Lynyrd Skynyrd are bringing back Gimme Back My Bullets. The Southern rock legends’ fourth album turned 50 years old on Groundhog Day. In honor of that milestone, they’re reissuing it on red, yellow, and black multicolor vinyl that matches the 1976’s LP’s cover art.
Gimme Back My Bullets shows off a wide range of Skynyrd’s skills. Though perhaps best known for the sauntering, chicken-pickin’ hit single “Double Trouble” and the album-opening title track—praised by The Vinyl District as “ferocious” and Rolling Stone as “relentless”—the album also has yearning folk-rocker “Every Mother’s Son,” Southern-fried blues-rocker “(I Got The) Same Old Blues,” the slow-motion stomper “Cry For The Bad Man,” and the aching ballads “Searching” and “All I Can Do Is Write About It,” among other gems.
Skynyrd parted ways with longtime producer Al Kooper after 1975’s Nuthin’ Fancy, instead partnering with another fellow future Rock & Roll Hall of Famer, Tom Dowd. “It was our album,” Ronnie Van Zant told Melody Maker at the time. “We were gonna have to suffer the consequences so we wanted to do it our way. Tom is more helpful, encourages us and suggests things, but forces nothing. He works with us. We’ll say to him, ‘We want the snare to sound like Charlie Watts’ snare on ‘Satisfaction.’ We want the bass to sound like something from the Grateful Dead. We want the rhythm to sound like John Fogerty,’ and he just goes, ‘Okay.’ He’s that good. He’s a genius.”
News of the Gimme Back My Bullets reissue arrives just ahead of Skynyrd’s appearance in a high-profile Super Bowl ad. Budweiser’s ad during the big game this coming Sunday, Feb. 8 will feature the band’s iconic power ballad “Free Bird.” The commercial, which follows the lifelong friendship between a Clydesdale and a bald eagle, celebrates Budweiser’s 150th anniversary and the 250th anniversary of the United States.
Buy the 50th anniversary edition of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Gimme Back My Bullets here.
