John Mellencamp

John Mellencamp
John Mellencamp performs at the Harbor Park in Norfolk, VA on July 25, 2009.
Background information
Also known as	Johnny Cougar John Cougar John Cougar Mellencamp
Born	October 7, 1951 (1951-10-07) (age 59) Seymour, Indiana, U.S.
Genres	Rock, heartland rock, roots rock, folk
Occupations	Musician, singer-songwriter
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, harmonica
Years active	1976–present
Labels	MCA, Riva, Mercury, Columbia, Island, Universal Republic Records, Hear Music
Associated acts	Crepe Soul Trash Mason Brothers Mitch Ryder James McMurtry Me'Shell Ndegeocello Chuck D India.Arie Trisha Yearwood Little Big Town Joan Baez
Website	JohnMellencamp.com

John Mellencamp, previously known by the stage names Johnny Cougar, John Cougar, and John Cougar Mellencamp, (born October 7, 1951) is an American rock singer-songwriter, musician, painter and occasional actor known for his catchy, populist brand of heartland rock that eschews synthesizers and other artificial sounds in favor of organic instrumentation. He has sold over 40 million albums worldwide and has amassed 22 Top 40 hits in the United States. In addition, he holds the record for the most tracks by a solo artist to hit number-one on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, with seven, and he has been nominated for 13 Grammy Awards, winning one. His latest album, No Better Than This, was released on August 17, 2010.

Mellencamp is also one of the founding members of Farm Aid, an organization that began in 1985 with a concert in Champaign, Illinois to raise awareness about the loss of family farms and to raise funds to keep farm families on their land. The Farm Aid concerts have remained an annual event over the past 25 years, and as of 2010 the organization has raised over $37 million to promote a strong and resilient family farm system of agriculture. The 25th anniversary Farm Aid concert will be held at Miller Park in Milwaukee on October 2, 2010.

Mellencamp was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 10, 2008 by Billy Joel.^[1] His biggest musical influences are Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie and The Rolling Stones.^[2]

Early life

Mellencamp was born in Seymour, Indiana with a mild form of spina bifida that necessitated a lengthy stay in the hospital as a baby.^[3] He is descended from German immigrant Johann Herman Möhlenkamp, who came to the White Creek area of Bartholomew County, Indiana in 1855.^[4]

He formed his first band, Crepe Soul, at the age of 14 ^[3] and later played in the local bands Trash, Snakepit Banana Barn and the Mason Brothers. He eloped with his pregnant girlfriend Priscilla at the age of 18^[3] and had his first child in December 1970, six months after he graduated from high school.

Mellencamp attended Vincennes University, a two-year college in Vincennes, Indiana, starting in 1972. During this time he experimented with drugs and alcohol, stating in a 1986 Rolling Stone interview, "When I was high on pot, it affected me so drastically that when I was in college there were times when I wouldn't get off the couch. I would lie there, listening to Roxy Music, right next to the record player so I wouldn't have to get up to flip the record over. I'd listen to this record, that record. There would be four or five days like that when I would be completely gone."^[2]

Upon graduating from Vincennes University in 1974, Mellencamp played in a couple of local bands, including the aforementioned glitter-band Trash, which was named after a New York Dolls song, and he later got a job in Seymour installing telephones. At this time, Mellencamp, who had given up drugs and alcohol for good prior to graduating from Vincennes University, decided to pursue a career in music.

Performing as Johnny Cougar & John Cougar (1976–1982)

After about 18 months of traveling back and forth from Indiana to New York City in 1974 and 1975, Mellencamp finally found someone receptive to his music and image in Tony DeFries of MainMan Management.^[2] DeFries insisted that Mellencamp's first album, Chestnut Street Incident, a collection of covers and a handful of original songs, be released under the stage name Johnny Cougar. The album sold 12,000 copies.

