{"id":10185,"date":"2026-04-13T08:16:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T08:16:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/creedence-clearwater-revival-the-full-story-by-john-fogerty-stu-cook-and-doug-clifford-6563\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T08:16:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T08:16:17","slug":"creedence-clearwater-revival-the-full-story-by-john-fogerty-stu-cook-and-doug-clifford-6563","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/creedence-clearwater-revival-the-full-story-by-john-fogerty-stu-cook-and-doug-clifford-6563\/","title":{"rendered":"Creedence Clearwater Revival \u2013 the full story, by John Fogerty, Stu Cook and Doug Clifford"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n

Originally published in Uncut Take 177 (February 2012 issue)…<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n

Originally published in Uncut Take 177 (February 2012 issue)\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

At the dawn of the \u201970s, Creedence Clearwater Revival were the biggest band in the world \u2013 a brilliant and driven hit machine with deep roots in American tradition. By 1972, though, it was all over, and the ex-bandmates embarked on a bitter war that still continues, 40 years later. Here, Fogerty tells his side of a remarkable story \u2013 and then hears the very different stories of his old Creedence sparring partners. \u201cI had so much anger,\u201d says Fogerty, \u201cI couldn\u2019t play those songs\u2026\u201d <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThere were long, dark times\u201d<\/h2>\n

Built in the Roaring Twenties, New York\u2019s Beacon Theatre is known as the \u2018older sister\u2019 of the famous Radio City Music Hall. The 30-foot Greek goddesses towering either side of the Beacon stage have witnessed everything from opera to a series of Allman Brothers concerts. Tonight, John Fogerty is playing the first of two shows in which he\u2019ll perform Creedence Clearwater Revival albums (Cosmo\u2019s Factory and, tomorrow, Green River) in their entirety. Both million-sellers, they contain eight classic singles between them.<\/p>\n

For various reasons, Fogerty refused to play Creedence\u2019s music for almost 15 years after their 1972 break-up. He relented on a few occasions in 1986\u20137, following some gentle cajoling by Bob Dylan and George Harrison, but then came a typically Fogertyesque withdrawal \u2013 a gloomy, implacable silence \u2013 before his re-emergence in 1997 with Blue Moon Swamp. He officially began reintroducing Creedence songs into his sets that year.<\/p>\n

Fogerty acknowledges the burden of engaging with the music (and, perhaps, demons) of his past. He compares it to the Eagles reuniting for their Hell Freezes Over tour. \u201cYes, there were long, dark times,\u201d he tells Uncut. \u201cI was miserable. I stopped playing guitar. I was a bitter person.\u201d Claiming to be free of his grudges, Fogerty \u2013 whose dyed hair makes him appear younger than his 66 years \u2013 is animated onstage. His voice remains one of the most rip-roaring of rock\u2019n\u2019roll instruments, seeming to come with its own slapback echo. \u201cThis [Cosmo\u2019s Factory] was an important record in the days when they still had vinyl,\u201d he winks to the Beacon audience, \u201cwhen people had Grateful Dead hairdos and smoked Jefferson Airplane cigarettes.\u201d<\/p>\n

The third song he plays is \u201cTravelin\u2019 Band\u201d, a worldwide hit in 1970, which Fogerty wrote as an homage to Little Richard, a boyhood hero. But his tone turns sarcastic as he informs the crowd: \u201cOf course, before you know it, lawyers got involved and I was sued.\u201d The crowd don\u2019t know what to say. Why has he mentioned a lawsuit? Why would someone sour the atmosphere of their own gig?<\/p>\n

They might if they were John Fogerty.<\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

Creedence Clearwater Revival were an American phenomenon. From 1968 to 1972, they dominated FM and AM radio alike \u2013 an unusual feat \u2013 with a prolific run of glorious singles (\u201cSuzie Q\u201d, \u201cProud Mary\u201d, \u201cBad Moon Rising\u201d, \u201cGreen River\u201d, \u201cFortunate Son\u201d, \u201cUp Around The Bend\u201d). In 1969 alone, they earned three platinum discs and released three acclaimed albums (Bayou Country, Green River, Willy And The Poor Boys), as well as playing Woodstock and most major festivals. By late \u201969, Creedence could have called themselves the biggest band in America. By mid-1970, they could have widened the parameters to \u2018biggest band in the world\u2019, since The Beatles, their only real competition in sales terms, no longer existed.<\/p>\n

