Creed Bratton Interview
January 29, 2006 - 12:00pm Pacific Time

Webmaster: Creed, thank you for taking the time to talk to us so we can relay information to your many fans. I am honored to talk to you since you have given so much to rock music listeners around the world. And it has only improved with age. My first question is regarding your vocal contributions. Did you sing on House of Stone?

Creed: No I didn’t. Warren sang that. There are a few things I would like to set the record straight on. With that song we did that when I was in The Young Californians. Greg, our other guitarist wrote House of Stone. We were doing that song in The 13th Floor, and I guess everyone assumed that I wrote that song. All of a sudden that album came out and it had my name on it. I said to myself “Oh God” and I called Greg and explained it to him. He was not too thrilled with it but he understood and we are still good friends.

Webmaster: What was Greg’s last name?

Creed: Fitzpatrick. I would like to clear a few other things up now if I could. Some sources say that Warren and I traveled together in Europe and we never did at all. When I left college, I was a drama major in my fourth year. I hitchhiked to New Orleans and ended up in Germany. I’m not going to go on too long, this is a long story. This is a movie in itself. But anyway, I was studying German and working in an electronics factory. Outside of the American Express, I met these two guys, Greg Fitzpatrick and Lee Zimmerman. Lee played banjo and Greg played guitar. They were singing there for money. They sang Green Back Dollar, a folk song. You know the song “ I don’t give a damn about a green back dollar.” They said to me “What do you think about that?” I said “Well, I don’t know” and I grabbed the guitar and played it and they said “Whoa, you CAN play that guitar!” They said ”Well, why don’t you come with us, we’re going to hitchhike clear to Africa.” I thought hitchhike to Africa, hitchhike to Africa? Stay here and study German, work in an electronics factory in Munich OR hitchhike to Africa? So.....the next morning I went out right away and did some soul searching. And you know what - I went and took out all the money I had saved from working at that factory for four months. By the way, when I arrived in Europe I had only $25 in my pocket. It’s true. Anyway, so then I got my rucksack, big parka, hiking boots and my guitar and I met them the next day and their mouths dropped. They said “You mean your going to go with us?” I said “Let’s go!”

So we did that, we hitchhiked all through Europe playing in the streets, sometimes in clubs, sometimes in restaurants. A lot of times sleeping on the road. We ended up in Gibraltar, went over to Morocco, all the way over to Egypt, Beirut, through Jordan and into Israel. We worked in Israel for awhile. They liked me and let me plant a tree. They treated us real well. We sang all the time for them and we were singing at a Folk Festival representing America, there was an English group there, there was a French group and so on. After the show, Warren Entner came up to me and said “Hey, you play pretty good guitar.” I said “Well, thanks man!” He said he had just graduated from film school at UCLA and if I wanted to get together sometime, to give him a call. So I took his number put it in the bottom of my rucksack, and about a year later in ‘66  when I got to Los Angeles, I called him up. And that’s how that happened. And we wrote “Beatin’ Round The Bush” together.

Webmaster: And that is one of the great Grass Roots songs...

Creed: I’ll be darned. We did some recording in London with the Young Californians with this producer who later did a recording “Performance” with the Rolling Stones. Now what we did was play rock and roll music on folk  instruments. And that was wrong. It’s like that thin line between smart and stupid. When we finally got it right was playing folk music on electric instruments. We were almost there you know. So that is that, I met Warren at a Folk Festival in Israel. Beatin’ Round The Bush is in D chord, that’s a staple of the folk movement, only we made it electric.

Webmaster: How did you come up with Beatin’ Round The Bush?

Creed: We just came up with this great D riff. Hammering on that D chord. We first wrote it at my girlfriends house located in Hollywood. I ended up marrying her, she was my first wife. We have a daughter.

Webmaster: What led you to leave the group?

Creed: We would get back from playing live and the studio would already pre-work these songs. They weren’t asking for contributions from the group anymore. And you know those first couple albums we played that stuff. It was organic and sure it was a little rough, but it was honest. And that’s one of the things that ticked me off. Maybe I shouldn’t have bit the hand that fed me.....but it bothered me, you know? It bothered me. It was horrible, we had to go out and play Midnight Confessions and we didn’t have any horns. It was just two guitars, drums and bass. It wasn’t like the record at all.

Webmaster: Was that after Feelings?

Creed: Feelings, that was written by Kenny Fukomoto, he was a great guy. He sang and played bass in the 13th Floor and was drafted. We needed Rob, he was the voice. Rob has a great pop voice. Warren sings very well. His was the grittier rock voice that kept us going. I don’t know why he won’t keep singing. I still talk to Warren, we talk quite a bit every couple of months or so. And I keep telling him that he’s got to come up and play with me. He says no, he is through with that stuff....

Webmaster: You were a part of the shift that happened in rock music, you touched on it earlier when you mentioned taking folk music and going electric. What recollections do you have of the fuzz guitar coming in the late 60’s?

Creed: “Oh my God” I had been playing nothing but folk music. Lee Zimmerman of The Young Californians the banjo player went back to Los Angeles. Greg Fitzpatrick moved to Sweden. I have just seen him recently because we’re connected as in-laws. I married his sister. I was there by myself, my normal weight is 195 and I dropped down to about 145. Starving. I was running out of gas. I was playing at some little pub or something, and a bunch of guys came up to me and said “You’ve got to see this guy play.” So we jumped in this little Morris Minor and drove to a small town. There was John Mayhall and the Blues Breakers and there was Eric Clapton. He had this 335 Gibson with rings on his fingers, he started playing and he looked as bored as anyone on the planet. After he was playing this stuff, my mouth dropped open. I thought to myself - Holy Crap! I’d never heard anything like it, later I learned that it was similar to Buddy Guy. He started it all. I went out and almost threw my guitar away. The guys said “You can’t do that, you’re good.” I said “It doesn’t matter.” Eric Clapton was intimidating to me.

