What is your opinion/take/feeling about SWEET HOME ALABAMA?

[pangaia]

Very serious question....

I've always really liked the song as just great rock 'n roll-- great groove, feel, great band, etc..
There is the 'controversy,' so to speak about the lyrics -the references to Neil Young's ALABAMA, Nixon, Wallace, etc etc.. and, at least in this video from Oakland, the flag...

While I'm at it, I could ask the same about THE NIGHT THEY DROVE OLD DIXIE DOWN,
a song I think is just brilliant, one of THE GREAT rock 'n roll bands of all time-- Levon Helm, Robbie Robertson, et al --- but then there is the controversial side also.

[jodymarie aimee]

1. Worship Neil Young, so don't cotton to anybody trashing him

In TESTIMONY Robbie Robertson tell us how a couple of BAND guys had real strong old ties to the South. Sometimes it was reflected in their choice of material.

[pangaia]

3. I like Neil also.

I read that years later Young said that Robbie was 'right' to get on him about ALABAMA, that Young felt he (Young) was being unfair in some of what he wrote.

I just found that interesting... as a part of R&R history...

[maveric]

37. Neil is an international treasure

"Old" Lynard Skynard were not a racist band. Listen to "The Ballad of Curtis Lowe". I read a Ronnie Van Zandt interview years ago in Rolling Stone. He attributed a lot of his music style to AA musicians he met growing up in Jacksonville.
No. It's not a racist song IMO.

[pangaia]

45. Totally agree

[tenderfoot]

2. Merry Clayton...

[pangaia]

8. Interesting....

That's what I was hoping for... to learn something about something...
Damn, she WAS on the session!!! I didn't know that...just missed it somehow..


You should see the great comments on the YouTube cut of the session! WOW All thrilled that Doug won..

[tenderfoot]

21. Check out '20 Feet from Stardom'

The song is discussed further. Very well done documentary

https://music.avclub.com/merry-clayton-on-20-feet-from-stardom-ray-charles-lyn-1798240198

http://twentyfeetfromstardom.com/

[IcyPeas]

56. Excellent documentary!!

all those fantastic backup singers!!

It was on BET a while back - that's where I caught it.

[lame54]

4. Neil Young is cool with it

[pangaia]

9. yeah, later he was.... good for him...

Life is SOOO complicated and layered...

[lame54]

12. And they are cool with Neil Young...

They used his quote of how much he likes the band on their live album

[pangaia]

26. Seems they were sort of 'buds.'

[treestar]

5. Since it was before the Reagan era and in the 70s

I don't assign the same thoughts to that flag. It's probably just to highlight "Southernness." I don't think they had even the slightest bit about white supremacy in their heads. I was in the South in those years, albeit at college, and racism and White Supremacy were not cool then and wouldn't be coming from any rock band in that era.

I never did get what the reference to Watergate, but just found it amusing (along with the teasing of Neil Young, who I think they were friends with, that is not meant in a serious way).

The Night they Drove Old Dixie Down is also meant to reflect that era and not literal - that probably was the attitude in that era. There is one line in it meant to extract sympathy - they should never have taken the very best - and you are like, then don't start a war to defend slavery. But the actual brother of a killed soldier would feel that way.

[pangaia]

16. I love what you wrote,

probably because that is my feeling as well...I mean, suffering is suffering.....


I lived several years in Memphis. I was there when MLK was killed..
I actually did a few sessions at STAX- YAY!

I loved it... well, most of it...... the parts you might expect...

A quote from Robbie Robertson, a Canadian -
From THE BAND
http://theband.hiof.no/

"I went from Toronto to the Mississippi Delta, and … I liked the way people talked, I liked the way they moved. I liked being in a place that had rhythm in the air. I thought 'No wonder they invented rock 'n' roll here. Everything sounds like music. … and I got to come into this world, a cold outsider - cold literally from Canada … and because I didn't take it for granted, it made me write something like The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down .These old men would say , 'Yeah, but never mind Robbie. One of these days the South is going to rise again.' I didn't take it as a joke. I thought it was really touching, that these people lived this world from the standpoint of a rocking chair.'

What he says about the 'rhythm' appealed to me, the rhythm of the life, the melody of life...--- probably as a musician....

[moriah]

29. I took it as definitely not pro-Wallace, but also not really pro-Nixon either.

There probably were people who did "what they could do" by trying to vote idiots out. But long haired freaky people in the South weren't that welcome either. At the same time, if the band members didn't vote for Nixon or didn't think the South should be blamed for him manipulating them via the Southern Strategy, then Watergate shouldn't really bother him personally.

I'm a Southerner. I love my state, Arkansas. It's gorgeous. I love many of the people -- there's a hippie enclave that would make the Castro proud for not giving two shits that people are openly genderqueer.

