RIDIN’ THE WILD STAMPEDE! JOHN FOGERTY RETURNS

After a whirlwind rise and fall as the genius behind Creedence Clearwater Revival, followed by a long, often traumatic hiatus, John Fogerty is finally back on the front-lines with Centerfield, his first album in 10 years.

As a diary of sorts, Centerfield neatly chronicles Fogerty’s musical past and adds a hopeful look into the future. Who can keep their feet from kickin’ up dust when John gets to rockin’ on the chorus of the title cut, “Centerfield” (“Put me in coach, I’m ready to play”!)? In a later verse, you can feel the sense of pride and breakthrough when John sings, “Just to hit the ball and touch ’em all—a moment in the sun.”

But Fogerty also dishes up a dark, ruminating glimpse at his career troubles in “Mr. Greed,” “Searchlight” and “Zanz Kant Danz”(which has gotten him into a bit of legal trouble with Saul Zaentz, his former boss at Fantasy Records).

Fogerty’s well-spring of experience is hardly surprising. Creedence Clearwater Revival was the most successful American rock ’n’ roll band of its time, selling over $150 million worth of records. Five of the group’s seven albums went platinum, in some cases, multi-platinum. Nine of their singles broke the Top 10 barrier, many smash hits on the “B” side as well.

Of course, the reasons for CCR’s huge popularity were clear. John Fogerty’s unabashed, soulful vocals breathed fire and life into their sound; his precise, rustic guitar work polished the group to a platinum luster, and his blunt, often biting lyrics gave the group conviction and direction.

Yet curiously, Creedence was an anachronism. Their music, pure and honest, carried the same honky-tonk torch as Hank Williams, but the flame was fed by the greasy petrol reserves of Little Richard and Ray Charles. With their unpretentious demeanor, and songs which spoke so vividly of a rural America from the past, CCR was just as glaringly unique on the “underground” stations as they were in the Top 10 that they so often dominated. During the late ’60s and early ’70s, Creedence’s music rang with a populist tone that cut through the sticky bubblegum and psychedelic hard-sell which occupied opposite ends of the radio dial.

In spite of all of this, or perhaps because of this, Creedence was ultimately a band for “the people.” “I see things through lower-class eyes,” John told Time in 1969. “If you sit around and think of all that money, you can’t write a song about where you came from.”

However by 1972, John’s brother Tom had left the band and the two remaining members of the rhythm section, Doug Clifford and Stu Cook, began demanding more artistic control. The resulting dissension, coupled with a legal wrangle with their record company (Fantasy) and accounting firm, eventually split the band in two.

John Fogerty then recorded two solo albums on which he played all the instruments, overdubbing them to sound like a full group of accomplished musicians. The first, The Blue Ridge Rangers, was a rural country romp. In 1975 however, John was back to rock’n’roll with an eponymously titled album for Asylum Records.

This is the point where things began to slip for John Fogerty. For the next decade, he locked up shop and cut off all communications with the music press. This led to much rumor and speculation as to just what happened to the once prolific artist. Had his creative well turned into a dark, echoing abyss? Did the tremendous pressure of churning out hit after hit with Creedence take its toll on his psyche? Had the man become embittered by the disillusionment of the “star machine”?

Angry comments by Fogerty’s ex-band mates added fuel to the fire. “John doesn’t like people and he doesn’t know how to deal with them well,” Doug Clifford chided in a 1979 Grooves article.

But the simple truth was that John Fogerty had grown tired of playing the record biz game by its own one-sided, losing rules. So he pulled out, taking with him the product his opponents hungered for the most.

Way back when John was a bespectacled kid from El Cerrito, California, a mild-mannered little suburb of Berkeley, his band and he cut a record deal with a small, local independent label named Fantasy Records. The company had its biggest hit with an instrumental by Vince Guaraldi entitled, “Cast Your Fate To The Wind.” They also did well with their Lenny Bruce albums. This was long before the day when musicians were cognizant—of legal double-talk. “Heck kid, don’t worry—it’s a record deal. ” No more nights sweating bullets for the bleary-eyed patrons at local dives like the Monkey Inn, a club where John’s band (then called the Golliwogs) frequently dwelled. “I think we were in it for the beer,” John said years ago.

