# 13 Best Creedence Tribute Bands - September 2026 - **URL:** https://www.protributebands.com/the-top-creedence-tribute-bands/ - **Published:** 2026-09-05 ## The 13 Best Creedence Tribute Bands in 2026 David Victor Updated October 8, 2026 - - Table of Contents - #1 – Randy Linder’s Creedence Revelation - #2 – Creedence Revived - #3 – Revisiting Creedence - #4 – Green River - #5 – Fortunate Son - #6 – The Fortunate Sons - #7 – Commotion (Iowa) - #8 – Creedenced (Southern California) - #9 – Creedence: The Tribute - #10 – Mystic Highway - #11 – Ramble Tamble - #12 – Creedence Clearwater Review - #13 – Creedence Clearwater Collective - Booking a Creedence Tribute Creedence Clearwater Revival put out seven albums in about four years, stacked up nine top-10 singles, and broke up in 1972 before most of America had figured out they were from El Cerrito, California and not the Louisiana bayou. Bad Moon Rising, Fortunate Son, Proud Mary, Have You Ever Seen the Rain: these songs never left the radio, and they’ve never left the setlist of any bar band that wants the room on its feet. Fogerty himself spent September 2026 on the road with Steve Winwood, and the two finally shared a song in Charlotte, In The Midnight Hour, so nobody’s getting tired of this music. That’s exactly why most CCR tributes are ordinary. The songs are simple, the parts are learnable, and it’s easy to get through Down on the Corner without embarrassing yourself. It’s very hard to sound like John Fogerty doing it. That voice is a rasp with a whole church choir behind it, and the guitar tone is a specific, fat, slightly overdriven thing that a lot of players approximate and few nail. I’ve spent my life on both sides of this, playing and singing in BOSTON and running ProTributeBands since 2011, so when I judge a Creedence act I’m listening for the vocal and the tone first and the costumes last. How the list is ordered: the incumbent at #1 keeps the spot because his show is still on the road and nobody has clearly passed him. After that it’s how much each band tours, how strong the recent footage is, and how honestly the singer handles Fogerty. Two ex-members of the real thing’s touring successor now front their own Creedence show, and they’re in here. Prices for acts at this level start well into five figures once you add travel, so read [what tribute bands cost](https://www.protributebands.com/how-much-do-tribute-bands-cost/) before you fall in love with one. ## #1 – Randy Linder’s Creedence Revelation Randy Linder has been a working musician since 1968 and built this Fogerty salute in 2000, which makes Creedence Revelation the longest-running act on the page by a wide margin. He looks the part, plays the lead guitar parts himself, and pulls out the blues harp on the songs that need it, which is the detail most Fogerty impersonators skip. The show has played Las Vegas rooms, Guam, and a festival in Mexicali in front of a crowd of 14,000. Home base is the Pacific Northwest. The 2026 calendar runs through Washington casinos, MoonFest at the end of July, and a Suquamish Clearwater date in September, with a San Jose theater show last fall. It’s a casino and fair act more than a performing arts center act, and that’s not a knock. Those buyers rebook the shows that work, and they keep rebooking this one. ## #2 – Creedence Revived If you ask a talent buyer to name one CCR tribute, this is usually the one. Creedence Revived pulls its four players from Chicago and Los Angeles, has toured Europe and Malaysia, and plays the Carolina Opry in Myrtle Beach on October 4, 2026. Singer Rich Perez, nicknamed “El Chameleon” for how completely he changes his voice per artist, has the Fogerty rasp without overdoing it, and JD King’s guitar leans blues, which is where Fogerty’s playing came from in the first place. The endorsement that matters: John “Bulldog” Tristao, who sang lead for Creedence Clearwater Revisited for 21 years, put his name on this band and said Perez “is the man.” Coming from the guy who held that chair next to Stu Cook and Doug Clifford, that’s about as close to a blessing from the source as a tribute act can get. They’re a strong choice for a [corporate event](https://www.protributebands.com/tribute-bands-for-corporate-events/) that wants a name with a track record. ## #3 – Revisiting Creedence Here’s the lineage entry. Dan McGuinness on lead vocals and Kurt Griffey on lead guitar spent roughly a decade fronting Creedence Clearwater Revisited, the band Stu Cook and Doug Clifford