Sadly, it's wedged between two towns that aren't nearly as friendly...to anyone other than WASPs that go to the right church. Those are the denizens of my state that bother me... not the state itself.

We can definitely say that even if a lot of white Southern people did vote for Moore, a hell of a lot stayed home, and over 22,000 went in specifically to say that even if they weren't going to vote for a Democrat, they weren't going to vote for a child molester either.

But insofar as matching a candidate to a constituency, Doug Jones DID something to earn the massive support he received from Alabama's African-American voters. And he ran a good ground game, as did the NAACP.

Now, let's keep on earning the votes of the demographics people seem to take for granted. The strength of our big tent is that if the "little guy" pitches in with us, we'll all get together to help them and use our coalition to support everyone. If any one starts to feel taken for granted, they won't turn out.

[sweetloukillbot]

6. Drive By Truckers sum it up nicely

https://m.

[KG]

10. word. Ronnie and Neil were freinds

beat me to it.

[ret5hd]

17. This one mentions, Neil, Ronnie, George Wallace, Van Zandt and more!

[pangaia]

38. Brilliant.... I am more and more encouraged about my feelings

and opinions......

[pangaia]

20. Never heard this--

Powerful stuff.....

[Va Lefty]

7. I think many misinterpret the song as being pro Wallace

'In 1975, Van Zant said: "The lyrics about the governor of Alabama were misunderstood. The general public didn't notice the words 'Boo! Boo! Boo!' after that particular line, and the media picked up only on the reference to the people loving the governor."[5] "The line 'We all did what we could do' is sort of ambiguous," Al Kooper notes. "'We tried to get Wallace out of there' is how I always thought of it."[5] Towards the end of the song, Van Zant adds "where the governor's true" to the chorus's "where the skies are so blue," a line rendered ironic by the previous booing of the governor. Journalist Al Swenson argues that the song is more complex than it is sometimes given credit for, suggesting that it only looks like an endorsement of Wallace.[5] "Wallace and I have very little in common," Van Zant himself said, "I don't like what he says about colored people."[5]

Music historians examining the juxtaposition of invoking Richard Nixon and Watergate after Wallace and Birmingham note that one reading of the lyrics is an "attack against the liberals who were so outraged at Nixon's conduct" while others interpret it regionally: "the band was speaking for the entire South, saying to northerners, we're not judging you as ordinary citizens for the failures of your leaders in Watergate; don't judge all of us as individuals for the racial problems of southern society"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_Home_Alabama

[pangaia]

22. Thanks, I read the WIKI entry as well

This is some of the music I 'lived with' back then...
Well, there was also BS&T but that's another story.. LOL

I'm really glad to hear all the positive comments......

[Bradshaw3]

31. Good take

I loved Neil more but also loved Skynrd.

[pangaia]

39. My #1 has always been THE BAND....

Well, there is BOOKER T.. and.....

[Bradshaw3]

57. oh yeah, Green Onions

[pangaia]

58. and lots more. I mean they were the house band at Stax

and are on so many sessions...

I was in memphis for a few years in the 60s when they were there..

[MountCleaners]

34. Well, I still don't like the song

I think it's kind of evasive and tries too hard not to offend.

You can't tell he's singing "boo boo boo". It sounds like "oo oo oo".

Never understood the line about Watergate, either. It's just too vague for my taste.

[DinahMoeHum]

35. Yeah, they were no fans of Wallace. Hated him, actually.

Mostly because people like Wallace and rednecks ragged on
and picked fights with long-haired Southern guys like them.

[MiltonBrown]

11. Notice the t-shirt the singer is wearing in first vid?

Neil Young!

I think that the original Skynryd were good dudes, not racists. Jimmy Carter Democrats IMO. I can't remember the song names but the original band had several songs with very progressive lyrics.

'Watergate does not bother me, does your conscious bother you?' The second line more than makes up for the first to me. Do good and forget 'em.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

13. This

Much has been written about members of Lynyrd Skynyrd and the "feud" with Neil Young. The song includes the lines: "Well, I hope Neil Young will remember, A Southern man don't need him around anyhow." While the lyrics of "Sweet Home Alabama" do take Young to task for bashing the entire South as racist in his songs "Southern Man" and "Alabama," band members reportedly had a good-natured relationship with Young and were fans. Ronnie Van Zant is even wearing a Neil Young T-shirt on the cover of Street Survivors, the last Lynyrd Skynyrd album before his death in a 1977 plane crash.

Neil Young performed "Sweet Home Alabama" only one time: at a memorial event for the three members of Lynyrd Skynyrd who died in a plane crash in 1977: singer Ronnie Van Zant, guitarist Steve Gaines and vocalist Cassie Gaines.


