| 11.15.08 | Caversham | WA, AU |
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Life, Death, Love and Freedom Reviews
Earlier this year, John McCain used John Mellencamp's hits "Our Country" and "Pink Houses" during stump speeches, until the Democratic singer asked him to stop. It's unlikely that the Republican candidate would find anything useful for his campaign on Life, Death, Love and Freedom. Mellencamp teamed up with producer T Bone Burnett to create a whole new sound — a set of textured, atmospheric folk and country blues that adds up to one of the most compelling albums of Mellencamp's career. There's not a bright, catchy riff or fist-pumping populist anthem to be found among these brooding, low-key songs about growing old, sick, lonely and pessimistic.
Burnett brings a fuzzy moodiness to the gospel hymn "If I Die Sudden" and the Springsteen-like "Don't Need This Body," both underpinned by distorted guitars and reverb-heavy leads. Politically motivated songs like "Jena," about the racially charged Jena 6 trial in Louisiana, and "Young Without Lovers," a more general plea for tolerance, sometimes strain to deliver a Big Message, with lines like "Let the people have the right to be different." But Mellencamp excels at the simple tunes: the twangy "My Sweet Love," kick-started by a big Bo Diddley beat and sweetened with female harmonies, and "A Ride Back Home," his desperate plea to Jesus over spare, ragged guitars. Life's dark undertones may not make for easy listening, but Mellencamp's raspy drawl has only gotten more soulful with age.
New York Times
John Mellencamp, 56, is feeling his age and then some on “Life Death Love and Freedom.” It’s an album presented like a deathbed testament: bleak, solitary, bluesy and unbowed. In “Don’t Need This Body” Mr. Mellencamp sings, “All I got left is a headful of memories/And a thought of my upcoming death,” and that just about sums up the album.
Everywhere he looks he sees shattered expectations and looming sorrow, both in his own future and in the wider world. And where, in decades past, he would shrug off any odds against him and come up grinning, now he strives for simple perseverance. It’s a brave album in the way it sets aside all his old consolations.
His voice is gruff and weary, with a craggy matter-of-factness replacing his old swagger. The album was produced by T Bone Burnett, and it shares the rootsy, spooked tone of Mr. Burnett’s 2007 production “Raising Sand” by Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. This album’s most upbeat track, “My Sweet Love,” is rockabilly heard from afar, a love song with a queasy undertow: “It sure would feel good to feel good again,” Mr. Mellencamp sings.
In the new songs he trades his familiar brawny rock for sparser settings, like the bluesy riff and echoes of “If I Die Sudden” and the Celtic-Appalachian modality of “Young Without Lovers.” Mr. Burnett disassembles Mr. Mellencamp’s usual sound, placing his own down-home guitar within the band and, for nearly half the album, devising arrangements without drums. Mr. Mellencamp can still come up with blunt, righteous choruses — like those in “Jena,” a song about racial confrontation in a Louisiana town — but on this CD he underplays them, as if he’s all too aware of every limitation.
Mr. Mellencamp’s tour is due Thursday at the Jones Beach Theater in Wantagh, N.Y., and Friday at the PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel, N.J. JON PARELES
New York Daily News - John Mellencamp isn't afraid to face death
By Jim Farber - Friday, July 11th 2008, 4:00 AM
John Mellencamp isn't afraid to face death in his bold and bluesy new CD.
John Mellencamp has mortality on his mind of late. He may have titled his new CD, "Life, Death, Love and Freedom," but it's the second word that gets the most emphasis, and draws the most alarm.
"Just put me in a pine box/six feet underground," Mellencamp brays in "If I Die Sudden." "Don't be callin' no minister/I don't need one around."
In "Don't Need This Body," he talks flagrantly about his "upcoming death," and proclaims "this getting older ain't for cowards," while in the album's first track, he sings "Life is short/even in its longest days."
It's not exactly bouncy summer concert fare. But that hasn't stopped Mellencamp from featuring a clutch of these tough-minded new songs on his current, otherwise hit-driven tour, which parks at the PNC Bank Arts Center tonight.
"I'm not so sure that one should personalize this album," Mellencamp wrote to the News in an e-mail. "But definitely at age 56, the youthful bravado that one once carried has been replaced by a more mature understanding or lack of understanding of one's life."
Besides, it's not like Mellencamp hasn't come close to this road before. In 2003, he put out a rattling blues CD, "Trouble No More," that had the backwoods yowl and morbid truth of the form's earliest expressions. The disk didn't sell, but it scored high creatively. Mellencamp inched back toward the mainstream with his follow-up CD, "Freedom Road," even going to the extreme of selling one song ("Our Country") to a car commercial, which earned howls of outrage from some.
As if in reaction, the new CD (out Tuesday) swings back to the blues, but this time in an even more bold and personal way. Where "Trouble No More" found the heartland rocker covering the likes of Willie Dixon and Robert Johnson, "Life, Death ..." features wholly original takes on blues and folk. It boasts the ideal producer for the task: T-Bone Burnett, the premier roots dial-twister of our time. He has overseen everything from the "O Brother" soundtrack to the recent hit collaboration between Robert Plant and Alison Krauss.
For Mellencamp's CD, Burnett helped craft a raw and splintery sound that makes full use of the singer's deepening vocal expression. He made sure the listener can savor every bit of it by releasing the album as a two-disk set, with one part a DVD that has a sound identical to the original master tapes. It's the first music released in this form.
The results straddle the harrowing and the beautiful. The melody of the ballad "Longest Days" may be Mellencamp's most caring, while a song like "If I Die Sudden" revels in his rougher blues rasp.
The CD isn't entirely devoted to dirges. Several peaks of hope poke through. But its power comes in its unflinching will to stare into the void - to face fear with both a cower and a sneer.
