John Fogerty - Deja Vu All Over Again CDs • Vinyl Records • LPs • Music Albums

Fogerty slips into his swamp-rock comfort zone, his own songs haunt him; you'll notice, for example, "Green River" lurking behind "Wicked Old Witch."

But echoes are, after all, part of what this album's about -- and they're not just musical. The title track is Fogerty's indictment of the Iraq war as another Vietnam, a senseless squandering of American lives and power. "Day by day I hear the voices rising," he sings. "Started with a whisper like it did before/Day by day we count the dead and dying/Ship the bodies home while the networks all keep score." This album's least ambitious moments -- the profession of devotion in "I Will Walk With You," the Farfisa-organ-driven garage rock of "Radar" -- are perhaps its most charming. But while John Fogerty may leave you wanting more, that doesn't mean you're not satisfied.

A legendary perfectionist, Fogerty seems to have hurried his usual glacial recording pace to get the anti-war title track released. The haunting song draws comparisons between Iraq and Vietnam, but the rest of the record is sunnier. It features some of his freshest and most relaxed songs since Centerfield (1984).