Mellencamp recorded The Kid Inside in 1977, the follow-up to Chestnut Street Incident, but DeFries eventually decided against releasing the album and Mellencamp was dropped from MCA records. He drew interest from Rod Stewart's manager, Billy Gaff, after parting ways with DeFries and was signed to the tiny Riva Records label. At Gaff's request, Mellencamp moved to London, England for nearly a year to record, promote and tour behind 1978's A Biography. The record wasn't released in the United States, but it yielded a hit in Australia with "I Need a Lover".^[2] Riva Records added "I Need a Lover" to Mellencamp's next album released in the United States, 1979's John Cougar, where the song became a No. 28 single in late 1979. Pat Benatar recorded "I Need a Lover" on her debut album In the Heat of the Night.

In 1980, Mellencamp returned with the Steve Cropper-produced Nothin' Matters and What If It Did, which yielded two Top 40 singles — "This Time" (No. 27) and "Ain't Even Done With the Night" (No. 17). "The singles were stupid little pop songs," he told Record Magazine in 1983. "I take no credit for that record. It wasn't like the title was made up — it wasn't supposed to be punky or cocky like some people thought. Toward the end, I didn't even go to the studio. Me and the guys in the band thought we were finished, anyway. It was the most expensive record I ever made. It cost $280,000, do you believe that? The worst thing was that I could have gone on making records like that for hundreds of years. Hell, as long as you sell a few records and the record company isn't putting lot of money into promotion, you're making money for 'em and that's all they care about. PolyGram loved Nothin' Matters. They thought I was going to turn into the next Neil Diamond."

In 1982, Mellencamp released his breakthrough album, American Fool, which contained the singles "Hurts So Good", an uptempo rock tune that spent four weeks at No. 2 and 16 weeks in the top 10, and "Jack & Diane", which was a No. 1 hit for four weeks. A third single, "Hand to Hold On To", made it to No. 19. "Hurts So Good" went on to win the Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance at the 25th Grammys. "To be real honest, there's three good songs on that record, and the rest is just sort of filler," Mellencamp told Creem Magazine of American Fool in 1984. "It was too labored over, too thought about, and it wasn't organic enough. The record company thought it would bomb, but I think the reason it took off was – not that the songs were better than my others – but people liked the sound of it, the 'bam-bam-bam' drums. It was a different sound."

Performing as John Cougar Mellencamp (1983–1990)

With some commercial success under his belt, Mellencamp had the record company add his real surname to his stage moniker. The first album he recorded as John Cougar Mellencamp was 1983's Uh-Huh, a Top-10 album that spawned the Top 10 singles "Pink Houses", "Crumblin' Down" as well as "Authority Song". During the recording of Uh-Huh, Mellencamp's backing band settled on the lineup it would retain for the next several albums: Kenny Aronoff on drums and percussion, Larry Crane and Mike Wanchic on guitars, Toby Myers on bass and John Cascella on keyboards. In 1988, Rolling Stone magazine called this version of Mellencamp's band "one of the most powerful and versatile live bands ever assembled." On the 1984 Uh-Huh Tour, Mellencamp opened his shows with cover versions of songs he admired growing up, including Elvis Presley's "Heartbreak Hotel," the Animals' "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood," Lee Dorsey's "Ya Ya," and the Left Banke's "Pretty Ballerina."

Since college, Mellencamp has lived a drug and alcohol-free lifestyle. In 1984, when asked about his views on drugs, he told Bill Holdship of Creem Magazine, "If you want to stick needles in your arms, go ahead and fucking do it. You're the one that's going to pay the consequences. I don't think it's a good idea, and I sure don't advocate it, but I'm not going to judge people. Hell, if that was the case, you wouldn't like anyone in the music business because everyone's blowing cocaine."

In 1985, Mellencamp released Scarecrow, which peaked at No. 2 in the fall of '85 and spawned five Top 40 singles: "Lonely Ol' Night" (No. 6), "Small Town" (No. 6), and "R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A. (A Salute to '60s Rock)" (No. 2), "Rain on the Scarecrow" (No. 21) and "Rumbleseat" (No. 28). Scarecrow was also the first album Mellencamp recorded at his own recording studio "Belmont Mall," located in Belmont, Indiana and built in 1984. Mellencamp sees Scarecrow as the start of the alternative country genre: "I think I invented that whole 'No Depression' thing with the Scarecrow album, though I don’t get the credit," he told Classic Rock magazine in October 2008.

