Remembrance

Won't you fly high, Freebirds, yeah...

BLACK CREEK - "Free Bird" is Lynyrd Skynyrd's "It's not you, it's me" classic Southern Rock anthem recorded in 1973 for their debut album Lynyrd Skynyrd (Pronounced 'Lĕh-'nérd 'Skin-'nérd). The first line of the song (If I leave here tomorrow, would you still remember me?) came from guitarist Allen Collins' girlfriend (Kathy Johns) who once asked him that question and he used it as his inspiritation for the song. Despite the finality of the lyrics, Collins and Johns eventually got married in 1970. Collins worked on the song for about two years before the band would play it for the first time. Frontman Ronnie Van Zant initially wasn't crazy about the song because he thought it had too many chords. However, after hearing Collins and Gary Rossington play an unused sequence one night, Ronnie ended up writing the rest of the lyrics in less than four minutes. "Free Bird" worked perfectly as the closing track to the first album, since it was always the last song played at shows. The guitar solos at the end were orginally added to give Ronnie a chance to rest, as the band was playing several sets per night at clubs at the time. Soon afterwards, the band learned classic pianist/roadie Billy Powell had written a beautiful introduction to the song. They included the distinctive intro as the finishing touch to the song and then formally added Powell to the band as their keyboardist. Due to the nine-minute length of the song, it was never a big hit on traditional radio stations peaking at #19 on the U.S. Billboard chart on January 25, 1975. The song did become a staple on the "new" FM rock stations of the 70s and is still a mainstay on classic rock stations to this day. "Free Bird" by most all credible accounts, is one of the best rock songs ever written, or recorded. Lynyrd Skynyrd left us on October 20, 1977 when their rinky-dink plane crashed near Gillsburg, Mississippi killing Ronnie, Steve Gaines, Cassie Gaines, their assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter McCreary and co-pilot John Gray. Other band members including Collins, Rossington, Powell, Leon Wilkeson, Artimus Pyle, Leslie Hawkins and tour manager Ron Eckerman and several road crew members suffered serious injuries. Skynyrd did leave us on that tragic day, but we still remember them. The last line of "Free Bird" is Won't you fly high, free bird, yeah. In Week 10 of the BDFL, the Freebirds soared high for a rare vict'ry this season by bludgeoning the Bullets (48-29) in a bloody Brother Bowl down on the reservation that will be remembered around Black Creek for a long while.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The Armadillos won this week's "Top Gun" award in the BDFL with 50 points in a late night vict'ry over the Blitz and were not the featured story on TheBDFL.com this week due to a press time that came earlier than the end of Monday Night Football (MNF).

Free Bird by Lynyrd Skynyrd - Live (1977)