Creedence Clearwater Revival: C or D?

I'd say the first 5 albums are great, 'Cosmo's Factory' is no dud. Long 'Grapevine' guitar solo and all.

They are the bollocks. Rocked as hard as the Stones at their best. 'Green River' and 'Willie and the poor boys' can stand happily alongside the likes of 'Let it bleed' or 'Beggar's Banquet'.

And you're right about the great singles. I came across them through 'Chronicle' which is as good an introduction as any.

Wouldn't that be great? Part of me suspects that something about CCR doesn't translate well for the British ILMers tho... someone prove me wrong!

Along with half of Canada.

Still CCR are klassik, rockist or not.

I'm still dreaming of some to-be-discovered bootleg recording of like a 20 minute live freakout jam on "Keep On Chooglin'"....

On principle of what, disliking good music?

Take Willy and the Poor Boys--Poorboy Shuffle and Side O' the Road are throwaways.

Green River--same goes for Cross Tie Walker, Sinister Purpose, Night Time is the Right Time.

I just remember really really loving the greatest hits when I was a kid. And then buying all the albums, and liking them, but being slightly disappointed that there weren't any real amazing finds beyond the singles.

No way, I think all those songs are great, just as strong as the singles. The harmonies on "Night Time" are this really strong, deep thing. "Sinister Purpose" is totally creepy, it's like a prelude to a murder down by the river or something.

you could say the same of "Factory Girl" and "Dear Doctor," too, though I agree that CCR's albums aren't as good as the Stones'. oh, and the answer is TOTAL CLASSIC.

And I was going to make the point about the Stones, but Matos made it for me. Except that I would have mentioned "Country Honk", and that he is TOTALLY wrong about "Factory Girl". That is one of the high points of that lp! It was great when they dug it up for the Steel Wheels tour...

(Also, the thing that makes songs like Dear Doctor et al more interesting to me is that they are not done straight--Jagger always has a distance from the material, and the lyrics themselves are somewhat ambiguous/parodistic, which makes the songs a bit more interesting since you don't know how seriously to take them)

As to yr main point -- I agree that the influx of country and mountain music is more important and successful with CCR than it is the Stones (although the Stones' double country whammy of "Dead Flowers" and "Sweet Virginia" kicks all of CCR's ass halfway to Modesto), but CCR's blues infusion feels kinda weak to me. I'm thinking of the middle bits of Willy & the Poor Boys here, and while Johnny can do a fair sharecropper impression with that yelp of his, it falls flat. It just seems that the Stones wanted to get the Negro strut down more than anything (which Mick still works at but Keith was born with), to get the style and the feel, while CCR went for the sound, but not the emotion. Maybe this is why CCR is so commonly identified as a very "white" band? (I'm thinking of the Big Lebowski and White Men Can't Jump (Snipes hassles Woody for them, doesn't he?) in particular)

On principle of not relating to rootsy Americana trad-rock boredom, which then gets shoved in your face as real authentic 'good' music. The whole rough-and-ready meat-and-potatoes-ness of it all. Of hating country music like any well-adjusted person. Like I said, though, they don't actually sound that bad. It's all pettiness.

Clarke just butted in but I know what he means about the aura.

Tracer roxor as always, even if I do think the Stones were ultimately a...not "better" but greater band, if you see what I mean--wider ranging (counts for a lot w/me, Prince was my formative listening) and more chance-taking. CCR's more perfect but the Stones had greater outreach. love 'em both about equally in that way

You can't say something like "I dislike them on principle", on this board of all places, and not expect to be called out on the meaninglessness of the statement unless you define your terms.

Of hating country music like any well-adjusted person

Color me ill-adjusted.

i like-a way you woak
i like-a way you toak

John Fogerty, 75 years young yesterday!

keep returning to the woodstock set, its so so SO GOOD

it really is

Lodi is their best song

Nope. Green River

ramble tamble or pagan baby

Someday never fucking comes

Nope not that one

Old man down the road vs centerfield

Run through the Jungle!!!

But yeah Lodi is definitely up there.

Pretty remarkable the vibe they work up on Bayou with just a tremolo effect on the guitar and a single 7th chord. Guess that’s a testament to the rhythm section

classic

A lot of it comes directly from Pop Staples, no? Which I believe may be discussed upthread.

Not this thread but a Fogerty sibling thread

Around the Bend
midnight special
someday never comes
run through the jungle

Apparently there’s a 2016 thriller film called midnight special starring Michael Shannon and Kirsten dunst???. “Shannon plays a father who escapes with his son from both the government and a cult after they discover that his son has special powers.l”

indeed

I've seen it, but that's all I can really say about it.

Have you seen Lorraine?

I just read the older version of the RAH gig which I have on cd somewhere possibly still and haven't heard in an age is actually from Oakland.
Not heard that before .Is it like widely known?

RAH? Robert Anson Heinlein?

Royal Albert Hall

Thanks. Figured that out but posted anyway.

Watching the documentary now; I already knew from the live-at-Woodstock album what monsters they could be onstage, but seeing it on film really hammers it home. Doug Clifford has a swinging backbeat of doom as heavy as Bill Ward or Phil Rudd, but he delivers the apocalypse while staring off into space like a St. Bernard — it's incredible to watch.

Possibly my favorite rhythm section ever.

Update: They've been playing about a half hour and there has been ZERO stage banter. I've seen grindcore bands take longer pauses between songs. These guys were absolutely merciless.