\u201cCreedence took America by storm,\u201d says Jake Rohrer, their former press officer and tour manager. \u201cThey had the broadest demographic imaginable. At Creedence concerts you\u2019d see pre-teens, grandparents and literally every age group in between.\u201d Some of their most enthusiastic fanmail came from US soldiers stationed in Vietnam, and inmates of federal prisons back home. \u201cCreedence didn\u2019t bring anything new to the culture,\u201d Rohrer clarifies. \u201cWhat they did was remind Americans from whence they\u2019d come. Their lyrics were just so American.\u201d<\/p>\n

Creedence\u2019s art was neither cosmic nor complex. Their grooves were smooth and warm, with steady, hypnotic momentum from Tom Fogerty\u2019s rhythm guitar and a Memphis-like sense of economy. Paradoxically, their songs were haunted by anxiety and premonitions \u2013 malevolent moons and Biblical rainfall \u2013 like those from a Calvinist preacher crossed with a pessimistic meteorologist. Writing while bodies fell in a faraway war, John Fogerty composed allegories for a conflict which he emotionally opposed, but which, all the same, he could easily have joined. Some Creedence songs exchanged voodoo for parable, portraying a folkloric South of bayous, railroad stowaways (\u201cflatcar riders\u201d) and old-time courtesies. In Fogerty\u2019s dual America, the bonfires of protest raged on the White House lawn (\u201cEffigy\u201d), but the people on the river were happy to share food with strangers (\u201cProud Mary\u201d).<\/p>\n

\u201cCreedence made music for all the waylaid Tom Sawyers and Huck Finns,\u201d pronounced Bruce Springsteen, inducting them into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 1993, \u201cand for the world that would never be able to take them up on their most simple and eloquent invitation, which is: \u2018If you get lost, come on home to Green River.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Fogerty\u2019s post-Creedence depression in the \u201980s had nothing to do with music. Mired in contractual disputes about royalties and publishing, he gradually lost his taste for the songs that the rest of the world loved. \u201cI had so much anger,\u201d he says of his long spell in the wilderness. \u201cI was afraid that I\u2019d start singing \u2018Proud Mary\u2019 and go off on a tirade. If one of my songs came on the car radio, I\u2019d change the station. That\u2019s why I couldn\u2019t play those songs. I didn\u2019t want that person standing in front of an audience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Does time heal all wounds? Intriguing comments by Fogerty last July suggested he would now be interested in a Creedence reunion. They last played together in 1983 (at a private party) and Fogerty explains that while he\u2019s \u201cnot actively making overtures\u201d to tour with them again, he\u2019d be willing to listen to proposals. Uncut telephones Fogerty\u2019s ex-colleagues to get their reactions. \u201cLeopards don\u2019t change their spots,\u201d says an unimpressed Stu Cook (bass). \u201cThis is just an image-polishing exercise by John. My phone certainly hasn\u2019t rung.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt might have been a nice idea 20 years ago, but it\u2019s too late,\u201d shrugs Doug Clifford (drums), who plays alongside Cook in Creedence Clearwater Revisited, a five-piece \u2018reincarnation\u2019 of CCR. Clifford adds: \u201cI prefer the band I\u2019m in now. We play Creedence better than Fogerty does.\u201d<\/p>\n

The three old friends and comrades, sad to say, have become used to aiming their remarks at the jugular.<\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

In one of his greatest songs, \u201cBorn On The Bayou\u201d, John Fogerty sang nostalgically of the places where he\u2019d grown up. He recalled the hound dog in the Louisiana backwoods; the Cajun Queen; the freight train \u201cchooglin\u2019\u201d past on its way to New Orleans. There was just one thing. \u201cBorn On The Bayou\u201d was complete fiction. It bore absolutely no resemblance to Fogerty\u2019s childhood. Like all the members of Creedence, he hailed from the Northern Californian town of El Cerrito, nestled between Berkeley and Richmond, with pleasant views of San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge for the families who could afford a house on the hill.<\/p>\n