Billboard Magazine: Life, Death, Love and Freedom Review
Searching for a ray of lyrical light in John Mellencamp's latest treatise on the state of the world proves consuming—but largely fruitless. That, however, makes the album all the more compelling. Its unrelentingly bleak landscape, populated by plain-spoken narrators and richly detailed characters and settings, leans more on the death part of the title equation, with pointed side trips into the political climate ("Young Without Lovers," "Troubled Land," "Without a Shot" and the particularly specific "Jena") and philosophical essays like "John Cockers" and "For the Children," in which Mellencamp seems to question his own capacity for the continuing struggle. T Bone Burnett's austere and atmospheric production brings a fresh kind of texture to the performance aspects of Mellencamp's songs, and his bonus DVD mix in the new HD CODE format lives up to its promise for richer and more articulated sound quality.—Gary Graff
St. Petersburg Times - A-
By Sean Daly, Times Pop Music Critic
In print: Sunday, July 27, 2008
Album: Life Death Love and Freedom (Hear)
In stores: Now
Why we care: Much like the mystic juju he conjured up for Robert Plant and Alison Krauss' Raising Sand, voodoo priest/super-producer T Bone Burnett slathers Mellencamp's new album in the same Southern Gothic swamp stank.
Why we like it: The 14-tracker grooves with resonator geetars, rattling bones and things that go bump in the subconscious. Mellencamp sings about kids getting stabbed at county fairs, politicians spiking the Kool-Aid, old men praying for death. But Burnett often saves John from himself, summoning a dead man's party to go with the so-serious words.
Reminds us of: Jack and Diane as groom and corpse bride.
Download this: My Sweet Love
Grade: A-
Virginian-Pilot/Hampton Roads - Go Get It Now
John Mellencamp delivers a message that many probably don't want to hear, but he's been doing that his entire 30-plus-year career.
The messages in this 14-track disc are often simple, mixed with the perfectly suited music that anchors them, from "life is short, even in its longest days" to "why do so many suffer; oppressed to the end of time; why does freedom move so slowly, unable to speak its mind." Acoustic melodies, mixed with beautiful harmonies with Karen Fairchild, are shown on songs such as "My Sweet Love."
For those who have loved Mellencamp since he was singing about needing a lover who didn't drive him crazy, his latest compilation should touch any generation. Sure, the Indiana rocker mixes words of pessimism, like being stabbed to death in "County Fair" by someone who "I can't remember who he was," but he also offers hope with his raspy, lingering voice in "A Brand New Song."
Thanks for these new songs, John. They'll resonate for a long time.
- Toni Guagenti, The Pilot
Rating: Go get it now
Tracks to download: "Longest Days," "My Sweet Love," "Don't Need This Body"
Blurt Magazine - 8 out of 10 Stars
by Jake Cline
An album titled Life Death Love and Freedom should be approached with much trepidation, doubly so if said album is by John Mellencamp, who gave up singing little ditties about young, Heartland lovers in favor of large, flag-waving jingles about Chevy trucks. So it’s no great surprise to discover how soberly Mellencamp tackles the big issues raised in the album’s title. (Presumably, he thought Life Death Love Freedom and Taxes would be pushing it.) It is, however, something of a mild shock to find how good this album actually is.
Produced by the ubiquitous T Bone Burnett, the disc is decidedly low-key, with understated guitars and organs complementing the singer’s morbid, reflective lyrics. “Life is short even in its longest days,” Mellencamp intones, and he ain’t kidding. When he’s not staring down the Reaper, Mellencamp proves he’s still a man of the people, as on the topical “Jena” and the jaded but rewarding “My Sweet Love.”
Standout Tracks: “My Sweet Love,” “If I Die Sudden”
Life, Death, Love and Freedom Documentary
The Associated Press Music Review: John Mellencamp's dark new CD
By MICHAEL McCALL, For The Associated Press Mon Jul 14, 4:42 PM ET
Induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame apparently incited John Mellencamp to obsess on mortality. He responds with "Life, Death, Love and Freedom," the most somber album of his 32-year career, offering bass-heavy, rumbling blues and dark-hued acoustic stomps that explore death, relationships and the dark clouds hovering over such ongoing concerns as liberty, equality and peaceful coexistence.
Working for the first time with veteran producer T Bone Burnett, Mellencamp moves away from the anthemic roots-rock and Midwestern soul music he's built his reputation on. Burnett envelops him in the same misty, reverberating twang used so well on Robert Plant and Alison Krauss' "Raising Sand." But Mellencamp uses that sound for an album of midnight ramblings that are less playful and more ominous.
The core songs address death directly: "Sometimes you get sick, and you don't get better," he sings in the opening "Longest Days." "If I Die Sudden" features lyrics as blunt as its title, while "A Ride Back Home" asks Jesus to deliver him once he's gone. Another song, "Don't Need This Body," starts with "This getting older ain't for cowards," then bemoans that he and his friends won't be around much longer.
Not everything is so bleak: "A Brand New Song" acknowledges life's difficulties while saying we all must work to find he best in ourselves and others, while "For The Children" is a prayer for a future of less suffering and more humanity — after he's gone, of course.
CHECK THIS OUT: "My Sweet Love," the album's one true upbeat tune, is a paean to the enduring spirit and connection to his wife, photographer and model Elaine Mellencamp, set to a Buddy Holly beat and sung as a duet with Karen Fairchild of Little Big Town.
Orlando Sentinel - 5 out of 5 Stars
Jim Abbott | Sentinel Music Critic - July 13, 2008
John Mellencamp is a new member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but the singer-songwriter has always possessed a depth that goes beyond rock clichés.
At its core, Life Death Love and Freedom isn't a rock album, no matter how much the frisky "My Sweet Love" shimmies with Buddy Holly style. There's an understated intensity in T Bone Burnett's production that's reminiscent of Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska in the solitary "Longest Days."