Shortly after finishing Scarecrow, Mellencamp helped organize the first Farm Aid benefit concert with Willie Nelson and Neil Young in Champaign, Illinois on September 22, 1985. The Farm Aid concerts remain an annual event and have raised over $37 million for struggling family farmers as of 2010.

Prior to the 1985–86 Scarecrow Tour, during which he covered a bunch of those same 1960s rock and soul songs he and his band rehearsed prior to the recording of Scarecrow, Mellencamp added fiddle player Lisa Germano to his band. Germano would remain in Mellencamp's band until 1994, when she left to pursue a solo career.

Mellencamp's next LP, 1987's The Lonesome Jubilee included the singles "Paper in Fire," (No. 9) "Cherry Bomb," (No. 8), "Check It Out," (No. 14) and "Rooty Toot Toot" (No. 61) along with the album tracks "Hard Times for an Honest Man" and "The Real Life," both of which garnered significant radio airplay. "We were on the road for a long time after Scarecrow, so we were together a lot as a band," Mellencamp said in a 1987 Creem Magazine feature. "For the first time ever, we talked about the record before we started. We had a very distinct vision of what should be happening here. At one point, The Lonesome Jubilee was supposed to be a double album, but at least 10 of the songs I'd written just didn't stick together with the idea and the sound we had in mind. So I just put those songs on a shelf, and cut it back down to a single record. Now, in the past, it was always 'Let's make it up as we go along' – and we did make some of The Lonesome Jubilee up as we went along. But we had a very clear idea of what we wanted it to sound like, even before it was written, right through to the day it was mastered."

As Frank DiGiacomo of Vanity Fair wrote in 2007, "The Lonesome Jubilee was the album in which Mellencamp defined his now signature sound: a rousing, crystalline mix of acoustic and electric guitars, Appalachian fiddle, and gospel-style backing vocals, anchored by a crisp, bare-knuckle drumbeat and completed by his own velveteen rasp."

During the 1987-88 Lonesome Jubilee Tour, Mellencamp was joined onstage by surprise guest Bruce Springsteen at the end of his May 26, 1988 gig in Irvine, California, for a duet of Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone," which Mellencamp performed as the penultimate song during each show on that tour.

After the Lonesome Jubilee Tour, Mellencamp divorced his second wife, Vicki.

In 1989, Mellencamp released the personal album Big Daddy, with the key tracks "Jackie Brown," "Big Daddy of Them All" and "Void in My Heart," and the Top 15 single "Pop Singer." The album, which Mellencamp called at the time the most "earthy" record he'd ever made, is also the last to feature the "Cougar" moniker.

Mellencamp was heavily involved in painting at this time in his life, and decided not to tour behind Big Daddy, stating "What's the point?... This other step that people keep wanting me to take to become another level of recording artist - to be Madonna? To sell out? To bend over? To kiss somebody's ass? I ain't gonna do it." ^[5] In his second painting exhibition, at the Churchman-Fehsenfeld Gallery in Indianapolis in 1990, Mellencamp's portraits were described as always having sad facial expressions and conveying "the same disillusionment found in his musical anthems about the nation's heartland and farm crisis." ^[6]

Performing as John Mellencamp (1991–1997)

Mellencamp's 1991 album, Whenever We Wanted, was the first whose cover was billed to just John Mellencamp. Whenever We Wanted yielded the Top 40 hits "Get a Leg Up" and "Again Tonight," but "Last Chance," "Love and Happiness" and "Now More Than Ever" also garnered significant radio airplay. "It's very rock 'n' roll," Mellencamp said of Whenever We Wanted. "I just wanted to get back to the basics."

In 1993, he released Human Wheels, whose title track peaked at No. 48 on the Billboard singles chart. "To me, this record is very urban," Mellencamp told Billboard magazine of Human Wheels in the summer of '93. "We had a lot of discussions about the rhythm and blues music of the day. We explored what a lot of these (current) bands are doing — these young black bands that are doing more than just sampling."

