“Proud Mary” (Creedence Clearwater Revival/Ike & Tina Turner)

Your classic song that mentions Memphis of the day is “Proud Mary.” It was a big hit twice—first for Creedence Clearwater Revival and two years later for Ike & Tina Turner.

CCR’s John Fogerty wrote “Proud Mary” right after he was discharged from the Army Reserves in 1968. CCR recorded the song for their second album, 1969’s Bayou Country, and it became their second big hit, after the previous year’s #11 “Suzie Q.” “Proud Mary” peaked at #2 on the Billboard Hot 100, the first of their five singles to reach the penultimate chart position.

“Proud Mary” is about a poor man who leaves “a good job in the city” to hitch a ride on a riverboat named Proud Mary. He’s happier among the down-and-out than he was working for the man in one big city after another. As the lyrics put it, he:

Cleaned a lot of plates in Memphis
Pumped a lot of tane down in New Orleans
But I never saw the good side of the city
Until I hitched a ride on a riverboat queen

Musically, “Proud Mary” is as simple as you can get, which is probably why it was covered by every garage band east and west of the Mississippi. It’s in the key of D and uses primarily the I, V, and vi chords—D, A, and Bm. The intro’s a little different, however, riffing on a C to A lick before settling into a D-driven groove. Anybody can play that on guitar.

Two years after CCR had their hit with “Proud Mary,” Ike and Tina Turner released their version in 1971. This one started off “nice and easy,” as Tina put it, but then cranked it up to a “nice and rough” smokin’ hot up-tempo cooker.

Ike & Tina’s version of “Proud Mary” charted just a tad lower than CCRs, at #4 on the Hot 100, but has, perhaps, had a more lasting impact. This is typically the version people remember when you mention the song. It was also the version our high school marching band—and, no doubt, thousands of other marching bands at the time—played at football game halftimes back in 1973. (Go, Giants!)

By the way, while it’s clear what Fogerty meant when he wrote about washing dishes in Memphis (our city of the week), pumping “tane” means pumping octane or gasoline. That’s right, he’s writing about being a pump jockey or gas station attendant in New Orleans. So now you know.