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There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.
Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.
Yes we’ll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we’ll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.
by Shel Silverstein
The steel mill sky is alive.
The fire breaks white and zigzag
shot on a gun-metal gloaming.
Man is a long time coming.
Man will yet win.
Brother may yet line up with brother:
This old anvil laughs at many broken hammers.
There are men who can’t be bought.
The fireborn are at home in fire.
The stars make no noise,
You can’t hinder the wind from blowing.
Time is a great teacher.
Who can live without hope?
In the darkness with a great bundle of grief
the people march.
In the night, and overhead a shovel of stars for keeps, the people
march:
“Where to? what next?”
— Carl Sandberg
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FluhhhK YeaHHH!
When my stockers would work an all night shift, every Thursday night, in Seattle at the old REI, the playlist was always topped by Freebird. The crew would go nuts and be energized for a couple hours after that. This is the same exact place that, 30 years hence, was declared the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone. Although I’m certain that there was a lot of free-bird’n in the CHAZ, in my estimate that fukn place was anything but free. Unless you were the warlord who slept at the Olympic every night, free-basin coke off of hooker tits, and handin’ out M4s to lucky kids in the zone after breakfast. That guy was free. He was goddamned Che Guevara and Joseph Stalin all rolled up into one. FreeeeBrrRRRRRRddd!
It was LS that performed one of the greatest rock songs of all time, which of course was banned/flagged on YouTube for awhile.
https://youtu.be/MDjQkGql9r8
Sign over the jukebox in a San Diego bar:
NO STAIRWAY!
NO FREEBIRD!
I could understand.
JWM
I think that’s an item in the film THE BLUES BROTHERS.
NOPE. Wrong. Waynes World and Stairway.
If I owned a bar anywhere, I think I might post that sign.
It’s not that either tune is bad, but that they were both so overplayed….like, forever.
No Cat and no Paranoid.
I’m slowly waving my Zippo (it’s not lit since it is dry and I don’t know where the fluid is).
That song is one of my traveling songs along with ‘Three Steps”
He said, “Hey there, fellow
With the hair colored yellow
Whatcha tryin’ to prove?
‘Cause that’s my woman there
And I’m a man who cares
And this might be all for you
I said, excuse me
I was scared and fearing for my life
I was shaking like a leaf on a tree
‘Cause he was lean, mean
Big and bad, Lord
Pointin’ that gun on me
“Oh, wait a minute, mister
I didn’t even kiss her
Don’t want no trouble with you
And I know you don’t owe me
But I wish you’d let me
Ask one favor from you”
“Oh, won’t you
Gimme three steps, gimme three steps, mister
And in the November of 1963 I found myself in a bar in Hannibal Missouri with a buddy with his college girl friend who was enjoying making the locals kind of jealous and I told my other two friends and our dates, it’s time to hit the floor and head for the door and we did. The girls were kind of slow coming along with us because they thought it was kind of funny, the townies did not think the same way.
Not many bands, nor many songs, can squeeze 3 guitars in like that.
And, this was a rare instance when all guitars and bass were Gibsons.
Rossington – SG Special
Collins – Explorer with tremolo
Gaines – Les Paul
Wilkeson – Thunderbird
Gaines usually played a Strat.
Rossington is the only one still alive.
I was on winter field exercise when they died. A soldier went back to post for supplies and returned to the field and let us know. Winter soldiering in the snow is always a difficult time and then the news of this plane crash made it more so. Off duty, overseas soldiers of that age range and of that era were heavily vested in music in all ways. Large scale audio equipment and hundreds of albums and tapes. It was pretty tragic. I never seen them in concert but I’ve seen their spin-off, 38 Special half a dozen times or more. Have no desire to see the reconstituted version.
I loved the recent post, “everything is a miracle” because it’s true. Everything. This song too. It flows together perfectly, the musicians were young, and somehow they captured just the right notes.