ran after CCR, and when that band retired they kept the songs going as Revisiting Creedence. Drummer Ron Wikso, another Revisited alum, has been in the lineup too. These are people who actually played this material next to two of the original four. It plays like a concert, not a tribute night. The 2026 routing is performing arts centers and Live Nation rooms: Tuacahn in Utah in March, the Fox Theatre in Hutchinson in October, Arizona Music Fest at the end of October, the Cerritos Center in November, plus a Kansas City casino date moved into 2027. The Oxford Performing Arts Center clip above is the honest picture of what you get: a tight, loud band that doesn’t need the costumes. ## #4 – Green River Green River is the brainchild of native New Yorker Rick “Noodles” Horvath, and it bills itself as the top nationally touring CCR and John Fogerty show. On the touring claim I’ll give it to them. The band is on a 15th Anniversary Legacy Tour in 2026, built around the songs on Fogerty’s Legacy album plus fan picks, with dates like the Musikfest Café in Bethlehem in August, Columbia, Maryland in June, and a June 6 show that sold out ahead of time. Horvath sings and plays harmonica and lead, and he treats the Fogerty solo catalog as part of the job, so you’ll hear The Old Man Down the Road and Centerfield next to Born on the Bayou. The Westport Library set in the video is a good test because there’s nowhere to hide in a room like that, and the band still sounds like a record. ## #5 – Fortunate Son Brad Ford has played John Fogerty in Fortunate Son since 1994, which means he was doing this before “tribute band” was a booking category. The act was featured on Season 4 of AXS TV’s The World’s Greatest Tribute Bands in September 2014, and Ford still works it hard: the late-2026 run goes South Padre Island, Apple Valley, the Carruthers Fair, Harrah’s Ak-Chin in Arizona, and the Historic Yuma Theatre in November, and a March 2026 date in San Pedro sold out. Ford’s voice sits a little smoother than Fogerty’s, and he leans on charisma and pacing rather than pure grit. That reads well in casinos and amphitheaters, which is where this show lives. The Campus JAX clip is from June 2026, so what you see is what you’d book. ## #6 – The Fortunate Sons Not to be confused with the act above. The Fortunate Sons are a Chicago band, touring since 2009, and their whole pitch is period accuracy: vintage instruments, correct costuming, and a bit of storytelling between songs so the show reads as a concert from 1970 rather than a greatest-hits medley. They’re the kind of band that cares whether the Rickenbacker is the right year. They tour nationally and overseas, with a Mitchell Opera House date in Indiana on October 23, 2026 and a Hengelo, Netherlands show that December. The video is a full King’s Day show from the Netherlands in 2024, and it shows the payoff of all that fussing over gear: the guitars sound like the records, not like a modern amp trying to sound old. ## #7 – Commotion (Iowa) Commotion came out of Fairfield, Iowa and turned into a theater act fast. Steve McLain sings and plays guitar, Jimmy Ryan handles lead guitar, and Mark Ellis is on drums. It’s billed as a multimedia concert, and the 2026 dates are performing arts centers: Westminster College’s Celebrity Series in April, the Ingersoll in Iowa in June, a July return to the Paramount in Iowa, and a September amphitheater show in Jefferson City. What I like is the balance. McLain doesn’t chase the rasp so hard that he loses pitch, and Ryan’s solos are melodic where a lot of CCR tributes just turn up and dig in. It’s a subscription-series band, and buyers who program those series will know exactly what that means. ## #8 – Creedenced (Southern California) Creedenced is a Southern California band fronted by Tim Walsh, whose own bandmates were the first to point out he sounded like Fogerty. Guitarist Neal Shelton, a Dean Guitars endorsee who also plays in a Judas Priest tribute and a Def Leppard tribute, takes the Tom Fogerty role and adds a heavier edge than most CCR acts carry. They cover the solo material too, so Centerfield and Rock and Roll Girls are in the set. They mostly work California and the desert Southwest: Skypark at Santa’s Village in September 2026, the Starbright Theater in Las Vegas in October, Spaghettini in Seal Beach, and the Coachella Valley casino and winery circuit. A solid regional pick if your event is west of the Rockies and you don’t want to fly a band in. ## #9 – Creedence: