John Boyle

tory by John Boyle

In the summer of 1971, at the young age of 17, I went to my first rock concert in San Antonio, Texas at the Hemisphere arena. I have been to quite a few concerts since then and have seen most of the great classic rock groups, but CCR has the distinction of being the first.

At the time, this was quite an event for me. Living in a small town (1000 people) in south Texas, I had not had much exposure to rock and roll music. Country and western was much the favorite type of music where I lived and very few of the good citizens of the town of Stockdale, Texas ever listened to rock and roll (and still don't!).

However, I had heard Creedence on the am radio station (KTSA 55 San Antonio) and much to the disappointment of my mother, had decided that they were absolutely the greatest thing since sliced bread and definitely my favorite group. At that time, my list of "favorite music" was unlimited and included the Beatles, Stones and Monkees and any other top 40 song that happened to be playing on the radio. CCR was different. I absolutely loved everything they did. When I heard that CCR and special guest Bo Diddley were going to play in concert in San Antonio (40 miles away), I made my mind up that I was going to see them one way or another.

I did not have transportation, but was able to convince my friend Mark who had a car, to take us and our girlfriends to the concert. We loaded up with beer and took off for what would prove to be a very memorable adventure.

Not only was it my first ever concert, it was the first time I ever saw someone smoking pot, guys with long hair and certainly the first time I had ever been to an event with that many people (12 thousand or so and mostly stoned) in one place.

The cost for the best seats at the concert was a whopping $6.00--very cheap by today's standards! Other than seeing CCR, the most memorable thing about the concert was seeing two beautiful young women in the men's rest room at the break between Bo Diddley and CCR. I distinctly recall one of the women's response when asked what she was doing in the men's rest room..."you should see the line for our rest room"...

Bo Diddley opened the concert and as I remember, played very well. Obviously, with my limited exposure to music, I had never ever heard of Bo Diddley or seen his box guitar. I was impressed none the less.

CCR came out and played a great set--but only for 45 minutes! I am not sure how many songs they played, they opened with "SWEET HITCH HIKER" and the only other song I definitely recall them playing was "COMMOTION". That is because when John sang the verse with the words "people keep a talking, they don't say a word....jaw, jaw, jaw", he symbolized talking with his right hand. I was very thrilled with the music, but very disappointed with the amount of time they played. The fact that Tom was no longer with them may have had something to do with it or perhaps the fact that this was their last tour...I am not sure. Again, it was an exciting time in my life, one I will always remember. I would love to have the opportunity to see them again.

Best regards and thanks for giving me the opportunity to tell my story.

John Boyle

Austin, Texas

Do you want to submit a story of your own memories of the Creedence Clearwater Revival (concerts, recordings, anything) onto this section?It's easy. Preferably, write your Creedence story onto your own web page, let me know the address of it, and I'll put a link to there. If you don't have the web facilities, you may submit your story to me via email and I'll be happy to put it onto my page. Thanks!