John Fogerty – Rock and Roll Girls

When John Fogerty released the Centerfield album in 1985 I was excited. He had disappeared from the music scene for 10 years. I gave up hope of ever hearing new music from him. I kept hoping he would regroup with Creedence but I didn’t know at that time of the hostile history between them. This album was highly anticipated. I bought the album and it didn’t disappoint.

This is the second track on Fogerty’s Centerfield album, his first in 10 years. The song was inspired by his 12-year-old daughter, Laurie. Fogerty would watch her and her best friend hanging out and jokingly call them the Rock and Roll Girls.

The song peaked at #20 in the Billboard 100, #16 in Canada, #38 in New Zealand, and #83 in the UK in 1985.

 

Rock and Roll Girls

Sometimes I think life is just a rodeo
The trick is to ride and make it to the bell
But there is a place, sweet as you will ever know
In music and love and things you never tell
You see it in their face, secrets on the telephone
A time out of time, for you and no one else

Hey, let’s go all over the world
Rock and roll girls, rock and roll girls

Yeah, yeah, yeah

If I had my way, I’d shuffle off to Buffalo
Sit by the lake and watch the world go by
Ladies in the sun, listenin’ to the radio
Like flowers on the sand, the rainbow in my mind

Hey, let’s go all over the world
Rock and roll girls, rock and roll girls

Hey, let’s go all over the world
Rock and roll girls, rock and roll girls

Hey, let’s go all over the world
Rock and roll girls, rock and roll girls, yeah, yeah, yeah

Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

57 thoughts on “John Fogerty – Rock and Roll Girls”

  1. I finally got around to picking this album up a few months ago when I came across it in a used bin at a local shop. It’s about time I say! lol
    Some really stellar tracks on it. 35 years late to the party but at least I showed up!!

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      2. I did also… our band learned it right off the bat…it was only one of the few modern songs we did lol…and it sounded old. Great record.

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    1. Yes I did and I was also. Hans I tried to like it because it was…John Fogerty. He tried to get with the times is my guess. It just didn’t work…Swamp meets eighties…just don’t work. I didn’t understand why he felt like he had to do that.

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      1. I remember being surprised he released another album so quickly. I was super excited about it-on first listen it felt like a downer- and it never got better.. I just read where he didn’t play in concert anything from that album for 22 years after the late 80’s. I bet he doesn’t even like it. Kind of his Let Me Up I’ve Had Enough.

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      2. That is a great comparison. He did rush it. It just didn’t sound like him and the writing wasn’t there. I’ve read that also where he didn’t like it at all. I remember thinking…the music sounded like The Power Station…fine for them but not him.

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      3. I haven’t listened to it in many years but you are right it sounded like an album made in the mid 80’s not a John Fogerty album.

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  3. While I think it’s fair to say it’s not quite as strong as some of CCR’s music, “Rock and Roll Girls” is a nice and catchy rocker. I also like the album’s title track.

    Undoubtedly, John Fogerty was the driving force in CCR. But I also think it’s fair to point out the other guys in that great band oftentimes are underrecognized. In my view, it’s not a coincidence that Fogerty’s solo music in general hasn’t been as compelling as CCR. And I say this as somebody who really digs Fogerty!

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    1. I read a book a few years ago on them. What a sad sitiuation. I can see both sides but it just got hostile.
      I agree…with Doug Clifford…I loved his drumming and it did add a lot.
      Have you ever heard Tom Fogerty sing? Tom and John sounded so much alike.

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      2. Yea John could have shared a little bit…not the entire album but a song or two for the others would have helped the situation.

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    1. I did like this album but the next one I didn’t like at all. Eye of the Zombie…it was too eighties…and eighties didn’t fit his music. I told Hans it sounded like Power Station….fine for Power Station but not for him.

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      2. Go listen to Eye of the Zombie…you will see what I’m talking about…is it the same? no but you will get the idea

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      3. Heh. I went to see who was the backing band. I was looking to see if anyone from The Power Station joined in. Change in the Weather is pretty good…bluesy/funky. Listening to the rest… Goin’ Back Home sounds a church choir.

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      4. Did you hear what I heard? It just doesn’t fit Fogerty. I forgot about Change In The Weather…that wasn’t bad.

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      5. This album is odd as f***. It’s like Fogerty got drunk and decided to try 80s Hair Band stuff AND Motown. LOL! Some of this reminds me of Tommy Shaw’s first album, in a way.

        I’m suddenly thinking what an album with George Jones turning Punk would sound like.

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      6. Oh you mean Eye of the Zombie album. Centerfield was great…it was him and not the 80s involved.
        Oh geez….Fogerty and Shaw in the same sentence. They don’t exactly go together.

        Lol Jones the punk rocker…

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      7. Only a couple of songs, that were long, reminded me of Shaw. Shaw’s first album was a bit of a departure from the influence of Styx. It was released in 1984 and it has an 80s feel to it. Then, he changed with Damn Yankees.