“There’s this place that rock ’n’ roll has to come from, and it is kind of a young place. You write from this place, and you sing from this place that is kind of an isolated, naive little spot.”

But the long shot finally came through. The group had changed their name to Creedence Clearwater Revival. “Something deep, true and pure,” John would say. “Through which the light always shines.” In 1969 the group finally scored with “Proud Mary.” Bob Dylan even called the song “the best this year.” Before the dawn of the ’70s, 35 other artists recorded their versions of this J.C. Fogerty classic.

The big boys at Fantasy were ecstatic...John Fogerty was not. Because when John signed that ever elusive “record deal,” he unwittingly signed away every quarter, dime and penny of publishing royalties.

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Last year, when Fogerty first stepped into the offices of Warner Bros, president Lenny Waronker, he displayed little confidence in the master tapes of six tunes from Centerfield which he carried under his arm. “Well Lenny,” John quipped, “How does a 39-year-old, has-been, rock ’n’ roll singer get you to listen to his records?”

After all, Fogerty reasoned, it had been 10 rough years since his voice set fire to vinyl. Worse yet, his last project, Hoodoo, was stashed into Asylum’s neverreleased vaults back in ’76.

But, you see, Fogerty was never really away. His musical vision resounded bold and true every time a Creedence classic crackled through the formulated mush on the airwaves throughout the “Me Decade” and into the consciousness of the “Video Generation.” Like a message chiseled in stone in a still-fertile field, Fogerty’s generous slices of Americana have weathered the storms and emerged with a concrete and timeless resolve.

During the course of the following interview, John Fogerty’s bubbling, boyish exuberance for his regained musical treasure was equalled only by that of his caustic spite toward the persons and entities that temporarily derailed a career which carried such impressive and valuable cargo.

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The most obvious first question is, John, what’cha been doin’ for the last decade?

Well, a lot of the story I don’t wanna skip over, but it’s pretty well documented. So, without going into great detail, I think it’s simple to say I was, you know, for a lot of those years I was legally bound to Fantasy Records. And it was not one of the greatest places...uhh...for my, you know...they’re very cruel. That word was cruel. Uhh...well, they realized they could make a lot of money off me. Without saying the word “greedy,” I guess I’ll just say (they were) greedy. And unwilling to sort of share what had been given to them really. And so, I spent a lot of the past 10 years trying to get away from my legal obligation to them, or my contractual obligation. And also the financial plan that they involved the whole group in. So that’s the biggest reason why it’s been 10 years.

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Musically, though, weren’t you dissatisfied with certain aspects of your overdubbing process, your drumming in particular?

That’s true, but now I feel much better about that.

Is this the album that you’ve been striving to make for the last 10 years?

Well, I’ve gotten rid of the obvious things that got in the way of being able to make a good record. I mean, there are some things that you just won’t do. Just because it’d make you feel good to do ’em; if your share of it or your side of it is gonna end up harming you more than helping you, then you should have the good common sense to just not do it. Where a lot of artists don’t have the strength to say, “Wait a minute, this greedy old guy is gonna get it all and all I get out of it is just the act of doing it.” For some people that’s enough, but it wasn’t enough for me.

I actually resent some writers who typecast you as being reclusive simply because you left the industry.

Well, that’s what happened, but it wasn’t self-imposed. I had to deal with it, certainly. Jeez...I was dyin’ everyday to be movin’, you know.

Let’s talk about some of these new songs. “Rock And Roll Girls" and “Centerfield" exude your joy for music, yet “Zanz Kant Danz" is very bitter.

Well, “Rock And Roll Girls” is just those three great chords. I mean, it’s just a simple, straight-ahead song. But to me, there’s a lot of meaning. That certain age that girls all go through. For them, it’s that wonderful time between being a child and being a woman. Right in between, but still the age of innocence. I have a daughter and you look in her face...“Secrets on the telephone”...you know, it’s true.

I can almost imagine a smile on your face when I hear that song.

