Just came across this video from 1999 of a gaggle of diehard Lynyrd Skynyrd fans going nuts when they get inside the old abandoned Riverside Studios in Jacksonville, Florida, where the southern-rock legends used to rehearse and record, along with .38 Special.
They all get pretty psyched when they come across a drawing on the wall that looks like it was done by Dean Kilpatrick, the Skynyrd road manager who died along with singer Ronnie Van Zant, guitarist Steve Gaines, and backup vocalist Cassie Gaines in the 1977 plane crash.
“Check the front door and make sure nobody’s comin’ in!,” says one guy at one point.
They get a little more excited than you’d expect when they find a .38 Special backstage pass from 1983. I mean, I liked .38 Special back in ’83 too—I even interviewed singer Donnie Van Zant—but they weren’t no Skynyrd.
Or Molly Hatchet, even.
“We have hit the motherload here boys and girls!” raves one guy. “Wait—we got a whole ‘nother room! We got the control room over here!”
They go on to discover a .38 Special playlist (which includes the big hit “Caught Up in You”) and a bunch more .38 Special passes. “They’re everywhere!”, says one guy as he peels them off. “They can come arrest me now for trespassing, I’ll fucking be happy.”
As they scramble around like kids on an easter-egg hunt, the woman in the group notices a pass from a 1976 Who concert that Skynyrd opened for. “That was the one where they blew them off the stage!” she blubbers. “No it’s not,” replies a guy who either thinks she got her concert wrong or is just a huge Who fan.
The biggest collectible treasure the yahoos unearth, at the 10:27 mark, is a Skynyrd backstage pass from ’75. “There’s Ed King!” spouts one guy. “Torture Tour, I’ll guaran-damn-tee it!.” When somebody in the background named “Slim” hears that there’s a Torture Tour pass in there but it won’t come off the door he hollers: “I’ll fuckin’ take the door off!”
And he probably would have too, if it wasn’t a metal door.
The scavengers go on to score an American flag (somebody must have already swiped the Confederate one) and a bottle opener. “They opened their fuckin’ beers with that!” one guy surmises. “At least Donnie did!”
Hey, if anybody knows where there’s an old abandoned Blue Oyster Cult rehearsal studio with a bunch of backstage passes stuck everywhere, I’m in.