And yet that “feud” was never real hatred. It was more like play, more like mutual recognition through musical needling. Lynyrd Skynyrd and Neil Young were in fact mutual admirers. Ronnie Van Zant often wore Neil Young T-shirts onstage, and he is wearing one on the cover of Street Survivors, the last Skynyrd album released before his death. When Songfacts spoke with Rickey Medlocke, a member of the band in its early years and again from 1996 onward, he said Van Zant “loved Neil Young.” He added that there had been a lot of talk about some supposed clash between Neil Young and Ronnie, but in reality there was no such thing. The relationship was so relaxed that Neil Young performed “Sweet Home Alabama” once, at a memorial for the three members of Lynyrd Skynyrd who died in the 1977 plane crash. Young later said that he preferred “Sweet Home Alabama” to some of his own songs.