Consumer Guide Album

Creedence Clearwater Revival: Cosmo's Factory [Fantasy, 1970]
A lover of rock and roll, not rock, John Fogerty serves up his progress in modest and reliable doses. The songwriting's not as inspired as on Willy and the Poorboys--no hidden treasures like "Don't Look Now" or "It Came Out of the Sky." But the sound is fuller, the band more coherent, Fogerty's singing more subtle and assured, so that a straightforward choogle like "Ramble Tamble" holds up simply as music for seven minutes. The same goes for the most ordinary three-minute job here--finally, none of them are ordinary. The triumphs are "I Heard It Through the Grapevine," which consummates "Suzie Q"'s artless concept of rock improvisation, and "Lookin' Out My Back Door," in which Fogerty abandons his gritty timbre--so obviously an affectation, yet so natural-seeming--for a near-tenor that sweetly synthesizes spirituality and whimsy. A