Lynyrd Skynyrd (Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd)

I don’t review many albums…because frankly I’m not great at it and there are other sites that do it much better…but I wanted to give this one a try.

Looking back on this album…it was one of the greatest debut rock albums of all time. The track listing

I Ain’t the One
Tuesday’s Gone
Gimme Three Steps
Simple Man
Things Goin’ On
Mississippi Kid
Poison Whiskey
Free Bird

That is four classic rock songs on their debut album! It’s great if you can luck out with one good song on your first two albums. There is not a weak song on here. They had been playing around 7 or so years by this time… around Jacksonville and Atlanta. They did not improvise like other bands…they played for the song and the song only.

Al Kooper discovered them in a rough club called Funochio’s in Atlanta Georgia. He ended up signing them on MCA’s Sounds of the South label and produced this album. They were called the American Rolling Stones and their concerts backed that claim up.

It was idiotic but they were compared to the Allman Brothers…who had nothing in common except both were from the south. The Allmans were a very versatile blues/jazz/rock jam band and Lynryd Skynryd was a southern rock band that was influenced by British rock and blues… the closer comparison would have been Paul Rodgers’s band Free. One listen to I Ain’t The One will verify that.

I Ain’t The One – One of my favorite songs on the album. It does remind me of the band Free with Paul Kossoff’s guitar sound. A rocker…

Tuesday’s Gone – A simple epic song that is structured beautifully. One of their best slower songs.

Gimmer Three Steps – A song that has been played and played on the radio but a rocker about getting out of Dodge really quick.

Simple Man – The song is simple and effective… now it’s been in numerous commercials. It’s the third most streaming song from LS just behind Free Bird and Sweet Home Alabama.

Free Bird – The signature song of their career. It usually ends up in the top 3 of the best rock songs. Both Stairway to Heaven and this one build up into a never to be forgotten ending. This one ended each of their shows with an incredible high. When they played this at Knebworth no other band could touch it.

They only released 5 albums in their career before the crash. Of those 5 albums, 3 were great and 2 were really good.

Robert Christgau…the crusty rock critic loved this band and album: Lacking both hippie roots and virtuosos, post-Allmanites like ZZ Top, Marshall Tucker, and Wet Willie become transcendently boring except when they get off a good song. But in this staunchly untranscendent band, lack of virtuosos is a virtue, because it inspires good songs, songs that often debunk good-old-boy shibboleths. Examples: “Poison Whiskey,” “Mississippi Kid,” and “Gimme Three Steps,” when Ronnie Van Zant, instead of outwitting the dumb redneck the way onetime Dylan sideman Charlie Daniels does in “Uneasy Rider,” just hightails it out of there. Savvy production from onetime Dylan sideman Al Kooper. A

Advertisement

Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball fan, old movie and tv show fan... and a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

26 thoughts on “Lynyrd Skynyrd (Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd)”

  2. With “Tuesday’s Gone”, “Gimme Three Steps”, “Simple Man” and the epic “Free Bird” you have three Lynyrd classics – so, yes, “(Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd)” has to be one of the best rock debut albums. I have an errand to run that involves an-hour car ride – perfect opportunity to listen to that album again!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

      2. To me…there is not a bad song on the album…the same with their second album. I think they have got more appreciation through the years. Mississippi Kid is also a favorite of mine.

        Liked by 1 person

  5. This is one of those albums where it reminds me of exactly where I was and what I was doing when it was on the airwaves. I was hanging out at a little berg town’s bar where my mom was a bartender and the guy I liked was a wild man who was so full of life and seemed so much like the spirit of Lynyrd Skynyrd music. He loved to play Gimme Three Steps on the jukebox. He later ended up getting killed in a freak accident, where a truckload of steel rods came loose on a truckbed and he was behind it in his vehicle and was crushed to death 😦

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  6. definitely a very good album and excellent for a debut! I didn’t know ‘Tuesday’s Gone’ but the other three you mention are indeed classics. As bands go, talent-wise do you think they were better or Allman Bros? The two seem to get lumped together a lot.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. That suprises me about Tuesday’s Gone…but it’s probably because of where I live I guess…from what we talked about yesterday…it’s the 5th most streamed song right behind Gimme Three Steps.

      No they were not as versatile as the Allman Brothers at all…not many rock bands were and that includes the Stones and other bands… They were a well-rehearsed band that didn’t improvise but…were more commercial than the Allmans. I would compare them to the Stones, Aerosmith, and other rock bands…the songwriting set them apart.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

Leave a Reply

Please log in using one of these methods to post your comment:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

%d bloggers like this: