Fogerty combs over classics in Vegas revival

Spencer Patterson

Monday, Aug. 2, 2004 | 8:11 a.m.

It's hard to imagine what Saturday night's show at The Joint at the Hard Rock Hotel might have been like had Fogerty not lifted that ban during the late 1990s.

Embarked on a rare solo tour, the 59-year-old rock 'n' roll legend unabashedly celebrated his past during his first Las Vegas appearance.

Of the 24 songs Fogerty performed, 16 harkened to his days with Creedence, a California band famous for sending swampy, Southern-sounding singles up the charts in the late '60s and early '70s.

A crowd of around 1,000 cheered deliriously upon recognizing the opening notes of each familiar tune, a reaction not unnoticed by the night's headliner.

"This is my first time playing here, and I'm loving it," Fogerty announced, offering up a hearty "Thank yeeoou!" between most numbers.

Dressed in all black, the vocalist/guitarist referenced his troubled past, one that included legal battles with his former record label and verbal sparring with his ex-CCR bandmates, two of whom now perform his tunes as Creedence Clearwater Revisited.

"So ya'll mighta heard sometime that I had a rough time in the music business," Fogerty said.

He quickly added, however, that that was "a long time ago," and that he is a happy man these days.

Fogerty certainly seemed it Saturday night, jumping as he soloed during show opener "Born on the Bayou."

Other welcome Creedence nuggets included: "Green River," "Suzie Q," "Up Around the Bend," "Lookin' Out My Back Door," "Have You Ever Seen the Rain?," "Who'll Stop the Rain," "Down on the Corner," "Travelin' Band," "Bad Moon Rising" and the encore pairing of "Fortunate Son" and "Proud Mary."

Most of the arrangements remained faithful to the originals -- the rare exception a revved-up take on "Lodi" -- but provided just enough freedom for Fogerty and his veteran four-piece band to operate unfettered.

Surprisingly, the two songs that most invigorated the crowd of mostly 40- and 50-somethings came from Fogerty's 1985 solo album, "Centerfield."

Fans shuffled in place as Fogerty played a baseball bat-shaped guitar during ballpark anthem "Centerfield," and they sang along with the "hidey-hidey-hide"s of "The Old Man Down the Road."

Fogerty's other solo material, which included three cuts from 1997's "Blue Moon Swamp" comeback album, didn't go over quite as well.

During one segment, audience members streamed toward the bathrooms and chatted among themselves while Fogerty performed four solo numbers in succession, sapping a bit of the concert's otherwise hard-charging momentum.

To his credit, however, Fogerty's more recent compositions sounded at home alongside his Creedence work, proving that he remains a talented songwriter 35 years after founding that Hall of Fame outfit.

Fogerty opted not to speak about politics, something of a shock for a man known for speaking his mind in interviews. He did, however, offer some grim lyrics about the war in Iraq during "Deja Vu (All Over Again)," the title track from a new disc pegged for a September release.

A sample: "Day by day I hear the voices rising / Started with a whisper like it did before / Day by day we count the dead and dying / Ship the bodies home while the networks all keep score."

Mostly, though, the night was upbeat and fun, both for fans and for Fogerty, who smiled broadly as he marveled at the enthusiastic reaction around the room.

"I want you to know you were so beautiful," Fogerty said before exiting. "Thank you for being so rambunctious."

And thank you, John, for re-opening your vaults and treating Las Vegas to a down-home Creedence revival.