At other points, Mellencamp enlists evocative percussion and an assortment of musical toys -- melodica, resonator guitars, accordion -- to add flesh to the album's acoustic structure. As a vocalist, his tenor has aged into a weathered, expressive instrument that wraps itself around plaintive ballads such as "Young Without Lovers" and "John Cockers" like a modern-day bluesman.
On the pseudo-spiritual "Don't Need This Body," Mellencamp sounds as if he's channeling Woody Guthrie, if the folk icon had been accompanied by a haunting distorted guitar. The song doesn't rock, but it's one for the ages.
USA Today 3.5 out of 5 Stars
* * * 1/2 -- Life in the serious lane
Despite the expansive title, there’s no room for Jack and Diane, barn-burning dance tunes or Zippo-raising heartland anthems on this dead-serious Life force, one of Mellencamp’s finest efforts to date. Produced by T Bone Burnett, who helped develop its high-definition CODE audio technology, the album winds down a dark, rootsy path of folk, country and haunting blues borrowed from Robert Johnson. In a twangy rasp, Mellencamp reflects with pessimism and regret, but he’s full of fire and purpose, whether offering scrappy prayer A Ride Back Home, brooding hymn If I Die Sudden or the politically charged Jena, based on racial friction sparked by a noose draped from a tree in Louisiana. This time, Mellencamp’s pink houses come with foreclosure signs. — Edna Gundersen
Boston Globe - In a serious state of mind
July 15, 2008
ESSENTIAL "A Ride Back Home"
Fresh from induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the plainspoken poet of the heartland continues to prove why he deserves that honor. Whether it's an impeccable turn of phrase or mesmerizing melody, Mellencamp finds plenty of inspiration on this glorious and haunting effort, produced with typically idiosyncratic skill by T Bone Burnett.
Eschewing any concept of "radio ready" and singing with a gruff immediacy, Mellencamp tackles all of the titular concepts on this folk- and blues-based material with a sense of liberation that is keenly palpable. Death, especially, is a popular topic. Mellencamp, 56, approaches it with calm contemplation on the meditative "Longest Days." He prepares for it with curmudgeonly attitude and gratitude on the dark, rumbling "If I Die Sudden" and even longs for it on "A Ride Back Home," in which Jesus serves as kind of a bouncer and celestial taxi service to the pearly gates.
Mostly written in two weeks and recorded in about the same amount of time, these vivid stories tell of people in various stages of living and dying who have learned a thing or two worth passing on. The album also comes with a DVD version, the first release in a new high-quality audio format called CODE, created by Burnett and a team of engineers. It indeed sounds warmer and more present than its CD counterpart. [Sarah Rodman]
Time Magazine Album Review: Life, Death, Love and Freedom
John Mellencamp Life, Death, Love and Freedom; out July 15 Whereas once his indignation was trained on factory bosses, now it's Mellencamp's own broken-down self that's got him pissed. Producer T Bone Burnett creates delicate acoustics and puts the singer's disappointment ("Well I used to have some values") center stage. It will not brighten your day, but it's his best in a decade. A-
The Buffalo News - Mellencamp's America
By Jeff Miers / NEWS POP MUSIC CRITIC
It’s one of rock’s great ironies that John Mellencamp is known largely as a purveyor of populist anthems in the vein of “Pink Houses,” “Small Town” and the like. Throughout a quarter-century career that hit an early peak with 1985’s “The Lonesome Jubilee” and has stayed remarkably consistent ever since, the former Johnny Cougar’s best work has always been in the dark, American gothic idiom, despite the “everyman” ethos his biggest hits have suggested.
“Life Death Love and Freedom,” out today is Mellencamp’s first record for the forward-looking Hear Music label. It may indeed be the darkest work among a canon that has sought to examine the dark underbelly of the American Dream.
Mellencamp does excel at conjuring rootsy rock tunes with indelible pop choruses — indeed, they’ve made him the most money of any of his songs and are likely responsible for the maintenance of his still-massive popularity. But when the final tally is taken of the man’s work, the Indiana native will be remembered as a chronicler of existential despair, a folk-based stoic whose best work suggests that life’s treasures are fleeting, and only a form of world-weary-but-stubborn “faith in transcendence” makes life worth living.
That’s a bitter pill to swallow, but Mellencamp ingests it with the same voracious appetite that has made him one of rock’s most loyal chain-smokers this side of Keith Richards. Clearly, he expects his audience to do the same. “Life Death Love and Freedom” finds him dishing out knotty complexities by the plateful. It’s easily his strongest album, from a lyrical standpoint at least, since the unjustly overlooked masterpiece “Human Wheels,” released in 1993.
From the point of conception onward, there was no way this disc could lose. Overseen by the estimable hands and ears of T Bone Burnett — on a hot streak following the wonderful Robert Plant/Alison Krauss project “Raising Sand” — the record’s sonic textures masterfully mirror its philosophical concerns. These, as the album’s title suggests, aren’t exactly centered on the standard rock tropes, i. e., girls and good times, etc.
Not since Bruce Springsteen’s “Nebraska,” in fact, has an American folk-based rock record offered such a bleak metaphysics.
Springsteen reacted to the onset of the Reagan era by retreating to his New Jersey bedroom and sketching character studies around remorse, poverty, murder, despair, and the bankrupt state of the American Dream. Mellencamp reacts to the tenure of Bush and Co. in an equally visceral nature, digging into the rich tradition of the Southern gothic school, where he excavates a world view in which hopelessness reigns as king, and man is beset by ill-intended forces from both without and within.
The album commences with stark acoustic guitars and a naked Mellencamp vocal intoning a front-porch folk ballad, one recalling his fondness for the Book of Ecclesiastes — which, interestingly, he quoted in the sleeve notes for “The Lonesome Jubilee” 23 years ago. That poetic tradition suggests that human life is a flawed concept — marked by equal portions of joy and tragedy, and over too soon, to boot. (“Nothing lasts forever/And your best efforts don’t always pay/Sometimes you get sick and you don’t get well/That’s when life is short, even in its longest days.”)
