“It was like Richard Dreyfuss”: the bizarre way John Fogerty fell back in love with his music
As much as some musicians would like to consider themselves lone soldiers who work in complete solitude, this isn’t and never has been true. Whether artists want to admit it or not, they create with the constant inspiration of those who came before them, resting on their shoulders. Take Bob Dylan, for instance, who was always aware of his hero’s impact.
Many people see Bob Dylan and think of him as an incredibly lonely figure. While he spent a lot of his time in isolation working on perfecting his craft, there is no denying that he carried the work of his heroes with him, meaning they surrounded him whenever he was attempting to write something.
Dylan was hugely inspired by the folk artist Woody Guthrie, so much so that he dedicated a large portion of his early career to him. Famously, when he took to the stage to play one of his first-ever gigs in New York, he made it clear who his inspiration was and who he’d like to follow in the footsteps of. “[I’ve] been travellin’ the country, followin’ in Woody Guthrie’s footsteps,” he said.
It can be helpful to some songwriters during particularly difficult periods to know that even when they might struggle to write and feel isolated, they are not alone in their creativity. Connected to them through the power of their music are the fans that they’ve made along the way, as well as the artists who act as persistent inspirations to them.
“I was taking these trips at the time without realising why I was going to Mississippi.”
John Fogerty
It was this reminder that helped John Fogerty when he was going through a rough patch with the Creedence Clearwater Revival. Like many artists, he struggled to write and fell out of love with a lot of the music he had created recently. It reminded him of his connection with those who inspired him, which made him break out of this slump and fall back in love with his music.
One of the artists who particularly influenced Fogerty was the blues player Robert Johnson. When he stumbled across Johnson’s grave, he stopped worrying so much about the music he was making. He realised his product didn’t matter, as his music reflected those who inspired him and himself.
“I was taking these trips at the time without realising why I was going to Mississippi. It was like Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, where he’s making these things out of mashed potatoes and has no idea what the symbolism is,” Fogerty recalled. “I was doing this. I thought I was going to Mississippi to look up old bluesmen. Seven years later I realised the real reason was so I would find myself at Robert Johnson’s grave and have this epiphany. I would come to the realisation that I should start doing my songs, and it would feel OK.”
Fogerty concluded that his fans know his music comes from the heart, and so that comes across, nothing else matters: “I realised that was my predicament: everyone knows I wrote those songs; they don’t care about the money; they know the songs came from my heart. That was a revelation to me.”