Mellencamp's 1994 Dance Naked album included a cover of Van Morrison's "Wild Night" as a duet with Me'Shell NdegeOcello. The album also contained two protest songs in "L.U.V." and "Another Sunny Day 12/25", in addition to the title track, which hit No. 41 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the summer of 1994. "This is as naked a rock record as you're going to hear," Mellencamp said of Dance Naked in a 1994 Billboard magazine interview. "All the vocals are first or second takes, and half the songs don't even have bass parts. Others have just one guitar, bass, and drums, which I haven't done since American Fool."

With guitarist Andy York now on board as Larry Crane's full-time replacement, Mellencamp launched his Dance Naked Tour in the summer of 1994, but a minor heart attack suffered after a show at Jones Beach in New York on August 8 of that year eventually forced him to cancel the last few weeks of the tour.

He returned to the concert stage in early 1995 by playing a series of dates in small Midwestern clubs under the pseudonym Pearl Doggy.

In September 1996, the experimental album Mr. Happy Go Lucky, which was produced by Junior Vasquez, was released to critical acclaim. "It's been fascinating to me how urban records use rhythm and electronics, and it's terribly challenging to make that work in the context of a rock band," Mellencamp told Billboard magazine in 1996. "But we took it further than an urban record. The arrangements are more ambitious, with programs and loops going right along with real drums and guitars."

Mr. Happy Go Lucky spawned the No. 14 single "Key West Intermezzo (I Saw You First)" (Mellencamp's last Top 40 hit) and "Just Another Day," which peaked at No. 46.

Recording for Columbia (1998–2003)

After the release of Mr. Happy Go Lucky and a subsequent four-month tour from March-July 1997 to promote it, Mellencamp signed a four-album deal with Columbia Records, although he wound up making only three albums for the label.

Issued a day before his 47th birthday in 1998, his self-titled debut for Columbia Records included the singles "Your Life is Now" and "I'm Not Running Anymore," along with standout album tracks such as "Eden Is Burning," "Miss Missy," "It All Comes True" and "Chance Meeting At The Tarantula." The switch in labels coincided with Dane Clark replacing Aronoff on drums. "On this record, we ended up quite a-bit away from where we started," Mellencamp told Guitar World Acoustic in 1998. "Initially, I wanted to make a record that barely had drums on it. Donovan made a record (in 1966), Sunshine Superman, and I wanted to start with that same kind of vibe—Eastern, very grand stories, fairy tales."

He released a book of his early paintings, titled Paintings and Reflections, in 1998.

In 1999, Mellencamp covered his own songs as well as those by Bob Dylan and the Drifters for his album Rough Harvest (recorded in 1997), one of two albums he owed Mercury Records to fulfill his contract (the other was The Best That I Could Do, a best-of collection).

The early 21st century found Mellencamp teaming up with artists such as Chuck D and India.Arie to deliver his second Columbia album, Cuttin' Heads and the single "Peaceful World" — a duet with Arie (a live acoustic version of the tune sung solo by Mellencamp was included on the benefit album God Bless America). Cuttin' Heads also included a duet with Trisha Yearwood on a love song called "Deep Blue Heart." "He played me this song," Yearwood told Country.com, "and he said, 'I kind of have an idea of like when Emmylou Harris sang on Bob Dylan's record, just kind of harmony all the way through.'"

Mellencamp embarked on the Cuttin' Heads Tour in the summer of 2001, before the album was even released. He opened each show on this tour with a cover of the Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter" and also played a solo acoustic version of the Cuttin' Heads track "Women Seem" at each show.

In 2003, he released Trouble No More, a quickly-recorded collection of folk and blues covers originally done by artists such as Robert Johnson, Son House, Lucinda Williams and Hoagie Carmichael. The album was also dedicated to Mellencamp's friend, Billboard magazine editor-in-chief Timothy White, who died from a heart attack in 2002. In October 2002, Mellencamp performed the Robert Johnson song "Stones In My Passway" at two benefit concerts for White. Columbia Records executives, who were in attendance at the benefits shows, were so impressed with Mellencamp's live renditions of "Stones In My Passway" that they convinced him to record an album of vintage American songs, which ultimately became Trouble No More. Mellencamp sang the gospel song "Will The Circle Be Unbroken" at White's funeral on July 2, 2002. Trouble No More spent several weeks at #1 on Billboard's Blues Album charts.

