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Writing those songs was just agony. It took a long time to resolve those songs
-- and I think it's a really good record.
What was the problem?
I had a conversation going with myself for a couple of years. The "Déjà Vu All Over Again" album was not a rocking record. I
think my fans were perplexed and I decided to get back to what the center of
rock is -- or what it is to me.
I've always thought of you as a sort of musical Unitarian in that you
don't seem to follow one doctrine of what constitutes good music. In fact, you
seem to make almost no distinction between, say, Hank Williams and Little
Richard.
Absolutely! As a young boy, I had equal love for blues, R&B and country.
I predate rock 'n' roll by a few years, and R&B and country were the two
pieces it drew on.
How did you learn about music? Was there a radio station or a record
store that played a big part in your formation?
It started when I was 7 or 8. We lived in El Cerrito, which was across the
[San Francisco] Bay. It was a small town and that was my whole world. Even
though it wasn't really that far from the city, it seemed like being way out in
the country. There was a TV program called "The Hoffman Hayride." It was hosted
by Spade Cooley from Los Angeles, and I liked the cowboy stuff.
When I was about 3, my mother gave me a yellow plastic record -- one of those
little, colored plastic ones -- and explained that this was Stephen Foster. One
side was "Oh! Susanna" and the other was "De Camptown Races."
When my older brothers got to be about 11 or 12, they started listening to
KWBR, the R&B station from Oakland. It was amazingly cool. Now I'm hearing
things like "Gee" by the Crows, and "Sh-Boom" by the Chords, and LaVern Baker,
Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters. I remember hearing Elvis doing "Blue Moon of
Kentucky" on KWBR. They only played it for like a week or two but they played
it. So I was listening to this and to the country music, mostly on TV. My mom
would call it Okie music. There were the Okies that came out to California
during the dust bowl and worked on the farms like in "The Grapes of Wrath," but
they were also working in the shipyards in Oakland, and there were western clubs
in Richmond. So we called it Okie music and then Hillbilly and finally country
music. I was enjoying all that stuff before rock n' roll, and then Elvis and
Bill Haley hit.
There was no record store close to our house. I can remember going to buy a
Christmas present for my brother -- "The Great Pretender" by the Platters and
"At My Front Door" by the El Dorados in '57-'58. I had to take a bus to Berkeley
to go to a record shop on Shattuck Ave. It was quite a trek for a little boy.
Later on, a furniture store near my house sold 45s. I know it seems strange, but
there was a tradition of selling records in furniture stores. They started
selling them with Victrolas, which were considered furniture.
I've always suspected Chuck Berry was your primary songwriting model.
Was he?
Well, I loved "Maybellene," but before Chuck I really loved Carl Perkins. It
was awhile before I heard much more by Chuck -- around '56 with "Roll Over
Beethoven." But I remember thinking Carl Perkins was cool because he wrote, sang
and played guitar. I later learned that Chuck Berry was the same.
The guitar parts were more sophisticated with Chuck -- and what I liked was
that he told a story. You could get a picture in your head from his songs. I
remember buying the album "After School." Whew! That had "Brown Eyed Handsome
Man" and "Too Much Monkey Business." And he had an instrumental B-side on
"School Days" called "Deep Feeling." I still go crazy when I hear that.
I see Starbucks is selling "Revival," and you made a special version
with a DVD exclusively for Wal-Mart. You've certainly seen music and the record
business change a lot.
When I was a kid and hearing the music for the first time it was about
singles. Albums were a luxury for a kid. You could go to the record store and it
seemed like there were thousands of labels operating out of someone's garage. It
was just wide open then as a business -- wildcats and outlaws.
It got very structured in the '60s. Everything got so conceptual after "Sgt.
Pepper's." A lot of people couldn't do it well.
Now, with the record companies crumbling, the situation is very complex. How
will I get my record out there and heard? I keep thinking the whole record
business is in disarray -- but that some hot 21-year-old with a hot band will
figure it out, just like I did. When we were starting Creedence I thought, "I
don't have a manager or an attorney or a big record company, so I'm going to
have to do it with the music." And I certainly did.
I figure somewhere in here it always helps to be 21 -- some kid will
negotiate through it and become the center of the universe and everyone else
will say, "That's the model" and adapt it.
Fred Goodman is the author of "The Mansion on the Hill: Dylan, Young,
Geffen, Springsteen and the Head-on Collision of Rock and Commerce" (Vintage). A
former editor of Rolling Stone and Billboard, his work has appeared in many
major publications.
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