John Fogerty was something of an anachronism. A serious, introverted boy, he grew up with a fondness for Uncle Remus stories and Disney\u2019s Song Of The South, absorbing by osmosis a language of riverboats and catfish. Just like his contemporary Robbie Robertson (a Canadian), Fogerty would find his songwriter\u2019s voice in the lexicon of the Southern states. \u201cLet\u2019s go all the way back,\u201d he smiles. \u201cBrer Rabbit. The Tar Baby. \u2018Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah\u2019. I found those things fascinating. Perhaps I identified with them more than kids who actually grew up in the South. I took note of them because they were so foreign to the place where I grew up.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of Fogerty\u2019s favourite movies was Swamp Water (1941), directed by the \u00e9migr\u00e9 Frenchman Jean Renoir. Filmed on location in Georgia\u2019s Okefenokee Swamp, it used real alligators and snakes and featured a spine-chilling shot of a human skull, balanced on a crucifix made of tree branches, grinning evilly above the foul water. Fogerty must have seen Swamp Water at an impressionable age. \u201cWalter Brennan plays a guy living in the swamp,\u201d he enthuses. \u201cDana Andrews is a government revenue guy trying to catch moonshiners \u2013 people making illegal booze \u2013 so he\u2019s the enemy. But then Dana gets bitten by a snake, and Walter\u2019s running around saying, \u2018Cottonmouth bit! Cottonmouth bit!\u2019 He nurses him back to health, but Dana goes delirious for a while and we see all these weird images. It\u2019s a swampy, scary-looking movie and I was just fascinated by it.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was Bo Diddley\u2019s \u201cWho Do You Love?\u201d that opened Fogerty\u2019s eyes to \u201cthe darkness and spookiness\u201d that could inhabit rock\u2019n\u2019roll. Along with a lifelong passion for echo-drenched Sun 45s, Diddley\u2019s voodoo-steeped universe was a key influence on Fogerty\u2019s thinking. \u201cHow can you not be inspired by a song about a guy wearing a cobra snake for a necktie?\u201d he asks rhetorically. \u201cAnd I liked anything to do with \u201cgumbo\u201d and \u201cLittle John the conqueroo\u201d and \u201cputting a spell\u201d on somebody \u2013 those things seemed way cool.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 1959, Fogerty and two schoolfriends \u2013 Stu Cook, a well-to-do lawyer\u2019s son, and Doug Clifford, a classmate of Cook\u2019s with a drumkit \u2013 formed The Blue Velvets, an instrumental trio. All three boys were 14. John\u2019s 18-year-old brother Tom, a singer, would sometimes borrow them as his backing group for gigs and demo recordings. In 1963, Tom joined The Blue Velvets permanently.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe four of us spent the next few years,\u201d Stu Cook recalls, \u201cputting out unsuccessful records and touring around Central and Northern California, playing little towns and military bases. We had a variety of names: The Visions, Tommy Fogerty & The Blue Velvets, The Golliwogs. We put out half a dozen singles on the Scorpio label, a subsidiary of Fantasy. They got airplay in towns like San Jose, Lodi, Merced, all the little stations in Central Valley.\u201d The idea of a musician playing out his days in one such backwater (\u201coh Lord, stuck in Lodi again\u201d) would inform the Green River album\u2019s poignant song \u201cLodi\u201d. Doug Clifford remembers Lodi as \u201ca small agricultural town with a seedy bar full of drunk farmhands and not a woman in the place\u201d.<\/p>\n

