Fortunate Son

by John Fogerty

  Hank Williams I loved, of course. I’m sure I heard about him as a kid, because I remember “Jambalaya” and “Kaw-Liga” almost as nursery rhymes from the early fifties. But the moment I actually became aware and curious about Hank was when I bought the Jerry Lee Lewis single “Great Balls of Fire.” When I turned the record over there was a version of “You Win Again” that is for the ages. One of the all-time great rock and roll songs. And there, just under the title, it said, “Hank Williams.” I had to learn about that guy, so I began to find more and more great music by him. Songs like “Lovesick Blues,” “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” and “Your Cheatin’ Heart” just slayed me. Hank became one of my biggest influences and is still up there on the mountaintop.

  Another at the top of my country list would be Lefty Frizzell—I always wanted to record a version of “Long Black Veil.” I loved Webb Pierce. There are many great songs, but it’s enough that he did “I Ain’t Never.” Whoever played that guitar… ! I recorded that on my Blue Ridge Rangers album. I loved Chet Atkins. He was such an inspiration. I don’t know if any musician ever practiced more hours than Chet. Ever heard “Yankee Doodle Dixie”? That’s pretty doggone advanced. The guy had all his fingers on both hands working. There’s been a couple of those guys in the history of the guitar. It must have taken thousands upon thousands of hours of practice. Or maybe there’s another race of humans that are wired differently. I used to wonder if that wasn’t true, because it took me such a long time to develop as a player. But then there’s always the question about how much you can learn versus how much you have inside of you.

  Merle Haggard is one of those artists who hit me really hard way back when and continues to have a profound influence on me all these years later. I guess it starts with that amazing voice of his. But through the years he’s just made so many great records. Then there’s the writing. Merle has such a thoughtful, intelligent, humble, fun-loving, badass view of the world! Truly one of the giants of music. I think it’s not an accident that so many of these guys that I listened to are great writers.

  As a teenager, I heard an awful lot of Buck Owens on the radio. “Tiger by the Tail.” “Together Again.” “Crying Time.” Those records were very important to me. That twang, that energy. Don Rich, playing all that Telecaster. When the Beatles covered Buck Owens with “Act Naturally,” that was not odd to me. George Harrison’s whole style, playing hybrid with his fingers—listen to “Help!” That’s a country guy. There was good pickin’ in there.

  I didn’t really meet Buck until kind of by accident at the Bay Area Music Awards (a.k.a. the Bammies) one year in the eighties. He just showed up in a country sports coat and a cowboy hat. We got to be friends. He gave me one of his red, white, and blue guitars. Buck melted me when he told me that Don Rich really loved Creedence.

  All this time, while I’m listening to blues, rock, and country, the folk music boom—some called it a scare—was building slowly all through the fifties, starting way back even before the Weavers and Pete Seeger. All this stuff was bubbling in coffeehouses, and then the Kingston Trio did “Tom Dooley” in 1958, and it just took off. There were a lot of folk hits during that time, so they started having festivals, which my mom so kindly took me to. When I asked her later why she didn’t bring my older brother Tom, she said, “Oh, he wouldn’t come.” I was at the right age. I was twelve and Tom was sixteen, so Tom was into girls and cars, and hey, I was… serious.

  The folk festivals on the campus at UC Berkeley were put on by a wonderful guitar teacher, Barry Olivier, who also gave me my first guitar lessons. I saw Pete Seeger, Jesse Fuller, Mance Lipscomb, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Sam Hinton, Alan Lomax—these weren’t just concerts: they were an education. I was enthralled by the whole thing. These folk festivals were hugely rewarding—just bedrock for me. And not just musically. I’m certain that folk music has a lot to do with my entire belief system in terms of how the world should work.

  In the daytime, the festivals would offer many different workshops. Pete would talk about the style of banjo he was playing, or things like how a lot of the bluesmen such as Lead Belly liked the Stella guitar because it was built so stoutly. Pete Seeger spoke with such affection and reverence—and Pete had film! Of Lead Belly! I mean, oh my God—I’m seeing Lead Belly playing this big ol’ Stella twelve-string, and then five minutes later Pete picks up a Stella, puts on some finger picks, and plays “Midnight Special.”

