138. Creedence Clearwater Revival - Bayou Country (1969)




















Track Listing

1. Born on the Bayou
2. Bootleg
3. Graveyard Train
4. Good Golly Miss Molly
5. Penthouse Pauper
6. Proud Mary
7. Keep on Chooglin'

Review

Ahhh, CCR, kings of Southern Fried rock. 1969 is definitely seeing a change from the psychadelia of the last 2 years, rock has been distilled into something at the same time more retro, but looking at the future. A lot was learned from psychadelia, but there was a need to recapture some of the purity of earlier rock. And blues influenced bands, from CCR to Led Zeppelin are popping up. And that's a good thing.

Don't get me wrong, I love psychadelia, really. But it was sometimes excessive, and became a parody of itself. The 60's are coming to an end, and with it so is the flower power utopia of drugs and free sex. Frankly I would have liked to be a part of that, but some of the ideas underlying flower power are just silly new age crap, which was sometimes reflected in psychadelia, making it sometimes ridiculous or just inane.

That said, CCR are not the greatest band in the world ever. They owe a lot to British stuff like Cream as well as to the older Blues interpreters. And if they do manage to do one thing is to make catchy and exciting music. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the track Proud Mary, probably CCR's most famous track. I also have to admire the guts to go south in music styles, where the prevalent counter-culture was not at all "Born On The Bayou". Fogerty was from California for that matter, but that didn't stop him trying to bring rock to its southern origins. And the music is good, it won't blow your mind away, but it is suitably enjoyable with lovely guitar and even harmonica work. It's darker than much of what was being produced at the time and also grittier. So buy it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Proud Mary
2. Graveyard Train
3. Bootleg
4. Keep On Chooglin'

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

Proud Mary:



Wikipedia:

In the film The Big Lebowski, the main character, Jeff "The Dude" Lebowski, lists the band as his favorite band.

What else do you need?