I don’t know that I emulated anybody. My Grandfather taught me a few chords, when I was 13. My Grandmother also played and it was like osmosis, I just soaked up all that music when I was growing up in Coarsegold. I started listening to the radio and watched other people play. By the time I was in my senior year in high school, I became a professional musician. I played with a band called The Tourquays. We had a following up at Bass Lake, even the Hells Angels would listen to us play. I was a green kid just happy to play guitar with my trusty Silvertone and a bigger amplifier.

Another guy that stands out to me is Bert Jansch, He is totally unique. Check him out. I thought if there is anything I can do with a folk guitar, I would do something like that. He made the guitar talk, he later played with a group called Pentangle. When I came back to the states in ‘72 after I left the Grass Roots, my wife, daughter & I stayed with the group and I followed them around. They took me under their wing. They were a great bunch of people. So in a nutshell, some influences for me were Eric Clapton & Bert Jansch.

Talking about fuzz, I was trying to sell some of my songs, before Beatin’ Round The Bush and I was in some guys office, he was a publisher and asked “Tell me what you think of this” and he played Shapes of Things by The Yardbirds. My head turned upside down. I had no idea what to make of this. I told him “I don’t know. It’s just so weird.” And it was, I can listen to it now and it’s brilliant. It was ahead of it’s time. And then Rubber Soul came out. There was a girl that was a friend of mine and she was letting me stay at her place. She had a little gramophone and I remember sitting in a little room for two or three weeks, drinking tea, eating toast and playing that stylus down to the nub. Over and over and over and over. THAT was the holy grail. To this day those songs are the best. Of coarse, I had known about The Beatles from my college days, I was going by one of the sorority houses and I heard screaming. I stuck my head in the door and a bunch of girls were watching The Beatles on TV. I walked in and stood right behind them and saw these girls going ballistic. I thought - well they never did that with me when I was playing. What’s going on? What is this about? I thought oh, long hair, tight pants let’s see......Their music knocked me out, the honesty...I can’t say anything about The Beatles that hasn’t already been said. Of coarse, I was effected profoundly by them and their good sense of humor. But I have never sat down and tried to learn anybody’s riff. But I may like the style in the way they play.

Webmaster: Creed, your timing playing the guitar is outstanding, how did you come up with that wild solo on Hot Bright Lights?

Creed: I played that on an old Les Paul into a Vox amplifier. I turned it up all the way. Blasted it! I can tell you a story, you know Out Of Touch? There’s a quirky little solo in there. The record people didn’t like it. They said “What is he doing, is that jazz or what?” They wanted a conventional solo. I approached it from a very ass backward way, but I thought it was cool. P.F. Sloan totally agreed with me. He fought them, he was my champion. He insisted that they keep that solo in there. P.F. and I are still buddies. I just backed him up awhile ago. It was a big honor for me. He called me and said he was doing a show at McCabe’s and would I come and play guitar with him. We still get together and there is a great chemistry, humor wise and music. We just enjoy hanging out together. By the way, be expecting something brilliant from him out of Nashville. He’s down there working on an album, I’ve got a feeling it’s really going to be big news!

Webmaster: The chemistry you and the others had in the early years of The Grass Roots is very evident. Sloan & Barri and the group were all young artists and very creative. What are your feelings about this?

Creed: Sloan and Barri were great, all my band mates were great. It’s not really anything to do with the musicianship, how great the singers are, how great the songs are, there is an exuberance and a synergistic quality where the sum of the parts outweigh the separates or individual parts. You take someone out of that equation, and it’s not the original Grass Roots anymore. We couldn’t lose anybody. Even though it was sloppy and staged sometimes, every once in awhile we would get a little groove going. It was fun! We had a ball. It was like marriage, it sometimes gets a little uncomfortable but all in all, I look back on it with very fond memories!

Webmaster: Since you left the group you have many accomplishments in the acting field. Could you expand on your experiences?

Creed: I have always been an actor. I was a drama major in college. After traveling through Europe I made my way back to the states and had planned to continue with acting until I met with Warren and continued in the music business. It was an obvious thing for me to act as soon as I left The Grass Roots. I went right away into studying acting again. That was my goal and now that I am in my 60’s and a cast member on a hit show.

Webmaster: The Office is a great show and you have great comic timing.

Creed: My goal is to hang in with the show, they are really writing me funny stuff. They know I can knock off these little bits here and there. They gave me a six page scene for the Holloween episode I appeared in. Steve Carell and I had one of the longest scenes ever done on the show. They saw that I could do it and now I am being rewarded. My plan is to work into film. I have a lot of characters that I want to do.

Webmaster: You are multi talented and we hope that you can bring your acting and musical abilities together in the future.

Creed: That would be nice. Maybe a little stage play where I could tell a story, act a part, pick up a guitar and do a song with it.

Webmaster: You have accomplished so much during your lifetime is it an honor to talk with you. We wish you the best in all your goals and would appreciate a return interview on the site in the future to keep us up to date!

Creed: I appreciate the site and look forward to some new additions. Cool, you’ve got me covered on the net!