(Credits: Far Out / MCA Records)
Tue 17 February 2026 18:00, UK
A lot of people assume that for a band to work, each member needs to be like-minded, but Lynyrd Skynyrd was out there proving the contrary.
It’s a sentiment echoed in the 2012 Tenacious D song, ‘Roadie’, the comedic duo’s song about how the backstage members of a band are often overlooked. While we might look upon our favourite rock stars with adoration, they wouldn’t be able to play the music that they do without roadies working backstage, ensuring guitars are tunes, amps are loaded, and sound is checked.
This is a fact that applies to all bands out there. Without their stage technicians, these musicians on whom we pin all our hopes and dreams would be reduced to acoustic sets in scruffy-looking cafes. Next time you’re watching your favourite band in a big arena, spare a thought for the roadie, the rock god behind the rock god.
While every band owes a lot to their helping hands, no band owes more than Lynyrd Skynyrd, as without the help of their backstage hand, Billy Powell, they would have never reached the heights that they did. Before they began working with him, a lot of their tracks (which would become hits) were either half-finished or being performed in a middling manner to lacklustre audiences, not fully fleshed out.
Turns out their secret weapon to scaling success had been under their noses the entire time, in the form of Powell, who was working for the band as a roadie for two years before he even revealed that he could play the piano. It wasn’t until they were leading gear onto the stage prior to a gig at a high school that he played a little something on the keys, and the rest of the band members watched in awe.
Upon hearing him, lead singer Ronnie Van Zant walked over to ask him about this hidden talent. “You mean to tell me,” he said, mind still processing what he had just heard, “You’ve been playing the piano like that, and you’ve been working for us as a roadie for a year?!”
The band wasted no time in enlisting his help, as he was asked to play piano for them that very night. While he might not have known the songs he was expected to play, it didn’t take much for him to sound them out, and he began adding his own dash of panache. The reason this musical relationship worked out so well, however, wasn’t because Powell played in a way which was similar to the rest of Lynyrd Skynyrd, but because he brought something different to the band.
When you’re trying to write music, if you hit a creative wall, it’s no good having everyone try to take it down the same way, as eventually, your hammers will shatter in your hand, those swinging them will tire, and despite the tribulations, the wall will remain standing. To counter that, you will need a different approach and one person to put the demolition kits down and just go get a ladder. That’s what Powell did.
The rest of Lynyrd Skynyrd were street musicians who taught themselves and had quite a grainy sound as a result. On the other hand, Powell was classically trained, offering a different interpretation of rock music that allowed differing minds to come together and lead to the development of the band’s biggest song, ‘Free Bird’, originally a slow ballad and a jam that earned its wings (so to speak) when he added those classical-sounding keys. Powell did this with a plethora of their other songs, too, and helped them find their iconic sound that would become known worldwide, proving that sometimes the missing piece of a band is just behind the curtains.