John Fogerty credits his wife for saving his life after a rough patch in his career.
During a recent interview on the “Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, the 80-year-old Creedence Clearwater Revival (CCR) founder discussed a tumultuous time in his music career following a legal battle with his record company regarding the ownership of his songs, crediting his wife for helping him come “out on the good side of it.”
“A lot of this, of course, is from the care of my wife, Julie. If I hadn’t met her, I probably would be dead. Simple as that,” he said. “I didn’t see any way out. I was really abusing myself, alcohol mostly. I really felt bad inside.”
He went on to explain that someone who feels as he did is “not really operating on the same plane in the world” as everyone else, and you can “become kind of a pathetic person.”
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“When you’re really hurting inside for whatever reason, I mean, in my case, something really unjust had been done to me,” he said. “But however you get there, and then you start abusing yourself with drugs, alcohol, whatever… it becomes a habit. You just stay there, right? And so you’re not really enjoying the sunshine and the love that’s around you.”
The Grammy Award-winning musician noted that this was his mindset when he met his wife, Julie, while on tour in 1986.
Fogerty admitted that he should have been “overjoyed” by the success of his third solo album, “Centerfield,” but instead felt “miserable” and bitter” due to repressed feelings, adding he was “in perpetual binge mode.”
He then released “Eye of the Zombie,” which was less successful but managed to bounce back after meeting Julie.
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“One day [I] just suddenly met Julie, not expecting to meet the love of my life, the person that I feel that I was destined to meet and the person that would, through her good graces, help me find myself and help me enjoy and find the joy of life again,” he said. “And it all changed.”
Fogerty and Julie went on to tie the knot in April 1991 and welcomed three children together during their 35-year marriage: sons Shane, 34, and Tyler, 33, and daughter Kelsy, 24.
As the founder of CCR, Fogerty wrote many of the band’s biggest hits, including “Proud Mary,” “Have You Ever Seen the Rain,” “Bad Moon Rising,” “Down on the Corner,” and “Fortunate Son,” but didn’t own the rights to them until January 2023 when he finally settled a decades-long dispute with the record company.
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“As of this January, I own my own songs again. This is something I thought would never be a possibility,” Fogerty said in a statement. “After 50 years, I am finally reunited with my songs. I also have a say in where and how my songs are used. Up until this year, that is something I have never been able to do. I am looking forward to touring and celebrating this year! I want thank Concord for helping to make all of this happen. And, I am excited for new ideas and a renewed interest in my music … like a revival.”
Fogerty originally left Fantasy Records in 1974 in a contentious separation, with the musician fighting the record company for his music from the beginning.
Fantasy Records even went as far as to sue Fogerty for plagiarism, with Fogerty telling Rogan, “I got sued for sounding like myself.”
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“I’m the dad [of these songs]. I created them,” Fogerty told Billboard, at the time. “They never should have been taken away in the first place. And that hijacking left such a massive hole in me. The happiest way to look at it is, yeah, it isn’t everything. It’s not a 100 percent win for me, but it’s sure better than it was. I’m really kind of still in shock.”
Julie helped celebrate the news in a statement released on Fogerty’s website, saying she is “so blissful knowing that this has finally come true for him.”