The sun never quite peeks through the clouds from there on out.
“If I Die Sudden” is a winning rewrite of the old blues piece “In My Time of Dying,” which Mellencamp covered previously. In it, the narrator insists that no one make a fuss when he kicks the bucket, as “this life’s been right to me/I got a whole bunch more than I deserve.”
“Troubled Land” is a portrait of contemporary America, but unlike Mellencamp’s most recent hit, “Our Country,” it doesn’t beg to be misunderstood as a flag-waver. “Beware of those who want to harm you/and drag you down to a lower game,” the singer warns, but the suggestion that “the truth is coming to bring peace to this troubled land” sounds less like an optimistic platitude than a disgusted clinging-to-belief.
Other songs — “John Cockers” and “A Ride Back Home” — are bleak, but Mellencamp seems to take perverse pleasure in delivering it. One can hear him smiling as he delivers the news, like some weatherbeaten town crier whose only pleasure comes from being able to offer the final “I told you so” to a populace he simultaneously despises and loves. As a half-Irish Romantic type, I laugh along with him, but it’s doubtful the average Mellencamp fan clamoring for “R. O. C. K. in the U. S. A.” will find the humor in this, black as it is.
Musically, “LDL&F” is much more dynamic than one might expect from what has been billed as an acoustic record. It never devolves into the state of torpor that so many low-key affairs centered on tragedy find themselves succumbing to. That has much to do with the way Burnett has chosen to subtly, but colorfully, adorn Mellencamp’s songs with rich, ambient guitars (including the contributions of Mellencamp band members Andy York and Mike Wanchic), warm upright bass, tasteful vocal harmonies and the like. In this world, the Buddy Holly-inspired rocker “My Sweet Love” sounds positively celebratory, even though its lyric is concerned with the ambivalence of enduring romantic entanglement.
“Life Death Love and Freedom” is not likely to win Mellencamp any new fans, so demanding is its presentation, and so unflinchingly despondent is its world view. It is, however, exactly the sort of record Mellencamp should be releasing today, one that consistently plays to his strengths as writer and singer. Like his past masterpieces, its honesty and lack of artifice feel cathartic. This is Mellencamp at his best.
Performing Songwriter Magazine - Featured Review July-August 2008
One of America’s original journeyman rockers—a distinction shared with Springsteen, Fogerty and Seger—John Mellencamp begins his affiliation with superstar-laden Hear Music by pulling up roots and returning to the heartland. Of course, Mellencamp’s Everyman attitude has generally reflected homespun values, from the compelling refrain of “Pink Houses” lamenting suburban sprawl to the populist appeal of “R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A.” and the sepia-tinged nostalgia cushioning “Jack and Diane.” But while albums like Scarecrow and The Lonesome Jubilee have found him traversing equally rustic terrain, the lack of commercial concern is especially apparent here.
Consequently, this set of revisionist folk songs is so immersed in authenticity, it could have been spawned in the Mississippi Delta or ripped from Woody Guthrie’s songbook. With the venerable T Bone Burnett behind the boards, the parched, stripped-down settings befit these weathered tales, even as Mellencamp’s coarse vocals echo the weariness and woes the album’s sweeping title implies. The turgid rumination imbued in “Longest Days,” “Young Without Lovers,” “Without a Shot” and “Country Fair” may surprise, and indeed, there’s little evidence of Mellencamp’s radio-ready past … the soulful sway of “Mean” and “Troubled Land” notwithstanding.
A bonus high-definition DVD offers enhanced sound, but ultimately, it’s the unlikely mesh of intimacy and insurgency that affirms Mellencamp’s status as an American original. —LZ
FOR FANS OF:
Bruce Springsteen – Devils and Dust
Bob Dylan – Time Out of Mind
Steve Earle – The Mountain
People Magazine Critic's Choice - 7/12/08
3 1/2 out of 4 stars By Chuck Arnold
Having been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year, John Mellencamp could certainly be forgiven for coasting a bit on the memory of Jack and Diane. Instead, the heartland rocker has released one of his best discs in years. On the stark, stirring meditation on Life, Death, Love, and Freedom, Mellencamp pairs up with Grammy winner producer T Bone Burnett (“Oh Brother Where Art Thou”) who brings a rootsy realness to the music and digs out some of the grittiest vocals ever from the singer. Meanwhile, Karen Fairchild of the country group Little Big Town provides vocals on four songs including first single “My Sweet Love”, a little ditty about down home romance. DOWNLOAD THIS: "Longest Days," a spare, Springsteen-esque ballad.
Welcome to Mellencamp.comLife, Death, Love and Freedom:
John Mellencamp's new album, Life, Death, Love and Freedom, produced by T Bone Burnett, is in stores NOW!
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Mellencamp Reflects on the Election
A deeply moved John Mellencamp spoke this morning about the election of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States.
“This for me is something I never thought I would see in my life,” said Mellencamp, echoing a feeling common to millions of Americans black and white and all colors in-between—especially those who came of age in the 1960s.
“I remember the assassination of Martin Luther King and the marches in Selma, Alabama, and seeing Rosa Parks, demonstrators getting sprayed by fire hoses and attacked by police dogs and all the other horrible things that happened at that time in our country,” he continued. “Then I played at the 2004 Democratic Convention, which was my first introduction to Barack Obama, and after his keynote address I looked at my wife Elaine and said, ‘Man, what a poet! He could be president of the United States!’ And that’s absolutely verbatim.