Oh sure! Oh, you have to smile when you hear it or sing it. And “Centerfield” is the same idea. It’s just full of optimism.

You're almost paralleling your music career with the game of baseball on that song. Like you’re ready to get back into the game.

You got it!! You got it!

What about “Zanz Kant Danz”?

I really can’t say too much about that. It’s really just a nursery rhyme song. There are some legal entanglements that are starting to crop up around that song. [Editor's note: At presstime, Fogerty had re-recorded the song as “Vanz Kant Danz” to appease Saul Zaentz, who was suing him for slander. Unsatisfied, Zaentz is reportedly still suing for damages. ] My only comment is...I wrote a song about a pig. It’s universally ackowledged that you’re a great singer and instrumentalist, but I’ve always loved the way your lyrics reflect the big picture, yet the themes are really vignettes.

Well, the first thing is the music. It’s records after all—and it’s based on sound. Making a good record comes from a good sound first. But if you’re able to make cool lyrics after that...l mean, that point at the beginning of Creedence when we were no longer the Golliwogs, and I discovered that, you know, "here’s an additional thing to make our band really cool. I’m gonna make cool words.” That hadn’t been there before. When we were 15 or 16, I just sorta wrote little rock ’n’ roll ditties without a whole lot of intelligence at all. It was all for the band. It was like, “Wow, if I can do this, then it’s really gonna make our band cool.” And once I discovered that I was able to do it, it became important. Not more important, but it was something that I was proud of. Something that helped make the overall image or acceptance that much better. Did you find the frantic pace with which you were making records in Creedence to be creatively exhausting?

No. No. The exhausting part was what you’d have to go through to get everybody to want to do this. To understand that this is a good arrangement—or that it’s not left field, or odd. There was a lot of that. Making people do stuff they didn’t want to do, and then realizing later that it was OK,

Any examples off the top of your head?

Yeah. “Down On The Corner.” It was just the feel. I won’t say who (which member), but we were in the studio and having a rough time with it; playing it with the right feel. Then someone (in the band) in frustration said, “This isn’t rock ’n’ roll.” And I just sort of had to bite my lip and be the little General and wait until we got it right. Then everything would be fine. I didn’t go there to fight, I went there to make a record!

How did you feel when Doug Clifford or Stu Cook would say things to the press after the break-up, that you didn’t see as fair or correct. Didn't you feel like calling a press conference and setting the record straight?

I certainly was hurt by some of the things they said over the years. What’s funny is people do that to make themselves look good, it’s as simple as that. And since I was notoriously reclusive, they knew there was going to be nothing coming back. So (they took) little shots here and there. I’d shake my head and go back in my little room and absorb it and wait ‘til it was my turn. I really don’t wanna get involved in that, but the other three do seem to have forgotten now the things they said for 10 years, or 12, or whatever it is. ’Cause now I’m gettin’ this flack, and they’re doin’ it again. They’ve written a few letters and I’m still kind of shakin’ my head about it. In other words, I’m the bad guy now, but everybody’s forgotten what they’ve said before.

Could you express the feelings that you had presenting the Centerfield tapes to Lenny Waronker, and contrast them to how you felt going into the Fantasy offices as a kid?

Well, when we went to old Fantasy, I was a child. I mean I was 18 years old and I knew they were just a little jazz label. I mean, they were just sort of...they were...strange! Going into Fantasy was nothing like going into Capitol or Columbia, or any big label. I knew they were quirky and odd, but it was still bigger than anything I’d been involved in before. But I went in, and I met this guy named Max Weiss..I mean he was obviously...he was strange! There was people right before me talkin’ about all their big contacts with Johnny Mathis and Andy Williams and all that. I was only 18, but I’m listenin’ to this guy tell Max Weiss about how Johnny Mathis and Andy Williams and somebody else are gonna do his song, and I’m sayin’, "If this is all true, why is he standin’ here in this dump?!!”

