God & Guns - Lynyrd Skynyrd

I've always been a huge music fan -- but I grew up on my Dad's EZ listening stuff, and from there into Sinatra & Big Band -- from there into Jazz. I was taught to hate Rock & Roll, and got in to it as a teenager through the door of Jan & Dean & The Beach Boys.

Even during college while my musical spectrum was expanding greatly, Skynyrd was considered too red-necky, and at that time in my life I was breifly trying to prove I was "better" than my roots -- because I cared too much about what my new peers thought of me.

Several years ago I bought Skynyrd's Greatest Hits and joked that I wouldn't admit I had it. Freebird, after all, is a classic, Gimme Three Steps is a lot of fun, and though the comeback to Neil Young on "Sweet Home Alabama" I always thought was fairly lame (a southern man don't need him around anyhow) -- the "hook" guitar lick is one of the finest and most recognizable in rock -- and beyond that line -- you know I really kind of like the song. It was catchy enough to inspire a romantic comedy, so it can't be all that rough.

I wasn't familiar with "That Smell" ... which is an anti-drug song, but it grew on me, and of course "Simple Man" ... which didn't make the greatest hits is an excellent song I have in MP3 form.

So this morning on the boob toob, there they are in front of the Fox News studio playing one of those free promo things they often do on Fox and Friends in the morning -- pushing their new album.

God & Guns.

Well, you know -- never was a huge fan of theirs beyond a few songs, but if they're gonna go ahead and name the album "God & Guns" ... I was just going to have to give it a listen all the way through just on principle.

So I'm giving it a listen on Rhapsody, and I'm payed of by a couple of songs -- this line from "That ain't my America" -- you can take your change on down the road and leave me here with mine. And another tune called "God & Guns" that ... frankly, they're tapping in to the sentiment behind the Tea Parties here.

I'm here in my back of the woods, Where God is great and guns are good You
really can't know that much about 'm If you think we're better off without 'm

It's a fairly hard-driving, southern-rock, hard-working, blue-collar America album that will probably never make it to "classic" status, but ... it's a good listen and worth it just for the two songs I mentioned.