Broken Spoke Shuffle
Background
"Broken Spoke Shuffle" is a "Cotton Fields" style instrumental track that collected dust for 39 years until was released as a bonus track on the 40th Anniversary CD Edition of Green River, the third album of Creedence Clearwater Revival.
John Fogerty was searching for a new studio in winter 1969 after recording the previous album, Bayou Country, at RCA in Los Angeles. Creedence Clearwater tested Wally Heider Recording by cutting there two instrumentals in winter 1969: "Glory Be" and "Briarpatch" (Chuck Crisafulli, Interview with Russ Gary, Gibson, November 11th, 2010).
According to engineer Russ Gary, it's doubtful whether "Broken Spoke Shuffle" originates from the audition session: "I can't recall the 10th song [Broken Spoke Shuffle] and a vocal was not attempted. I have no idea of the melody and I believe I re-used the tape for another tune. I could be wrong and the track could have survived and become "Broken Spoke Shuffle", but I doubt it. I heard a bit of "Broken Spoke Shuffle" recently and no part of it sounds familiar." (On Steve Hoffman Music Forums, August 19, 2008.)
However, John Fogerty is sure the two songs were "Glory Be" and "Broken Spoke Shuffle" which would indicate that "Briarpatch" and "Broken Spoke Shufle" were the same song all the way (John Fogerty, Fortunate Son, 2015).
Written by John C. Fogerty.
Recorded at Wally Heider Recording, San Francisco, CA, USA, in winter or spring 1969.
Appears on the 40th Anniversary CD Edition of the Green River album.
Released on September 30th, 2008.