The Blue Ridge Rangers

AMG Review of The Blue Ridge Rangers

John Dougan
All Music Guide

With wonderfully chosen songs like "Hearts of Stone" and George Jones' classic country weeper "She Thinks I Still Care," John Fogerty's solo debut with The Blue Ridge Rangers has held up well over the last two decades. It isn't the most supple or technically proficient one-man recording of all time, but it's a wonderfully engaging record; upbeat, unpretentious, and loaded with good songs. Fogerty's rigid, no-frills drumming took a lot of heat for being mechanical, but no one has ever explained how Fogerty's abilities on the trap kit are significantly different from Creedence's Doug Clifford. In retrospect, this was a tremendously risky record to make; country music in the early '70s was regarded as the domain of right-wing, ock & roll-hating Nashville traditionalists, and it was reasonable to assume that fans (even staunch ones) wouldn't take kindly to this genre switch. While it wasn't a huge success, it was in no way a disaster, and perhaps more importantly, served as a much-needed ock & roll history lesson.