Recent activity (2004–present)

Mellencamp participated in the Vote for Change tour in October 2004 leading up to the 2004 U.S. Presidential election. That same month he released the two-disc career hits retrospective Words & Music: John Mellencamp's Greatest Hits, which contained 35 of his radio singles (including all 22 of his Top 40 hits) along with two new tunes, "Walk Tall" and "Thank You" — both produced by Babyface but written by Mellencamp.

In 2005, Mellencamp toured with Donovan and John Fogerty. The first leg of what was called the Words and Music Tour in the spring of '05 featured Donovan playing in the middle of Mellencamp's set. Mellencamp would play a handful of songs before introducing Donovan and then duetting with him on the 1966 hit "Sunshine Superman." Mellencamp would leave the stage as Donovan played seven or eight of his songs (backed by Mellencamp's band) and then return to finish off his own set after Donovan departed. On the second leg of the tour in the summer of '05, Fogerty co-headlined with Mellencamp at outdoor amphitheaters across the United States. Fogerty would join Mellencamp for duets on Fogerty's Creedence Clearwater Revival hit "Green River" and Mellencamp's "Rain on the Scarecrow."

Mellencamp released Freedom's Road on January 23, 2007. "Our Country," the first single from the album was played as the opening song on Mellencamp's 2006 spring tour, and the band that opened for him on that tour, Little Big Town, was called on to record harmonies on the studio version of "Our Country," as well as seven other songs on Freedom's Road. "Our Country" began being featured in Chevy Silverado TV commercials in late September 2006. He sang the song to open Game 2 of the 2006 World Series. "Our Country" was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award in the category Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance but lost out to Bruce Springsteen's "Radio Nowhere."

Mellencamp wrote and produced all 10 songs on Freedom's Road, and the record peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard 200 album chart by selling 56,000 copies in its first week on the market. Freedom's Road included "Jim Crow", a duet with Joan Baez, "Rural Route" and "Someday," which was the album's second single.

On August 13, 2007, Mellencamp began recording his 18th album of original material, titled Life, Death, Love and Freedom. The album, which was released on July 15, 2008, was produced by T Bone Burnett. The first song with video, "Jena," was introduced on Mellencamp's website in October 2007. In an interview with the Bloomington Herald-Times in March 2008, Mellencamp dubbed Life, Death, Love and Freedom "The best record I've ever made." He signed with Starbucks' Hear Music label to distribute the album and said, "they think it's a fucking masterpiece." The album's first single was "My Sweet Love." A video for the song was filmed in Savannah, GA on June 9, 2008. Karen Fairchild of Little Big Town is featured in the video. She harmonizes with Mellencamp on "My Sweet Love" and provides background vocals to three other songs on Life, Death, Love and Freedom, which became the ninth Top 10 album of Mellencamp's career when it debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard 200 the week of August 2, 2008. It sold 56,000 copies in its first week on the market. In its list of the 50 best albums of 2008, Rolling Stone magazine named Life, Death, Love and Freedom No. 5 overall and also dubbed "Troubled Land" No. 48 among the 100 best singles of the year.

Mellencamp made a guest appearance at Billy Joel's July 16, 2008 concert at Shea Stadium in New York. Mellencamp sang "Pink Houses" in front of a sold-out crowd of nearly 60,000 people.

John Mellencamp and Sheryl Crow perform Mellencamp's 2008 single "My Sweet Love" in Hunter Valley, New South Wales, Australia on Nov. 29, 2008.

On September 3, 2008, Mellencamp made available on his website a home-video recording of his solo acoustic cover of Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" as a sign that the 2008 Presidential Election is going to bring about change in America.

Mellencamp filmed a concert at the Crump Theatre in Columbus, Indiana on September 23, 2008 for a new A&E Biography series called "Homeward Bound". The show features performers returning to small venues they performed at during the early stages of their careers. Mellencamp had last played at the Crump Theatre on October 4, 1976. The program aired on December 11, 2008 and also featured an in-depth documentary tracing Mellencamp's roots.

