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"Lynyrd Skynyrd is about an indomitable will... a survival of spirit... unbowed, uniquely American, stubbornly resolute..." That's how the band describe themselves having come back from tragedy when their plane crashed into a forest in Gillsburg, Mississippi in 1977, killing key band members Ronnie Van Zant and Steve Gaines - and various other members of their entourage - and leaving the rest of the band severely injured. Occurring in the wake of car crashes suffered by both Gary Rossington and Allen Collins at the height of their fame, with their fifth album Street Survivors released days earlier, it seemed to signal the end of the band. After some of the survivors formed the Rossington Collins, Lynyrd Skynyrd did make a comeback a decade after the accident with Johnny Van Zant as lead singer and main songwriter. It provoked legal wrangles with the estates of those who'd died but, with a series of line-up changes and without matching former glories, they stoically maintained their hard-rocking stance.Artist biography compiled by BDS/West 10. All rights reserved
