Nifty pics of Leon Wilkeson with T-birds.

[gweimer]

I never knew about the injury, either.  It does make sense.  I had my left shoulder snapped out of the socket in my car accident, and using the Embassy became a task for a while.  As I got older, it only got worse.  I've still got about 80% use of my left arm, but I feel it on cold days.

Count me in as another who wasn't the biggest Skynyrd fan, but always dug Leon's playing a whole lot.  Bands that can't follow his bass lines pretty closely should stop trying to do their songs.  In some cases, like "Gimme Three Steps", the bass makes the song.

[uwe]

My first experience with Lynyrd Skynyrd was of course their classic live album One for from the Road. I thought Working for MCA (the whole concept of writing a song as a perceived record company employee) hilarious/brilliant.

To me, Lynyrd Skynyrd never climbed the musical heights of the Allmans, but they never toppled into the netherworld of musical embarrassment like Molly Hatchet either. Even what they do today as essentially the "Ricky Medlocke Band" - and I'm least likely to share their political messages - has musical value. God & Guns is musically a good album with a great production, I don't have to agree with everything they sing.

Ronnie's vocals (not really rock, not really country and not really blues, but all his own) certainly gave them an identity and his brother emulates them well. Live they can still entertain.

[gearHed289]

I'm still inspired by Leon Wilkeson.  Just been listening to "Gimme Three Steps." 

Ed King actually played the bass parts on that first album, although the "parts" are rightly credited to Leon. Leon is pictured playing a Ric 4000 on the inside gatefold sleeve.

[Chaser001]

Ed King actually played the bass parts on that first album, although the "parts" are rightly credited to Leon. Leon is pictured playing a Ric 4000 on the inside gatefold sleeve.

I never really kept up much with all of that.  I've seen plenty of live clips of Leon playing and like what he was doing.  I do know that Ed King played bass for a while, but Van Zant hated his bass playing.  Ed King had played guitar on the smash psychedelic hit "Incense and Peppermints" by the Strawberry Alarm Clock."  It is also my understanding that he was responsible for the main guitar riffs in "Sweet Home Alabama."  I think this is correct, but not having ever been a Skynyrd fan, there are probably a lot of details about their career that I'm unaware of. 

[Highlander]

I got into them fairly early on (bought Nuthin' Fancy when it came out) and first saw them on the GBMB tour, and finally in '77, but I don't know much about their recent work...

He (LW) had to completely rejig his playing style post the accident...one link gives this list of his injuries...
...broke his jaw and had most of his teeth knocked out, suffered a crushed chest (with a punctured lung), almost needed an arm amputated, and he sustained internal injuries. (Wilkeson reportedly coded at the hospital and had to be revived.)...

He was also found with his throat slashed on the tour bus at one point in the '90s - no one was found to have been the attacker... Ed King saved his life...

Ed King was playing guitar with the band but LW quit just prior to the recording of the first LP - Ed King just played what LW had been playing, post recording he re-joined and recorded until his passing...

He was not the original bassist - I know of two predecessors - first was Larry Junstrom (38 Special) and then Greg Walker (Blackfoot) - Rick Medlocke used to play Drums for them along with his Blackfoot partner Greg Walker - they both feature on "First and Last"

[Bionic-Joe]

How's that beautiful blue 12ver Baz?

You mean the 8 string??? I don't own any 12vers. Just my Blue Metal Flake 8 string T bird II and the Futura 8 string I'm building.

[TBird1958]

You mean the 8 string??? I don't own any 12vers. Just my Blue Metal Flake 8 string T bird II and the Futura 8 string I'm building.

Oops I'm wrong!  Yes, the 8 string.
Is it done?
Sound nice?

[Bionic-Joe]

Oh...man...it's the best 8 string I've ever played, built, owned....but now I did crudely (like Dr. Frankenstein) wired and strung up the Futura 8 string.....(it  just needs a nut and to be checked out by my main tech/repair guy to make sure it's Kosher before I finish it or scrap it and start over!) It's sounded so bad -ass....Almost..ALMOST, i tell you...better than the Blue metal flake one....You truly must always use a Thun derbird Pickup for an 8 string bass....Or a P bass split pickup...if you can stomach the way it looks...although I did borrow Tom Heslin's Rickenbacker 8 string for a coupla weeks....THAT...if it had a better bridge...that was Killer as well....an 8 string Rick!!! So...As soon as I get my strings that I ordered...I will take it in a hopefully...jopefully finish putting it together and disassemble it and paint it in the spring.

[Stjofön Big]

That 8-string just makes me jealous! Can't we change the subject?

[Denis]

Can't we change the subject?

Sure!

http://bassoutpost.com/index.php?topic=4991.0

[Hornisse]

Founds this on the web:

Leon smashed his left arm and it took months of repeated surgeries to help him to a position where he could even play again, and for those of you who do not know this, but if you look at the way Leon plays the bass guitar he has it standing up almost vertically and the reason for this was because his left arm was smashed and he lost the ability to rotate the arm and play normally, so the bass guitars had to be modified with an extension off the body of the guitar so he could strap it on a specific way and turn the guitar into an almost upright position just to play it because he could not rotate that left arm any more.

[Freuds_Cat]

  In some cases, like "Gimme Three Steps", the bass makes the song.

Just my opinion but I think his playing MAKES most of LS's songs. I love his style. We play their song Swamp Music with the Crocs. Great lines.

[Chaser001]

I went to YouTube and typed in Leon Wilkeson.  I wanted to see if I could find some specific examples of his bass playing.  Years ago, I had been on YouTube for a while looking at live performances of LS.  I thought maybe I would find something like that again.  However, the first thing that came up on YouTube was "Leon Wilkeson's testimony."  I wasn't completely surprised by that because the only time I saw him was at a church in Gulfport, Mississippi in the 80s.  I began to wonder if maybe Leon Wilkeson had been in a Christian rock band for a while.  I googled and found that he had been in a Christian rock band with Billy Powell called "Vision" in the mid-80s.  By coincidence, a Lynyrd Skynyrd documentary came on last night.  There were a few clips of Wilkeson and Powell, as well as other people.  But there was no mention of Ed King at all.  It seemed to me that about 90% of the documentary was about Ronnie Van Zant.  Even Ronnie's father was on there about five times.  He got way more attention than Leon Wilkeson.  I don't even remember one really clear shot of him playing bass on the entire documentary.  Overall, the documentary was pretty sad, but that's primarily because the plane crash was an overwhelming tragedy, truly horrifying. 

[Denis]

Here's some footage of one of the shows. Not sure if it's this clip, but there are others from this concert which have good footage of Leon. Yu can hear his playing in this one, though.
With a Jazz bass


With a Tele bass
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wacfM3NRb_8&feature=fvst

He's got a NR T-bird in this one! You can see it well around 8:44 and later.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PH9C5qYWkWA&feature=fvw

[heavychevy]