It had been Tom, not John, who led the charge in the band\u2019s formative days, encouraging the younger lads to think of music as a viable career. Without his energy, they might have got nowhere. But it would be John who took over as singer, writer, leader and \u2013 ultimately \u2013 visionary as the years rolled by. A symbolic sibling shift took place, unspoken, for the benefit of all.<\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Golliwogs was a gimmicky British Invasion name foisted on them by Fantasy Records. The band hated it, mumbling into their collars when people asked them what they were called. Meanwhile, a more worrying matter presented itself. In late \u201966, John Fogerty and Doug Clifford were drafted. Fogerty was placed in the reserve force. \u201cI had a six-month active duty, plus a long period when I would do a whole weekend once a month, and every summer I\u2019d do two weeks. And all that time I had the fear, at any moment, of being activated and sent to Vietnam.\u201d Clifford had an even narrower escape. \u201cI was two weeks away from being transferred to the Army and sent to Vietnam,\u201d he confirms. \u201cI even had the piece of paper in my hand, telling me where I\u2019d be going.\u201d Clifford calls it \u201cthe destiny of Creedence\u201d. He says quietly, \u201cFifty-eight thousand Americans were killed out there, and hundreds of thousands were wounded, and John and I could have been among them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Golliwogs re-signed with Fantasy \u2013 now run by new owner Saul Zaentz \u2013 in late \u201967 and changed their name to Creedence Clearwater Revival. The three words came from different sources. Creedence was the Christian name of a friend of someone that Tom Fogerty knew. Clearwater was taken from a beer commercial. Revival (which they liked to say was the most salient part of the name) signified a rebooting of their youthful ambitions and a return to \u201950s rock\u2019n\u2019roll values. \u201cI didn\u2019t like the idea of those acid-rock, 45-minute guitar solos,\u201d says John Fogerty today. \u201cI thought music should get to the point a little more quickly than that. I was a mainstream rock\u2019n\u2019roll kid, and I also had a country blues ethic. Lead Belly was a big influence. I learned about him through Pete Seeger. When you listen to those guys, you\u2019re getting down to the root of the tree.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the constant threat of John or Doug being suddenly dispatched to Vietnam, there was a growing feeling in the Bay Area that Creedence had a promising future. Promoter Bill Graham expressed interest in managing them. \u201cThey\u2019d play Winterland and the Fillmore West, third on the bill, and blow everyone off the stage,\u201d declares Jake Rohrer. Fantasy were confident, too. \u201cWe sat in Saul Zaentz\u2019s kitchen,\u201d recalls Cook, \u201cand he told us, \u2018When you guys are successful, we\u2019ll tear up this contract and give you a real deal.\u2019\u201d Cook sighs. \u201cWell, we kept our side of the bargain. He didn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n
\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Their 1968 debut album, Creedence Clearwater Revival, was a modest seller at first. Its standout track was \u201cSuzie Q\u201d, an eight-minute version of a 1957 hit by Louisiana rocker Dale Hawkins. For all his scepticism about long solos, Fogerty stretched out penetratingly on guitar while Creedence\u2019s rhythm trio laid down a sublime slow boogie. An edited version, issued by Fantasy as a single, was picked up by AM radio and reached No 11 in the charts. Nine years into their career, Creedence were finally a smash. That summer, on the day that he received his discharge papers from the Army, Fogerty wrote a song about a man shaking off the pressures of the city and finding harmony on the river. Fogerty called it \u201cProud Mary\u201d.<\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

The first of Creedence\u2019s true monster hits, \u201cProud Mary\u201d would have topped the American charts if 1969 hadn\u2019t been the annus mirabilis of bubblegum pop. As it was, Tommy Roe\u2019s infernally catchy \u201cDizzy\u201d kept Creedence at No 2, but \u201cProud Mary\u201d, later covered by Ike & Tina Turner, Elvis Presley and a couple of hundred thousand bar bands, was already on its way to being established as a landmark in rock\u2019n\u2019roll. \u201cBad Moon Rising\u201d, another million-seller, followed it to US No 2. As soon as the bad moon began to wane, it was promptly replaced in the charts by \u201cGreen River\u201d, which sat (once again) at No 2 behind The Archies\u2019 \u201cSugar Sugar\u201d \u2013 another bubblegum behemoth \u2013 in September.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe worked on a 12-week cycle,\u201d explains Clifford. \u201cJohn\u2019s theory was that if we ever went out of the charts, our career would be over and we\u2019d be forgotten. None of our peers thought that way. It put a lot of pressure on John. A lot of pressure on all of us.\u201d Talking to Fogerty now, he gives every indication that the pressure stimulated him immensely. In 1969\u201370 he was arguably America\u2019s most socio-politically significant songwriter since Dylan. Ask Fogerty about any song\u2019s origins and he quickly applies his answer to the context of the times. \u201cEffigy\u201d (on Willy And The Poor Boys) was his response to President Nixon emerging from the White House one afternoon and sneering at the anti-war demonstrators outside. (\u201cHe said, \u2018Nothing you do here today will have any effect on me. I\u2019m going back inside to watch the football game.\u2019\u201d) \u201cFortunate Son\u201d, angry and indignant, was an attack on the iniquities of the draft system, which saw rich men calling in favours to help their sons avoid the Vietnam bombs and bullets. \u201cRun Through The Jungle\u201d warns of a different kind of arms proliferation \u2013 this time at home \u2013 though its gun control message, couched in metaphor like most Fogerty songs, didn\u2019t stop it being adopted as an anthem by US troops in the Vietnam jungles. Fogerty wrote the bulk of Creedence\u2019s Bayou Country album, meanwhile, while a muted TV in the corner of his room showed horrified reactions to the assassination of Bobby Kennedy in June 1968.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would sit in my little apartment \u2013 which was very sparse \u2013 and stare at the wall. That\u2019s how I wrote. I would stare at it all night. There was nothing hanging on the wall, because I didn\u2019t have any money for paintings. It was just a beige wall. It was a blank slate, a blank canvas. But it was also exciting. I could go anywhere and do anything, because I was a writer. I was conjuring that place deep in my soul that was me.\u201d<\/p>\n

