This Thread Has Very Little To Do With John Fogerty

[Smitty]

I'm as big a shill for DBT as it gets but I'm not about to say anything they do musically is particularly new or even unique, they just do it better than damn near if not anyone else

[Tequila Cowboy]

I'm as big a shill for DBT as it gets but I'm not about to say anything they do musically is particularly new or even unique, they just do it better than damn near if not anyone else

Exactly!!!

[RevMatt]

Too many posts to respond individually.

First, I apologize to anyone who feels I've been condescending. It is not my intention but, unfortunately, one's intentions are not always communicated well online. I didn't see the point in comparing a DBT song with something like a Raymond Carver short story or poem because most people are not familiar with his work. Doesn't mean you aren't well read or anything. Short fiction just isn't everyone's cup of tea. If you were to compare a certain rock song with an opera the comparison would go over my head because I know absolutely nothing about opera. Same if I were to compare a Patterson Hood song with a Robert Stone story. More people bought the last Truckers album than the last Tobias Wolff short story collection. That's all I was trying to say.

Second, I've spoken to dozens of DBT fans, both online and in person. When we talk about why we like Drive By Truckers 99% of the time it comes down to the songs. Most people express the sentiment that DBT's songs are different. People regard them the same way they regard their favorite films, books, plays and cable dramas. For the most part these people are lifelong music fans who have been to hundreds of shows and know the history of rock music like the back of their hand. Hell, many people on this board witnessed historic moments in music, though at the time they may not have known the significance of what they were seeing. Most of the people express the sentiment that The Truckers speak to them like no other band has ever spoken to them. My response is usually something like, "They ought to. They are doing things differently with their songs." It is not that they are reaching fences that other artists can't reach. They are swinging for different fences altogether.

Honestly, I don't really get bothered about the debates we have on this board. It keeps things interesting. I can laugh off the references people make to "Watershed Moments", Townes Van Zandt comparisons and whether or not I have the hots for Shonna Tucker. (I don't. Maybe I would if she looked more like the painting on the Eye Candy album cover.) But what puzzles me if we spent the better part of two years on this board doing the "Song of The Week" feature where in some cases there were several pages of posts offering different interpretations of various songs. If you go to the "Former Members" board there are currently over 40 posts where people are discussing their interpretations of "Elephant". Rock songs usually don't inspire this sort of behavior, even from their most rabid fans. Plays, films, poems, novels and short stories, however, do inspire this. You can even earn a bachelors, masters or PhD doing the sort of analysis of "literature" that we do as a matter of course on some of the better Drive By Truckers songs.

Why is this? Is it because we are just a bunch of obsessive Trekies who have latched onto a particular band and message board and if the Drive By Truckers weren't around we'd be doing this on the Lucero board or something? Or is it because over the course of a career that spans from Gangstabilly through Go Go Boots this band has raised songwriting to a whole new level, going places where others haven't and saying things that haven't been said before in songs? Personally, I say it is the latter. I am reminded of what the so-called dirty realists like Raymond Carver, Andre Dubus and Tobias Wolff started doing with The Short Story in the late 1970's and early 1980's. I don't know if The Truckers were influenced by this movement -- I don't think they were, I think with Patterson and Cooley it was a combination of film, hip hop lyrics, Springsteen, Tom T. Hall and their overly ambitious goal of recording a two disc rock opera about the region and era they grew up in. (Isbell, however, did major in English and is supposedly only a couple credits shy of a degree.)

Again, not trying to cut anyone down or even hijack a thread. (This all started when I posted two top five lists, one made up of my personal faves, the other of bands I consider with impressive legacies. I had both Fogerty and DBT on my legacy list and was called on it.)

