Some folks are born made to wave the flag / Ooh, they’re red, white, and blue, legendary frontman John Fogerty belted on Creedence Clearwater Revival’s 1969 hit “Fortunate Son.” And when the band plays “Hail To The Chief” / Ooh, they point the cannon at you, Lord. Off the band’s fourth studio album Willy and the Poor Boys, the song gave a soulful, impassioned voice to the anti-Vietnam War movement. Nearly six decades later, it’s still widely regarded as one of CCR’s best—by everyone except Fogerty.
Why John Fogerty Feels This Song “Didn’t Quite Hit the Mark”
Added to the Library of Congress’ National Recording Registry in 2013, “Fortunate Son” remains one of the most potent antiwar anthems of all time.
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However, Creedence Clearwater Revival vocalist John Fogerty admitted in 2014 that he found his singing “a little lacking.” The 80-year-old legendary rocker reiterated this belief during a recent interview with The Los Angeles Times.
Fogerty revealed that he finished up the vocals for both “Fortunate Son” and its B-side “Down on the Corner” in the same afternoon at San Francisco’s Wally Heider Studios.
“So I’d been singing at the top of my lungs for probably an hour and a half, then I had to go back and finish ‘Fortunate Son,’” Fogerty recalled. “I was screaming my heart out, doing the best I could, but later I felt that some of the notes were a little flat — that I hadn’t quite hit the mark. I always sort of cringed about that.”
Personally speaking, Fogerty’s craggy vocals are precisely what make the song for me. It truly captures the sense of urgency and rage that many Americans felt in the late ’60s. “Perhaps the fact that it was a little out of tune made it — what’s the word? — more pop-worthy,” Fogerty speculated. “I don’t know.”
‘Fortunate Son’ Climbed the Charts Anyway
Regardless of John Fogerty’s personal feelings about his own performance, “Fortunate Son” became one of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s signature songs. It peaked at No. 3 on Billboard’s U.S. chart in December 1969.
Discussing the song during a 2015 appearance on NBC’s The Voice, Fogerty said the song came from “a lot of anger.” He drew on his own experiences serving in the U.S. Army in the late ’60s.
“Now I was drafted and they’re making me fight, and no one has actually defined why. So this was all boiling inside of me and I sat down on the edge of my bed and out came, ‘It ain’t me, it ain’t me, I ain’t no senator’s son!’” he said. “You know, it took about 20 minutes to write the song.”
Featured image by Didier Messens/Getty Images
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