Earlier this year, the lone remaining original member of Lynyrd Skynyrd, guitarist Gary Rossington, passed away at the age of 71. 

“It is with our deepest sympathy and sadness that we have to advise, that we lost our brother, friend, family member, songwriter and guitarist, Gary Rossington, today,” read a post from the Band on social media.

“Gary is now with his Skynyrd brothers and family in heaven and playing it pretty, like he always does. Please keep Dale, Mary, Annie and the entire Rossington family in your prayers and respect the family’s privacy at this difficult time.”

Many speculated that Rossington’s passing might signal the end of Lynyrd Skynyrd. The band themselves announced a farewell tour in 2020. But in a new interview with Ultimate Classic Rock, frontman Johnny Van Zant admitted the band has backtracked on those plans. 

“I want to be upfront with you,” he said. “We were on our last year – 2020 was really going to be our last year. It was like, okay, we’ll go out and maybe do two or three shows after that or do some charity work. We were [in our] last year and C*VID hit. We were, like, ‘Well, sh*t. This is great.’ We sat at home for 15 months and when those months were up, we were obligated to finish off the dates that we had booked.”

“So we said, ‘Okay, well, let’s reform and get back out there and put everybody back to work.’ We got back out there and went, ‘You know what? We really missed this.’ We missed seeing our fans. Gary was a big part of that. He was, like, ‘I don’t want to sit at home. C*VID retired me for 15 months and I didn’t like it.’ [Laughs] That’s all he’s ever done. That’s all any of us have ever done. So we said, ‘Okay, maybe we were wrong about that.’”

The singer continued: “I’ve come to a conclusion: Musicians never retire; they just play less shows. We’ll see where the heck the future goes. There isn’t a thing happening right now that Gary didn’t know about, and he wanted it to happen. So we’re going to fulfill those wishes and we’ll see what the future brings.”