And it doesn't matter if they hear it on a jukebox, in the local gin mill, or in a goddamn truck commercial because they ain't gonna hear it on the radio any more. Dane Clark filed for unemployment benefits last week, a career first for the Indiana musician who's played drums in John Mellencamp's band since 1996. Mellencamp released Easy Targetthe first single from Sad Clowns & Hillbillies and a "reflection on the state of our country" on January 19, 2017, which was the eve of the 2017 Presidential Inauguration. Mike Wanchic Mike Wanchic, John's long time guitarist, recently completed production on singer/songwriter Stoll Vaughan's latest album The Conversation. It was singularly the most important concert I've ever been to in my life because it showed me the way.[63][64]. John Cougar. Mellencamp and Green had a falling out in the early 2000s, and Green ultimately moved from Bloomington, Indiana to Taos, New Mexico in 2001. I wish I would've been able to enjoy it, but I was too busy slugging. In addition to the score, Mellencamp wrote two original songs for Ithaca: "Sugar Hill Mountain" (sung by Carlene Carter) and "Seeing You Around" (sung by Leon Redbone). 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". On August 13, 2007, Mellencamp began recording his 18th album of original material, titled Life, Death, Love and Freedom. "[82][bettersourceneeded], Mellencamp supported Michael Bloomberg in his 2020 presidential campaign by taping a Bloomberg 2020 campaign ad that featured Mellencamp singing "Small Town". In May 2000, he gave the Indiana University commencement address, in which he advised graduates to "play it like you feel it!" In 1988, Rolling Stone magazine called this version of Mellencamp's band "one of the most powerful and versatile live bands ever assembled." 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. The worst thing was that I could have gone on making records like that for hundreds of years. Growing up in southern Indianawith which he is strongly identifiedMellencamp began playing in rock bands . Known over the course of his successful four-decade music career for his acutely observed songs about the American landscape and its cast of characters, Mellencamp has been equally productive as a painter mining similar terrain. Also Known As. A third single, "Hand to Hold on To", made it to No. When we walked out onstage, there wasn't a band on Earth to touch us. He returned to the concert stage in early 1995 by playing a series of dates in small Midwestern clubs under the pseudonym Pearl Doggy. When the band formed in Los Angeles in 1977, Jeff Porcaro, the eldest of three brothers, was the drummer and de facto leader; Steve, the youngest, played keyboards. A national treasure, he's also one of the truly great music creators that can make us care, move, clap and sing along. [52] Mellencamp will launch a 76-date tour in 2023 called "Live and in Person" that will begin February 5 in Bloomington, Indiana and end on June 24 in South Bend, Indiana. His original intent was to duet on the Freedom's Road track Jim Crow" with singer and activist Joan Baez. Mellencamp has won one Grammy Award (Best Male Rock Performer for "Hurts So Good" in 1983) and been nominated for 12 others. 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. You know it, and I know it. Mellencamp's band provided the backing on both tracks and performed all the music that is in the movie. Our band features a Grammy award winner to those that have toured with some of the biggest names in the industry. Prior to the 198586 Scarecrow Tour, during which he covered some of the 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. Maybe one of the reasons John Gunnell (a.k.a. The albums second single, "Chasing Rainbows", was released on December 10, 2021. Only in America, and I mean only, in America, can 21 people be murdered and a week later be buried and forgotten, with a flimsy little thumbnail, a vague notion of some sort of gun control law laying on the senators' desks. He was born with spina bifida, for which he had corrective surgery as an infant. "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. [94], In September 2015, Mellencamp reportedly started dating former supermodel Christie Brinkley. . "I started messing around with oil paints when I was about ten but, you know, without instruction," he remembers. That's when I was believe it or not, I used to not be as ugly as I am now. ", Nationally known art writer Lilly Wei, who interviewed Mellencamp for Studio International, also wrote a brief essay, in which she points out, "Mellencamp is a writer and often uses words in his paintings, from the graffiti scribbled across earlier work inspired by what he saw in the streets and Jean-Michel Basquiat to his present versions of text painting, a genre that is increasingly commonplace in works by artists such as Lawrence Weiner, Richard Prince, Glenn Ligon and Christopher Wool. Mellencamp embarked on the Cuttin' Heads Tour in the summer of 2001, before the album was even released. Official website of Legendary singer songwriter John Mellencamp. Now, we weren't playing the best songs in the world. The album's first single was "My Sweet Love". [50], During a performance in his hometown of Seymour, Indiana on September 17, 2022 to benefit the Southern Indiana Center for the Arts, Mellencamp revealed the title of the new record to be Orpheus