Lynyrd Skynyrd - Street Survivors (1977)

When Lynyrd Skynyrd were ready to start recording their fifth album, they set off to the Criterion studios in Miami, and in April 1977 laid down a number of tracks for their next release, 'Street Survivors', with producer Tom Dowd. However, these were rejected by the record company for not sounding commercial enough, and so six months later they went to Studio One in Doraville, Georgia, where they'd taped their first record, and recorded the whole album again. These were the takes which were used when 'Street Survivors' eventually came out, but the April recordings have surfaced on the Deluxe re-issue of the album, and as some of them are radically different and some were never used at all, this is a reconstruction of what the album could have sounded like if it had been released after the April recordings were completed. While 'What's Your Name' doesn't sound that different, 'That Smell' has an extended coda, making it two minutes longer than the take we know. 'Honky Time Night Time Man' was recorded under it's original title of  'Jacksonville Kid' and with different lyrics, and I've replaced some of the other August recordings with out-takes from the April sessions, including the lovely acoustic 'Four Walls Of Raiford'. 
The re-recorded album was released in October 1977, sporting a cover of the band engulfed in flames. Two days later, flying on to the their next gig from a date in South Carolina, their plane ran out of fuel and crashed, killing Ronnie Van Zant, Steve Gaines and his sister Cassie, as well as their assistant road manager and the two pilots, and seriously injuring the rest of the band. The record company immediately withdrew the album and re-issued it in a more sombre black sleeve, although the 'flames' cover was reinstated for the 2008 Deluxe re-issue. This album uses an alternate picture from that photo-shoot, with the band plus backing singers. 

Track listing

01 What's Your Name
02 That Smell
03 When You Got Good Friends
04 Georgia Peaches
05 One In The Sun
06 You Got That Right
07 I Never Dreamed
08 Jacksonville Kid
09 Four Walls Of Raiford
10 Ain't No Good Life

From The Album Fixer December 2014 - all notes and opinions are his.