Mellencamp toured Australia and New Zealand with opening act Sheryl Crow from November 15 – December 7, 2008. Crow joined Mellencamp on stage to duet on "My Sweet Love" during the last seven shows.

Mellencamp participated in a tribute concert for Pete Seeger's 90th birthday on May 3, 2009 at Madison Square Garden in New York City which raised funds for an environmental organization founded by Seeger to preserve and protect the Hudson River. Mellencamp performed solo acoustic renditions of Seeger and Lee Hays' "If I Had a Hammer" and his own "A Ride Back Home".

Mellencamp released an eight-track live album called Life, Death, Live and Freedom on June 23, 2009. The album captures live performances of eight Life, Death, Love and Freedom tracks. This is the first official live album of Mellencamp's career.

Mellencamp embarked on a tour of minor league ballparks with Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson in the summer of 2009 that ran from July 2 – August 15.

While he was on tour, Mellencamp recorded a new album, titled No Better Than This, that was again produced by T-Bone Burnett. The tracks for the album were recorded at historic locations, such as the First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia as well as at the Sun Studio in Memphis and the Sheraton Gunter Hotel in San Antonio, where blues pioneer Robert Johnson recorded "Sweet Home Chicago" and "Crossroad Blues". Mellencamp recorded the album using a 1955 Ampex portable recording machine and only one microphone, requiring all the musicians to gather together around the mic. The album was recorded in mono. Mellencamp wrote over 30 songs for the record (only 13 made the final cut), and he wrote one song specifically for Room 414 at the Gunther Hotel. "It's called 'Right Behind Me'. I wrote it just for this room," Mellencamp told the San Antonio Express-News. "I could have done this in my studio. But I want to do it this way, and if I can't do what I want at this point, I'm not going to do it. If it's not fun, I'm not going to do it. I'm through digging a ditch." No Better Than This was released on August 17, 2010. The title track served as the album's first single and was sent to radio on June 28.

On December 6, 2009, Mellencamp performed "Born in the U.S.A." as a tribute to Bruce Springsteen, who was one of the honorees at the 2009 Kennedy Center Honors. "I was very proud and humbled to have been able to play 'Born in the U.S.A.' in a different fashion that I think was true to the feelings that Bruce had when he wrote it," Mellencamp said. He performed "Down By The River" on January 29, 2010 in Los Angeles in tribute to Neil Young, who was honored at the 20th annual MusiCares Person of the Year gala. Mellencamp sang the hymn "Keep Your Eyes on the Prize" at "In Performance at the White House: A Celebration of Music from the Civil Rights Movement" on February 9, 2010.

A career-spanning box set of album tracks and demos titled On the Rural Route 7609 was released on June 15, 2010, nine weeks before No Better Than This hit stores. "If you didn’t get deeper into the original albums and know these songs, it will be like discovering new material," Mellencamp said about On the Rural Route 7609.

Mellencamp, who co-headlined 11 shows in the summer of 2010 with Bob Dylan, will launch the No Better Than This theater tour on October 29, 2010 in his hometown of Bloomington, Indiana. On this tour, which will run through late spring 2011 and cover the entire United States, he will open each concert with a showing of a Kurt Markus documentary about the making of No Better Than This called "It's About You" before hitting the stage to play three different sets: a stripped-down acoustic set with his band, a solo acoustic set, and a fully electrified rock set. "It'll be like Alan Freed, like the old Moondog shows," Mellencamp told Billboard magazine. "When you went to see his shows, there was a movie, like 'The Girl Can't Help It' or something, and then three or four bands played. I'm gonna come out and play with upright bass and cocktail [drum] kits and a lot of acoustic instruments. I'll play for, like, 40 minutes that way. Then the band will leave and it'll just be me with an acoustic guitar for 40 minutes, and then there'll be 40 minutes of rock 'n' roll. You'll get three different types of John Mellencamp, and you'll get a movie."

