In the winter of 1986, when exchanging some deadly washed down vinyls for others - those killed just in the trash, but never listened to by me (not everything and did not immediately come back then in the state of "the first needle"), I got a load of a TDK cassette with a mishmash of rock n-roll - I did not know a single performer there "by sight".
Killed me by the killer Good Golly, Miss Molly.
Before that, having remained (to this day) in some painful bewilderment from the Beatles, having experienced disappointment with the Rolling Stones and almost giving up on the concept of a "rock band" as such, I had never heard anything like it.
They were Creedence Clearwater Revival.
And there (on the cassette) was also Suzie Q.
I think (no, I'm sure), all of us, men, have something like this monologue in our heads and scroll it when we are “blown away”:
I like the way you walk
I like the way you talk
I like the way you walk, I like the way you talk
Suzie Q
Oh say that you'll be true
Oh say that you'll be true
Oh say that you'll be true and never leave me blue
Suzie Q
That day I was quickly enlightened that yes: “Such dudes in the States.
Cool and cool, but fell apart a long time ago, you know their song ironically - Elvis sang it all his life!
Proud Mary! "
Having rummaged wherever possible, I got hold of a discography of the Credences and discovered that many of their songs are familiar to me, even Bill Haley recorded a very exciting and cocky record on one of the Travelin 'Band and Who'll Stop the Rain albums.
The name especially hooked me.
At Moscow State University, as soon as we did not translate it (journalists, creative people, everything in the image), but the final decision has not yet been made.
Pure water.
The trust.
Vera.
Revival.
Revitalization.
Faith of pure water revitalization?
There is one simple and understandable option - living water.
They are like a breath of air and freedom.
Tactful.
Thin.
Smart.
Thinking rockers.
Collected and fit, without drug twists and star-blunt drifts.
Guys from the South.
Heirs to kings and kingdoms.
Rock and Roll Artists.
You see, I am in memories and sensations - few facts, many feelings.
What to say?
You can read the history of the group yourself.
They were the stars of Woodstock.
Are you hooked?
Me - no.
Like Woodstock itself.
The Credences, by the way, were not only the headliners of Woodstock, they were the first to take up the challenge and officially announced their participation by signing a contract.
All the others followed.
CCR were able to take the stage only at midnight of the second day of the festival - August 16, 1969.
The performance time shifted for everyone, an utter mess reigned, and, in addition, it was almost constantly raining, alternating with thunderstorms, many musicians were electrocuted, and they say that blue sparks flew from the guitars.
John Fogerty, the band's leader and most songwriter with a classically refined, southern and blurry accent, who invented the CCR style and the legend of the fictional Willy and the Poor Boys, recalled Woodstock:
“My first thought was: wow!
- will have to play for the group (Grateful Dead), which managed to put half a million people to sleep!
Well, I play, I scream, after three songs I peer into the space behind the Jupiters - rows of intertwined bodies: everyone is asleep.
We got stoned and fell asleep ... No matter how hard we tried, half a million spectators were passed out.
It was like a scene from Dante: in the underworld, half a million grappling bodies are sleeping in the mud.
And then came the moment that remained in my memory for the rest of my life.
About a quarter of a mile away from us, on the other side of the field, on a hill, a guy strikes a lighter, and I hear his voice in the night: “Don't worry, John!
We are with you! "
I did the rest of the show for this guy ... "
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The Credences, with their inconceivable, almost military discipline and self-discipline in preparing for recordings in the studio, it was impossible to "share the bright values" of the generation of flower children / hippies, gently flowing into the generation of gladiators of the sexual revolution.
These four from San Francisco, perhaps simple-minded in appearance, were great professionals, which means they professed the principle of "10,000 hours of hard work", rehearsed seven hours a day, managed to spend no more than $ 5,000 on recording an album, and According to Russ Gary, sound engineer at Wally Heider Recording, “they were definitely one of the few bands that came to the session fully prepared for the job.
They worked tirelessly, without whims and disruptions, and very quickly.
Wally Haider himself (the owner of the studio) told me more than once that he had never met a group with such an approach to business. "
And what could they say about the Woodstock generation?
What could they say about the "brilliant and in every sense free" crowd in the middle of the rain-flooded field?
The Woodstock Generation?
Oh yes, top class.
Fifty mile traffic jam.
No food, no water, no roof over your head.
It's raining, everyone is sleeping in the mud.
“Man, that was great!
What a party!
Sound is awful!
Who, you ask, did I see last night?
Yes, especially no one! .. I was completely stoned - so ... I forgot who. "
Having reached the first lines of the charts in the first two years of its existence, overcoming the resistance of the pop-cultural garbage barrier and breaking through to the hearts of Americans clinging to radio receivers (a little pretentious, but it was so), the Credences hardly changed their addictions and their way of life - except that they moved higher up the hill, slightly expanding the home domain.
The rest - daily rehearsals and work on new albums.
There were not many of them - only seven.
My favorites (for me) are Bayou Country in January 1969, Green River in August 1969, Willy and the Poor Boys in November 1969, Cosmo's Factory in July 1970.
What is the density of success.
And the accuracy of the sound.
And the simplicity of the texts.
But are they that simple?
In their songs of protest, the Credences confidently determined the place and true face of the then politicians, not hesitating to embarrass Ronald Reagan (then Governor of California) and Richard Nixon, President of the Blessed United States, mired in Watergate.
The Credences have been listed as “potential reds” more than once, calling them a group “calling on young people to rebel”.
Doubtful assertion, not without foundation, - CCR led the rebellion against the dullness and "monstrous middle" of show business.
And if you need confirmation ...
The title track of the album Green River was released in the USA as a single and reached the second place on the Billboard lists for only one reason - it was outstripped by Sugar Sugar, the fresh hit of The Archies.
And this despite the fact that the music reviewer for Rolling Stone magazine has awarded Green River five stars.
But do you feel the chasm separating the first and second places on that chart?
You can't help but feel.
Therefore, they broke up in 1972 - a unique phenomenon, one of a kind.
The most worthy.
Strangers among "friends".
Blacks considered them black, whites - southerners.
Just like in the days of Elvis and the first.
And about the simplicity of the Credence texts.
About cotton.
About the South of the States.
So many words have been said about the hard life of farmers and hired workers, who almost (for the most part) did not differ from each other in the level (ha-ha) of life.
Now read the short text of the "simple" Cotton Fields (they sing it so joyfully, and there is such a fire under a thin layer of ash of memories ...):
When I was a little bitty baby
My mama would rock me in the cradle,
In them old cotton fields back home.
It was down in Louisiana,
Just about a mile from Texarkana,
In them old cotton fields back home.
Oh, when them cotton bolls get rotten
You can't pick very much cotton,
In them old cotton fields back home.
Everything has its time in the world under the stars ...
When the cotton bolls rot
The big cotton crop cannot be harvested
We have at home in the old cotton fields.
The point of view of the author may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.