John Cougar

Recorded to benefit the Special Olympics, this has some of the biggest names in contemporary music, most covering seasonal favorites with mixed success. Outstanding tracks include The Pretenders "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," with Chrissie Hynde giving a touching performance. Run-D.M.C.'s topical "Christmas in Hollis" relies heavily on sampling "Back Door Santa," and may head you toward the dance floor. Alison Moyet's stately version of "The Coventry Carol" is beautifully haunting. Only the Material Girl, Madonna, embarrasses herself with an overly campy "Santa Baby".

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. In Anthony DeCurtis' excellent liner essay/interview, Mellencamp claims he isn’t “trying to prove anything. . . it was a way for them to discover songs of mine that perhaps were overlooked because of the songs that were so popular on the radio.” Given his choice of material, he may not feel that his career-long demand has been met yet.

John Mellencamp - 1978-2012 (2013) {19 Disc Box Set Mercury Records B0019508-02}
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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.