...the Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd show.

The BBC broadcasted a piece about Southern Rock, over the weekend. I recorded and watched it and it should really have been called the Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd show. Absolutely no complaints from me on that point.
I have albums from both bands, one or two from the Allman Brothers and five Lynyrd Skynyrd albums. My first Skynyrd acquisition was "First...and Last" and whilst it is an odd album, it does have "Comin' Home" on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i048vKpaALU
Of course there are the obligatory hits, "Sweet Home Alabama" and "Freebird" dedicated to Ronnie's hero, Duane Allman, but "Comin' Home" has everything, great lyrics, a melancholy feel to it, musical craftsmanship, an easy feel and lots of bite when needed and it couldn't come from anywhere else but the Southern States of America. Lynyrd Skynyrd were far more than a redneck Southern band, they fused blues, jazz, rock and country into something fresh but with some heritage to it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PT3XYUegiNs
I love Lynyrd Skynyrd, I love "Sweet Home Alabama", enough that I had to learn it on the guitar and the solos in it are sods to play. This is a band that I have actually loved more as time has gone on, I appreciate them far more now than at 15 years old and it seems to get stronger year on year. Just for the record, nothing against the reincarnation of the band but it is the 1976 version that I love.

Freebird live in 1976: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuZyMx2NXZM

Now the Allman Brothers were a different kettle of fish, they didn't have the big song until "Top Gear" used "Jessica" as it's theme song and whilst it is a great song, they have done better and they have a phenomenal singer in Greg Allman but it was his brother, Duane Allman that made the band so special and it makes his death at the age of 24, all the more tragic. His guitar playing is both intuitive and easy with an abundance of technical ability but his tone and feel are gifts, they can't be learned, those are talents you are born with.
For those that aren't familiar with the Allman Brothers and Duane Allman, he was dead by the time "Jessica" was written and released but you will be more familiar Derek and the Dominoes, "Layla". That song started life as a ballad and it was Duane Allman that wrote the rock riff and it is his slide guitar solo that sparkles and dazzles, Clapton's best song after Cream split and he wasn't the person that made it special, Duane Allman was.
Here is the Allman Brothers and a song called "Dreams" just to show how smooth Duane's playing was: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fyhyor0yU3o
You know that he is jamming that, he's in the zone, playing from the heart and the tone and fluidity of his playing is simply beautiful. I originally heard this song covered by Molly Hatchet, their's is a fine version but the original is in a whole new league.
Here is "Little Martha" and the story behind this song is that Jimi Hendrix showed him this song in a dream and he woke up and wrote it down: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmSPCOby-1A

The Allman Brothers were a mixed band, at a time when segregation and racism in the Southern states was the norm. They had a black drummer and championed black music, they were ahead of the curve in so many ways, Duane Allman was a musician, the talisman of the band, the older brother and leader and this was his dream. He worked in mixed studios, recorded for black artists and loved the blues, he should have been the future.

Ronnie Van Zant, leader of Lynyrd Skynyrd was widely considered to be racist, even the BBC documentary  held up "Sweet Home Alabama" as proof of that with the lyric,
"In Birmingham they love the Governor
We all did what we could do"
Wallace was the Governor and he supported segregation and the assumption, from the BBC, was that the "We all did what we could do" line was in support of him but what they missed was the full line,
"In Birmingham they love the Guv'nor (Boo, Boo, Boo)
"We all did what we could do"
It was a sarcastic line and without the "Boo, Boo, Boo" it becomes a racist line in support of Wallace, that was very lazy journalism on the part of the BBC, so I checked some more into Ronnie Van Zant and whilst Skynyrd did fly the confederate flag in the early days, Ronnie wasn't comfortable with the meaning behind it and stopped using it as a backdrop as well as dropping "Dixie" as the opening song they came on to. Ronnie Van Zant sang about ecology, cared about racism, thought there should be more gun control and disliked drugs and in his spare time at school he was a poet. So this hard drinking, gun toting wild man of rock was all of that as well and despite coming from a Republican family, he supported Jimmy Carter in his Presidential run (as did the Allman Brothers Band), a Democrat.
It seems to be very easy to tar someone with the racism moniker, particularly when they are born in what was considered the last bastion of racism, all you need to do take a few badly used symbols, mis-quote a lyric and feed peoples prejudices.

Southern Rock was epitomized by those two bands. I went on to adore the Georgia Satellites (a seriously good live band), Blackfoot, Molly Hatchett, 38 Special, the Marshall Tucker Band, Ozark Mountain Daredevils and many other obscure and brilliant groups but it all goes back to the founding fathers, Duane Allman and Ronnie Van Zant, the guys that pooled all the influences into the blender and concocted a powerful brew, a new kind of moonshine that gave rise to a new kind of South.

Duane Allman was killed in a motorbike crash in 1971 at the age of 24.

Ronnie Van Zant was killed in 1976 in a plane crash at the age of 29.