That was until I got older and came to understand our past, including George Wallace, segregation, and Reaganomics. Like many Alabamians, I had a tortured relationship with Lynyrd Skynyrd and their confederate flag-flying ways. A true Skynyrd fan can’t omit that fact that “Tuesday’s Gone” is perhaps the only song in the oeuvre of Southern rock that will make your pawpaw cry. More than any of the talented acts that had that Muscle Shoals Sound, I remember my sweet, hard-working grandfather changing the cassette tape in his truck to Skynyrd after listening to an Elvis gospel record on the way to the Northside Grocery Store to get me a Dr. I was surrounded by the tracks of every musician the Swampers played with-mostly Aretha Franklin, but Percy Sledge, Wilson Pickett, and Bob Dylan made their respective ways into my boombox when my sister or parents were finished with the CDs. I listened to the Drive-By Truckers as an elementary school student with a cool older sister. Growing up in Russellville, Alabama-a mere 15-minute drive from Muscle Shoals through the cotton flats on Highway 43-taught me a thing or two about music. I’ll be damned if anyone tells me “Free Bird” shouldn’t define my South. Lynyrd Skynyrd is as much a part of my heritage as my marble-mouthed Alabama accent, my affinity for biscuits, and the holes in the soles of my used Laredos. My sister and I drunkenly danced to “Gimme Three Steps” in a gas station parking lot in New Orleans during Mardi Gras. “Sweet Home Alabama” has played at nearly every ball game I’ve ever attended. The gym teacher played “Free Bird” at the middle school dance the night I got my first kiss. ’Cause there's too many places I've got to see. As much as I love the Truckers, I know they wouldn’t sound the same if Lynyrd Skynyrd never recorded “Free Bird” in 1971 at the hottest studio at the time - Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. I never saw Lynyrd Skynyrd, but I sure saw the Drive-By Truckers.
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