

They wanted me to come on for a tribute tour. I walked into a room, and here are these guys who survived the crash with my brother. Ten years after the crash, I was called into a meeting. Lynyrd Skynyrd was going to go on with my brother forever. Johnny Van Zant: I had never wanted to be in the band. In 1987, Rossington and other pre-crash members organized a reunion tour and approached Johnny Van Zant, a solo artist at the time, about joining as lead vocalist. Rossington also survived the crash and today is the band’s sole living original member still performing. Released as a single in November 1974, 'Free Bird' entered the US Billboard Hot 100 on November 23 at No. The song is featured on their 1973 debut album. Collins survived the crash with serious injuries. 'Free Bird', also spelled 'Freebird', is a song by American rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd, written by guitarist Allen Collins and lead singer Ronnie Van Zant.

On October 20, 1977, as the band was flying between shows in South Carolina and Louisiana, the charter plane ran out of fuel and crashed in a Mississippi forest, killing six passengers, including Van Zant. Lynyrd Skynyrd in 1977, shortly before the plane crash that killed six passengers, including Ronnie Van Zant.
#Free bird song free
“Bye bye, baby, it’s been a sweet love,” doesn’t mean a final goodbye to me. Free Bird Lyrics Intro Verse 1 If I leave here tomorrow Would you still remember me For I must be traveling on, now Cause theres too many places Ive got to see Pre-Chorus But if I stay. Rickey Medlocke: The way Ronnie wrote lyrics, you got out of it the meaning in your own way. It wasn’t so heavy or nothing to us at first. We were playing everywhere we could play. This time Ronnie said, “Play that again.” Allen played the chords, then I’d play them, and Ronnie just sat there and wrote the lyrics, a love song. He’d lie there and hear mistakes and say, “Let’s fix that.” When one of us would get a good idea going, he’d say, “Play it, play.”Īllen had these chords, and he’d play them over and over, but at first Ronnie thought there were too many chord changes to write lyrics to. Ronnie used to always lie on the couch after two or three hours of rehearsing. Gary Rossington: One rehearsal day, Allen started playing the chords to “Free Bird” at the house where we used to hang out after school and after we quit school.