“But even I, who have written countless songs about race, could not believe that a man of color could be president of the United States. But today I am so proud of America. I am so happy for all Americans, that we have finally started to fulfill our obligation to the immortal words of our Declaration of Independence, that all men are created equal. We cannot expect this man to immediately change the last eight years of fear and deception, but I think we can rejoice in the fact that there is someone speaking not just for his own interests, now, but hopefully as a voice for us all.”
"Peaceful World" Video (2001)
“Troubled Land” Video is Now on TV and on Web
VH1 has put it in “large rotation,” meaning it will get 14 to 16 plays a week. The GAC (Great American Country) channel will add it shortly, while the competing CMT will put it up on its Web site initially.
Meanwhile, “Troubled Land” continues to garner exposure outside the traditional means of pop radio. Following Mellencamp’s performance of it last week on “Good Morning America” followed by a phone-in radio interview on “The Stephanie Miller Show,” the song will now be heard on the Nov. 11 episode of CBS-TV’s “NCIS” Navy police series.
Mellencamp’s conversation with Miller illustrates not only the significance of “Troubled Land” as social commentary, but also the provocative imagery of its video. Miller, who identified herself as “a huge fan” of Mellencamp, lauded both for pointing out “a whole lot of things about a country in need of repair.” Specifically noting the video’s foreclosure sign and rapidly increasing gas pump pricing, she credited Mellencamp with “really talking about what people are going through.”
Miller also referenced Mellencamp’s statement accompanying Huffington Post’s premiere of the clip, in which he said he recorded “Troubled Land” as a means of “[giving] folks the news like Woody Guthrie used to do with his music.” But she agreed with Huffington Post that the video ended with “a message of hope” in its depiction of a baby crawling across an American flag.
“The video and song are really realistic about what’s going on and how many people are really hurting,” she said, then observed a “rebirth and idealism” symbolized by the baby.
“After World War II America really was a great country—and we seem to keep falling down the ladder,” responded Mellencamp. “It was a great country then and can be a great country again because we have the doctrine to follow and to live by.”
Mellencamp Posts Second Web-Only Video—“Troubled Land”
It seemed only fitting that on the day that a new CBS News/New York Times poll found that a record high 89 percent of Americans—Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike--believe that the country is on the wrong track, John Mellencamp announced a new Web site exclusive solo acoustic video performance “Troubled Land,” the single from his acclaimed album “Life, Death, Love, and Freedom.” And in agreement with the song’s opening lyric “Well there's a pain in my side/But I keep travelin’ on/Bring peace to this troubled land…,” Mellencamp was himself greatly troubled.
From the rustic setting of his home in Bloomington, Indiana, he shared his thoughts on the war, the role of government, and of course, the economy—all topics that are reflected in “Troubled Land”’s dark tone.
“Ten years ago there wasn’t a house in town worth a million dollars—and now there are so many!” Mellencamp said, but not with approval. “Who are these people that can afford them? They can’t afford them. That’s the whole point!”
America’s rampant consumerism, he suggested, breeds such crippling national irresponsibility.
“If it’s a divine right to have a car, everybody would want to have a Porsche,” he postulated. “Nobody would be responsible.”
Hence the necessary evil of government, and by extension, the more recent unnecessary evil of government deregulation.
“Society needs government--that’s why we have laws,” he said. “Do I always want it in my house? Hell, no! But I understand that we’re all human, and according to the Bible, sinners: We tend to let our greed and irresponsibility take advantage of the system. And there’s been nothing in the last few years to prevent us from doing so, in fact, we’ve even been encouraged to be irresponsibly greedy and wasteful! So you really can’t blame people for wanting a million-dollar house or a Porsche, but it’s only helped lead us into the economic mess we’re in now.”
Shifting to the foreign affairs aspect of all that ails “this troubled land,” the avowed pacifist commented on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“We’re in wars that we shouldn’t be in,” he said. “We simply cannot afford, either ethically or economically, to continue to be the police of the world.”
An additional negative associated with the wars, he noted, is the privatization/outsourcing that he feels has been so damaging to American society as a whole. He referred specifically to private security contractors like Blackwater USA, a product of a limited military commitment at the onset that has since proven enormously costly for all sides.
“It’s the same things with privatized prisons in this country—to use one example,” Mellencamp said. “Why are there so many prisons? Because they’re owned by private companies! And they’re filled with petty drug-use people because the companies get a set amount of money per inmate and spend less than they get so the rest is profit—and there’s no incentive to let anybody out..”
The end result is “the ruination of the compassionate country that the United States used to be,” concluded Mellencamp. “But here’s the zinger: In some ways, it’s almost a good thing. Because we’re lacking the roots of what made this country great. You hear it in the music, see it in the movies. And what about the labor of the great American workers? We don’t have that anymore, either, because there’s no work for them to do! So maybe it’s best if we bottom out, to allow our compassion and authenticity to come back. And responsibility.”
He nostalgically recalled the time of his grandparents.
“If you wanted a soda, you had to pay for the soda. You couldn’t charge it or put it on layaway or steal it. If you want a soda you have to pay for the soda! And the Depression gave us Woody Guthrie! Like today, you know, it’s the Pussycat Dolls. But Woody was the real thing. He was authentic.”
The “Troubled Land” video is Mellencamp’s second Web site-only clip, following last month’s acclaimed cover of Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’.”
-jim bessman
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November 18th, 2008 -
Two of England’s top magazines have in-depth interviews of John Mellencamp in
their current issues.Classic Rock caught Mellencamp in England on his birthday “looking good,” according to writer Max Bell, who described him thusly: “Big, dark quaff, leather jerkin, white tee, blue jeans and work boots; he’s a man of the people crossed with Martin Sheen in ‘Badlands’ going a James Dean impersonation.” There’s also a great bit regarding Mellencamp’s continued ambivalence toward the country on account of his lingering disdain for the way his first two managers—both Brits—handled his career roll-out.