And after 11 two- to three-minute songs in a row, bang bang bang, they end with an eight and a half minute version of "Keep On Chooglin'." It's insane; it's like if the Ramones ended one of their shows with a cover of "Stranglehold."

it's really something how great the music sounds and how utterly dreadful the picture quality on the interviews is. i guess last dance and get back raised the bar for the treatment of historical footage but man it's just... bad. a swarming mass of weird mpeg artifacts. sit far back enough from the TV and i guess it's alright? or squint. the overlaid text is just bad powerpoint default text as well, just minimum effort. and no insight, no stories, nothing surprising. on the other hand the music just sounds incredible. in fact every show on that european tour sounds incredible. is there high quality sound for all those shows? it's funny though, sometimes with creedence it's a little bit deflating because apart from the jams it really does sound - and they refer to this explicitly in the doc - so much like the record that you're like, well, okay, fine, i could just listen to the record.

last night i did a double-bill of this and the zz top doc and it was pretty funny how they both did the whole walk-hard thing, black and white footage of sock hops, etc. the zz top doc is easily superior in terms of funny stories and just all around quality but it felt extremely jarring to have it come to an end right after... eliminator? i'll probably take it to the zz thread but kinda disrespectful imo. "breakaway" on antenna is probably my favorite song they ever did.

sometimes with creedence it's a little bit deflating because apart from the jams it really does sound - and they refer to this explicitly in the doc - so much like the record that you're like, well, okay, fine, i could just listen to the record.

Yes and no. The arrangements are certainly the same as the record — there’s no radical (or even slight) re-imagining of the songs. But the intensity, momentum, and juuust slightly and perfectly ahead-of-the-beat agitation makes it a far different, and more exciting, experience for me.

Yes and no. The arrangements are certainly the same as the record — there’s no radical (or even slight) re-imagining of the songs. But the intensity, momentum, and juuust slightly and perfectly ahead-of-the-beat agitation makes it a far different, and more exciting, experience for me.

Agree with this 100%. They were absolutely more energetic and intense onstage than in the studio; that's why I wound up focusing so much on the drums, and hearing the similarities to (Bon Scott-era) AC/DC.

it is better live, i agree.

Some nice slap-back / Sun Ra feedback delay on this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2oJIBQKlnw

this is enough of a thing that fogerty is even quoted discussing it on wikipedia but (given how political he was and how much of a touchstone it was for the counterculture in its years of defeat and setback and turmoil) i continue to love how jolly "bad moon rising" sounds

One thing I took away from this was how many songs are in E that I had always thought were in D - Bad Moon and Mary come to mind

D Major
The key of triumph, of Hallejuahs, of war-cries, of victory-rejoicing. Thus, the inviting symphonies, the marches, holiday songs and heaven-rejoicing choruses are set in this key.

D Minor
Melancholy womanliness, the spleen and humours brood.

E♭ Major
The key of love, of devotion, of intimate conversation with God.

D# Minor
Feelings of the anxiety of the soul's deepest distress, of brooding despair, of blackest depresssion, of the most gloomy condition of the soul. Every fear, every hesitation of the shuddering heart, breathes out of horrible D# minor. If ghosts could speak, their speech would approximate this key.

E Major
Noisy shouts of joy, laughing pleasure and not yet complete, full delight lies in E Major.

I think they tuned down on at least some songs?

If you mean that some songs were played in a different key from the record at the RAH show, no, all songs were in the same keys as the recordings. But if you mean “tuning down” in the sense that some CCR songs use a drop-D guitar tuning, then yes — “Ramble Tamble” uses that tuning (where the high and low E strings are tuned to D).

Haven't seen the doc yet, but I did read that the audio version of the set has apparently trimmed out brief moments of banter and guitar swapping, so perhaps that was also the case with the video of the show?

(xp) the latter

... actually no, I meant they'd tune down a whole step, if that's the right terminology.

As far as I can tell, CCR's instruments were all in standard tuning (lowest to highest strings): E A D G B E. On "Ramble Tamble" the tuning was D A D G B D.

The video shows Fogerty stopping to drink something between songs, and a roadie hands him a different guitar a couple of times, but the pauses are never more than a few seconds, and he never speaks to the audience until right before "Keep On Chooglin'," and all he says is "Thanks; this is our last song, it's called 'Keep On Chooglin''."

Got it, I was just reading on another forum someone complaining that some between song stuff had been "excised" on the audio release.

The Royal Albert Hall doc might have been a dvd release of just the concert in the 2000s, but it seems like they had to pad it with a documentary portion for Netflix. It's so flimsy though that it feels like someone created an AI prompt for "Creedence visiting European landmarks." Nevertheless, the show is a fun watch. The seated crowd mostly seems bottled up throughout until a handful of them lose their shit during "Keep on Chooglin.'" What a strange, powerful alchemy these guys had.

good to hear stu explaining how very different denmark is from norway tho

Watched the doc last night and christ, "Fortunate Son" is so amped up and frantic it sounds like the Feelies or something. Doug Clifford keeps pushing it faster & faster until by the end its like a hairs breadth from going completely off the rails. Fucking killer.

Damn, that lady in the front row losing it to "Keep On Chooglin'"...You only wish you could have as good a time as that.

Proud Mary definitely has some higher string jangle in the studio recording so maybe they used capo on the second fret for that, but couldn’t be bothered live