A loner who rarely socialised, Fogerty put Creedence through their paces as musicians. They rehearsed doggedly until songs\u2019 arrangements were inch-perfect, enabling them to record whole albums in a matter of days. The emphasis was on being well-drilled, well-prepared, almost like the army that Fogerty had recently left. Creedence had a \u2018no alcohol\u2019 rule in their dressing-room. They disdained the drug culture. \u201cThe San Francisco bands called us boy scouts because we didn\u2019t get high and we were all married with families,\u201d laughs Clifford. Fogerty\u2019s natural discipline (and self-confessed fear of LSD) made him a Roy Keane in an era of Balotellis. \u201cAt a time when rock\u2019n\u2019rollers were developing increasingly flamboyant looks,\u201d relates Russ Gary, a recording engineer on several Creedence albums, \u201cFogerty, in his simple jeans and flannel shirt, came across as more of a shaggy haired workingman than a rock star. But even just standing around, he gave off an intensity that drew your eye to him.\u201d<\/p>\n

As they travelled around the country, Creedence were thrilled to be embraced in Louisiana and Georgia, where they\u2019d been somewhat nervous about playing. Cook: \u201cWe were celebrating their culture and they liked us. The real disconnect was that they thought we were from the South. When they found out we were from California, they scratched their heads.\u201d Jake Rohrer: \u201cI remember Duck Dunn of Booker T & The MG\u2019s telling me that when he found out the guys who\u2019d done \u2018Born On The Bayou\u2019 were from Berkeley, he was going to go and burn all his Creedence records.\u201d In the event, Creedence and The MG\u2019s became friends and later toured together.<\/p>\n

In the studio, Creedence shunned the psychedelic effects that other bands relied on, and instead used slapback echo to get the sounds of the mid-\u201950s Sun singles that John Fogerty adored. \u201cI was greatly influenced by the early records of Elvis Presley and I just thought that was the way that music should sound,\u201d he says. \u201cI also loved Carl Perkins\u2019 great records from that era. And also Roy Orbison\u2019s \u2018Ooby Dooby\u2019 [which Creedence covered in 1970] and \u2018Go Go Go\u2019.\u201d Fogerty would never outgrow the traditions and protocols of the \u201950s. His aim was to make music that sounded great coming out of a radio, not music that hippies could trip out to on headphones. \u201cThis statement holds true for everybodyin Creedence: simple is better, less is more,\u201d Fogerty says. \u201cBut even though it\u2019s simple rock\u2019n\u2019roll, everybody will have a certain role within the framework. Tom\u2019s guitar playing may just sound like a guy in a garage strumming away, but it\u2019s awfully specific.\u201d Cook adds: \u201cPeople called it swamp-rock. We never called it that. We just called it rock\u2019n\u2019roll.\u201d<\/p>\n

Green River is Fogerty\u2019s favourite Creedence album. The second of the three albums they released during 1969 (an amazing statistic which was matched by Fairport Convention in Britain), Green River was, says Fogerty, \u201csomething that I\u2019d been carrying all of my life. Musically, Green River was everything that I was about. I really enjoyed making it. I was really focused with the arrangements, the rehearsals, the necessities for each song.<\/p>\n

\n
\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

\u201cThe inspiration for \u2018Bad Moon Rising\u2019 was an old movie called The Devil And Daniel Webster. It\u2019s an old tale about the Devil seducing some poor guy who\u2019s wishing for a better life. In steps the Devil: \u2018I can promise you untold success and wealth.\u2019 \u2018You can?\u2019 \u2018Yes. All you have to do is give me your soul.\u2019 The movie made a big impression on me \u2013 especially a scene where there\u2019s a hurricane during the night and the guy is cowering in his barn. The next morning he opens the door and it\u2019s a beautiful sunny day. He looks over and sees his neighbour\u2019s field trounced to the ground by the hailstorm, but his own crops are standing straight up. That was a very powerful image to me. That was my inspiration for \u2018Bad Moon Rising\u2019. I saw the movie again recently and the scene was so subtle, and so hard to hear, that it\u2019s a wonder I got any inspiration from it. I guess in the old days movies were more subtle.\u201d<\/p>\n

