50 Year Trip: Live At Red Rocks
BMG, 2019
8/10
Listen to 50 Year Trip: Live At Red Rocks
As a casual Fogerty fan (saw him in the mid ‘80s, but haven’t paid much attention to his more recent work), I was quite curious as to how these classic songs would hold up in a live setting- especially at his age.
“Born On The Bayou” starts the listen with firm grooves as Fogerty’s inimitable vocals guide us through the energetic opener, and this extends to the rhythmic “Lookin’ Out My Back Door”, as well as the unmistakable guitar work of the rockin’ “Up Around The Bend”.
At 19 tracks, this is a lengthy listen, but with songs like the subdued beauty of “Long As I Can See The Light” and the spirited organ fills of “Have You Ever Seen The Rain”, it never out welcomes its stay.
Forgerty is accompanied by his 2 songs on stage, as well as a solid crew of session musicians on this set recorded in June of 2019 when he was 74 years old. Amazingly, though it’s been 50 years since CCR played Woodstock, Fogerty hasn’t lost a step in his art, as this recording sounds fantastic.
While I’m sure some will gripe that this release is a pretty expected set list, for the vast majority of us, these are the tunes we want to hear- even if we’ve heard them 1000 times before.
The bottom line is, there are very few artists more timeless than John Fogerty; I mean, “Centerfield” sounds like as glorious here as it did in 1985.
Absolutely a worthwhile addition to the Fogerty catalog, the double disc version includes several covers from the concert, too.
Travels well with: The Textones- Old Stone Gang; John Hiatt- The Eclipse Sessions