GOOD OL' BOY? JOHN DENVER CAN BE A MERCHANT OF VENOM WHEN HE'S RILED by Sid Smith Entertainment Writer Chicago Tribune 8-17-86 Singer John Denver's wholesome smile and gosh gee golly gush reached iconographic proportions in the 70's - he probably has been called "smarmy" as much as any entertainer. But sitting backstage after his recent concert in Rockford, finishing up a hasty dinner of pale pink salmon and steamed brown rice, Denver wasn't coming across as smarmy wholesome, good ol' boy or as he likes to sum up his longtime image, the Mickey Mouse of Pop. He was angry. "I have very little respect for the press" he almost shouted. "It's not only this personal thing with me, but I see it permeates everything that goes on. Ever since the whole thing with Libya. Europe has been suffering because American acts aren't touring there. That's a big part of their economy. And where the suffering is the most intense is England, and they're the ones who stood on our side. "Now, I don't recall Mr. Reagan or anyone in the administration saying "Don't go to Europe," but the press went into this whole big thing about terrorism over there and all that to the degree that Americans really bought it, and the administration did nothing to deny it. Many of the Europeans won't recover from the effects of this summer. "They're our partners, and we f---- 'em." Libya? Europe? Four-letter words? Whatever happened to the thank God I'm a country boy Denver in search of Rocky Mountain highs and Grandma's feather bed? "The media chose to present me that way" says Denver, who performs at Poplar Creek Wednesday. "They bought a certain kind of thing by which they judged me and criticized my concerts and my music." This may be self-serving revisionism in part, but consider Denver's entry in the influential "The Rolling Stone Record Guide": "One of the many pastoral singer/songwriters who proliferated in the early 70's. His thin, whiny voice, sophomoric writing and extremely limited instrumental facility made him far from the most interesting practitioner of the style." The entry goes on to label "Rocky Mountain High" as a good song that far outshines Denver himself as well as anything else he's recorded." That's not only vicious, it's a tad inhuman - how can a song outshine an entire human being? And yet it's a reminder of the kind of automatic venom Denver brings forth from critics and many others. Curiously, that criticism ignores what has been and remains an important component of his career, an almost rabid political activism. For instance, he began in the late 60's with the Chad Mitchell Trio, a folksinging group very much in the protest tradition of Pete Seeger, Joan Baez and Peter, Paul and Mary. (Denver still sings Seeger songs from the period at his current concerts). Each of his first five albums contained a pointed protest song, ranging from send ups of then Vice President Spiro Agnew and "The Ballad of Richard Nixon" (which consisted totally of silence) to antiwar songs by Tom Paxton, odes to returning Vietnam veterans and queries about our missing POW's - all hot political items at the time and all decidedly leftist. In the late '70's, Denver spend a lot of time - at least 2 days a month - working as a member of President Jimmy Carter's special commission on world hunger, long before a BBC documentary and rocker Bob Geldoff made the cause fashionable. "We delivered a report, and it was quoted on Page 47 of the New York Times" he says. "I was doing a concert tour at the time, and I played 112 concerts in 100 cities in 120 days. And at each one, I held a press conference and talked about the commission report. Later, the only reporters I'd agree to talk to again were the ones who got a sentence about hunger somehow past their editors and into the stories. And that was the only time there was any mention of it in most of the newspapers or on any of the television stations all over the U.S." "It has to be shoved down your throats" he continues. "Five years ago, some of us were talking about Ethiopia and what was happening there. We were actively lobbying for aid to Africa. And five years ago, if we had done only half of what we did last year for Ethiopia, millions of lives would have been saved." (The unkindest cut of all came when the organizers behind the "We Are The World" effort snubbed Denver, who had done far more fighting against hunger than almost any of the participants). Denver has also been a heavy crusader for space exploration and one new song on his album, his 25th for RCA, serenades the downed Challenger's shuttle crew. But his real concern these days is the loss of farms and small businesses partly because of what he considers an inordinate amount of defense spending. Denver's activism can't erase all criticisms, however. There was the short-lived controversy during the 1979 gasoline crunch when neighbors complained that Denver the Environmentalist was hoarding thousands of gallons worth of fuel on his private Colorado estate. And where was his political concern when he was being so bland and lovable during stints as host of the "Tonight Show" and in his 70's television specials? He counters that a part of the deal for the specials involved documentaries on serious topics - films that were made and won awards but few audiences. He also says when he began to lobby for one controversial or activist guest per "Tonight Show" episode he hosted, he was quietly dropped. "I blew the opportunity to continue doing variety television." Ironically, Denver's leftist interest seem at odds with those of his loyal fans. In Rockford, clean-cut young couples, often accompanied by their children, older parents and even grandparents, made up the 75 percent plus capacity crowd at the city's metro Center showplace. "I think some of them are showed at what I say" he admits. "That's why I come out first a do a string of six of my old hits first. And they relax and sit back and say to themselves, 'Yeah, there's ol' John.' Then I tell them how we lost 43,000 farms in this country last year before going into 'What Are We Making Weapons For?" (his anti-nuclear song). A few get up and leave, but for the most part the response is tremendous." RCA has not been so enthusiastic. Denver says he had to pressure the company to release the new album, and after that, RCA elected not to renew his contract. Denver was already somewhat bitter about what he considers RCA's mishandling of marketing on his previous album "Dreamland Express." "But the contract thing was purely business. After General Electric purchased RCA, a whole new team came in, looked at my contract, which was one of the top five in the industry, and then looked at the fact that I haven't had a hit record in 10 years." So it would seem times are tough for Denver. He has been divorced for several years now from his wife, Annie, although they recently became neighbors and are said to be getting along more positively. Still, Denver is very impassioned and self-recriminating when discussing her. "She wanted me to be something I wasn't, and I wanted her to be something she wasn't. It was one of the most catastrophic things that has ever happened to me." He notes that financially he doesn't have to tour or record. He says he works so hard that he's had only 16 days off so far this year. Besides the current American tour, Denver has spent time in Europe, Australia and the Soviet Union in recent years. Plans for a Broadway musical written by and starring Denver (as Will Rogers) are finally falling into place, with a tentative opening set for March. Rogers is someone Denver greatly admires. "He was one of the most beloved and respected entertainers in the States, an early supporter of aviation and a cowboy philosopher. He helped get us through one of the most difficult times in our country, and it was about the Depression that he said, 'Ours is the only country in the world who's gonna go to the poorhouse driving an automobile.'" "That's still true."