Creedence Clearwater Revisited
Wildhorse Saloon
Saturday, September 29, 2007
I must first apologize for the lateness of this review. I haven’t written a full feature in quite a while for a number of reasons, most notably taking ownership and day-to-day operations of this site. I’ve actually been contemplating hanging up my writing hat but couldn’t say no when one of my publicist friends offered me a chance to review Creedence Clearwater Revisited’s recent performance at The Wildhorse Saloon. The invitation brought back wonderful memories of sifting through my parents’ record collection and trying to fake my way through guitar chords from many classic albums by The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and ‘Cosmo’s Factory’ by CCR. I had heard about CCR getting back together without John Fogerty and brother Tom so I was a bit apprehensive about what to expect but was excited to see the original rhythm section of bassist Stu Cook and Doug ‘Cosmos’ Clifford live.
I was added +1 to the guest list of the Wildhorse and the decision of who to take was an easy one; my mother. If it wasn’t for my parents’ record collection, I would have missed out on some great music in those early teenage years. Knowing she was a fan, I was excited to take her to the show. Although this will never make up for everything she has done for me over the years, I hope it showed her some of my appreciation. Love ya mom!
This was the first time that I’ve ever been inside of the Wildhorse and I was very impressed with the venue and staff. The stage is enormous and there are three levels of seating and a bar in every corner. Getting inside the venue was quite a challenge as I was a late add to the guest list and it took some shifting to get in but we finally made it. We were near the back of the large ballroom and were pleased to see some flat screen plasma televisions set up on some of the posts to the side. Now, on to the one rant that I have for this review.
The opening act was a country group called Telluride. While I know that this is the Wildhorse Saloon and it got its fame from hosting country shows, they seem to want to crawl into bed with rock music lately and I view a CCR concert as a rock show. Sure, there are some country elements to CCR’s music, but I ‘m getting pretty sick of country music always finding a way to stick its butt in the air and say “Look at me!” Don’t get me wrong, Telluride is a talented group but they were not exactly my cup of tea. On top of everything else, they played 90% cover songs. If I want to hear five scruffy guys playing ‘Jack and Diane’ for the 3,000,000th time, I’ll go to a dive bar. Okay, I’m glad that I got that off of my chest.
After a pretty long intermission, everyone got what they were waiting for. The familiar guitar intro from ‘Born on the Bayou’ began to ring out and the crowd came alive. The band hit the stage looking happy and excited. I’ve always loved John Fogerty so I had pretty high expectations for new vocalist John Tristao. While Tristao doesn’t have the hippie-ish lanky build of Fogerty (and actually looks more like Michael Chiklis from the television show The Shield), he’s a dead ringer in the vocal department. If you close your eyes, you’ll swear that Fogerty is up there with the boys again. His pipes stayed effective through the whole set and he’s very entertaining and has quite a sense of humor in his stage presence. You could tell that he came to play music and have fun and his enthusiasm was contagious. Lead guitarist, Tal Morris actually looked quite a bit like the Fogerty brothers, clad in the flannel and jeans, and did a fantastic job, playing faithful versions of the classic riffs of such songs as “Commotion”, “Who’ll Stop the Rain”, and “Hey Tonight”. Original members Doug ‘Cosmos’ Clifford and Stu Cook provided a rhythm section so tight that it can’t be achieved without decades of practice. Clifford still bashes the drums every bit as hard as he did in the 60’s.
As a fan of the Fogerty-era CCR, I was very ready to give this act a negative review. After all, it’s only two of the original members. What I witnessed that September night was mesmerizing. Creedence Clearwater Revisited won the entire crowd over (me included) with an amazing set of hits that were played flawlessly and faithful to the spirit of the original band. While hit after hit was played, it finally dawned on me how many great songs this band has in its canon. From the bluesy shuffle of “Suzy-Q” to the powerful emotion of “Lodi”, CCR came at the audience with the fire of an era where substance won over style and good songwriting happened within a band. The band closed its regular set with “Bad Moon Rising”, an extremely up-tempo cover version of “Proud Mary” and the politically apropos “Fortunate Son”. When the set ended, I looked at my mother and we were both thinking “How do they top this?” After a short break, they did. CCR came back on stage and ended the night with an action packed quartet of hits in “Have You Ever Seen the Rain”, “Travelin’ Band”, “Run through the Jungle”, and “Up Around the Bend”. While there were a number of older baby-boomers in the audience, the younger audience members were dancing alongside them throughout the show. It felt more like a block party than a rock concert.
If you are a fan of CCR, I would highly recommend seeing them if they are in your area. I went into this thinking it would be a disaster and walked out feeling uplifted, nostalgic, and happier for seeing it when I had the chance. This music is timeless and should be remembered and enjoyed in any form you can get it. Thanks to CCR for putting such a great show, to the Wildhorse Saloon for its great facilities, and to Wendy Weisberg for inviting me to see the band.
That’ll do it for this time.
Until Next Time, I’m out like record sales.
Chris Czynszak
To reach Chris Czynszak, e-mail to cczynszak@nashvillerock.net