[Tequila Cowboy]

Fair enough Rev. A few quick responses:

- Unlike you I guess I would just assume that the vast majority of folks on this board have read Raymond Carver although I could be wrong about that. If they haven't they've read some southern based writers that have worked in the short story form like William Faulkner or, from a more recent vintage, Larry Brown. Either way I thinks folks around here are a pretty literary sort which I thought you would have known based on past threads/conversations.
- I also think that a lot of us are as a group are the obsessive type and if it wasn't DBT we'd be talking about something else. In fact many of us do be it sports, books, movies, TV, etc.
- It has never once occurred to me that the obsessive discussion of DBT is something inherent to the band or the kind of songs they write. That being said the many layers of the songs and records do lend themselves to that kind of scrutiny so I do see why it attracts certain kinds of folks. I just think that saying that's the reason is a bit of a stretch. In fact I think there are many, many reasons people are attracted to DBT and their music.
- All of the above notwithstanding I DO think DBT have something special or I wouldn't have spent the last ten years following them. They are great songwriters, great performers and above all very interesting people which comes across in interviews, blog posts, etc. They are no doubt right there with the masters of the story song format, if you want to classify them as such. I just think we have to careful when raising them up to such lofty heights, particularly in terms of innovation. I don't really think they invented anything but like Smitty pointed out they sure do what they do as well or better than anyone else.
- I sure am guilty of the of hyperbole that I think you fell victim to here. I've been there before and as I said I want to be more careful about it in the future. I just think we all have to be careful of opinions we present as facts. lotusamerica's post last week that called both of us out on this has weighed heavily on me ever since. It's fine, just something to think about.

[Kudzu Guillotine]

I'm as big a shill for DBT as it gets but I'm not about to say anything they do musically is particularly new or even unique, they just do it better than damn near if not anyone else

For some reason this has always stayed with me but way back when I was first getting into the Truckers, someone that wasn't nearly as big a fan as myself (and quite possibly wasn't a fan at all) said something along the lines of, "they weren't bad in concert but their fans acted like they were the best thing they'd ever seen".

[dime in the gutter]

hyperbole presented as fact is highly underrated. i say more of it. give us all something to shoot at.

here's one....john fogerty is the greatest rock and roll singer of all time. prove it wrong.

keep em coming revmatt and tc. how often does one get to post bon jovi lyrics? not often enough, i say.

[sactochris]

I disagree with revmatt, if you don't know who Raymond Carver was, you can't be considered well read.

[tinnitus photography]

Willie Nelson is gonna be pissed that Fogerty is honing in on his turf.

Fogerty is playing FarmAid this year.

uh, i didn't see him.

i am just catching up on this (hilarious) thread, and i had no idea he'd put out a collab LP this year. i think TC wrote the review on discogs:

During the late 1960’s and early 70’s, John Fogerty was not only the voice of Creedence Clearwater Revival, he was the voice of a generation, laying out cryptic country blues that were interlaced with a brilliant rock sound that has never gone out of fashion, and is as instantly recognized today, as it was then. Though having said that, I’m not sure I need this grouping of songs, and even more-so, I’m not sure that I need this album artwork ... because the packaging pretty much says it all.

John’s reached that age where people want to record with him, if for nothing else, than to say they have, and in that spirit I’m more than sure that John’s reaching for a younger generation who may find their way to him through the backdoor of their current country and rock heros. Some reviewers [Rolling Stone] have stated that John seems to be having a lot of fun, but to me this all sounds a bit like a karaoke script, where other artists step in at their appointed line and deliver just what they’re expected to deliver ... filling in the blanks, often sounding like they’re sleepwalking, and never finding the groove. And it’s this notion of “finding the groove,” that’s so important, because other than Bob Seger, none of these people were around when this grouping of songs first hit the radio, they have no personal connection to these songs or to the relevance these songs held for the times from which they blossomed.

Just hearing Kid Rock using his voice modulator on “Born On The Bayou” was enough to make want to turn on my dusty boot heels and spit into the wind, while the Foo Fighters saturated “Fortunate Son” with their own brand of high octane that left me feeling a bit uncomfortable to say the least. I’ve been to Fogerty concerts, I’ve been to CCR shows, I’ve always been enchanted when someone who’s been hanging out backstage is asked to step up and splinter the floorboards with the band, where it actually did sound like the collaboration was fun, and the guests do rock back, breathing it all in like fine wine on the palette, morphing into something greater. But this is not great, it’s not even the less is more approach, and when the publication Country Weekly tries to insist that Wrote A Song For Everyone is somehow mesmerizing, where you can feel the mutual love and respect, that fact is, this is just flat, sad and boring ... pretty much as sad as the album jacket makes me feel.

