With the death Sunday of Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist Gary Rossington, that leaves former drummer Artimus Pyle as the only living member of both the 1977 plane crash that claimed the lives of three members, and the lineup that was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2006.
Pyle tells Rolling Stone, “As it turns out, being the last living member of Lynyrd Skynyrd is not all it’s cracked up to be. It’s painful, and I’m trying to process it and deal with it.”
Plyle replaced original drummer Bob Burns in 1975.
"When Bob, Gary and [singer] Ronnie [Van Zant] got together in Bob’s carport on the west side of Jacksonville, Florida, they put something together that went worldwide. Everyone will remember Gary as a road dog, trouper, songwriter and one of the greatest guitar players that ever lived. He just loved being onstage...
“I’m thinking about the good times, you know? The fun things we did, those giant concerts, like in London playing Knebworth [in 1976] and opening up for The Rolling Stones. Gary and I were very close. We liked a lot of the same things -- listening to Jeff Beck at his house on his gigantic stereo, out on the water in his boat, riding horses together."
Pyle and members of Skynyrd and the estate of Ronnie Van Zant were embroiled in a lawsuit over his 2020 movie, Street Survivors: The True Story of the Lynyrd Skynyrd Plane Crash, but Pyle chooses to focus on fonder memeories.
“At this point in my life, especially since Gary passed away, all of that bad stuff, all of the reasons I was mad at everybody? I don’t want to remember those things. I don’t want to ever talk about it again -- the music business did not kill our love for the music, it never did. Gary’s place in music history is rock solid. Fly on, fly high, our free bird brother.”
Rossington's death at the age of 71 is the 13th in the band's history. He was predeceased by, in order:
- Ronnie Van Zant - 1977 plane crash
- Steve Gaines (guitar) - 1977 plane crash
- Cassie Gaines (back-up singer) - 1977 plane crash
- Allen Collins (guitar) - 1990
- Leon Wilkeson (bass) - 2001
- Hughie Thomasson (guitar) - 2007
- Billy Powell (keyboards) - 2009
- Donald "Ean" Wayne Evans (bass) - 2009
- JoJo Billingsley (back-up singer) - 2010
- Byron Glover (guitar) - 2010
- Bob Burns (drums) - 2015
- Ed King (guitar) - 2018
- Larry Junstrom (bass) - 2019