  I’d heard my mom sing “Goodnight Irene” way back when I was little. Watching a film of Lead Belly doing it—well, it sounded like what I was hearin’ on the radio! Like Muddy Waters or Howlin’ Wolf, except they had drums and electric guitars. But at these folk events it was almost like, “Shhhh, don’t talk about that.” I was learning about the folk police. They didn’t like any commercial stuff. After “Tom Dooley,” all the folk purists were raggin’ on the Kingston Trio—“Who are they? They’re just some college kids. They never picked cotton!” Gee, they took a song and rearranged it, and that’s a bad thing? You mean like, uh, Lead Belly doing “Midnight Special”? I tucked things like that away in my brain. The folk people were just in their own little world. They didn’t want to acknowledge Gene Krupa.

  Seeing Lightnin’ Hopkins was incredible. He had this huge hit, “Mojo Hand”—one of the coolest records ever made. It had that secret, forbidden, cultish thing—stuff that’s just really hidden from the white man. I had to pay attention and try to figure it out. A mojo hand was actually a monkey paw. Whoa! I actually met Lightnin’ Hopkins at the folk festival. This was within minutes of meeting Pete Seeger. Lightnin’ was very gracious. I gave him a little piece of paper and a pen and he made a very shaky-looking X. That was his autograph. If I had been an adult he probably would’ve said no because he wouldn’t have wanted to reveal the fact that he couldn’t write. I kept that piece of paper in the drawer with my socks for the longest time, but it went missing. But I can say that the memory is better than any piece of paper. I met Lightnin’ Hopkins.

  Pete Seeger is the greatest entertainer I have ever seen. An incredible musician. He’d be talking, telling a story, that skinny body of his rocking, and his head would go back and out would come “Michael, row the boat ashore…” You were there in the boat with Pete. Then he’d get everybody in the whole audience to sing along in three parts. It’s like, “Damn. How did we all just do that for an hour?” I’ve never seen anybody else do that—ever. I’ve tried it myself a few times! I’ve witnessed the Franks, the Sammys, the Dinos, the Elvises, but Pete Seeger just had the magic, the showmanship. It was authentic and it was effortless.

  And right around the time I’m watching him, the House Un-American Activities Committee was flailing Pete. He was taking a stand by saying, “I have the right to believe what I believe.” And these kinds of thoughts and ideas were helped along through music. That resonated a lot more with people than a stuffy old speech, especially with some unsuspecting kid like me. There were people fighting and even dying for an idea that in the end actually was good for me? And if enough people didn’t stand up and do that, I wouldn’t get to be free? That really spoke to me.

  I loved Pete. I learned so much from him. He liked to present songs that had ideas, but he never lost sight of just singing and having fun. There was the big folk music canon to perform, and it wasn’t all doom and gloom.* So even though I was a rock and roll kid, I just ate all of this up and thought it was the best. Though I didn’t realize it at the time, Pete’s influence on me was probably greater than any of the rock and roll guys.

  Folk, rock, blues, country—I didn’t make distinctions, wasn’t separating them. “This is R & B. This is country.” I was young and open to all of it.

  I’m still that way. Get me going and it’s tough to stop. I haven’t mentioned records like “The Slummer the Slum” by the 5 Royales, or “I Confess” by the Four Rivers. I covered that one in the eighties—had to lower the key. We can’t do everything we want to do. Only maniacs know that record, and yeah, I’m a
maniac. That was a real dashboard-banger. Or “Henrietta” by Jimmy Dee and the Offbeats—that’s a frantic rockabilly record. The Offbeats—that’s just so wacky in the right way. Very punk name: “We suck! Ugh, stab me!” It was on Dot Records, 1958. The name, the label, the album cover, the sound, and the way the songs came in a certain order, on a certain side—all those little details were so important to me as a kid. They gave an album more mystery, not less. Pulled you in and got you hooked. It was all there to unfold, and that’s one thing missing from music now.

  Which brings us to Mrs. Starck’s class.

  In seventh and eighth grade at Portola Junior High, I was in Mrs. Starck’s music appreciation class. There was some music history and some hands-on playing of instruments—rhythm instruments, mostly. I really, really loved that class. Mrs. Starck kept her hair in a ponytail and sported beads; she was slightly on the beatnik side, and she was amazing. We learned about Mozart and Beethoven—the idea that Beethoven was deaf was very intriguing to me—and even a little bit about boogie-woogie. Meade Lux Lewis and Albert Ammons—those guys. Mrs. Starck talked about all of it like it was important. Like it was real music, to be mentioned in the same breath as Beethoven. Which was way cool. We even learned some about the music business, how contracts were important and often unfair. I shoulda paid more attention.