Mojo’s Phil Sutcliffe caught him at the time of the Elvis Costello’s forthcoming show’s taping in New York—and covered similar ground. His piece leads: “The restless voice of ornery America, John Mellencamp has spent three decades railing against injustice and conservatism. Now, on the eve of the US election, Mojo finds him contemplating his own mortality on the set of Elvis Costello’s new TV show….”
Both publications should be available at newsstands where import magazines are sold.
November 17th, 2008 -
By Allen Newton Why would any concert promoter want to use a venue other than Sandalford Winery in the Swan Valley?
With the sun going down, an enthusiastic crowd spread across the lawns, a glass of wine in hand and two fabulous performers - Sheryl Crow and John Mellencamp - on stage, it doesn’t get much better.
Mellencamp isn’t one of those performers I would instantly put on my list to go and see, but the veteran hit it off with the crowd in a big way at Sandalford’s Evening On The Green on Sunday night.
Kicking off his first Australian tour in 15 years with two Perth concerts, Mellencamp showed off a delightful range of styles and easily developed a rapport with the sell-out crowd.
It didn’t hurt that his support act came in the form of Sheryl Crow, who had the crowd grooving along to hits such as All I Wanna Do and If It Makes You Happy.
While Crow was singing about “a beer buzz in the morning” the crowd was already in the same spirit with plenty of people on a wine buzz up in front of the stage getting involved.
We were at the concert courtesy of garden company Yates, in fantastic seats just a few rows from the front. The sound for us was superb – and it didn’t seem as if there were too many complaints from the thousands spread out on picnic blankets around the sprawling lawns.
Crow offered her approval of the outdoor venue, saying it was great to turn up “with a cooler and your weed”.
Weed or not, the crowd was well and truly rocking by the time the sun had set and Mellencamp, with his Elvis-like hair and his band, strolled on stage.
“Are you ready?” he asked the crowd as the band launched into Pink Houses. It seems they were.
The bass and drums throbbing through his 1987 hit Paper In Fire had plenty of punch and while the twanging guitar and violin ain’t really my cup of tea My Sweet Love from his new 2008 album Life, Death, Love and Freedom, was well received by the crowd.
Mellencamp was nothing if not versatile, moving easily from the almost country to the entirely acoustic in a set without his band and accompanied only by his own guitar.
At times Mellencamp’s acoustic ballads are reminiscent of Dylan.
And the 57 year-old’s voice with those nice crusty tones certainly suit the music. He may have 21 albums behind him, but Mellencamp is certainly no has-been. He has grown beautifully into his music.
He enchanted the crowd with a story about his 100-year-old grandmother who, when he was about 40, started to pray saying: “Buddy (her nickname for him) and me are ready to come home.”
His grandmother may have been, but not Mellencamp, he was too busy raising Cain – the inspiration for Longest Days, also from the new album, a kind of ode to his grandmother.
From the acoustic set, while Mellencamp headed backstage - presumably for a bourbon and coke - keyboardist Troye Kinnett and violinist Miriam Sturm combined talents on accordion and violin for a little traditional crossover, while the band returned to the stage to move the vibe back into the rock and roll of his 1985 hit Scarecrow.
Then it was the more hard-driving bluesy sound of Six Feet Under, which really gave Mellencamp a chance to stretch his vocal chords.
The crowd didn’t need much encouragement when Mellencamp asked them: “Are you ready to dance?”
“Yes” they roared and up they got to the music of Crumblin’ Down. Mellencamp then revved up for the concert finale with a pumping rendition of R.O.C.K. In The USA and joined by the crowd singing enthusiastically. He then kept the crowd involved by asking them to phone a friend so Mellencamp could tell everybody: “This is John and we’ve got something to tell you” – launching into Jack And Diane.
And so it does for Mellencamp – and long may it continue to do so. This concert was a privilege to attend.
Click HERE to read this article online.
Click HERE to view the online photo gallery.
November 14th, 2008 -
John Mellencamp-Live Death Love And Freedom (Hear Music) B It takes a couple of listens to truly hear this new album from America's last true rock troubadour, John Mellencamp, but it's worth the effort. Mellencamp has long since stopped trying to hit the charts as he used to regularly do with some ease all those years ago. Now he's satisfied singing about growing older, love between two people that really lasts and his views on being a conscious person in his time left on Earth. Without a hint of irony, he relays these tales with a journeyperson's deft touch and his band is right there with him, along with respected album producer T. Bone Burnett. Well worth a listen.
— Jeff Monk
Click HERE to read this article online.
November 12th, 2008 -
John Mellencamp was the featured guest on National Public Radio’s “World Cafe” on Tuesday, Nov. 11th. The nearly half hour visit featured an in-depth interview along with solo acoustic performances by John of "Longest Days," "Small Town," "A Ride Back Home," and "Troubled Land". Click HERE to listen to John's entire visit and performance!“World Cafe” is the premier public radio showcase for contemporary music programming with a broad range of styles including blues, rock, world, folk, and alternative country. It is hosted by long-time Philadelphia radio personality David Dye.
