As 1969 drew to a close there was little doubt Creedence Clearwater Revival stood among the most admired rock acts on the planet and no doubting whatsoever they were the best-selling American group of the era.
Despite not starting their recording career until May 1968, since that self-titled debut set they had released three hugely successful albums – ‘Bayou Country‘ (January), ‘Green River‘ (August), ‘Wily and the Poor Boys‘ (October) – through the final year of the decade, each one a vehicle for the songwriting talents of singer/guitarist John Fogerty. The undisputed leader of the troupe (at this stage responsible of all their original songs and production duties), he led a classy, cohesive quartet in creating a sound rooted in ’50s rock and roll honed with some of the finest pop sensibilities around.
The distinctive tight-knit tone of their records, combined with imaginative lyricism from Fogerty evoking vivid scenes of the American South, saw the label of ‘swamp-rock’ attached to the ongoing output of Creedence Clearwater Revival, epitomized in the worldwide double A-side 1969 hit single ‘Proud Mary’/’Born on the Bayou‘ from the ‘Bayou Country‘ LP. While Fogerty was no child of the bayou or had ever hitched a ride on a river boat queen these were resonant rock songs, ‘Proud Mary‘ among the finest 45s ever recorded.
Indeed, Fogerty (28/5/45), like cohorts elder brother, rhythm guitarist Tom (9/11/41), bassist Stu Cook (25/4/45) and drummer Doug Clifford 24/4/45) hailed from the Bay area. They broke through at roughly the same time as several Haight-Asbury acid rock ensembles (Creedence emerged from less affluent San Francisco neighborhoods as they pointed out more than once), but eschewed the excesses of psychodelia, John Fogerty ploughing a furrow closer to Jerry Lee Lewis than Jerry Garcia.
His unrelenting consistency for writing distinguished, high quality singles was evident when Creedence began 1970 with the January release ‘Who’ll Stop the Rain’/Travellin’ Band‘, maintained through the year with further entries onto their splendid roster, ‘Up Around the Bend’/Run Through the Jungle‘ (April) and ‘Long As I Can See the Light’/Lookin’ Out my Back Door‘ (July).
All three attained high chart placings in the U.S. and U.K. – their profile further boosted by appearing on the cover of Rolling Stone and undertaking a sell-out North American tour.
At a time when several frontline rock acts were creating albums loaded with grand conceptual themes, Creedence were the one major band who still approached albums as a collection of singles, with all six songs issued through the current year included on their long-player ‘COSMO’S FACTORY‘ (July 1970).
In fact those half-a-dozen pieces, each one a prime Creedence cut, form the framework of this their fifth album which contains only one previously unheard Fogerty song – the record fleshed out with four covers in creating an 11-track entity.
While they had not previously been adverse to putting their own stamp on material of others, the first two Creedence singles to chart, ‘Susie Q‘ and ‘I Put A Spell on You‘, (both lifted from the debut album), were renditions of songs that had been hits for others in the late ’50s. ‘Cosmo’s Factory‘, however, contained the highest proportion of tracks sourced from outside the band to feature on a CCR album. Their final offering ‘Mardi Gras‘ (1972) released after Tom Fogerty had quit, contains equal songwriting input from Clifford, Cook and John Fogerty but suffers accordingly, Creedence embracing democracy before biting the dust soon afterward.
If in essence there is little deviation to be found from previous Creedence albums in terms of style and presentation, then ‘Cosmo’s Factory‘ does offer variety if only for the inclusion of two lengthy tracks, (one per side), that extend the running time of a staple Fogerty number by three, even four times their accustomed length.
Again this is not a totally new departure for the band having in the past, especially across the first two albums, allowed themselves scope to jam by extending a song beyond its expected duration. In regard to covers and long form pieces, the previous ‘Wily and the Poor Boys‘ set consisted of ten relatively short tracks of which Fogerty was responsible for eight, while the next ‘Pendulum‘ (December 1970) consisted entirely of his songs, none of which ran more than six and half minutes.