But then, over the next few years, we hung around Fantasy. They named us the Golliwogs, and I came to realize that this place was really goofy and didn’t know anything about the record business. I eventually worked therefor about a year, I think, as a shipping clerk. And believe me...they didn’t ship a lot of Cal Tjader records out the door. So when the new guy (Saul Zaentz) bought it, basically I felt like we were in a partnership. He had this little office in Oakland, there was no studio or anything. There wasn’t even a record player! There was nothing there, just the four of us in the band and there was one lady to answer the phone. They didn’t even have a shipping clerk at first. So when the guy told us, “Well, if you have a hit, we’ll all share in a much bigger way in the success,” I believed him.

When you walked into Warner Brothers, did you have a feeling of trepidation like, “Oh no, here we go again"?

Oh no. I was totally happy with Warners. The weekend before I started recording my album, there was a double page ad in Billboard. It was a Warner Brothers ad congratulating themselves. It showed all the hits they’d had in the past. It was either the hits they’d had, or the ones that were on the charts right then! And there was like 10 records there, like Madonna and Prince; Rod Stewart had a hit album then. It was just crazy. About three days later I started recording and I saw that ad and I thought, “My God, I’m finally on the right record company!!”

Were you nervous going into Warners with the Centerfield demos?

Yeah, and they weren’t demos! No, they were six songs from the album exactly as they appear. Six of ’em were done and three of ’em weren’t, and I took ’em in to see, “Is this what you guys wanna hear, or are you afraid of something that’s kinda reminiscent of Creedence Clearwater?” And they loved it! So you didn’t actually demo the tunes first?

Oh no. I did all that at home, I mean in my little studio. But nobody ever heard that.

Do you have a four-track?

I’ve got an eight-track studio. It’s not at home, I have an office that I maintain. It can’t be in your home or you’ll never get out of bed. How did the demos progress?

That’s how you work stuff out. You get to where you really communicate to your own little system. You can make a change in a verse, go back and do it that way. You can change it within 10 minutes and have it another way, which I did over the course of a year or so. With the advent of electronic drum machines...

I don’t use those too much now. I like acoustic stuff much better. I find that when you set one of those things, and set your programs...it’s just not the same. There’s nothing that terrible about them per se. It’s just that anyone can do it.

Is your life pretty regimented around music?

Well, it has been for about 10 or 12 years. Eight hours a day here (at his office), and then another three or four at home.

Are you ready for the road?

I want to make another original songs album before I go on the road.

Maybe another year?

Well, it won’t be quite that long. I would think I’d start near the end of this year.

Do you have any musicians in mind you’d like to travel with?

Well, I just made that little TV thing that we recorded down here with Booker T. and Duck Dunn and Albert Lee and Prairie Prince and Steve Douglas. It was wonderful!

I’ll bet it was like old times gettin’ together with Booker T. and all them.

Yeah, it was. We had a lot of old stories. Sure, I’d love to tour with them.

Was it more exhilarating working with those guys than it is hearing all of your tracks meshing together in the studio?

Hmmm, let’s see. There’s definitely a difference, but don’t get me wrong, all the stuff we played was worked out. I mean it was worked out just like I worked it out in the past, just like I did for Centerfield, so that everybody had parts. It wasn’t a jam, it was definitely organized music. That’s the only way to do it. One of the songs we do is “Rock And Roll Girls,” pretty faithfully to the feel of (the version on) Centerfield. It was fun. It was very fun to play with guys of that caliber.

Does it feel different making music in 1985 as opposed to back in 1970?

No, it’s not a bit different. It’s not different now. You end up finding—that’s what you’re searching for—you find the same place. I commented on this to Lenny (Waronker) one day when we were listening to the new album. Well, it was a tape then. He said, “My God, you sound so young!” And I said, “Well, Lenny, it’s not young on purpose, but there’s this place that rock’n’roll has to come from and it is kind of a young place. You don’t know about bills and power plays and all that kind of stuff. You write from this place, and you sing from this place that is kind of an isolated, naive little spot.” And to answer your question, it’s the same spot that I was in in 1970. It’s just that it took this incredible detour for a long time where I couldn’t find that place again. But once I did, I’m back at the same address now.

So the joy is back in your music now.

Oh, indeed. That’s what I’m operating under now. That’s my word—that’s the exact word I use, is “joy.” That’s just what it felt like. Was it really that joyous in Creedence?