Creedence made a rare foray outside America in 1970, flying to Europe and headlining the Royal Albert Hall. Jake Rohrer remembers arriving in West Germany \u201cand finding we were bigger than The Beatles\u201d. Cosmo\u2019s Factory, released in July, was their fifth album in two years. Its title was a reference to the band\u2019s Berkeley office space (The Factory) and also to their gregarious drummer Clifford (whose longtime nickname was \u2018Cosmo\u2019). The album\u2019s front cover showed the four of them caught by a camera in an off-duty moment, a proudly uncool quartet who looked more like lumberjacks than rock stars. The album was enormous and the hit singles kept coming. Cosmo\u2019s Factory had six of them. While San Francisco longhairs across the bridge scoffed at their commercialism, Creedence henceforth made a point of releasing double A-sides. And invariably both songs would have an uncanny knack of cutting through the weasel words and speaking directly to all sections of the population.<\/p>\n

Clifford: \u201c\u2018Fortunate Son\u2019 and \u2018Who\u2019ll Stop The Rain\u2019 \u2013 which was about Nixon \u2013 were very powerful messages. Some of the other bands on the political left were writing stuff like \u2018fuck the pigs\u2019, but who\u2019s going to listen to something like that except the hardcore freaks? To be able to spread a message to a divided country, so that both sides heard it \u2013 and to do it poetically and descriptively \u2013 that\u2019s where the power of John\u2019s songs lay. We reached the masses with strong messages and feelgood music, and that really was our greatest achievement.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n
\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

In the autumn of 1970, Creedence were on top of the world. Nobody could have foreseen what would happen next. Having captured America\u2019s hearts and minds, the four men somehow found a way to implode \u2013 with toxic effects on long-held friendships and a relationship between two brothers. It was to be the most acrimonious and protracted divorce that rock\u2019n\u2019roll has ever known.<\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

It began, John Fogerty recalls, with a band meeting. That in itself was odd. Creedence didn\u2019t have band meetings. Creedence was a benevolent dictatorship in which the will of the rhythm section yielded to the decree of the flannel-shirted leader. Ever since \u201cProud Mary\u201d, the system had worked with spectacular results. Fogerty was therefore irritated and nonplussed, towards the end of 1970, to be confronted with the first mentions of an unwelcome concept called democracy. \u201cSuddenly everybody wanted to be a general,\u201d he says ironically.<\/p>\n

Part of the problem was that Creedence, even at their height of their fame, were a remarkably small operation. They travelled with two or three roadies, plus Rohrer, and that was it. They had no manager, no booking agent, no PR firm, no entourage. They were the equivalent of a small family firm that accidentally creates a brand name as marketable as Coca-Cola. \u201cJohn was our manager,\u201d Clifford groans. \u201cBad idea. He had no concept of the business side. Zero. None. Nada.\u201d Stu Cook, who has a business degree from San Jose State University, gives a withering assessment of Fogerty\u2019s managerial shortcomings. \u201cHe condemned us to a career that effectively never became professional. Doug and I call it El Cerrito Syndrome. We were always limited by John\u2019s vision of how a band is supposed to be run. We were tied \u2013 and we\u2019re still tied to this day \u2013 to the worst contract signed by any band in history. We said to John, \u2018Look, you didn\u2019t get us a new contract with Fantasy like you were supposed to do, like you said you\u2019d do. You\u2019re not qualified to be the manager. We\u2019re the number one band in the world and we deserve a real manager.\u2019 So what does John do, in an act of what I can only describe as brutal cynicism? He brings us Allen Klein.\u201d<\/p>\n

Klein was sent packing after one meeting and Fogerty resumed management of Creedence. A contract renegotiation was put on the table, but it would drag on for a year, complicated by Saul Zaentz\u2019s offer of a percentage in Fantasy as a sweetener. Cook describes the percentage as \u201chuge\u201d. Clifford calculates it as \u201cmonumental\u201d. Fogerty disputes their accounts, arguing that the percentage was minuscule and that only a pair of idiots would think otherwise. Cook counters that Fogerty was a novice at reading contracts and should have asked a lawyer to help him understand it. Fogerty refused to sign the contract. Cook and Clifford claim that his intransigence cost them tens of millions of dollars.<\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