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      8. I saw the Damn Yankees….last date I went on before the ole ball and chain lol…A red headed lady named…ready? Mary Moore…I had to ask her…”Is your middle name” and before I could finish…she said…no it’s not Tyler.

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      14. I can be at times…but my getting lost, changing of subjects, and monkeys on tricycles evens it out.

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      18. Yep… I got it back up. 2003 servers as dc and a 2012 exchange server.
        I demoted a domain controller and re upped it today… I turned a service off and didn’t restart it today… WHOOPS! lol… it’s now fixed

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      19. Ah. Ok. Gotcha. It was like 2am and I was thinking personal email. Wow. A 2003 server. Working with dinosaurs, huh?

        My systems training is SO rusty. I dabbled a bit a decade ago. I was more into database management (Access with Cold Fusion on the backend, hooked up to a SQL server) & web programming.

        Everything running OK, now?

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      20. Yep 2003 server. I stopped the Kerberos service to reset the server’s password and didn’t start it back. It took around 6 hours to bite me in the ass.

        See you are way in front of me on that. I don’t know much about database stuff…

        Yes once I started the service…slowly it started to work again.

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      21. Um…yeah. If you’re gonna take a service down…you eventually are going to have to bring it back up…um…if you want it to work. 😆

        Well…I haven’t done any database work since I left Texas. And, few people even use Access anymore. Plus, government work is chewing gum & baling wire…well, it was back then. I remember when I left Roche Biomedical in my hometown (now Lab Corp.) in 1992 & went to work for the state in Durham. I went from top of the line software & equipment to push-button, box telephones with handset cradles & red HOLD buttons…and they had been PAINTED. I’d never seen a re-painted telephone before.

        I’ve kinda hung onto my web programming. Don’t remember the Javascript, anymore, tho…

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      22. The tricky part was we have 4 other domain controllers running it fine but this was the master.

        I have a friend who does Access Database stuff for the State. I can’t believe they still use it but they do.
        A repainted telephone…no I’ve never seen that before. When I started they had a 80s-90s PBX system…which really was reliable. Now we are on IP phones…more control but not as reliable as the PBX old phones.

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      23. Access is very limited. It is good as a format for design & control & parsing with limited storage. Somewhere along the line, you are gonna need something on the backend to hold more data. Technically, it is a static, finite database…much like Excel spreadsheets top out at 65,000 records. Or, did. Hell, IDK anymore. Win10, as a service, may have dynamically extended all of its office products, now.

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      24. I can’t keep up with Microsoft. I’m surprised they dont’ charge for Win10 every month.

        I’m going to ask him what exactly he designs the databases for…he probably works with an SQL guy on the back end.

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      25. They probably will charge. I was talking to a geek who teaches classes at Durham Tech. Win10 is not even an operating system anymore. It is a Cloud service (I really hate that term…Cloud…NO, it’s not in a CLOUD, people…it’s just a SERVER). Which means, charging for more services. We were chatting about a possible move to Linux. I f***ing hate Satanware. I’ve hated it since I lost my IBM OS/2. I can’t stand Apple, either. They are proud of their expensive s***. The ex-Marine & I tried to move to Linux in the middle 2000s but, the GUI was so clunky (do you remember SUSE Linux?).

        There’s bound to be SQL on the backend. It’s possible Oracle might work with MS.

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      26. I dont remember that one…the only ones I’ve fooled with is Red Hat and Ubuntu…if I didn’t get the software free I would have switch already. Where I work I get access to anything they have. I still have Office 2013 and it’s good enough for me…it’s not a service so I like it.

        Yea I’m sure they will turn it into a service.

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      28. Yea he regretted it BAD….he didn’t play any of it live until years later….he probably changed the songs to his style.

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      30. No he has a rip your head off voice…I love it though. I would give anything for his and Van Morrison’s voice.

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      32. Yea a more controlled but yes. Born on the Bayou I love….I so wish I had that voice.

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      34. lol now now…Fogerty is good at what he does..Johnson…yea I would agree with that more but not Fogerty….Johnson could not sing Green River

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  5. Pingback: The Forgotten Fogerty – Christian's Music Musings

  6. Good song, though not as strong as the other singles off that album. John’s one of the few who ever dreamed of shuffling of to Buffalo!
    I had ‘eye of the Zombie’ too and I remember I liked about half of it- can’t remember that many of the tracks now, but I do recall playing 4 or5 songs on it quite a bit back then, but there were some duds on it too.

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    2. Dave…for some reason every comment I make goes to spam… if you get this you may want to check your spam filter. I commented on your posts today but I don’t know if they took

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  7. Yeah, I liked that one and just looked back over the track listings and I remember I liked ‘soda Pop’ and ‘Headlines’ back then too and found the title track semi-cool but a little too out there to really merit frequent listenings.

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