Hank Bordowitz’s Bad Moon Rising: The Unauthorized History of Creedence Clearwater Revival chronicles the origins, commercial, and critical successes and failures, breakup, and legacy of CCR. It also addresses the decades-long personal and litigious pissing contests that have sometimes overshadowed CCR’s actual musical output. In fact, Going Litigious On Each Others’ Asses might have been a more appropriate subtitle than the one chosen for this book.
Bordowitz’s book essentially takes a traditional chronological approach in crafting the band’s story, encompassing everything from the band’s early incarnations as the Golliwogs (complete with ridiculous headwear) to their incredible run of hit singles as a shit-kicking quartet. In many ways the band’s story is dysfunctional and remarkably ugly, particularly all the legal battles and potshots back and forth between the band members; Bordowitz’s book at times reads more like a legal history than a band biography.
Bordowitz does a nice job telling the band’s story as impartially as possible; what emerges is a portrayal of each band member that is pretty balanced. Tom Fogerty receives the best treatment, and is essentially portrayed as a gentle soul and music lover who quit CCR to pursue his own musical interests. Though his various chemical addictions, which increased in the post-CCR years, are discussed, Bordowitz clearly views the musician with sympathy.
The depictions of the remaining three CCR members -- Stu Cook, Doug Clifford, and John Fogerty -- are decidedly less flattering. Cook and Clifford, perhaps due to being aligned together in their legal and personal squabbles with John Fogerty, share a common portrayal in the book. Although Bordowitz does show the many cases in which the two musicians were slighted by Fogerty -- and there are many, especially in terms of their musical contributions to CCR -- Bordowitz doesn’t let them off the hook as innocent victims. Without showing any bias, Bordowitz does point out some of the more questionable post-CCR decisions made by Cook and Clifford, including touring sans-Fogerty as Creedence Clearwater Revisited, where they performed the CCR songs entirely written by the estranged lead singer.
Article comments