If the restrictive clauses and meagre royalties of Creedence\u2019s 1967 contract have denied Cook and Clifford the earnings they feel entitled to \u2013 well, that could be termed a \u2018professional\u2019 grievance. But so much of Creedence\u2019s disintegration is personal. Fogerty\u2019s stranglehold over their affairs was challenged, crucially, by his brother Tom, who had grown resentful of John\u2019s refusal to allow him a more prominent role. \u201cTom had put up with a lot of shit from John,\u201d remarks Clifford, Tom\u2019s closest ally in the group. \u201cI think Tom was expecting John to say, \u2018OK, now we\u2019ve achieved our goals, why don\u2019t you start singing a few of the songs?\u2019 Tom had a great voice, kinda like Ritchie Valens. Tom would have done a damn good job on \u2018La Bamba\u2019. But John didn\u2019t want him to sing it, in case we had a hit with it. He didn\u2019t want Tom to succeed.\u201d John insists he simply didn\u2019t want to mess with a successful formula.<\/p>\n

Creedence\u2019s sixth album, Pendulum, had a fuller-sounding production than its predecessors, and had been a long time in the works while John overdubbed keyboards and saxophones. Engineer Russ Gary remembers that Cook, Clifford and Tom Fogerty were only in the studio for \u201ctwo or three days at the most\u201d. Pendulum was launched to the media with an expensive PR event to which 200 journalists were invited \u2013 a very un-Creedence-like evening which John maintains he attended under protest. The party had been Tom\u2019s idea.<\/p>\n

Tom, nevertheless, left Creedence in early 1971 to begin a solo career. The others considered asking Duck Dunn to join, before deciding to continue as a trio. The bombshell lay just around the corner. Forty years later, the accusations are so vehement on both sides that it\u2019s impossible to know who to believe. Fogerty complains that Cook and Clifford concocted a false story about him giving them a bizarre ultimatum in a limousine after a concert in San Diego. Cook and Clifford are adamant that the ultimatum (and the limo) were real. Fogerty says that Cook and Clifford demanded to write and sing a third of the next album each, or they\u2019d leave. Cook and Clifford reject this completely, alleging that Fogerty threatened to leave if they didn\u2019t write and sing a third of the next album each. It seems a shocking allegation for them to make, because it implies that Fogerty would intentionally sabotage an album \u2013 not to mention tarnish Creedence\u2019s legacy \u2013 in order to make his two bandmates look inadequate.<\/p>\n

\u201cJohn wanted out,\u201d says Clifford with contempt, \u201cbut first he wanted to punish us for supporting Tom. He was cutting his nose off to spite his face. That\u2019s the way John Fogerty does things. Stu and I wanted some input, but the last thing we wanted to do was sing. But, anyway, we wrote and sang three songs, and of course the album was doomed to fail. John told the press that we\u2019d put a gun to his head, but it was quite the opposite. It was a cruel lie.\u201d Mardi Gras (1971), one of the most scathingly reviewed albums ever, was the last record Creedence would ever make.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had a pretty good idea that the album would be dreadful,\u201d says Fogerty, who blames Cook and Clifford for forcing their songs on him. \u201cI\u2019d known these guys since high school and I figured I had a good handle on their abilities. The phrase I kept repeating to myself was, \u2018I guess they deserve a shot.\u2019 But I was dreading the results. Jon Landau in Rolling Stone called it the worst album he\u2019d ever heard. And I agreed. The other guys didn\u2019t. They thought the album was really cool.\u201d He laughs. \u201cThey changed their tune later.\u201d<\/p>\n

Creedence split in 1972. Fogerty released The Blue Ridge Rangers in 1973, a country-bluegrass album on which he played all the instruments himself. In the years following Creedence\u2019s demise, the real poison seeped in. Cook and Clifford became convinced that Fogerty\u2019s mismanagement of the band\u2019s affairs had got them into trouble with the IRS. In the meantime, the bandmembers had lost millions in an offshore banking scheme that turned out to be a swindle. \u201cThe full picture slowly unfolded,\u201d says Cook, \u201cthat not only were we broke but we were also in trouble with the authorities. We found out more and more of what had actually gone on in John\u2019s negotiations with Fantasy. More hard feelings developed. We got more and more isolated and estranged from John over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n

