 |
| |
|
|
|
10/08/2008 -
Q Magazine
By Anthony Barnes
US star John Mellencamp today landed the prestigious title of Classic Songwriter
at the 2008 Q Awards with Russian Standard Vodka.
The artist formerly known as Johnny Cougar – who celebrates his 57th birthday
tomorrow (Tuesday) – is best known for his top 30 hit Jack And Diane and has
scored a string of US hits over a 30-year period. They include the huge single
Hurts So Good.
Collecting his award, Mellencamp told guests: “I wrote that song 30 years ago
that Jack and Diane song and people are still playing it. The whole thing about
being a songwriter is to show some humility when you are writing a song you want
something that goes into people’s hearts … I’m still hoping to write that song.”
Last year the title was won by Billy Bragg.
Click
HERE to read the article online.
Bil Read More
|
|
|
|
10/08/2008 - John Mellencamp's next tour is Australia and New Zealand in November. Stay tuned for future touring updates! Read More
|
|
|
|
10/07/2008 - Today is John Mellencamp’s birthday! The singer turns 57 and he explained to us
that as great as surviving is, there is more he wants to do.
“I understand that surviving is a noble cause and I think that’s ok and
that’s fine for guys who want to do that, but if I’m gonna do something, it’s
not so much getting my message or my thoughts out, it’s just trying to get
people to feel good about themselves and come to the conclusion that I’ve come
to is that if you want a better world it starts with you.”
John will be spreading his word Down Under next month. The singer kicks off a
tour of Australia and New Zealand on November 15th.
Read More
|
|
|
|
10/06/2008 - John Mellencamp
Life Death Love And Freedom
3 stars
By Paul Ree’s
Among a crop of like minded American singer-songwriters to have emerged in the
‘70’s (Springsteen, Tom Petty, Warren Zevon), John Mellencamp is the forgotten
man over here, and unfairly so. Life Death Love And Freedom (punctuation is for
wimps, apparently) won’t return him to the US chart-topping status he once
enjoyed, but it’s his best work since 1993’s Human Wheels. Like that album it’s
a folksy, melancholy affair, producer T-Bone Burnett bringing the same intimate
feel he gave to Robert Plant and Alison Krauss’s Raising Sand. AS the title
implies, it talks the big issues, sometimes at the expense of melody, but
there’s a handful of very fine songs here.
Download: Jena
Read More
|
|
|
|
10/06/2008 - Be sure to visit the PAINTINGS section to see the new paintings just posted in the RECENT PAINTINGS gallery. Read More
|
|
|
|
10/06/2008 - John Mellencamp was awarded Q Magazine’s prestigious “Classic Songwriter” title at today’s star-studded 2008 Q Awards with Russian Standard Vodka presentation at London’s Grosvenor House Hotel.
The award was presented personally by Q editor Paul Rees.
Best known in the U.K. for “Jack and Diane,” Mellencamp said in his acceptance speech, “I wrote that song 30 years ago--that ‘Jack and Diane song’--and people are still playing it. The whole thing about being a songwriter is to show some humility when you are writing a song--you want something that goes into people’s hearts…I’m still hoping to write that song!”
The title places Mellencamp in celebrated company. Billy Bragg won it last year, and previous winners include Elton John and Noel Gallagher of Oasis. Additionally, Mellencamp was in a group of other Q Award winners including Coldplay (Best Act in the World), Grace Jones (Q Legend), Adam Ant (Q Icon) and Glen Campbell (Q Legend).
Mellencamp, along with Coldplay a Read More
|
|
|
|
10/05/2008 -
John Mellencamp
Life Death Love And Freedom
Hear Music
4 Stars
By Adam Sweeting
Springsteen school graduate excels with scary country sound
This bracingly raw set of fables finds the Indiana balladeer digging
deeper into the country-blues roots he finds increasingly fascinating, so
potently that it's like time-traveling back to the depression and Roosevelt's
New Deal. Mellencamp uses traditional forms and mostly acoustic instruments, but
his messages are contemporary. ("Foundation is crumbling, the inner structure's
gone"), and his songs about death and doubt carry a chilling ring of
authenticity. In "Longest Days", he's written one of the most harrowing
songs about age and disillusion you'll ever hear. Bleak but brilliant. Read More
|
|
|
|
10/05/2008 -
John Mellencamp
4 Stars
Life, Death, Love And Freedom
Universal
Proper Indianan Hoosier Mellencamp shows his darker and fiery roots.
Several major health problems, four marriages and 23 albums, Mellencamp might
actually win major original artist status by the time he's 60 (in three year's
time). Last year he was still heartland-rocky enough to sell a track for a Chevy
TV ad, but only the Undertakers of America will see synergy in this one.
