About 38 Special
38 Special, often stylized as .38 Special or spelled out as Thirty-eight Special, is an American rock band formed by singer-guitarists Donnie Van Zant and Don Barnes in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1974.
They are known for their hit songs, including "Hold On Loosely" and "Caught Up in You", among various other Top 40 hits on the US Billboard Hot 100 during the 1980s and early 1990s, including "Rockin' into the Night", "You Keep Runnin' Away", "If I'd Been the One", "Back Where You Belong", "Teacher, Teacher", "Like No Other Night", "Second Chance" and "The Sound of Your Voice".
Donnie Van Zant, the younger brother of Lynyrd Skynyrd co-founder and frontman Ronnie Van Zant, began playing music during his teen years, forming a band called Standard Production in 1968, which paved the way for Sweet Rooster, Donnie's first professional group that he formed in 1969 with guitarist Jeff Carlisi and bassist Ken Lyons, soon joined by drummer Steve Brookins. Carlisi left Sweet Rooster after graduating high school to study architecture at Georgia Tech and was replaced by Don Barnes in 1970. Brookins also left to work as a truck driver and Sweet Rooster was defunct by 1973.
Van Zant, Barnes and Lyons, while continuing their day jobs and working in other bands, began composing original songs. By 1974, they decided to form "the ultimate band" that would be their "one last shot" at success. Briefly, Van Zant was considering a higher-paying position for the railroad at which he worked, but was finally convinced by brother Ronnie to stick with music since it was "in his blood".
The new group comprised Van Zant, Barnes, Lyons, Brookins, second drummer Jack Grondin and a returning Carlisi. The band's name was thought up after an incident which found the boys practicing in a warehouse out in the middle of nowhere. When police arrived after being notified by locals of the noise, the band members were unable to come out because of a padlock on the door. One of the cops said, "That's all right. We'll let this .38 special do the talking", and shot off the lock.
Now that they had their name, the group spent most of 1975 and 1976 playing a steady grind of one-nighters, mostly in the South and the Midwest. Eventually, big brother Ronnie figured Donnie and the gang had paid enough dues and set them up with Skynryd's manager Peter Rudge, who also handled the Who and was tour manager for the Rolling Stones. Rudge quickly set the group up to open shows for red-hot acts, like Peter Frampton, Foghat and Kiss, and got them signed to A&M Records, who assigned Dan Hartman to produce their first album, .38 Special, which was released in May 1977.
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