger and non blogger). Please be an early bird to register to get better offer.

Alright... back to my usual weekend post - Band Of The Week, this week I'm going to introduce you all - Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Ok, never forget to share with you some of my favorite songs from Lynyrd Skynyrd. First is 'Free Bird', this song has been voted as one of the top 10 best guitar solo till now. Second is 'Sweet Home Alabama', I think most of you heard this song before. Third is 'Tuesday's Gone', another famous song from Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Click 'Play' for music



Lynyrd Skynyrd - Free Bird



Lynyrd Skynyrd - Sweet Home Alabama



Lynyrd Skynyrd - Tuesday's Gone

About Lynyrd Skynyrd (source from wikipedia)

Lynyrd Skynyrd (pronounced /leh-nerd skin-nerd/) is a U.S. Southern rock band, described by All Music Guide's Stephen Thomas Erlewine as "the definitive Southern rock band, fusing the overdriven power of blues-rock with a rebellious, Southern image and a hard rock swagger." The band reached prominence during the 1970s under the leadership of vocalist and primary songwriter Ronnie Van Zant until he died, along with several other members of the band, in a plane crash in 1977.

Lynyrd Skynyrd

Lynyrd Skynyrd was one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed Southern Rock groups of the 1970's and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 13, 2006. Their distinctive triple-lead guitar sound made their songs "Free Bird", and "Sweet Home Alabama" American anthems and staples of FM radio. Members inducted include: Ronnie Van Zant, Gary Rossington, Allen Collins, Leon Wilkeson, Bob Burns, Billy Powell, Ed King, Artimus Pyle and Steve Gaines.


History

The band, first called My Backyard, was formed in Gainesville, Florida in the summer of 1964 by teenage friends Ronnie Van Zant (vocals), Allen Collins (guitar), Gary Rossington (guitar), Larry Junstrom (bass), and Bob Burns (drums). Their early influences included British Invasion bands such as Free, The Yardbirds, and The Beatles, as well as Southern blues and country & western music.

During the 1960s, the band changed names several times (most notably The Noble Five and One Percent) while playing local dances and clubs in Jacksonville. In 1968 they won a local Battle of the Bands contest, using the prize money to record the songs "Need All My Friends" and "Michelle", the former released as their debut single on Jacksonville-based Shade Tree Records. They also won the opening slot on several Southeast shows for California-based psychedelic rock band Strawberry Alarm Clock.

Lynyrd Skynyrd

The Journey...

- Peak years, 1970-1977


- Plane crash, 1977

Lynyrd Skynyrd's legend is grounded in a plane crash that occurred on October 20, 1977, three days after the release of Street Survivors. A chartered Convair 240 carrying the band between shows from Greenville, South Carolina to LSU in Baton Rouge, Louisiana crashed near a forest in McComb, Mississippi. A damaged magneto in the right engine resulted in the plane literally running out of fuel. The resulting crash killed singer/songwriter Ronnie Van Zant, guitarist/vocalist Steve Gaines, vocalist Cassie Gaines, assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter McCreary and co-pilot William Gray. Other band members were injured, some very seriously. Drummer Artimus Pyle crawled out of the plane wreckage with several broken ribs, yet ran nearly a mile to a farmhouse to try to get help. The farmer Johnny Mote, on first seeing the wild-haired blood- and mud-encrusted drummer babbling incoherently, greeted him with a (non-fatal) shotgun blast to his shoulder. Only when Mote realized that this person was connected with the plane crash he had just heard did he call for help. Allen Collins suffered two cracked vertebrae in his neck, and both Collins and Leon Wilkeson nearly had arms amputated as a result of crash injuries. Wilkeson suffered severe internal injuries, a punctured lung, and had most of his teeth knocked out. Gary Rossington broke both of his arms and both of his legs in the crash, and took many months to recuperate. Leslie Hawkins sustained a concussion, broke her neck in three places and had severe facial lacerations.

Only pianist Billy Powell was relatively unhurt, but he nearly had his nose torn off and suffered severe facial lacerations. He later caused a controversy by giving a lurid account of Cassie Gaines' final moments on a VH1 Behind The Music special about the band, claiming that the backing singer's throat was cut from ear to ear and that she bled to death in his arms. Powell also claimed that Ronnie Van Zant's head had been smashed. Powell's version of events has been discounted by both Artimus Pyle and Judy Van Zant Jenness, who posted the autopsy reports on the band's website in early 1998 in order to set the record straight.

After Plane Crash - Lynyrd Skynyrd

- Hiatus, 1977-1986

Rossington and Collins formed The Rossington-Collins Band between 1980 and 1982, releasing two albums. Pyle formed The Artimus Pyle Band in 1982. Collins formed The Allen Collins Band in 1983. Tragedy struck the band again in 1986 when Collins crashed his car while driving drunk near his home in Jacksonville, killing his girlfriend and leaving him permanently paralyzed from the waist down.


- Reunion years, 1987-present

On November 28, 2005, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame announced that Lynyrd Skynyrd would be inducted alongside Black Sabbath, Blondie, Miles Davis, and the Sex Pistols. They were inducted in the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in Manhattan on March 13, 2006. Lynyrd Skynyrd had been nominated 7 times.

Performing 'Free Bird'

Lynyrd Skynyrd in live

Lynyrd Skynyrd - present

Lynyrd Skynyrd... The rock band never dies!!!


Happy Weekend!!!