(Credit: Alamy)
Sat 20 September 2025 19:45, UK
As is the perennial theme of 1970s classic rock, the creeping presence of drugs and alcohol began to derail Lynyrd Skynyrd just as fortunes were looking certain.
Lynyrd Skynyrd had been slogging it for the best part of ten years under various band names before settling on their namesake lampoon of their stuffy PE teacher from high school. Before long, their distinctive blend of country, blues, and hard rock would thrust the Jacksonville band to the definitive act of the southern rock explosion, finding near universal acclaim with 1973’s (Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd) and its immortal ‘Freebird’.
Further albums would follow around their defining ‘Sweet Home Alabama’, but internal fractures would test Lynyrd Skynyrd’s resolve. The original drummer, Bob Burns, had called it quits, producer Al Kooper had distanced himself after dissatisfaction with the Nuthin’ Fancy sessions, and guitarist Ed King walked away halfway through its associated tour. Plenty of drink, cocaine, and heroin had entered Lynyrd Skynyrd’s lives too, frontman Ronnie Van Zant claiming the indulgences were to ease the pressure of performing to large crowds.
The abuse of drink and drugs began to trigger reckless behaviour. While recording Lynyrd Skynyrd’s fifth album, guitarist Gary Rossington crashed his Ford Torino with new additional guitarist Allen Collins into an oak tree along Jacksonville’s Mandarin Road while whacked on Quaaludes. Significantly delaying the album sessions, Van Zant found the time to absorb the accident’s bad vibes that had only compounded the dark clouds hovering over the band during the tail-end of 1976.
“I had a creepy feeling things were going against us, so I thought I’d write a morbid song,” Van Zant stated.
Appearing on 1977’s Street Survivors, ‘That Smell’ sought to capture the pervading fog of destruction that held its grip on Lynyrd Skynyrd, Van Zant articulating death’s malevolent stench ever inching closer as the partying turns stale and ever less fun. Highlighting the crash specifically, Rossington had found himself gifted with a new moniker: “Now they call you Prince Charming / Can’t speak a word when you’re full of ‘ludes / Say you’ll be alright come tomorrow / But tomorrow might not be here for you”.
Fortunes looked to start favouring Lynyrd Skynyrd once again, however. The recruited Honkette backing singers had been a success, and one third of the new singing group, Cassie Gaines, had brought her younger brother and guitar maestro Steve into the fold, all impressing the band with his skills. Following a successful show in Oakland’s Green Festival and an anticipated tour, a silver age looked set for Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Yet, “that smell” would eventually stop the band in their tracks. After a show in South Carolina’s Greenville on October 20th, 1977, the band boarded a chartered plane for Louisiana, where mid-flight the aircraft ran out of fuel and an emergency landing was attempted by the pilots, crashing in a forest and killing Van Zant, Steve and Cassie Gaines, assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, and both pilots.
The tragedy striking just three days after Street Survivors’ release, Van Zant never got to see Lynyrd Skynyrd’s fifth LP sailing to number five on the Billboard 200, their highest position yet. Standing as a fan favourite, ‘That Smell’ marks an eerie and uncanny cut in the Jacksonville band’s songbook, a slice of hard rock clairvoyance wrought from gut feelings and sinister premonition.
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