  One day, Mrs. Starck said, “John, you collect records. Why don’t you bring some of your favorites, and we’ll play them in class and you can talk about why you like them.” I thought she was so cool for doing that. I know I brought “I’m Walkin’” by Fats Domino. I just loved Fats and how that record took its time. I’m pretty sure I brought “Boppin’ the Blues” by Carl Perkins. I might’ve brought “Henrietta” just because I knew that it would probably make Mrs. Starck anxious. She was very tolerant.

  Mrs. Starck was a great inspiration. Rather than thwarting me when I went over to the piano to bang out some rock and roll—which I’m sure sounded pretty awful—she encouraged it and acted like it was the coolest thing in the world.

  My last class of the day was phys ed, right down the stairs from her classroom, so one day I just wandered back into her room. This was in the eighth grade. I don’t know where I got the gumption to sit down and play. I think there was nobody around. I’m a pretty shy person, really.

  Next thing I knew, there were a couple of kids standing there. I could do a few things I was learning at home: “Do You Want to Dance” and a couple of instrumentals that I was playing on the black keys in F sharp, kind of bluesy boogie-woogie. After a few days of doing that, there was a crowd of people. One day Doug Clifford was there. And he started talking about playing drums—he even said he had a drum. We decided to get together.

  When I went over to his house, I saw a snare drum sitting on a flowerpot stand and a cymbal. That was it. Later, Doug got a hi-hat from a guy named Rich Knapp, who’d made it in metal shop. It was homemade, but it worked.

  So we began to play. We started making music—me with my little Sears guitar and amplifier and Doug with his flowerpot snare and cymbal.

  CHAPTER 4

  “There’s Somethin’ Missing,” Says R. B. King

  I REMEMBER A TRIP to Montana with my father in the summer of ninth grade. I had my Silvertone guitar and I’d sit in the backseat of the car and play. I was trying out “Red River Valley” in a minor key, kind of making it blues or folk. My dad took note. It was so frickin’ hot that the plastic pickguard would swell up like a melting candle. It must’ve been 115 degrees out, but I didn’t care. I had my guitar and I was in a magical world, connecting with the shaman’s secret path. I don’t know how else to say it. I have the exact same connection to music today.

  I came out of the womb whistling. I knew I wanted to express myself musically, that I had to, or else I wouldn’t be whole.

  The first guitar we had in the house was an old Stella built like a ’48 Ford. Us kids used to play baseball inside the house, and the Stella was our bat! But I don’t know if it was my dad’s or my mom’s, since nobody played it. My dad might’ve known some chords. By the time I was serious about it, my dad hadn’t been around for a few years.

  My mom and I would bring the Stella acoustic to the lessons with Barry Olivier and take turns playing it. Barry suggested a nylon string guitar, and that made things better. Learning music in a group, all adults except for me, two sessions of about six weeks each—that was a godsend. Barry was such a charismatic person and very sincere about it all. And I was a sponge.

  Either my mom or Barry Olivier had told me to get ahold of The Burl Ives Song Book. In the back were a whole bunch of chords. “Oh, that’s how you make a D chord?” That really helped a lot.

  One night on our way to folk lessons my younger brother Dan was in the car. I played “S & J Blues” on the guitar. Dan said, “Wow, you’re sounding professional.”

  We had an old piano in the house, so naturally I tried to play it. The piano was certainly out of tune. Sometimes I put tacks on the hammers to make it sound honky-tonk. I can’t imagine a kid these days being patient enough to do that. We had a 78 of “Bumble Boogie” by Jack Fina. I played the record at slower speeds to figure out what he was doing. Slowly I learned, “Oooh, there’s some mathematics to this.” I just stayed at it and stayed at it until I could present a pretty plausible version of “Bumble Boogie.” It was probably while I was in high school that I spent the most time practicing and playing piano. I never got real, real good with keyboard, although I could play “Great Balls of Fire” and “Whole Lot of Shakin’ Going On.” The intro to that song is still one of the coolest-sounding piano parts ever.

