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- [00:00]
Jeff Zito
Foreign. And thank you for listening to the Celebrity Jobber podcast, which is number one on the Apple Podcast music interviews chart. So thank you very much for that. You can follow on Instagram Celebrity Underscore, Jobber Underscore podcast and also YouTube.com the signce celebrity jobber and and we're streaming on iHeart, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever you listen to podcasts. So please subscribe. Would love a five star rating. And also if you would please leave a review, you could check out past guests and episodes which are online@celebrityjobber.com My guest this week is a legendary singer songwriter whose songs include Proud Mary, Bad Moon Rising, Fortunate sun, down on the Corner, who'll stop the Rain? Oh, up around the Bend, have you ever seen the rain? Center field, the Old man down the Road, and many, many more. He was the lead singer of the band Creedence Clearwater Revival and then had a very successful solo career when that band parted ways back in 1972. We'll talk a little bit about him growing up, the music business, his big break, the moment that changed everything in his life and of course, his, his first job from Creedence Clearwater Revival, the iconic John Fogarty is my guest this week on Celebrity Jobber, the Celebrity Jobber.
- [01:34]
Podcast Announcer
Podcast with Jeff Zito. If you like what you hear, please subscribe, give a five star rating and leave a review. Check out all our past episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you pod. What if these celebrities weren't famous? What would they have become? What was their first job? We're about to find out.
- [01:54]
Jeff Zito
John, how are you?
- [01:56]
John Fogerty
I'm doing good, thank you.
- [01:57]
Jeff Zito
Growing up in the 60s in the San Francisco area, I mean, everything was going on back then, you know. Do you, do you, do you look back nowadays and look back at that time, growing up in such an important part of our culture?
- [02:14]
John Fogerty
Well, I do, but I think more so. I remember how dizzy, how exciting, how tumultuous everything was. You know, a lot of different things were in motion, I suppose you'd say. And I kind of see it more from a personal perspective rather than something, you know, a kid later would read about it in a history book or something. But since we experienced it, it comes from personal recollection.
- [02:43]
Jeff Zito
Yeah. And how was your growing up, John? I mean, did you have a, did you have a fun growing up as a, as a child?
- [02:51]
John Fogerty
Yeah, I grew up in a little town called El Cerrito. I think that was a wonderful place to grow up. It was a small town and yet it was part of The Bay Area. So you're part of the big mega at the same time, you know, always in the shadow of San Francisco, I guess you'd say. But yet, Abel, especially in my earlier years, it was pretty small. More like a village, I'd say, especially the years when I was learning about music and the big musical world out there. It was a great place to be.
- [03:26]
Jeff Zito
And what got you interested in that big musical world out there? Did your mother or father, did they play music? What did they do for work?
- [03:36]
John Fogerty
Well, they didn't do it professionally. My mom played the piano, something I found out when I was probably a little older. The first time I. Well, I say older, I was about 6 or 7. My dad picked up a little toy harmonica and started playing oh, Susanna. And it just blew my mind. I didn't know he could do that, you know. I mean, I'd been probably watching him for a couple of years by the time I was five, you know, and just didn't know that about him. My parents split up when I was quite young. So mostly I was influenced by my mom after that. One of the things my mom did that was very unusual, when I was three years old, she sat me down and gave me a little Yellow Kids record. It turned out that one side was oh, Susanna and the other side was Camptown Races. And she played the songs for me, and then she explained to me that Stephen Foster was the songwriter of both of those songs. And that's just a really unusual thing to do for a kid. Yeah, a youngster. And so I've focused on that my whole life. I mean, I became aware of Stephen Foster's songs and sort of that whole realm of, you know, what we now call Americana.
- [05:03]
Jeff Zito
Right.
- [05:03]
John Fogerty
But it was just a wonderful world to me at the time.
- [05:07]
Podcast Announcer
The Celebrity Jobber podcast with Jeff Zito.
- [05:10]
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- [05:41]
Jeff Zito
Jobber and the beginnings of CCR. I would say the origins started in high school and maybe interrupted by a brief relationship with Uncle Sam. Would that be correct?
- [05:54]
John Fogerty
Well, yeah. We met in junior high, actually. Doug and Stu in Credence, of course. I known my brother Tom all my life.
- [06:05]
Jeff Zito
Right.