Always reminds me of the movie “Elizabethtown” and the Ruckus cover: classic. Sarandon’s best work too…
I’d add the Outlaws Green Grass & High Tides to the bar’s do not play list, even though I enjoy that tune as much as Skynrd’s Freebird. Best played on long asphalt highway, on a hot summer day, with windows down, and the pedal to the metal.
LOTS of stuff from that era was overplayed then, but these (FB and GG&HT) have stood the test and deserve not only to be played still but played LOUD. Three guitar southern rock is one of the best things to come of that era.
So many things from then are now banned by the Soviets among us; Stars and Bars being the first one that should be revived.
How many of those lush young things on their guys shoulders have turned into bitter harpies? I suspect a goodly number.
If you’re looking for three guitar stuff that didn’t get overplayed try Blackfoot’s “Highway Song”
Oh man, another of my favorites and you are right.
I’ve seen Blackfoot several times.
I’m a cracker and I likes me sum southern rock.
….molly hatchet
Very Guilty! of overplaying those and several more southern rock anthems in 8 tracks, then cassette players and on vinyl spinners. Most likely because my short term memory was inhibited in those dayz and or I was all out of fuks to give.
Marshall Tucker Band and CDB have found their way back onto my current driving play list.
Marshall Tucker Band is the other great one from the mid 70’s.
Think it was just before the China bug, we took in a Marshall Tucker concert, a bit sout of Carson City Nv, an outdoor venue. Tommy did a fair amount of singing he’s getting long on the tooth, freely admitted it. Had a kid, well younger man I would close my eyes and I swear to god I thought it was Toy Caldwell, sadly he’s been dead many years after rolling his Toyota Landcruiser.
Music is the language of the world. Music is a problem solver, a communications tool of the entire world.
ghost, the sound / production quality of the hatchet albums still amazes me every time I blast Gator County, Bounty Hunter or Dreams on a modern sound system.
Morning, Gerard. Perhaps you could fix up my coding error. Should’ve closed out the link after “Green Grass & Hightides.” Guess I better get another cup of coffee in me.
I was there that bright summer day in Oakland. Had no idea at the time how iconic that concert would become 40 plus years later. It was a different world back then, notice there isn’t a cell phone in sight. The world has changed, and not for the better.
Freebird!
Who knew that skinny girls and tube tops would represent a long-gone world?
Not much of a FB/LS fan. But I gotta say that their “Simple Man” is the best mother-son song ever written.
I was only 10yo when this concert happened, but my oldest brother at least had LS’s One More From the Road, which was the closest I came to seeing them live and which I must’ve played over a million times – especially side 4. The inside of that double album jacket mesmerized me like no album artwork ever.
As good as Freebird was, “That Smell” was their greatest song. Such amazing guitar work. I think the competition among the band’s guitarists was what made the band so good. That and RVZ cracking the whip, never settling for second best.
I concur “That Smell” was their best. The guitars closing out that song combined to form a sound that is unique, gets under your skin, and stands the test of time for sheer power. Music to my ear holes!!
Indeed, That Smell is my favorite for the past year I’ve been working on it. Been playing Skynyrd toons for 40 years and only recently turned my focus to that one. Hardly 2 days go by that I don’t tear into it.
Back then a series of Concerts named Day On The Greens, a series of concerts at Raider football stadium.Oakland Calif I was not there, in SE Asia. I did attend a lot of those event prior
I seem to recall these were Bill Graham productions, a legendary promotor., GV wondering did you ever meet Bill?
VI
Man,am I late to the party. Gerard’s Garage Band ‘O Bros done packed up and gone;nothing left but peanut shells and a mostly empty bottle of Jack Daniels…
Interesting point about the competition between 3 lead guitarists.They kept each other well-honed,to our immense benefit. “Saturday Night Special” is another great Skynyrd tune;bet many here can recognize it after 2 notes of the intro. At the time it was released,the Raven .25 was the hottest selling handgun in Phoenix,mostly to cholo gangbangers and their darker ilk. Cheap little gun,zinc alloy,firing pin designed to eject the spent round. Precisely the type of gun the song was written about.