Descending. On September 23, 2008, Mellencamp filmed a concert at the Crump Theatre in Columbus, Indiana for a new A&E Biography series called Homeward Bound. At these dozen shows, which ranged in length from 45 to 60 minutes, Mellencamp covered a number of rock and folk classics and sprinkled in a few of his own songs. [26] Although Mellencamp said that Burnett would serve as the producer of Plain Spoken, Burnett was only credited as the "executive producer" of the album. Rolling Stone contributor Anthony DeCurtis said: Mellencamp has created an important body of work that has earned him both critical regard and an enormous audience. [3] On August 30, 2018, Mellencamp was bestowed with the Woody Guthrie Prize in Tulsa, Oklahoma. "[28], After a star-studded lineup paid tribute to Dylan with cover versions of some of his greatest songs, Dylan closed the evening with a 30-minute speech that included a reference to Mellencamp's 2008 song "Longest Days". [4], Mellencamp attended Vincennes University, a two-year college in Vincennes, Indiana, starting in 1972. "[5], During his college years, Mellencamp played in several local bands, including the glitter-band Trash, which was named for a New York Dolls song, and he later got a job in Seymour installing telephones. The album also contained two protest songs in "L.U.V." But once this latest round of COVID hit I said, Guys, whats the difference this year, next year? He married fashion model Elaine Irwin on September 5, 1992. "[23], In October 2013, Mellencamp revealed that he was working on a new album, and he offered this update on the project to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: "I've had a couple rehearsals with the band, and T Bone [Burnett] and I go in the studio in January. Mellencamp released Freedom's Road, his first album of original material in over five years, on January 23, 2007. One reviewer called the opening gig of the European leg of the tour "maybe the best rock-performance ever in Denmark. New Releases . 28 single in late 1979. 28). His sad clowns, ex-girlfriends, creative heroes, imagined outliers, and hillbilly singers are often endowed with oversize hands and facial features and always with deadpan, proud stares.". We had a very distinct vision of what should be happening here. "It was too labored over, too thought about, and it wasn't organic enough. A video for the song was filmed in Savannah, Georgia on June 9, 2008. And I said, 'Well, I am.' If you listen to the lead Larry [Crane] plays on 'Face of the Nation,' he never would have played that 'cause he didn't really know who the Animals were. In August 2000, Mellencamp played a series of unannounced free concerts in major cities on the East Coast and in the Midwest as a way of giving back to fans who had supported him the previous 24 years. 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." What happened was the girl he fell in love with got sent to Haiti, he went down and met with the devil and bad things happenedYou can read about Orpheus in Greek mythology."[51]. ", Mellencamp has also honed his skills by his own self-education in art history, visiting museums across Europe and America whenever he was on tour and studying a broad spectrum of artists and the mechanics of their work and by looking at signs and billboards out the windows of cars and buses while crisscrossing the country. He brought the No Better Than This tour to Europe in the summer of 2011, opening in Copenhagen on June 24. Following the delivery of his address, Indiana University bestowed upon him an honorary Doctorate of Musical Arts. Mellencamp was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008,[2] followed by an induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2018. 8), "Check It Out" (No. John Mellencamp Community February 10, 2023, 08:08:31 am Welcome, Guest. Id walk in and the guys in the band would look at me and go, Not the same guy talking, so wed just move on to another song. Mellencamp performed solo acoustic renditions of Seeger and Lee Hays' "If I Had a Hammer" and his own "A Ride Back Home.". So that was what I had to do but I thought the name was pretty silly."[9]. [77], In 2003, Mellencamp became one of the first entertainers to speak out against the Iraq War when he released the song "To Washington", which was also critical of the 2000 U.S. Presidential elections. "I've known George since we were in the same Sunday school class. "Do you guys know who Orpheus was? 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. The show featured performers returning to small venues where they performed during the early stages of their careers. In 1985, Mellencamp released Scarecrow, which peaked at No. 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. ), The early 21st century also 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". But we don't have to worry about money or record companies it's our own money we're putting into it, so we said, let's just make something beautiful., Ryan D'Agostino of Esquire 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. And I read the script and I thought, 'Yeah, I get it but I don't want to take my shirt off.' Mellencamp recorded The Kid Inside, the follow-up to Chestnut Street Incident, in 1977, but DeFries eventually decided against releasing the album, and Mellencamp was dropped from MCA records (DeFries finally released The Kid Inside in early 1983, after Mellencamp achieved stardom). [1] She began her career as a violinist for John Mellencamp. Mellencamp's artwork has been the focus of a number of exhibitions. [93] It was reported that Mellencamp and Ryan broke up in the middle of 2014 after dating for over three years. 