November 11th, 2008 -
Radio Format: Triple AJohn Mellencamp - Troubled Land (3:23)
Producer: T Bone Burnett
Writer: J. Mellencamp
Publisher: not listed
Hear Music
At this point, John Mellencamp has nothin’ to prove. With his induction in to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame earlier this year alongside a Grammy Award and 12 other nods, counting hits is beside the point. Previous single “My Sweet Love,” featuring Karen Fairchild of Little Big Town, from current folk rock album “Life, Death, Love and Freedom,” was a triumph at triple A. Follow-up “Troubled Land” is signature Mellencamp fare-that means a laid-back vocal and smart lyrics: “Stand up and holler, lay down and die/We can turn up our collars and never try/Just know the truth is coming, to bring peace to this troubled land.” Producer T Bone Burnett conjures an organic landscape, fostering ideal fare for all who connect with music beyond the surface. Mellencamp again stakes his claim as that rare intellectual musician whose melodies and messages are equally accessible. – CT
November 11th, 2008 -
Elmore, November/December 2008JOHN MELLENCAMP
Life Death Love and Freedom
(Hear Music)
If you’re musically aware enough to be reading this magazine, then you don’t need an introductory bio on John Mellencamp, but what may come in handy before listening to Mellencamp’s latest release, Life Death Love and Freedom, is an explanation of where he is coming from in releasing such an incredibly deep and personal CD. Mellencamp has always provided beautifully descriptive insights into everyday life and the heart of rural America. Now he is applying that same depth to his personal world, which (especially for those of us not too far behind him in age) can leave you with a foreboding feeling of doom, unless you listen to it carefully enough to hear the glimmers of hope that lie beneath the seemingly relentless tales of misery.
With lyrics like “sometimes you get sick and you don’t get better” from the opener “Longest Days,” it is vividly clear that you won’t find anyone’s wedding song buried in Life Death Love and Freedom. “Troubled Land” finds Mellencamp’s voice rougher than usual as it weaves through the swirling organ and syncopated percussion. Mellencamp’s music is not about individual musicianship but about a central theme, which in this case is mortality as starkly demonstrated in “Don’t Need This Body” and “John Cockers.” “A Ride Back Home” still deals with death but in a slightly less somber tone, while “For the Children” and “A Brand New Song” offer a slight sigh of relief. “My Sweet Love” (which, rumor has it, his wife convinced him to include) is actually, dare I say, upbeat.
Listen to Life Death Love and Freedom as often as need be to cultivate the hope that lies within. It’s worth every bit of effort.
- Steve Walbridge
November 9th, 2008 -
John Mellencamp undertakes his first full-fledged concert tour, outside North America since 1992, this week when he and his band fly to Australia for a month-long stay.His first show is Nov. 15th in Caversham, just outside of Perth and followed by eight shows through Dec. 7th, including stops in Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne in Australia as well as three shows in New Zealand. The tour features visits to large outdoor amphitheaters and indoor arenas.
Australia has played a pivotal role in Mellencamp's career, as "I Need a Lover" became a hit for him Down Under in 1978 --thereby generating much-needed career momentum for him at home in the USA. He has gone on to earn multiple gold and platinum albums in Australia.
The upcoming Aussie shows are Mellencamp's first concerts there since May of 1992.
November 9th, 2008 -
Paul Mendenhall, of Bloomington/Indianapolis' 92.3 WTTS radio, recently sat for an in-depth interview with John Mellencamp, discussing JM's early years, the current state of music, John's art, and all-things Mellencamp. Hear the interview all week (Nov. 10-14) on the WTTS Morning Show. WTTS will air new segments each morning at 7 and 8 AM, then make them available On-Demand.
November 8th, 2008 -
John Mellencamp's appearance on Elvis Costello's Sundance Channel series "Spectacle: Elvis Costello with..." will be aired on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 at 9 PM.Taped at Harlem's famed Apollo Theater in September, the program features Mellencamp, Rosanne Cash, Kris Kristofferson, and Norah Jones, together with Costello, exchanging songs and stories in the nature of a Nashville "guitar pull." It is one of 13 one-hour episodes in the Costello-hosted series, which launches Dec. 3rd with Sir Elton John as Costello's sole guest. Other artists featured on the series include The Police, Tony Bennett, Lou Reed and Diana Krall.
November 8th, 2008 -
John Mellencamp, who did a lot of serious work on behalf of Barack Obama's historic presidential campaign, was linked with the President-elect in a humorous vein by David Letterman on Friday's installment of "Late Night."During his "Fun Facts" segment, Letterman related that for the first years of his political career, Obama went by the name "Barack Cougar Obamacamp."
November 2nd, 2008 -
John's two appearances on Good Morning America last week are available for online viewing. The Saturday piece featured a very cool interview with John, taped at his Belmont Mall studio as well as touring around Bloomington IN, with host Kate Snow.Watch on ABCNews' website - Click HERE
Watch on YouTube - Click HERE
Read article based on John's interview - Click HERE
November 1st, 2008 -
Singer John Mellencamp Shows 'GMA' Around Battleground IndianaPosted by By KATE SNOW and COURTNEY CHAPMAN on Friday, October 31, 2008
Sometimes the best way to see a state is with a local. So when ABC News' 50 states in 50 days project rolled into Indiana, we called up favorite son, singer John Mellencamp.
John Mellencamp
We all know he was born in a small town (Seymour, Ind., to be exact), and while chart-topping songs have helped him realize the American dream, he hasn't left the heartland behind. He and his third wife, former supermodel Elaine Irwin, now call Bloomington, Ind., home.
He can be stopped driving around in his 1956 Chevy Nomad. He says there's an authenticity to these back roads that you don't find in the big city, even if he disagrees vehemently with most of his neighbors.
"I never did really want to fit in, " Mellencamp said. "I enjoy being the outsider. You know I'm a loud talker and always have been even before I had a guitar and record deals and hit records."
He calls himself a political outcast in his home state. But he has never been shy about voicing, or singing, his politics.
"If I was to vote my interest I'd be a Republican. I don't vote my interest. I vote for what I think would be the best and most compassionate for the country," said Mellencamp. "You know, America used to be a great place. It's not now, and we will be again, but right now it's not a great place."
Mellencamp's career has spanned 32 years and 23 albums. And while he still writes a lot about changing tradition, he no longer cares what other people say.
"I'm an old man. I'm long past worrying when I sit down to write a song what people are going to think of it."
The lyrics to one of Mellencamp's most memorable tunes, "Jack and Diane," were inspired by his experiences growing up in Seymour, Ind. And while the line "suckin on a chili dog outside the Tastee Freeze" lives on, the actual Tastee Freeze is long gone.