Ghost Brothers of Darkland County

Mellencamp has been working on a musical with horror author Stephen King, entitled Ghost Brothers of Darkland County since 2000. Liv Ullmann said in a March 2010 radio interview that she will direct. According to Mellencamp's website, production of the Ghost Brothers of Darkland County CD/book package began on June 15, 2009, when Burnett began laying down tracks in Los Angeles for the 18 new songs Mellencamp has written for the musical. The recording will be available in a book package containing the full text, two discs featuring the entire production of the spoken word script and songs performed by the cast, and a third CD of the songs only.

Mellencamp's website states that the story involves domestic turmoil. The story is set in the fictional town of Lake Belle Reve, Mississippi and centers on the deaths in 1957 of two brothers and a young girl and the legend that grows out of the tragedy.

Mellencamp characterizes his music for the production as "down-home," with the earthiness and feeling of the acoustic folk-country blues of the 1930s.

Ryan D'Agostino of Esquire Magazine stated in a review of a New York rehearsal of Ghost Brothers of Darkland County in the fall of 2007, "Musicals aren't usually a guy thing. This one, though, is not only tolerable, it's good. It may be the first-ever musical written by men for men. There's no orchestra, just two twangy acoustic guitars, an accordion, and a fiddle. The songs are both haunting and all-American."

Movie career

Mellencamp has made several forays into acting over the years, appearing in four films: Falling from Grace (which he also directed) (1992), Madison (2001, narration only), After Image (2001), and Lone Star State of Mind (2002). John's older brother, Joe Mellencamp, appears in Falling from Grace as the bandleader during the country club scene.

In 1980, Mellencamp turned down the lead role in the movie The Idolmaker because, as he told the Toledo Blade in 1983, "I was afraid that if I made too much money, I'd have no motivation to make records anymore."

Roger Ebert called Falling from Grace "one of the best films of the year" in 1992.

In April 2007, Mellencamp was a "guest critic" on At the Movies, filling in for Ebert.

Personal life

Mellencamp lives in Bloomington, Indiana and has been married to former supermodel Elaine Irwin Mellencamp since September 5, 1992. Mellencamp has five children from his three marriages: Michelle from his first marriage to Priscilla Esterline (1970–81); daughters Teddi Jo and Justice from his second marriage to Victoria Granucci (1981–89); and sons Hud and Speck from his current marriage.

In 2000, he gave the Indiana University commencement address, in which he advised graduates to "play it like you feel it!" and that "you'll be all right." Following the delivery of his address, Indiana University bestowed upon him an honorary doctorate of Musical Arts.

Politics and activism

Mellencamp has written numerous political songs throughout his career. Most of these songs take a liberal viewpoint.

Mellencamp was very critical of Ronald Reagan through his music in the 1980s and wrote numerous songs about him, including "Country Gentleman," where he sang: "He ain't-a gonna help no poor man/He ain't-a gonna help no children/He aint-a gonna help no women/He's just gonna help his rich friends" ^[7]

In a 1987 TV interview, Mellencamp said "The biggest joke for me was when they cleaned the Statue of Liberty off and all these people who were getting screwed by these corporations were going, 'Yeah, man. Great.' I was embarrassed by all that. I wouldn't watch that, I wouldn't go to it, I'd be no party to that kind of stuff. That's how manipulated we are... I can live without the landmark. Get the starving people and the mentally ill people who need help off the streets of New York. You wanna do something with that money? Get those people off the streets. Don't spend millions of dollars to clean the Statue of Liberty. Who gives a shit? I don't care if it falls down. It don't mean anything to me. What means something to me is trying to help these people."