The Tribute Northeast Ohio’s Creedence: The Tribute formed in the summer of 2020, which is an odd year to start a band, and it’s now one of the most visible CCR acts in the Midwest. Pat Daley sings, plays guitar and harmonica as Fogerty, and Dan Holland covers the Tom Fogerty rhythm parts, with Sam Helton on bass and Dave Strickland on drums and, yes, washboard. They chase the studio recordings and use a lot of the same gear CCR used on stage. They’ve been on Fox 8 News in Cleveland and play a steady 2026 schedule of Ohio clubs and theaters, including a Stadium Theatre booking. The Hey Tonight clip from March 2026 is the freshest footage of any band on this page, and Daley’s harmonica break is the giveaway that he’s studied the source. ## #10 – Mystic Highway Mystic Highway is an Ontario band, members of the Hamilton Musicians Guild and both the Canadian and American Federations of Musicians, and it crosses the border constantly. Frontman Gil Gaidola has the Fogerty range and the guitar chops, and the band has played to 3,000 on the Bay City, Michigan waterfront, the Back to Batoche gathering in Saskatchewan three years running, and casino rooms from Ho-Chunk in Wisconsin to Great Blue Heron in October 2026 and the Virgin River in Mesquite, Nevada in August. A buyer at Ho-Chunk described the set as “like listening to a studio recording,” and the Bad Moon Rising clip backs that up. This is the act to call for a Great Lakes or Upper Midwest date where the drive is shorter from Ontario than from anywhere else on this list. ## #11 – Ramble Tamble Ramble Tamble is the Creedence production from Georgia Players Guild, the Georgia touring company behind a string of theater tribute shows, and it’s built for the performing arts center circuit in the Southeast. September 2026 alone has the Ritz Theatre on St. Simons Island, the Oxford Performing Arts Center in Alabama, and the Tift Theatre in Tifton, with a June date at the Jennie T. Anderson Theatre in Marietta and a 2025 stop at the Renaissance in Mansfield, Ohio. Naming a CCR show after the seven-minute opener on Cosmo’s Factory tells you the band takes the deep cuts seriously. The GPG promo clip is polished production rather than raw bar footage, which is the right sample for a PAC buyer. ## #12 – Creedence Clearwater Review The UK’s Creedence Clearwater Review is the one to know if your event is in Britain. It’s booked through Red River Artists, runs a proper theater tour with Ticketmaster and Live Nation listings into 2027, and toured a full Cosmo’s Factory show in 2025. Recent stops include the Commemoration Hall in Huntingdon, Airdrie Town Hall, and the Warner hotel circuit. The name is a wink; the playing isn’t. British tributes tend to play it “true to the record,” as this band puts it, and the Redgrave Theatre clip shows that. Fogerty’s Americana comes across a little cleaner with a UK accent behind it, which the crowds don’t seem to mind one bit. ## #13 – Creedence Clearwater Collective Down under it’s Creedence Clearwater Collective, an Australian production booked through Carter Entertainment with tour dates already posted through 2027. The 2026 run covers both countries: the Events Centre in Caloundra, Bunjil Place near Melbourne, the Isaac Theatre Royal in Christchurch in August, and the Clarence St Theatre in Hamilton, New Zealand in October, with New Zealand ticketing through Ticketek. The 2026 trailer is worth a look for the guitar tone alone. If you’re reading this from the US, this is the band your Australian cousin will tell you about. ## Booking a Creedence Tribute Every act on this page tours, and most of them are already routed for 2026, so the practical questions are geography and budget. A regional band driving to your date costs a fraction of a national act flying in with a crew, and for a [wedding](https://www.protributebands.com/tribute-bands-for-weddings/) or a private party the regional pick is often the smarter one. Read [how to choose a tribute band](https://www.protributebands.com/how-to-choose-the-right-tribute-band-for-your-event/) for the rest of that math. One more thing about CCR songs: they were written to be played loud in a small room, and they still work that way. Pick the band whose singer you believe, and the rest takes care of itself. For more roots and jam rock, see the [best Grateful Dead tribute bands](https://www.protributebands.com/best-grateful-dead-tribute-bands/). Written by [David Victor](https://www.protributebands.com/david-victor-bio/)