First time I noticed the Neil Young references (only took me 30 years or so), I thought Lynyrd Skynyrd was being a bunch of anti-Canadian redneck asshats. Then I read this quote by Ronnie Van Zant:
"We wrote Alabama as a joke. We didn’t even think about it – the words just came out that way. We just laughed like hell, and said 'Ain’t that funny’ … We love Neil Young, we love his music…”
So, who knows.