Indeed, if to the unconverted their albums had begun to come across as interchangeable, ‘Cosmo’s Factory‘ sustains interest not least for being a mix of punchy and prolonged, Creedence again proving themselves adept at sounding accomplished no matter whether the song was of short or long form.
The only track written by Fogerty that had not featured on one side or another of a 1970 single was the seven and a half minute opener ‘Ramble Tamble‘.
Beginning to all intents and purposes as a mix of propulsive rockabilly and progressive county rock, Fogerty, the most politically charged songsmith of the day (his position on the liberal left having already been established), once again takes up the cause of the common man who has poverty and suspicion from authority to contend with:
‘There’s garbage on the sidewalk/Highways in the back yard/Police on the corner/Mortgage on the car.’
From its frenetic opening the track eases into a more restrained middle section yet Creedence as a unit always retain a sense of direction, the inventive element in Fogerty’s writing apparent through an instrumental segment that matches The Beatles for melodicism.
But when they revert back to the rumbustious nature of the opening passage it is clear Fogerty has not finished singing from the perspective of a poor man, pointing the finger at those he feels responsible for his impoverished state:
‘They’re selling independence/Actors in the White House/Acid indigestion/Mortgage on my life.‘
The first Fogerty song already familiar to listeners is the rampant ‘Travellin’ Band‘, a brief but uproarious account of being part of a touring rock band (‘737 comin’ out of the sky/Oh! won’t you take me down to Memphis on a midnight ride/I wanna move/Playin’ in a travelin’ band‘).
With Fogerty fleshing out the mix with creaking, self-played saxophone breaks, the track bears obvious similarity to ‘Good Golly Miss Molly‘ by Little Richard whose representatives also heard the likeness.
The Creedence front man agreed an out of court settlement as means of redress, but even then it does not detract from the sheer exuberance of the piece – such buoyancy, although not quite to the same extent, found in the jaunty country rock overtones of ‘Lookin’ Out my Back Door.’
Creating the notion of having returned from a tour (‘Just got home from Illinois/Lock the front door/Oh boy!/Got to sit down/Take a rest on the porch/Imagination sets in/Pretty soon I’m singin‘), the writer conjures strange if engaging imagery of a circus passing through his back garden.
Assisted in these visions by possible stimulants (‘Wond’rous apparition/Provided by magician‘), Fogerty sounds far closer to country music icon Hank Williams than present day hard rockers Humble Pie when observing:
‘Look at all the happy creatures dancing on the lawn/Bother me tomorrow/Today, I’ll buy no sorrows/Doo, doo, doo/Lookin’ out my back door‘.
Side one closer ‘Run Through the Jungle‘ is altogether darker and more foreboding. The ominous electric guitar-based sound effects that herald start of the track, along with the title, create instant association with the Vietnam war that was currently raging without end in sight. But rather than protesting against a conflict from which the United States could not extricate itself, Fogerty has since insisted the song was comment on the proliferation of guns in America – the number referenced in the lyric relating to a figure that effectively represented one for every man, woman and child of the population:
‘Thought i heard a rumblin’/Callin’ to my name/Two hundred million guns are loaded/Satan cries, “take aim.”
Despite the composer clarifying his inspiration in regard of the song, there are few other pieces so representative (if inadvertently) of the warfare in South East Asia, its unerring resonance bringing repeated inclusion in film dramas and documentaries appertaining to Vietnam.
While more relaxed in outlook, ‘Up Around the Bend‘ ensures an energetic start to side two, Fogerty requiring barely two and half minutes to extol the virtues of easy country living (‘Hitch a ride to the end of the highway/Where the neon’s turn to wood‘), as opposed to the hurly-burly of city life. Rooted firmly in the rock and roll that shaped them, even in 1970 ‘Up Around the Bend‘ represented a throwback to the late-1950s, their anachronistic dimension preventing any number of Creedence songs from sounding dated as they already sounded from a bygone decade at the time of release.