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. Mellencamp's publicist, Bob Merlis, noted to the Associated Press: 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? People are worried. Active. If it's not fun, I'm not going to do it. That's rock 'n' roll at its very core. 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. 14), and "Rooty Toot Toot" (No. A CD/DVD deluxe edition, featuring the dialog, soundtrack, handwritten lyrics and a mini-documentary about the making of the musical, was released on June 4, 2013. [68], Mellencamp was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's Class of 2008. 88: 'Ghost Brothers of Darkland County', a Musical for Men", "Stephen King and John Mellencamp Will Redevelop GHOST BROTHERS OF DARKLAND COUNTY for Licensing", "An Open Letter to America: It's Time to Take Back Our Country", "Mellencamp Music for McCain? "Some guy comes on and says, 'I don't know who I hate the most, John Mellencamp or Osama bin Laden.'"[78]. He's played with the likes of John Mellencamp, Paul McCartney, Sting, Bon Jovi, Elton John, The Smashing Pumpkins, MeatloafThe list goes . A former keyboardist. "I was up to 80 cigarettes a day," Mellencamp told the Boston Herald in September 1996 about the habits that led to his heart malfunction two years beforehand. "[10], Scarecrow was the first album Mellencamp recorded at his own recording studio, jokingly dubbed "Belmont Mall", located in Belmont, Indiana and built in 1984. John Mellencamp's former keyboardist Eric Franklin Rosser pleads guilty after being named the first-ever child pornography suspect placed on the FBI's Most Wanted list. I mean, we were really good. "[24] A short time later, Mellencamp told Rolling Stone: "I've got a notebook with 85 new songs that I've written for my next record. The documentary is narrated by Academy Award winning actor Matthew McConaughey, who is an avowed Mellencamp fan.[46]. I can tell you theres a couple good songs already that I thought, Wow, did I write that fuckin song? The soundtrack includes Rosanne Cash, Sheryl Crow, Elvis Costello, Taj Mahal, Ryan Bingham, Will Dailey and Neko Case among others singing the songs Mellencamp wrote. Theres no difference. So next year, hopefully, well be on top of (the pandemic) and itll feel alright to go out. [49]. Explore John Mellencamp's discography including top tracks, albums, and reviews. It was just a terrible lifestyle. 19. 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.[11]. I want to write my songs, do some little shows. October 7, 1951 in Seymour, IN. Writing and recording great songs that millions of people like and buy is not part of that sentimental pictureregardless of how comfortably the music itself sits within the genres parameters.". Which is correct? [88][89] He donated $1.5 million to the school to build an indoor athletics training facility, which was named John Mellencamp Pavilion. Germano played with Mellencamp from 1985-1993 before leaving in 1994 to pursue a solo career. John Cougar Mellencamp . [41], In two separate 2018 television interviews, Mellencamp teased a musical he is working on based on his 1982 No. [27], Outside of the Plain Spoken Tour, Mellencamp's most noteworthy live performance in 2015 came on February 6, when he paid tribute to Bob Dylan at the annual MusiCares Person of the Year event by performing a piano-and-vocal rendition of "Highway 61 Revisited" (the piano was played by Troye Kinnett from Mellencamp's band). Although Mellencamp had always been outspoken and adamant about not selling any of his songs to corporations to use in commercials, he changed his stance and let Chevrolet use "Our Country" in Chevy Silverado TV commercials that began airing in late September 2006. Joan Baez is a 66-year-old woman and the sweetest gal in the world.[80]. I write a lot of sad songs, so it's like Sad Clowns & Hillbilliesthat's where it came from. [21], On July 8, 2014, Mellencamp released a new live album called Performs Trouble No More Live at Town Hall without any advance notice. Trouble No More was released in 2003, dedicated to Mellencamp's friend Timothy White, and spent several weeks at No. 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). Right now, Elvis Costello, Meg Ryan, Kris Kristofferson and Matthew McConaughey are doing table readings like an old radio play. On December 30, 2010, Mellencamp announced that he and Irwin had separated after 18 years of marriage. Home Help Search Login Register John Mellencamp Community > MELLENCAMP DISCUSSION > The Band > Current Members Of John's Band? The Farm Aid concerts remain an annual event and have raised over $60million for struggling family farmers as of 2022[update]. Within the context of what was still undeniably the sound of a rock & roll band, he began incorporating instruments more characteristic of folk and roots musicdulcimer, mandolin, fiddle, accordion, dobro, penny whistle, among them. He intended for Freedom's Road to have a 1960s rock sound while still remaining contemporary, and he feels that goal was achieved. 1970s - 2020s. 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