John Mellencamp

John Mellencamp releases live album and documentary titled: The Good Samaritan Tour. The documentary, which will be narrated by Academy® Award winner Matthew McConaughey, chronicles Mellencamp’s historic free tour in 2000 when he performed on street corners and in public parks across the country. The new music is just one of many new projects Mellencamp has been working on including original plays, paintings and more.

John Mellencamp has been in need of a thorough, career-spanning compilation for a while, and Island/UTV's 2004 release Words & Music: John Mellencamp's Greatest Hits finally fills that gap. His previous hits collection, 1997's The Best That I Could Do, was too short, since he had more hits than could fit on a brief 14-track disc. Words & Music doesn't have the problem of brevity. Spanning 37 songs over two discs, this has nearly all of his charting hits. Radio hits like "Justice and Independence '85" and "Rooty Toot Toot" may be absent, but they're not missed, since all the big hits are here, including "Pink Houses," "Lonely Ol' Night," "Paper in Fire," "Authority Song," "Crumblin' Down," "Small Town," "Hurts So Good," and "Jack & Diane," among many others (including two solid new songs).

Only John Mellencamp, whose career began with a series of wrong turns, raw determination, and the audaciousness to demand he be taken seriously could create a box set as strange, representative, and labyrinthine as On the Rural Route 7609. In the era of the “track,” Mellencamp has issued a massive, beautifully packaged, and exhaustively annotated four-disc career retrospective that doesn’t lean on his hits (many aren’t here), but rather on more obscure album cuts, outtakes, rarities (17 selections make their debuts here), and more recent material – numerous selections come from 2007’s Freedom’s Road and 2008’s Life Love Death and Freedom…

John Mellencamp - 1978-2012 (2013) {19 Disc Box Set Mercury Records B0019508-02}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 6.88 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 2.85 Gb
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© 1978-2012, 2013 Mercury Records / Universal Music | B0019508-02
Rock / Southern Rock / Folk Rock / Blues Rock / Heartland Rock / Roots Rock

This is effectively the entire studio catalogue, and includes all the American singer-songwriter’s albums recorded as John Cougar, John Cougar Mellencamp and John Mellencamp for various record labels. The set contains a total of 223 tracks and spans 35 years. Twelve of the albums have bonus tracks, sourced from the 2005 re-mastered versions of Mellencamp’s Mercury releases.

John Mellencamp confirms a reissue of his beloved 1985 album Scarecrow (on Mercury/UME) and shares “Small Town (2022 Remaster)” as well as two previously unreleased versions, “Small Town (Writer’s Demo)” and “Small Town (Acoustic Version).” The Scarecrow Deluxe reissue is set for release November 4 as a box set including 2 CDs of newly remixed and remastered songs plus previously unreleased bonus tracks and alternate versions, a booklet full of rare photographs and all new liner notes by acclaimed author and music critic Anthony DeCurtis. His eighth studio album, Scarecrow was originally released in 1985 and is one of Mellencamp’s most beloved albums. The album contains three chart topping hits—“R.O.C.K In The U.S.A. (A Salute To 60’s Rock)” “Lonely Ol’ Night” and “Small Town”—and reached #2 on the U.S. chart.

John Mellencamp’s 25th studio album, Strictly A One-Eyed Jack was written and produced by Mellencamp, recorded at his Belmont Mall Studios in Indiana, and recorded/mixed by GRAMMY-award winner David Leonard. It features a number of longtime band members including Andy York, Dane Clark, Mike Wanchic, Troye Kinnett, and more. It also features three collaborations with Bruce Springsteen including the landmark duet “Wasted Days.”

Sad Clowns & Hillbillies marks the first time in a decade that a John Mellencamp studio record finds him in the producer's chair. It's the first time ever that he's shared billing on an album cover. Carlene Carter is a singer/songwriter and music biz veteran; the daughter of country music royalty – Carl Smith and June Carter Cash – making her the stepdaughter of Johnny. She and Mellencamp worked together on 2012's Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, the musical theater project he scored for Stephen King; they collaborated further on the soundtrack for Ithaca – the "Sugar Hill Mountain" reprised here is one of a handful of excellent duets between them. Things don't begin well, however.