Lynyrd Skynyrd: Sweet Home Alabama Meaning

Song Released: 1974

Sweet Home Alabama Lyrics

Lyrics removed by the request of NMPA

1. anonymous

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   Feb 26th 2022 !⃝

   It’s my understanding that the original ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ lyrics, which would back up another’s opinion on this thread that Ronnie was an MLK fan, as was I, the line was originally a more direct & disrespectful sarcastic comment directed at George Wallace…”in Montgomery they HUNG the Governor! Boo-Hoo Hoo!” (which I swear I heard played on the radio)
   Didn’t take long for the complaints and controversy to follow, I assume because of any reference of lynching regardless as if it intimated at an eye for an eye revenge, I suppose?
   And in a very short time the lyrics were changed and re-released to the version we hear & repeat to this day.
   It’s just what I heard back in the day as an explanation why those lyrics were changed. I don’t believe I dreamed it up
2. anonymous

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   Mar 7th 2021 !⃝

   It's about racism in the south. In Montgomery they love the governor boo boo boo, Montgomery was where the civil rights movement started, another line said they love the governor boo boo boo, George Wallace was the governor at the time and he stood for segregation. Everyone thinks Ronnie and the band where racist but they are just stupid if they think that,one of Ronnie's heros was Martin Luther King who he shared a birthday with.
3. anonymous

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   Oct 1st 2011 !⃝

   The song was not written about Neil Young. Ronnie and Neil were good friends.
4. CHAD

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   Oct 6th 2008 !⃝

   The song is written by two people,neither of which are from Alabama.Lyrics,as always,are by Ronnie.The Neil Young song Southern Man was considered by Ronnie to be an insult to the south.The earliest Skynyrd recordings were made near Muscle Schoals, Alabama. Ronnie was fond of the treatment of the band by the people there.He used Alabama as the backdrop for the "anti" Neil Young, and anti southern stereotype song Sweet Home Alabama.It is rumoured that as a final inside joke,Ronnie was buried in a Neil Young T shirt,but I have never seen anything to back that up.As for the main guitar verse,it was written by Ed King,who came from California,and even used a seashell for a pick.

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