Geezerology Roundtable: Rollin' on the kid's coattails

Ca. 1968: Tom Fogerty, Clifford, Cook, John Fogerty

Tom Fogerty had just graduated from high school in the San Francisco Bay area when he got his first big break in the music business. His band, Spider Webb and the Insects, got a recording contract from Del-Fi Records down in Hollywood, CA.

But the Insects disintegrated in 1959 before they could even got a record released. The disappointed yet still determined singer-guitarist, approaching his 18th birthday, went back home and hooked up with The Blue Velvets, a band formed by his 14-year-old brother, John, and the kid's school chums Doug Clifford and Stu Cook.

America and its unfortunate sons

Rich old rich men start the wars but poor young men fight them. Unless you are a fortunate son then someone else takes your place in the trenches.

I was a few years too young for Vietnam but old enough to be aware of the war and to understand the devastation it wrought in my country and in the jungles, rice paddies and highlands of Vietnam. Fourteen young men from my hometown died in Vietnam; another seven from the small towns that dotted my home county.