John Fogerty has regained ownership of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s back catalogue.
The 77-year-old musician has spent years fighting for his songs and he has now bought a majority interest in the global publishing rights to his extensive discography from Concord Records, who had acquired the band’s work when they bought out Fantasy Records in 2004, restoring royalties to the singer in good faith that same year.
John would soon have had some US publishing rights restored under a law which caps copyright on intellectual property at 56 years, but he and his wife Julie decided to also seek majority control of worldwide rights.
He told Billboard: “The happiest way to look at it is, yeah, it isn’t everything. It’s not a 100% win for me, but it’s sure better than it was. I’m really kind of still in shock. I haven’t allowed my brain to really, actually, start feeling it yet.”
He also tweeted: “As of this January, I own my songs again.
“This is something I thought would never be a possibility.
After 50 years, I am finally reunited with my songs. I also have a say in where and how my songs are used. Up until this year, that is something I have never been able to do.”
Under the terms of the deal, Concord will retain the Creedence Clearwater Revival master recordings already in its catalogue and will continue to administer John’s share of the publishing catalogue for an unspecified limited time.
Concord president Bob Valentine said: “John’s songs are some of the greatest compositions of the 20th century.
“We’ve been honoured to own and represent these works ever since we acquired Fantasy in 2004. Given the unique set of circumstances around the history of John’s relationship with Fantasy, we were more than happy to oblige John and Julie in working out an agreement for these songs to revert back to him early.
“And we’re profoundly grateful that John has agreed to partner with Concord for the remaining worldwide copyrights on the share of these songs that we will retain.”
The ‘Bad Moon Rising’ hitmakers – which also included John’s brother Tom, Stu Cook and Doug Clifford – signed to Saul Zaentz’s Fantasy Records in 1968 and in 1980, the ‘Fortunate Son’s singer opted to relinquish all rights to the band’s music to the label boss in a bid to get out of their contact, sparking a long bitter legal battle.
This included a failed plagiarism lawsuit filed by the movie producer against his former artist over one of John’s own songs that he no longer held the rights for, and agreeing a publishing deal which eventually fell through.
Zaentz – who funded much of his movie production career from the band’s royalties – died from Alzheimer’s complications in 2014.