What Only Lynyrd Skynyrd Superfans Knew About Gary Rossington

Shortly after the October 1977 plane crash that killed six people, including Lynyrd Skynyrd members Ronnie Van Zant, Steve Gaines, and Cassie Gaines, the band released "That Smell," a track off their final pre-crash album, "Street Survivors." The song's lyrics, which include the line "the smell of death surrounds you," make its topic painfully clear to listeners, and it was a pair of car accidents the year prior, one of which involved Gary Rossington, that inspired Van Zant to write the dark and foreboding tune.

As explained by Ultimate Classic Rock, Rossington and his fellow guitarist Allen Collins were both drinking at the time of their respective accidents, and while Collins escaped relatively unscathed, Rossington was hospitalized after he rammed his car into a tree, having fallen asleep at the wheel. Van Zant was so upset with the axemen that he fined them $5,000 each for what he saw as irresponsible, dangerous behavior.

"We're glad [Rossington's] gonna make it, he's tremendously lucky to be alive, but it was his fault," Van Zant fumed. "He passed out at the wheel of his brand new Ford Torino, with his foot on the gas. He knocked down a telephone pole, split an oak tree and did $7,000 worth of damage to a house. That's being just plain stupid. I told him that on his hospital bed."

Indeed, "That Smell" didn't waste any time in referencing Rossington's crash, as the first few lines of the song directly pertained to the accident — "Whiskey bottles and brand new cars / Oak tree, you're in my way."