________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

Fogerty\u2019s solo career faltered in the mid-\u201970s. He stopped recording, angered by a clause in his Fantasy contract that seemed to demand greater and greater amounts of product as each year passed. Jake Rohrer, who worked for Fogerty until 1977, questions his interpretation of the wording. \u201cI disagree with John\u2019s comment that the contract was a prison sentence. I personally thought that John wasted two decades of his life waging a war with Saul Zaentz.\u201d Either way, it became dangerous to mention Zaentz\u2019s name in Fogerty\u2019s presence during the \u201980s. His 1985 comeback album for Warner Bros, Centerfield, railed at Zaentz on not one but two tracks (\u201cMr. Greed\u201d, \u201cZanz Kant Danz\u201d), to the disbelief of his former colleagues. \u201cHe even told Warners, \u2018I\u2019ll indemnify you against lawsuits\u2019,\u201d says Doug Clifford. \u201cHe was still carrying all this crap from 15 years ago. He\u2019s free, he\u2019s won, he\u2019s on the biggest label in the world, but he can\u2019t get his foot out of the bucket of shit. So, of course, he gets sued.\u201d<\/p>\n

In spite of their animosities, Creedence played together twice during that decade. Both were private occasions. First came Tom Fogerty\u2019s wedding in 1980. Then John Fogerty showed up at a 1983 high-school reunion in El Cerrito and Creedence performed as The Blue Velvets, shaking a tail feather the way they\u2019d done in 1959. But the problems between the Fogerty brothers remained unresolved. At some point in the \u201980s, Tom, who had undergone several operations on his back since 1974, caught AIDS from an unscreened blood transfusion. By 1989, his illness was a matter of desperate concern. Tom had one last request. He wanted Creedence to play as a four-piece one more time, if only in his living room, before his inevitable return to hospital. John declined the request. \u201cFinally,\u201d recalls Stu Cook, \u201cwhen Tom couldn\u2019t even lift his arm properly because he was so weak, John said, \u2018OK, I\u2019ll play with you.\u2019 Just a little bit late there, John.\u201d Admitting that he did not make his peace with Tom (who died in 1990), John reveals why he felt unable to grant him his wish. Some of the last words Tom ever uttered to John while he lay in an Arizona hospital were: \u201cSaul Zaentz is my best friend.\u201d They were the six words that John Fogerty could never forgive.<\/p>\n

Creedence were inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 1993. For Jake Rohrer, it was \u201cthe saddest chapter of their career\u201d. It was Fogerty at his most ruthless: he\u2019d learned Cook and Clifford had sold their Creedence veto rights to Zaentz for five-figure sums, and he was not happy about it. Cook and Clifford arrived at the Hollywood centre with their families, expecting to play Creedence hits with Fogerty that night. They were informed by the stage manager that Fogerty would be performing with an all-star band (including Bruce Springsteen and Robbie Robertson) instead. \u201cIt was humiliating,\u201d says Cook. \u201cIt was like John thought he was getting inducted, instead of Creedence. He thought he could exclude us.\u201d Booing was heard when Fogerty took the stage. \u201cIt was a terrible night,\u201d concludes Rohrer, \u201cand all it did was pour kerosene on the flames.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Hank Bordowitz\u2019s well-researched Creedence biography, Bad Moon Rising (1998), there are 31 index entries for \u2018Fogerty, John, bitterness and rage\u2019. Fogerty claims to lack venom these days (\u201cI\u2019m no longer a prisoner of my own device, to quote a Don Henley line,\u201d he assures us), but it\u2019s noticeable that, during a follow-up interview, he repeatedly describes a former business associate as a cheat, a liar and the second worst man in history after Saddam Hussein.<\/p>\n

Clifford, who regards Fogerty\u2019s career arc as \u201ckind of Shakespearean\u201d attempts to put a positive slant on Creedence\u2019s ongoing hostilities. \u201cThe good news is, the music is what\u2019s important,\u201d Clifford says. \u201cLook, we all made mistakes. It\u2019s unfortunate, but the legacy of the music is still there, intact.\u201d The bayou will surely freeze over, however, before Creedence Clearwater Revival share a stage again.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The post Creedence Clearwater Revival \u2013 the full story, by John Fogerty, Stu Cook and Doug Clifford<\/a> appeared first on UNCUT<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally published in Uncut Take 177 (February 2012 issue)… Originally published in Uncut Take 177 (February 2012 issue)\u2026 At the dawn of the \u201970s, Creedence Clearwater Revival were the biggest…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3329,31,35,912],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-creedence-clearwater-revival","category-features","category-interviews","category-john-fogerty"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10185\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}