Sweet Home Alabama is a great kick ass paean to a state like this one:

If I was a disc jockey I would play those two songs in succession

[pangaia]

23. KICK ASS for sure !!!

[DemocratSinceBirth]

28. Then I would play this

I think it would work

[pangaia]

41. HA HA HA !!!!

Right on Mr/Ms Birth....




Here's another -- Nelson Riddle !!!

[DemocratSinceBirth]

42. ...

The chords:

[pangaia]

47. You win

[Glorfindel]

14. I've never been a big fan of the whole "southern boogie" rock and roll genre

But just as a song, as music, "Sweet Home Alabama" isn't all that bad. "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" is a musical masterpiece, and the fact that Joan Baez chose to record it should remove all controversy about it.

[pangaia]

24. THE NIGHT... I could play listen to that for hours.......

Listening to that tune and Levon sing it is..... just about as good as playing the end of Mahler #1...

[Journeyman]

27. Or this by Richie Havens (which has the added benefit that he used the true lyrics) . . .

Joan Baez transcribed the lyrics as she listened to the song. Among the problems, in the first stanza it is "Stoneman's cavalry," and not as Baez sings "so much cavalry." Minor quibble? Perhaps. But when properly understood, the song is a damning indictment of the futility of the South's cause, the wastefulness of its efforts, and the sheer horror that was the Siege at Petersburg.

[Glorfindel]

54. Thanks, Journeyman. I had never heard that version. I love it.

Richie Havens has a wonderful, unique voice. I wish everyone on earth could understand that all war is wasteful, futile, and horrible.

[moriah]

32. I have to admit loving the song "The Devil Went Down To Georgia".

But it's because I appreciate stringed instruments used in modern music.

[MountCleaners]

36. Me too

I think Johnny was better but we northern kids liked the devil better.

[Glorfindel]

53. Everybody has one guilty pleasure song. Here's mine:

[leftynyc]

15. I have both on my ipod

I'm a yankee but do love great music.

[pangaia]

48. I'm a Mets but also love great music

[leftynyc]

49. I'm also a Met's fan

but that's a family thing. Baseball is not my game. Giants/Knicks/Rangers are my "scream until I'm hoarse" teams.

[Adrahil]

18. It's a rockin' song, but reprehensible lyrics. NT

[pangaia]

25. I agree about the song.. super..

But, I think there have been misunderstandings about the lyrics... which is sort of what I was getting at....

[DemocratSinceBirth]

19. More Skynyrd classics

[HopeAgain]

30. I love simple man

Truly a spiritual song.

[Orrex]

33. Skynyrd lost me about 70 minutes into the third verse of Freebird.

[KG]

40. like Stairway to heaven, I thought it was a cool song the first 10 thousand times i heard it

[Orrex]

43. Stairway at least has a strong finish, but I agree with you. (nt)

[DemocratSinceBirth]

46. "like Smoke On The Water, I thought it was a cool song the first 10 thousand times i heard it."

I will admit "Frank Zappa and the Mothers were at the best place in town" is a great line.

[ProfessorGAC]

52. Side Note On That Song

I went to Montreaux for a conference. (Got to tour CERN too)

Anyway, although it was closed for total renovation, i went to the Grand Hotel to see it and get my picture taken outside the front door just because of the song.

BTW: I went to the casino too, for a banquet, but it was a different building because we all know the one in the song "burned all the way to the ground. Now!"

[tazkcmo]

44. Nothing wrong with showing some pride

I think the band would be the first to admit it's not perfect but it's not a song about perfection. It's a song about home.

[Iggo]

50. If I think too hard about it, the quit-trying-to-make-me-feel-guilty vibe is a turn-off.

But's it's Southern-fried rock, so I never think too hard about it.

Just gimme some GUI-tar.

[Hoyt]

51. Sorry, Nowadays don't like those who promote confederate flags, be it Skynard, Nugent or any other

person or group.

Sorry, but today it is a symbol of hatred just like the swastika. Anyone that tone-deaf needs to have their butts kicked.



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I've seen a few cases where it's clear the confederate flag wearer/waver doesn't mean it as hatred, but those cases are few.

[pangaia]

55. Thanks. That's where I can feel caught between a rock and a hard place.

'Cause I love the music.
And that was the original Skynard in the 1970s, and they certainly were not racists...

Nugent, on the other hand, is a piece of human shit...

[Hoyt]

59. Like I said, anyone who flew that flag was "tone-deaf" at best. Neil Young knew it too.

If Mozart flew a confederate flag, swastika or the equivalent in the 1700s, I'd bash him and his music. No excuse in my mind.