"I see small towns across America going out of business," he said. "The town I grew up in, there's no stores in there anymore. Corporate America moved in and put all those stores out of business. I don't like the fact that we're now all the same."
Three years after the success of "Jack and Diane," Mellencamp recorded "Scarecrow," an album that dealt with the problems facing small towns and small family farms. On the heels of its success, Farm Aid was formed.
"You know, since we started Farm Aid there has been 300,000 small farms going out of business. Over a million acres lost to urban sprawl," Mellencamp recalled. "That's not the kind of compassion you want to show the people who grow the food and support basically this country and the world."
Though he hasn't performed there in more than 20 years, the auditorium at Indiana University is still one of Mellencamp's favorite venues. It was there where he went from performing in bars to the big time.
"When I played here in 1984, we were rocking this place so hard the balcony almost fell down," he said.
He long ago lost his stage fright, and now he always gets excited about performing in front of an audience -- kind of how he feels about election night.
"I think that if a guy had any hope at all," he said, "I think better times are in front of us."
Click HERE to read this article online.
October 31st, 2008 -
A video supporting Barack Obama using John Mellencamp’s version of Woody Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land” is spreading virally across the Internet.The one-minute clip presents a travelogue of America, including shots of farmland, skyscrapers, forests, small towns, highways and waterways—all loosely corresponding with the song lyrics—followed by quick portraits of a wide variety of Americans. It ends with the text “It’s never been more important to be one America” superimposed on a shot of the Statue of Liberty, followed by “November 4, 2008” superimposed on a shot of Obama at a rally.
The video has appeared on YouTube and Huffington Post, the latter site including a note that it was produced by Rich Silverstein and Jeff Goodby, the creators of “got milk?,” Hewlett-Packard and the NBA ad campaigns.
“This message uses music that’s been reassuring to all Americans for nearly a century, through good times and bad,” explains Silverstein. “Our country is all the ‘real America,’ from sea to sea. It’s one place and in tough times, it’s all the more important to remind ourselves of what we share, rather than what divides us.”
Mellencamp’s version of the Guthrie song, in which he accompanies himself solo on acoustic guitar, comes from “Song of America,” the 50-song, three-CD set envisioned by former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno and artist/producer Ed Pettersen, that was released last year and also featured artists including the Blind Boys of Alabama, Martha Wainwright, and the Black Crowes. Hugely influenced by Guthrie, Mellencamp received the 2003 Woody Guthrie Award for exemplifying the ideals of the legendary folksinger.
October 30th, 2008 -
"Good Morning America" had interviews with Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Sarah
Palin on Thursday morning. But John Mellencamp may have made the most forceful
comments -- in song and word -- as the ABC program visited Orlando's Church
Street Station.Mellencamp sang "Troubled Land" and "Pink Houses" at the Cheyenne Saloon. Chris Cuomo of "GMA" told Mellencamp that "Pink Houses" was as relevant when the singer wrote it years ago.
"I'm just trying to do my part, you know, trying to say something that might mean something to somebody and make people feel good about themselves," Mellencamp said.
Asked about the timely lyrics, Mellencamp said, "The American Dream has kind of been hidden lately. So I think that it's time for hard-working people to be able to earn a decent wage and realize their dreams. That's what this country was founded on. I believe in the First Amendment, and I believe in hard-working people."
The crowd at the Cheyenne Saloon gave his commentary thunderous applause.
Cuomo talked to Obama and Clinton after their late Wednesday rally in Kissimmee, which drew 35,000. In Ohio, Elizabeth Vargas interviewed Palin. In Orlando, Diane Sawyer talked to family members with sharply different political views. And the Cheyenne Saloon received a national showcase -- it would be the perfect backdrop for a variety show.
Click HERE to read this article online.
October 29th, 2008 -
The John Mellencamp documentary produced for A&E’s Biography (Bio) Channel, formerly titled “Back Where We Started,” is scheduled to air on Thursday Dec. 11 as “Homeward Bound: John Mellencamp.”According to the program’s production company Stage 3 Productions’ executive director of original programming Anthony Uro, the 90-minute program “really gives viewers an in-depth look at the John Mellencamp most people don’t see, because it’s not only about John the successful rock star. It also paints a very detailed picture of John’s early life and career before he was famous and the people, places and events that shaped him as a person and as an artist.”
Mellencamp was interviewed exclusively for the production, as were his wife Elaine Irwin Mellencamp and current and former bandmates Mike Wanchic, Kenny Aronoff, Miriam Sturm, Andy York, Toby Myers, Robert "Ferd" Frank, Dave Parman and Mike Jackson. Fred Booker, who was the co-lead singer with Mellencamp in Mellencamp’s first group Crepe Soul Band, was also interviewed, as were high school classmates and friends.
Also interviewed were Mellencamp’s longtime press agent Bob Merlis, Bloomington Herald Times music writer Mike Leonard, and journalist Jim Bessman, author of “John Mellencamp—The Concert at Walter Reed.”
“To have John tell his story first hand is an amazing component of the show,” continues Uro. “His memories of childhood, his early bands, his development as a musician and songwriter as well as his struggles in the music business and what it took for him to break through and follow his own true path, are very compelling.”
Further setting “Homeward Bound” apart, Uro adds, is that “it culminates with an intimate concert at the Crump Theatre where John performed in 1976 under the name Johnny Cougar. It really is a ‘one night only’ type of event with John playing for 700 fans from his home state of Indiana, and even features John performing songs he hasn’t done live in years.”
Concludes Uro: “I grew up listening to John's music, so to be able to work directly with him--and the people who were responsible for creating the songs that were a big part of my life--was just incredible!”
“Homeward Bound: John Mellencamp” is also the premiere episode of Bio’s new "Homeward Bound" series.
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