- [06:07]
John Fogerty
And, yeah, we kind of drifted apart many different times through high school and the years after, either people weren't playing, or, in my case, I was playing with other musicians, that sort of thing. I got drafted in 1966, and so I was eventually into the Army Reserve. I was in the Army Reserve for about three years during those years, during the Vietnam time.
- [06:39]
Jeff Zito
And can you tell me about the. If there was a particular moment that kind of everything changed for you, like maybe hearing a CCR record on the radio or getting that phone call, maybe from a record label wanting to sign you? Can you think of a moment where everything changed for John Fogarty in your life? Everything went in the way that you wanted of your dreams?
- [07:06]
John Fogerty
Well, I think for me, the biggest moment that happened with a, you know, a singular boom right then, rather than some sort of gradual process, was the day I wrote Proud Mary. Because, you know, all my. Well, starting from when my mother told me about Stephen Foster and growing up and admiring many songwriters and great songs. Of course, my mom loved Hoagie Carmichael, let's say, and Old Buttermilk sky and things like that to even, you know, when the Beatles started showing up on our shores and I learned who Lennon and McCartney were. The day I wrote Proud Mary. Put it this way, I had admired songs all my life, but I had never written a really great song before. And the day that that happened, I realized that Proud Mary was a classic. I mean, I looked at it, and I was aware that this was far above anything I'd ever done before and that this song was destined to be a classic. I also knew I was. It was a bit of humor at the time. I told myself, I'm the only one in the whole world that knows this. It was just sort of a strange feeling, you know, But I was so positive that Proud Mary was far above, you know, up in the clouds. So that was a. Wow. Kind of a rite of passage. Minutes before, I'd been here, and now I was, boom, there. And as you said, everything changed after that.
- [08:46]
Jeff Zito
That. That is a remarkable story. And I understand. You know, I kind of.
- [08:52]
Podcast Announcer
The Celebrity Jobber podcast with Jeff Zito. The Celebrity Jobber podcast with Jeff Zito.
- [08:58]
Jeff Zito
I don't understand the music business, you know, like you do. And I know there are so much behind the curtain that people don't understand, but you get a new album which is coming out. It's all of your songs. It's called Legacy, the Credence Clearwater Revival years, and you didn't own this music. I don't Understand how you can't own this music. You wrote it, it's yours. So explain a little bit about that to me and how. How you got it back.
- [09:30]
John Fogerty
Well, okay, I'll try and do it quickly and simply. The four of us in the band who had just recently, through my. I had changed the name to Creedence Clearwater Revival. On Christmas Eve of 1967, this was early January 1968, we found ourselves at the office of Saul, who owned Fantasy. We signed a contract at that time, and the contract said that the label would own our recordings, but it also said it would own any original songs that were written by any of the four of us. So at that moment in time, we were still all looking around as kind of a democracy, you might say, full of a lot of wishful thinking, and didn't really realize at that moment that I would be writing all the songs that kind of came in the next few months, where clearly I began to write these wonderful songs that we all know now. And so at the time of signing the contract, I didn't even realize that something I would do, you know, six months, eight months a year from now would be owned by Saul. And that's how that happened. So for the next three years, which is basically the career of Credence, he owned everything that I wrote. The other fellows actually didn't write any songs during that period of time. And so then, basically, I was set on a path. Obviously, that's an unfair thing. I'm writing the songs, but he owns them. Yeah, you know, it's pretty unfair. I was set onto a path that would take me almost the rest of my life to fix. And here we are up into about 20, 23, where I finally got that reversed, and I now own my own songs.
- [11:34]
Jeff Zito
And that record is coming out on Friday, I believe the 20. Is it the 22nd, John?
- [11:40]
John Fogerty
Yes. Correct. And really, what this record, I think, represents is beyond me actually getting the ownership of the songs back. Re recording these things and having them come. You know, this album is really nice. I really like it. I mean, I'm not sitting here trying to sell, you know, snow to Eskimos. It's a thing I really am behind because it just feels wonderful. And, you know, until you hear it, you won't know what I'm saying, but once you hear it, you will know what I'm saying. And I just believe that there's something at play here, that somehow this album sort of kind of restates the ownership, the authorship of these songs to the world. You know, it seems to Be that that's what this is. At least that's how it feels to me.
- [12:46]
Jeff Zito
I think it's very, very cool. John. I know we gotta go. They're telling me we gotta go. But I just have one last question.
- [12:52]
Podcast Announcer
The Celebrity Jobber podcast with Jeff Zito.
