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Editorial Reviews

Lynyrd Skynyrd's fifth studio release should have been the band's well-deserved entrée into the upper echelons of international rock & roll stardom. Fate would intervene and for some very non-musical reasons, Lynyrd Skynyrd's best-selling release also became the band's final studio recording. In addition to the thoroughly remastered album, this expanded edition adds several alternate versions of tracks from the disc, as well as a few songs left over from the Street Survivors sessions. The success of "What's Your Name" as well as "That Smell" and "You Got That Right" was practically guaranteed by the incessant support of FM rock radio. A closer examination reveals that Street Survivors actually bears very little in the way of filler material, considering the cut-and-paste methodology used to complete the disc. In fact, one of the most underappreciated pieces on Street Survivors dates back to before the band's debut album. "One More Time" was originally recorded during a 1971 session at Muscle Shoals studios and can be heard -- sans the 1977 augmentation -- on Skynyrd's First: Complete Muscle Shoals Album. Likewise, "I Know a Little" is a track that Steve Gaines (guitar/vocals) brought to the fold from his pre- Skynyrd days. The song's high-energy rhythm and good-time country flavor made it almost obligatory incidental music during the '80s NASCAR sports simulcasts. Although a majority of the bonus tracks were issued on subsequent compilations, here they are given both historical perspective as well as presented in a way that highlights the improvements and directions that the band was attempting to steer the music into. On October 20, 1977, three days after the release of Street Survivors, Ronnie Van Zant (vocals) and Steve Gaines (guitar) were killed when the chartered aircraft the band was using ran out of fuel near Gillsburg, MS. Indeed, the band's surviving members would re-form in several spurious attempts to reclaim and/or honor the music and heritage of Lynyrd Skynyrd. However, it is difficult to argue that the band's effect would ever be as powerful or as direct than on this release. Lindsay Planer, All Music Guide

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