John Fogerty Deja vu

John Fogerty is many things, but predictable is not one of them. His solo career has proceeded in fits and starts, with waits as long as a decade separating solo albums, and when the records did arrive, they could be as brilliant as Centerfield or as bewilderingly misdirected as Eye of the Zombie. There was no telling what a new Fogerty record would bring, but perhaps the strangest thing about his sixth studio album, 2004's Deja Vu All Over Again, is that it's the closest thing to an average, by-the-books John Fogerty album that he's released in his solo career. Unlike its immediate predecessor, the Southern-obsessed Blue Moon Swamp, there is no unifying lyrical or musical theme, nor was it released with the comeback fanfare of that 1997 affair.

The self-referential title of Fogerty's first album in three years is no mere play on words; this is as close as he's gotten in a long while to duplicating the loose swamp blues, country, folk, soul and rock that he so memorably created a template for in Creedence Clearwater Revival. Thankfully the advertisement for downloaded ringtones in the disc's booklet is the only contemporary influence creeping into this stripped-down set of rootsy rockers and ballads. Fogerty's voice sounds great throughout; passionate, more committed and comfortable with these songs than he has seemed in years.

Not long after the 2004 release of his fifth solo album, Deja Vu All Over Again, John Fogerty parted ways with DreamWorks – but perhaps a more important label development for the singer/songwriter was that his old home Fantasy Records, the place where he cut all his classic Creedence Clearwater Revival albums, was sold to Concord Records…

The Long Road Home: The Ultimate John Fogerty/Creedence Collection is the first compilation to feature both Fogerty's classic Creedence Clearwater Revival hits and his solo recordings of the '80s and '90s…