- [12:55]
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- [13:23]
Podcast Announcer
Paid for by Electronic Payments Coalition. Celebrity Jobber.
- [13:27]
Jeff Zito
Can you remember your very first job and what was it?
- [13:32]
John Fogerty
Oh, my first job. I had a paper route.
- [13:34]
Jeff Zito
Yeah, that was your very first job.
- [13:37]
John Fogerty
Buy a guitar. And that's what I did.
- [13:39]
Jeff Zito
Your very first job was a paper route. And how old were you?
- [13:43]
John Fogerty
I was in the fifth grade and I had a paper out till I was in the 10th grade and I started working in a gas station.
- [13:51]
Jeff Zito
And he wanted to buy a guitar.
- [13:53]
John Fogerty
Yep. My first Sears guitar I paid for with that paper app.
- [13:59]
Jeff Zito
That's incredible. John, again, a real pleasure speaking with you and look forward to hearing the album.
- [14:06]
John Fogerty
Thank you very much. Have fun.
- [14:08]
Jeff Zito
The legendary John Fogarty. So he had a paper route, that was his very first job. But this is the important part of that story. You know, he had the paper route when he was in 5th grade till he was in 10th grade. Used that money that he made from the paper route to buy his very first guitar. For some reason, that really resonated with me, you know, a paper route, that was my very first job too. And I wanted to save money for a brand new skateboard. I remember it was. I think it was 70 bucks. But I guess the lesson here is John Fogarty used his money to buy his very first guitar.
- [14:50]
Podcast Announcer
He.
- [14:50]
Jeff Zito
He ended up writing some of the most classic songs in the history of rock and roll. You know, I did not end up being a professional skateboarder like Tony Hawk. So to know that when he was in the fifth grade that he was thinking about music and writing songs, I don't know it. That's. That really got me. And he also briefly touched on working at a gas station after the paper route. So that was probably his first real job. Not trying to discount paperboy as not a real job, but I think everybody knows where I'm coming from. John's dad worked on a printing press for the local newspaper, his mom taught the second grade. And in his book, John stated that his parents were both alcoholics and they divorced when he was in the third or the fourth grade. You know, he said his parents both played a little bit of music. Not professionally. Mom played the pianos. Dad knew how to play the harmonica. But he pointed out a very important part of his life when he was like three years old, have no idea how he could remember this. His mom played him some kind of kid's record and mentioned to John how the songwriter of that kid's record was Stephen Foster. And that somehow struck a chord with John, pardon the pun. I kind of thought that was an interesting story. And, you know, talking about his big break, what changed John's life forever, Interestingly enough, he didn't bring up a moment like when he signed his record contract or the first time he heard his song on the radio or the first time he gave an autograph. He said it was when he wrote the song Proud Mary. You know, he said he instantly knew that song was going to be a classic. It was far superior than anything else he's ever written. He jokingly said, though he was the only one that knew this at the time. I thought that was really cool. And he was right. And then speaking of John's new album, Legacy, the Credence Clearwater Revival Years, which is now out, it kind of gives you a look behind the curtain, if you will, about how shady the music business is or was to where this guy wrote all of these songs, all of these classic hit songs. And when he signed the contract, it said that those songs were no longer owned by him. They were going to be owned by the record label who didn't write any of the material. And you think about that and how this guy was making zero off of his own publishing for so many years and he had to go to court and, you know, get the rights back. Really a shame how he was taken advantage of back in those early years and now releasing all those songs where he is getting all the money from the record sales and rightfully so. Legacy, the Credence Clearwater Revival Years by John Fogarty. My guest this week on Celebrity Jobber. Just an incredible iconic singer, songwriter, looks really good. I mean, he's like in his 80s. The guy looks pretty great. And thank you so much for making this the number one podcast on the Apple Podcast music interviews chart. Past guests and episodes you can find online@celebrityjobber.com and streaming everywhere. You listen to podcasts where whether it's Apple Podcasts Spotify, iHeart. We're streaming on all platforms. Please subscribe. Would love a five star rating and leave a review. The legendary John Fogarty. Very first job as a paperboy. He used that money to buy his very first guitar. Pretty incredible how it all connects with being the paperboy, isn't it? I think so. Have a great Labor Day weekend again. I appreciate you listening to another episode of the Celebrity Jobber podcast. And until next week, I'll see you then. I'm Jeff Zito.