In 2003, Mellencamp became one of the first entertainers to speak out against the Iraqi War when he released the song "To Washington," which was also critical of the 2000 U.S. Presidential elections. "When the song first came out I was in the car one day and we were driving to the airport and I had my kids with me and a radio station was playing 'To Washington' and having callers call in," Mellencamp said. "Some guy comes on and says, 'I don't know who I hate the most, John Mellencamp or Osama bin Laden.'" ^[8]

Mellencamp also did an interview on the Fox News Channel in 2003 and had this to say about the experience: "So I go in there and they ask me a few questions about the record. Then all of a sudden the guy says to me, 'You wrote a song that took some potshots at the President.' I said, 'Whoa, motherfucker! I didn't take any potshots at anybody, that's not my style. I'm not yelling from the back of the crowd or giving somebody the finger. That's not what I do... I wrote a song and got the lyrics out of any newspaper in the country.' He said, 'Well, you saw what happened to the Dixie Chicks.' I said, 'Listen, people have died in World War I, World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam, and a bunch of little wars in between so that people will have the freedom to speak out, and then the administration gets on the news and says there's a price for freedom. Yeah, and these dead guys have already paid for it."

In an "Open Letter to America" on his website, Mellencamp stated: "The Governor of California was removed from office based on finance troubles. And yet George W. Bush has lied to us, failed to keep our own borders secure, entered a war under false pretense, endangered lives, and created financial chaos. How is it that he hasn't been recalled? Perhaps this time we could even have a real election... but that wouldn't fit the Bush administration's "take what you want and fire people later" policy. Take an election; take an oil field; take advantage of your own people – a game of political Three-Card Monte."^[9]

On his 2007 album Freedom's Road, Mellencamp included a hidden track called "Rodeo Clown," which was a direct reference to George W. Bush ("The bloody red eyes of the rodeo clown").

In April 2007, Mellencamp performed for the wounded troops at the Walter Reed Medical Center. His original intent was to duet on the Freedom's Road track "Jim Crow" with singer and activist Joan Baez. However, Army officials barred Baez from performing. He told Rolling Stone magazine: "They didn’t give me a reason why she couldn’t come. We asked why and they said, ‘She can’t fit here, period.’ Joan Baez is a 66 year-old woman and the sweetest gal in the world." ^[10]

According to a February 8, 2008, Associated Press report, Mellencamp's camp suggested that the campaign for presidential candidate Sen. John McCain stop using his songs, including "Our Country" and "Pink Houses", during their campaign events. McCain's campaign responded by pulling the songs from their playlist. Mellencamp's publicist, Bob Merlis, noted to the Associated Press that "if (McCain is) such a true conservative, why (is he) playing songs that have a very populist pro-labor message written by a guy who would find no argument if you characterized him as an ardent leftist?"

Mellencamp performed "Small Town" at a Barack Obama rally in Evansville, Indiana on April 22, the night of the 2008 Pennsylvania primary.

Mellencamp also performed "Our Country" at a rally for Hillary Clinton in Indianapolis, Indiana, on May 3, 2008, although he never came out in support of either Obama or Clinton during the primaries. "Neither candidate is as liberal as he would prefer, but he's happy to contribute what he can," Merlis said.

On Sunday, January 18, 2009, Mellencamp performed "Pink Houses" at the Obama inaugural celebration at the Lincoln Memorial.

Honors and awards

Mellencamp has won one Grammy Award (Best Male Rock Performer for "Hurts So Good" in 1982) and been nominated for 12 others. He has also been bestowed with the Nordoff-Robbins Silver Clef Special Music Industry Humanitarian Award (1991), the Billboard Century Award (2001), the Woody Guthrie Award (2003), and the ASCAP Foundation Champion Award (2007). On October 6, 2008, Mellencamp won the prestigious Classic Songwriter Award at the 2008 Q Awards in London, England. Mellencamp was nominated for induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2009 and 2010 but was not elected either time. In September 2010, Mellencamp will receive the Americana Lifetime Achievement Award in Nashville.

Mellencamp's biggest honor came when he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's Class of 2008. The induction ceremony took place in New York City on March 10, 2008, and Mellencamp was inducted by good friend Billy Joel, who asked Mellencamp to induct him into the Rock Hall back in 1999 (Mellencamp had to opt out because of another commitment, so Ray Charles inducted Joel). During his induction speech for Mellencamp, Joel said:

Discography

See also

• Best selling music artists
• List of artists who reached number one on the U.S. Mainstream Rock chart
• Bruce Robb (producer)

Footnotes

External links

• Mellencamp.com Official Website
• 2007 Vanity Fair Feature