  I saw jazz pianist Earl Grant doing “Fever” live on TV in 1958 or so, and I bought the 45. Little Willie John had done the song, and Peggy Lee, but as a piano song it was as fresh as “What’d I Say” and “Whole Lot of Shakin’.” The song started with a cool riff. When the show ended, I went over to the piano and played it the best I could remember. I didn’t know what key he was in, but I played it pretty much on the black keys, maybe in the key of B or F sharp. To get in between notes, he’d hit two notes—a trill or something. You try and hit a blues note—you can’t bend a note on a piano. I hadn’t heard that before. I had one of those orgasmic musical moments with “Fever.” For an hour and a half I played it over and over and over, until I really couldn’t reap any more emotion out of it. I was in another land.

  Nowadays a kid could do it all on a computer, but way back in the analog world, you just sort of figured it out. A lot of early rock and roll was so simple guitar-wise that you could pick a song apart and learn how to play it. I was really learning from records—what a band did, what parts they played. It sounds obvious, but before this time in my life, when I really had my hands on instruments, the music on the radio was all just sort of coming at you. I had to learn what the mystery of it was, why and how the guy played certain notes.

  I remember trying to play Ernie Freeman’s instrumental “Lost Dreams.” That drum just sounds so forceful. It could’ve been made yesterday. I had an electric guitar that Tom had rented at Leo’s Music. I’m sitting at the piano, playing the melody with my left hand, hitting one or two guitar strings with my right hand, playing the backbeat with one foot on Doug’s homemade hi-hat, obviously enjoying myself. It was a way to make that “Lost Dreams” sound, but it was me playing instead of listening to the record. Then, for an instant in time, I got to realize how, say, Jerry Lee Lewis must have felt when everybody told him, “Jerry Lee—you’re just crazy! What are you doing?” That’s exactly what happened to me.

  I’m sitting there playing that song on three instruments and my mom comes in the front door and says, “Oh, Johnny! What are you doing?” Like, “You’re just crazy!” I said to myself, Yeah, okay. This must be right! My mom wasn’t wild about rock and roll. She thought Elvis was kind of crude. I think she wondered if it was respectable or not. One time she went to the Monterey Jazz Festival with a couple of girlfriends, and when she got hom
e, she couldn’t stop talking about a song one of the jazz guys did—“I think it was called ‘Give Me One More Time.’” I didn’t have the heart to tell her, “Mom, that was Ray Charles’s ‘What’d I Say,’ and that was rock and roll!” But you know what? I was in the house, banging away on the piano, and she let me. She didn’t second-guess it.

  My brother Tom was four years older than me, so he was able to move in circles I was too young for. And that included being with musicians who were a little beyond where I was, talent-wise. “Do You Want to Dance” by Bobby Freeman—that song got absorbed into our Fogerty brothers mythology. It’s a very simple record: just piano, some bongos. There might be a little bit of upright bass in there and some guitar, but that’s all—there’s no real drums. It’s a great performance, a cool rock and roll arrangement. Plus Bobby was a Bay Area guy, and Tom knew the piano player, Richard Dean. Tom’s voice sounded just like Bobby Freeman’s, and for some reason we had a set of bongos around, so Tom would play the song on the piano and sing, and I’d play the bongos. Tom had been playing for a few more years than I had, us alternating at the piano every chance we could get, and I learned to do that song just like the record. Bongos are pretty easy, right? Tom would sing that song deep into the night, even at two in the morning, and as good as he was, our neighbor would object. It was cute.

  Tom had a really sweet, mellow voice with a high range like Bobby Freeman’s or Ritchie Valens’s. He was perfect for that stuff. Tom could’ve been in the front of a white doo-wop group like the Crests or Randy and the Rainbows, singing something like “Sixteen Candles.” At some point he hooked up with this band Spider Webb and the Insects—older guys with a sax player. They came over to the house and did a song with Tom: the Ritchie Valens hit “Donna.” I wish there was a record of that. I can still hear it in my mind—Tom singing, the sax player playing the guitar filler parts. Even my mom thought it was cool. The Insects brought these gals with them—rock and roll gals dressed alluringly in tight clothes, enhanced attire for men. Mom didn’t like that, and she let the guys know afterward. Even being younger I could kind of tell there was something up with these chicks. My mom was embarrassed for me, I guess.