WCSX Classic Cuts
Lynyrd Skynyrd: “Gimme Back My Bullets”
The Hook: Some fans had the wrong idea about what kind of bullets they meant.
Album: Gimme Back My Bullets
Year: 1976
Writers: Gary Rossington and Ronnie Van Zant
Stats: Didn’t chart on the Billboard Hot 100, but got lots of rock radio airplay and became one of the band’s classics.
Background: The title track of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s fourth album, Gimme Back My Bullets (1976), isn’t actually about the first thing you think of when you hear its title. Guitarist Gary Rossington tells us it was about record sales, not ammunition.
Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist Gary Rossington on how some fans got the wrong idea about “Gimme Back Some Bullets.” OC:…kinda funny. :22
“It was about ‘Gimme Back My Bullets’ in the charts, not about really guns. But I remember doing that in concert when it first came out and people used to throw 22 shells and shotgun shells at us when we did it a lot and we’d get hit all the time with them, so we had to drop the song from the set because we were getting hit by bullets so much. I’m glad they weren’t shooting and they were just throwing them, but, it was kinda funny.”