[beantownbubba]

how often does one get to post bon jovi lyrics? not often enough, i say.

Now that's just silly.

[Iowan]

hyperbole presented as fact is highly underrated. i say more of it. give us all something to shoot at.

If Shonna Tucker had re-positioned her amp, she would be the next Loretta Lynn.

[Tequila Cowboy]

I disagree with revmatt, if you don't know who Raymond Carver was, you can't be considered well read.

Indeed

[one belt loop]

I'd say more Kurt Vonnegut than Raymond Carver.

[GW in IA]

Are we talking about Carver, the peanut butter guy?

[Steve French]

I'd say more Kurt Vonnegut than Raymond Carver.

I just want to say whoever re-named this thread did a hell of a job.

hell of a job.

[Steve French]

Are we talking about Carver, the peanut butter guy?

maybe John Carter? from Mars?


great, underrated film by the way

[Steve French]

I disagree with revmatt, if you don't know who Raymond Carver was, you can't be considered well read.

Indeed

Shit, some of us are just catching up with our Elmore Leonards. Not to mention our James Ellroys. ANOTHER one for the reading list? Will this be on the test?

[Rocky]

Thanks for the thread rename TC. It's more than appropriate.

[Zip City]

CORMAC MCCARTHY FOR LIFE!

[Smitty]

If we're just throwing out great author names at random, Larry McMurtry.

[Tequila Cowboy]

I think RevMatt was primarily referring to short story writers but even with that there are plenty of them, Ray Bradbury, Neil Gaiman, Kurt Vonnegut, Larry Brown and even Stephen King all come to mind pretty quickly.

[Smitty]

I think RevMatt was primarily referring to short story writers but even with that there are plenty of them, Ray Bradbury, Neil Gaiman, Kurt Vonnegut, Larry Brown and even Stephen King all come to mind pretty quickly.

Ok, Faulkner, Welty, Hemingway, O'Connor,Poe & Fitzgerald.

[Tequila Cowboy]

I think RevMatt was primarily referring to short story writers but even with that there are plenty of them, Ray Bradbury, Neil Gaiman, Kurt Vonnegut, Larry Brown and even Stephen King all come to mind pretty quickly.

Ok, Faulkner, Welty, Hemingway, O'Connor,Poe & Fitzgerald.

All good ones.

[beantownbubba]

E=MC(squared)

Just sayin'.

[tinnitus photography]

did we really get to six pages discussing influential American bands w/o a single mention of Sonic Youth?

[Bill in CT]

As for authors...check out Thomas Ligotti and William T. Vollmann.

[Tequila Cowboy]

did we really get to six pages discussing influential American bands w/o a single mention of Sonic Youth?

Yeah, that ain't right.

[John A Arkansawyer]

did we really get to six pages discussing influential American bands w/o a single mention of Sonic Youth?

Not anymore. Bastard.

[Tequila Cowboy]

did we really get to six pages discussing influential American bands w/o a single mention of Sonic Youth?

Not anymore. Bastard.

If there was no Sonic Youth there would have been no Nirvana, of course the Replacements figured into that equation too.

[lotusamerica]

- I sure am guilty of the of hyperbole that I think you fell victim to here. I've been there before and as I said I want to be more careful about it in the future. I just think we all have to be careful of opinions we present as facts. lotusamerica's post last week that called both of us out on this has weighed heavily on me ever since. It's fine, just something to think about.

Oh, please don't let anything I ever say on here weigh heavily - it's usually just a passing thought on my end, often phrased however my mood is at the moment.

Well, perhaps other than this: If we don't find some time at one of the shows to have a good margarita together, I may go on to the end of my days drinking Jose Cuervo and that green mixer stuff, possibly even in frozen blender style. Now there's something you should perhaps let weigh heavily on you if you care for me at all, or even just take a simple interest in the well-being of humanity.

[tinnitus photography]

this post belonged on pg 2 or 3, but i wanna get in on the action...

top 5 most influential US bands of all time

- Velvet Underground
- Stooges
- Metallica
- Sonic Youth
- Byrds (possibly The Dead or The Airplane, as well)

Ramones was a tough omission.