It started that way. The biggest thing was— since there was a sort of lopsided talent or ability distribution between the group, I mean, that in itself is kind of a built-in trigger or bomb that’s gonna go off someday. I mean, on their side, they were frustrated because I was doing this well or that well and becoming known for it and they wished they could do it. On the other hand, from my point of view, I was working harder and harder to prove to ’em that I could do the job so “leave me alone, this is what works.” So here I’d be writing and writing like crazy to come up with the next single and arrange it so it’d be sung and played cool and all that kind of stuff. To make our group more successful you know, to do a good job in other words. I hoped that once I reached a certain point of doing it so good that they would say, “OK, we realize you gotta do it, you’re helping us.” But from their point of view, what was going on is, the more successful we became, the more jealous they got. So eventually it destroyed us. It made going to work everyday, these four guys were more and more in a tension-filled situation. Rather than enjoy it more, we enjoyed it less and less and less. Your legal troubles have been fairly well documented, but do you feel that these problems put sort of a tourniquet on you creativity?

Oh, certainly. There was two things at the time. Number one, if I was to produce any music during those times, it would go straight to the owners of Fantasy Records—and they could use that to get even richer and buy up even more record companies and still pay me a pittance. But at the same time, with the knowledge of that—I mean, knowing that was the situation, it just sort of precluded even having a good musical idea. It’s like the inspiration was gone before I even had it—knowing what would be the result if I had a good idea. Whose music inspires you today, removes that tourniquet?

I don’t know if there’s anybody right on the radio right now. There’s older records that I’ve liked for years. Of course, there’s all the people who’ve influenced me: Little Richard and Ray Charles and some of the great old gospel groups that always just knocked me over. They’re always just there, and ready to be put on.

You’ve always sang with extraordinary power. Is there anybody that you listen to that affects you in that same way?

Bob Seger has certainly done some nice things.

Did you know that Bob was doing “Fortunate Son’’ on his 1983 tour, saying that CCR was one of his favorite groups?

No, I didn’t! Aside from that though, he does have a pretty good voice. We’ve got a lot of singers runnin’ around now who really don’t sing very well.

How do you feel hearing another artist interpret one of your songs?

It’s kind of cool. It’s even better if they do it well (laughter).

Has the dawn of music videos taken some of the shimmer off of how others music hits you. I can actually smell the smokey campfire at Cody’s camp in “Green River. ” I feel videos rob people of that.

You’ve just stated my greatest argument as to why you shouldn’t do videos! Because, yeah, it takes your imagination away. I think it’s much cooler to imagine it than to have it shown to you. But unfortunately, it’s a fact of life now. I have to weigh that all very carefully. I remember hearing a story about you taking your son to a Def Leppard concert and the group did one of your tunes.

Yeah, “Travelin’ Band”! They did it as their encore. They had just nailed the audience and they went off and the audience was applauding and all that— YEAH, YEAH, YEAH. So they came back out and the drummer started, “Boom de de de,” you know, the whole thing. Then they said, “We’d like to do a song by a bloke that lives around here...his name is ...JOHN FOGERTYi!” My kid—and me, too—we just sort of...it was a great moment for a father and a son.

That had to fill your son up with a lot of pride.

It certainly did, certainly did. Especially since he’d been askin’ to go. He loves ’em, and he’d been askin’ me to take him to go and see ’em for like a year-and-a-half-two years. (Feigns a childs voice) “If Def Leppard ever comes, will you take me to go see ’em”? It was all his idea and then to have ’em turn it around like that—it was incredible.

On the inner sleeve of Centerfield you dedicate the album to, “Gossimer Wump—and dreams that survive.” After 25 years in a tough business, what are the dreams that survive for John Fogarty?

I’d say...standing right here...in the middle of Centerfield!

[Ken Settle is a freelance music journalist, living and working in Westland, Michigan and is the author of, Creedence Clearwater Revival— Bayou and Backstreets, an exhaustive history of the band, appearing in Goldmine (Volume 10, Issue 10, Number 101. June 8, 1984)]