Creedence Clearwater Revival - Green River (1969)

The cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival's Green River shows John Fogerty standing alone and in front, with (from left) brother and rhythm guitarist Tom Fogerty, bassist Stu Cook and drummer Doug Clifford relegated to the background.  That indicates how integral John Fogerty was to this band, but it downplays the contributions of the others a little too much.  Green River, first and foremost, is the work of a band, and probably this band's best album ever (I will not be offended by those who want to argue for Willy and the Poor Boys).  The music is direct, tightly arranged, and stepped in American blues and country tradition.  And while John Fogerty was Creedence's guiding force, the rhythm section that his brother Tom, Cook, and Clifford comprised provide the solid, steady undercurrent for Fogerty's back-to-basics vision.    

Green River begins with the title track, which carries itself once it gets going.  It glides like a smooth, steady railroad train with a steady, gently rocking rhythm expertly emphasized by Clifford's drums and counterbalanced by by John Fogerty's biting leads.  The rest of the album runs just as flawlessly, seemingly without effort; as residents of a working-class suburb in the San Francisco Bay area, the members of Creedence Clearwater Revival could identify with the basics and the immediacy of the Mississippi Delta-based music they loved.  The eight John Fogerty originals on Green River instantly became classics - just as Ray Charles' "The Night Time Is the Right Time," Creedence's cover of which closes this album, had already been - almost as soon as this album was released.  

There are several moments of joy on Green River, from the sprightly "Commotion" to the shuffling railroad pedestrian's paean "Cross Tie Walker,"  but there are several elements of danger here as well; Creedence delves in to some of the darker, more menacing elements of Americana with the heavy blues number "Tombstone Shadow" creeping out like a hand with long, bony fingers and one of John's nastier solos on tap, as well as the slightly less foreboding "Sinister Purpose."  Some of the less intense moments on this record are deceiving; "Bad Moon Rising" is set to a danceable beat but its lyrics - inspired by Richard Nixon's 1968 presidential election victory - portend dark times ahead.  "Bad Moon Rising" shows how Fogerty is driven by a need to strip rock and roll down its most bitter truths, and in the late sixties he did so at a time when idealistic optimism ruled the day.  Even David Crosby, in his song "Long Time Gone" (about Robert Kennedy's assassination), saw light at the end of the long, dark tunnel America was headed into; Fogerty saw no such redemption in sight.  (Anyone who bought into the promise of Barack Obama's Presidency at the start of 2009 would agree that time has shown Fogerty the wiser.)

More than that, Fogerty brings to his music a desire to communicate the personal as well as the political, as demonstrated by Green River's two most pensive cuts, "Wrote a Song For Everyone" and "Lodi"; in the former song, he ponders the irony of reaching a mass audience with his music while being unable to talk to his closest confidante, while the latter song reveals his desire to stick out the tough times and persevere.  His band's no-nonsense style and his respect for tradition broke through the clutter of acid rock, progressive rock, folk rock, and all the other forms of rock that had developed in the late sixties; Green River, if anything, is a conversation between the artiste and the listener about the essence of America, reflected in its most essential musical expression.  John Fogerty really did write a song for everyone; Green River is an album everyone ought to have.

(This is my last review for awhile; I need another break, and I probably need it more than Congress.)