John J Mellencamp, beforehand generally known as Johnny Cougar, John Cougar, and John Cougar Mellencamp, is an American musician, singer-songwriter, painter, and actor. He’s recognized for his catchy, populist model of heartland rock, which emphasizes conventional instrumentation.
Mellencamp rose to fame within the Eighties whereas “honing an virtually startlingly plainspoken writing model that, beginning in 1982, yielded a string of High 10 singles”, together with “Hurts So Good“, “Jack & Diane“, “Crumblin’ Down“, “Pink Homes“, “Lonely Ol’ Evening“, “Small City“, “R.O.C.Ok. in the usA.“, “Paper in Fireplace“, and “Cherry Bomb“. He has amassed 22 High 40 hits in america.
As well as, he holds the file for essentially the most tracks by a solo artist to hit primary on the Scorching Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, with seven. Mellencamp has been nominated for 13 Grammy Awards, successful one. Mellencamp launched his newest album, Unhappy Clowns & Hillbillies, on April 28, 2017, to widespread vital acclaim.
Mellencamp can also be one of many founding members of Farm Help, a corporation that started in 1985 with a live performance in Champaign, Illinois, to boost consciousness concerning the lack of household farms and to boost funds to maintain farm households on their land. Farm Help live shows have remained an annual occasion over the previous 33 years, and as of 2018 the group has raised over $50 million to advertise a powerful and resilient household farm system of agriculture.
Mellencamp was inducted into the Rock and Roll Corridor of Fame on March 10, 2008. His greatest musical influences are Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, James Brown and the Rolling Stones. Rolling Stone contributor Anthony DeCurtissaid: “Mellencamp has created an vital physique of labor that has earned him each vital regard and an infinite viewers.
His songs doc the fun and struggles of extraordinary individuals in search of to make their means, and he has constantly introduced the contemporary air of widespread expertise to the usually glamour-addled world of fashionable music.”
In 2001, Billboard journal editor-in-chief Timothy White mentioned:
John Mellencamp is arguably a very powerful roots rocker of his era. John has made fiddles, hammer dulcimers, Autoharps and accordions lead rock devices on a par with electrical guitar, bass and drums, and he additionally introduced what he calls ‘a uncooked Appalachian’ lyrical outlook to his songs. Mellencamp’s finest music is rock ‘n roll stripped of all escapism, and it appears to be like instantly on the messiness of life because it’s really lived.
In his music, mortality, anxiousness, acts of God, questions of romance and brotherhood, and crises of conscience all collide and demand laborious choices.