The social commentary aspect of Fogerty’s writing returns in the sublime ‘Who’ll Stop the Rain‘ and if previous hits such as ‘Proud Mary‘ and ‘Bad Moon Rising‘ could fill a dance floor as fast as The Temptations, here the lyrics give rise (and confirm) that nobody else at the time was penning words of comparable political candour.
Framed by a gorgeous folk-rock melody, rain is used as a metaphor in linking ambitious Presidential aspirations (Roosevelt) of the past (‘Five year plans and new deals wrapped in golden chains‘) to current day circumstances where downpours have been prevalent – namely the Vietnam war and the 1969 Woodstock festival when overhead the August skies emptied while Creedence were playing their set.
Through each verse his allusions evoke attempts aimed at improving the fabric of society (‘Good men through the ages tryin’ to find the sun‘) that have fallen short, Fogerty of a mind the country has been thwarted in fulfilling its potential, heavy weather being made of the progress that still needs to occur.
The latest generation to see their ambitions denied is that who gathered in the mud of Woodstock holding ideals of peace and love – this while America became further mired in a far away war:
‘Heard the singers playin’/How we cheered for more/The crowd had rushed together tryin’ to keep warm/ Still the rain kept pourin/Fallin’ on my ears/And I wonder/Still I wonder who’ll stop the rain.’
Of the two covers included one side one, ‘Before You Accuse Me‘ (written in 1957 by Bo Diddley) shuffles along nicely and comes with far more twang than a version cut by Eric Clapton several years later, while ‘Ooby Dooby‘ which had been a late ’50s hit for Roy Orbison is dutifully souped up in taking the form of a latter-day ‘Tutti Frutti.’
Over on side two there is a short but accelerated reading of the early Elvis Presley standard ‘My Baby Left Me‘ although in contrast ‘I Heard It Through the Grapevine‘ which two years earlier had been taken to the top of the charts for Motown by soul master Marvin Gaye, is elongated to just over eleven minutes.
To their credit Creedence maintain a spontaneous vibe as the time ticks by, testament to just how intuitive they were as a collective even if for some one listen of this rendition was generally enough.
The album closes with a final Fogerty offering, this being the introspective electric piano ballad, ‘Long as I Can See the Light.’
Delivering the song with a soulful if world-weary vocal, Fogerty is fatigued at the thought of an impending journey, but also cheered his absence from familiar surroundings will not be permanent:
‘Put a candle in the window/’Cause I feel I’ve got to move/Though I’m going, going/I’ll be coming home soon/’Long as I can see the light.’
Made even more poignant by a resonant sax solo, played by the writer, the spiritual connotation in using the candle as means of guidance, (suggesting the influence of Van Morrison rather than Eddie Cochran), makes it untypical among the songs Fogerty had so far written, but an emotive addition nevertheless to an impressive and ever-lengthening list.
Taking its title from the nickname of drummer Clifford, coupled with the fact he had found them a warehouse in Berkeley to rehearse, (the album recorded at the Wally Heider Studio in San Francisco), ‘Cosmo’s Factory‘ was an instant critical and commercial success – a nine week run at number one on the U.S. charts (also topping U.K. listings for a fortnight), making it the biggest selling album of their career.
At the end of the year, Rolling Stone ranked it 13th on their list of best albums from 1970, (13 places higher than ‘Pendulum‘ that it predates by six months), ‘Cosmo’s Factory‘ enhancing the claim made by the magazine in their review that Creedence Clearwater Revival are ‘one great rock and roll band.’
Of that there is little dispute, CCR having no rivals as the most consistently excellent singles band not only of their day, but through an entire period lasting from the going of Beatlemania to the coming of punk – ‘Cosmo’s Factory‘ the greatest collection of 45s ever assembled on one album outside of a compilation.
CREEDENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL – COSMO’S FACTORY (Released July 8 1970):
Ramble Tamble/Before You Accuse Me/Travellin’ Band/Ooby Dooby/Lookin’ out My Back Door/Run Through the Jungle/Up Around the Bend/My Baby Left Me/Who’ll Stop the Rain/I Heard It Through the Grapevine/Long As I Can See the Light;
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