Amid producer T Bone Burnett's open prairie sound and aptly distorted
guitar moods, Mellencamp croaks a sequence of raw, all but nihilistic yet far
from self-pitying first person tales about well, death mainly, leavened by the
odd rather forlorn reference to the life, love, and freedom elements of the
title. As one of his grimly ancient narrators opines in Don't Need This Body,
"This getting older/Ain't for cowards.", Rock 'n' Roll truth spans the
generations. Has to. Comes with a free DVD versio Read More
|
|
|
|
10/02/2008 - John Mellencamp will be the featured entertainer Friday night in Washington, D.C. at the annual YouthAIDS benefit, to be held at the Ritz Carlton Tysons Corner grand ballroom. The event, which is dubbed “The Power of Music,” will honor Annie Lennox and MTV CEO Judy McGrath, and will be hosted by Ashley Judd with Sharon Osbourne acting as M.C.
A D.C.-based education/prevention program, YouthAIDS uses media, pop culture, music, theatre and sports to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS and reach 600 million young people in more than 60 countries with life-saving messages, products, services and care. Its annual fundraiser has been named one of the city’s Top 100 Events.
“Many people in the 60 countries where we operate are illiterate or of low-literacy,” said deputy director Marshall Stowell. “We bring in DJs and street music and dance to educate them on the HIV risk and direct them to clinics.”
Stowell further saluted Mellencamp as “an activist in his own right.” Click Read More
|
|
|
|
10/01/2008 - Mellencamp.com was updated today with revised and updated DISCOGRAPHY, PAINTINGS, PHOTO and VIDEO sections! In Discography you can click on the album covers on the album detail page to view a larger version. Read More
|
|
|
|
09/30/2008 - HDNet has scheduled repeat showings of “John Mellencamp Live at Walter Reed,” the landmark April 28, 2007 concert from the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. that was originally shown live on the channel. The full concert will run again on Sunday, Oct. 5, at 9:40 p.m. (Eastern), and will be offered also on Oct. 6 and Oct. 12.
Also on Oct. 6, HDNet will re-run “The Plain Truth – Dan Rather with John Mellencamp,” which originally ran on July 4, 2007 following a re-run of the Walter Reed concert. Taped in his recording studio in Bloomington, the program features Mellencamp’s discussion with Rather concerning the concert as well as his music career.
“John Mellencamp Live at Walter Re Read More
|
|
|
|
09/28/2008 - John Mellencamp’s musical heroes notwithstanding, no one had a bigger impact on him than the late Paul Newman.
“In 1967, me and four other guys went to see ‘Cool Hand Luke’ every night for seven nights straight,” recalled Mellencamp, who was a high school sophomore when he and his pals “stumbled on” Newman’s classic prison drama film at Seymour’s Vondee Theater. “It was winter and we wanted to get out of the house on a Monday night—and we came back Tuesday and Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. We saved up our lunch money so we could go and by the end of the week we could recite every line!”
This, of course, was at a time of historic musical creativity.
“There was so much great music to be discovered,” Mellencamp continued. “Remember, there was Dylan, the Stones, the importance of James Brown. But for some reason on that week Paul Newman made the biggest influence on me, probably bigger than Dylan, Woody Guthrie, and James Brown--just by the nature of that characte Read More
|
|
|
|
09/26/2008 - Mellencamp & Gill: 2 intimate experiences
By journalismrookie
It’s not too often you go to a concert and feel close to the artist. Yeah, you
may enjoy yourself, clapping, cheering and singing along. But most of the time,
you’re just one of many sitting out there in the audience, while the singer
sings one song after another, not saying much in between. But with two concerts
I attended this week, it’s a different story.
John Mellencamp’s concert Tuesday at the Crump Theatre in downtown Columbus was
the most intimate concert I’ve ever been to. And after talking to a few people
afterwards about the show, they felt the same way. Mellencamp last performed at
the Crump on Oct. 4, 1976. That was when he was known as Johnny Cougar, and the
performance followed his show at the Seymour National Guard Armory. So in this
area was where his career began. It was only fitting to return there as A&E was
filming the concert to insert in its new series “Back Where We Started” for Read More
|
|
|
|
09/26/2008 - Commentary
By Mike Leonard
The motivation to stage a John Mellencamp concert in the crumbling Crump
Theater in Columbus came out of brainstorming for a new cable television series,
tentatively titled “Back Where We Started.”
The concept is to take someone both famous and accomplished — Mellencamp’s
induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year pretty much set his
legacy in stone — and go back to take an in-depth look at that person’s early
years.
“It was perfect for us to have John as the premiere for the series because for
this kind of show to work, we need someone who is both prolific and been in the
business a long time,” explained Anthony Uro, executive director for original
programming for Stage 3 Productions, a Philadelphia firm. “It wouldn’t work with
someone who was famous for five years and then went away. Or someone who has
done the same thing all their lives.”
The film crew has gone to impressive lengths to tell the s Read More
|
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
