Hear It Here - John Mellencamp's New Song "Chasing Rainbows"

"Chasing Rainbows" off of the upcoming release Strictly A One-Eyed Jack on January 21, 2022. 

New Music Video From John Mellencamp and Bruce Springsteen - "Wasted Days"

Hear It Here: The Farm Aid 2018 Concert In Entirety - Featuring Willie Nelson, Jamey Johnson, Chris Stapleton, Sturgill Simpson and More

Farm Aid was started by Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp in 1985 to keep family farmers on the land and has worked since then to make sure everyone has access to good food from family farmers. Dave Matthews joined Farm Aid's board of directors in 2001.  Yesterday, in Hartford, Connecticut, Farm Aid 2018 played in front of 24,000 fans.

Now it can be 24,001. For the first time, Farm Aid partnered with YouTube and has the concert in entirety from start to finish in one video for fans to be able to enjoy around the world. You can share this once-in-a-lifetime experience from home. Watch and listen to the legendary artists who came together to support Farm Aid’s mission of building a vibrant, family farm-centered system of agriculture in America.

The Farm Aid 2018 Webcast Lineup:
- Jamey Johnson – 3:00pm
- Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats – 3:31pm
- Kacey Musgraves – 4:18pm
- Sturgill Simpson – 5:13pm
- Chris Stapleton – 6:08pm
- Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds – 7:03pm
- John Mellencamp – 8:03pm
- Neil Young & Promise of the Real – 9:03pm
- Willie Nelson & Family – 10:03pm

 

John Mellencamp Announces Release Date For Upcoming Other People's Stuff Album

Artist: John Mellencamp
Album: Other People's Stuff
Label: Republic
Release date: November 16, 2018

John Mellencamp announced a new album, Other People’s Stuff, will be released on Nov. 16. It will be followed by the John Mellencamp Show tour, which kicks off on Feb. 7 and runs until March 30, 2019. Producers AEG said that each show would start promptly at 8PM and would not include an opening act, and that each ticket purchased would come with a physical copy of the new album.

Not many details have come out about the new project but from the title, it may be possible that there are some covers and/or some tracks not written by the legendary hall of famer.

 

Other People’s Stuff marks Mellencamp’s 24th studio album and follows his 2017 release, Sad Clowns and Hillbillies. Every ticket for Mellencamp’s upcoming tour purchased online will come with a physical copy of the record.

That Nashville Sound Saturday Newsbytes: Kenny Chesney, Keith Urban, LeAnn Rimes, Kacey Musgraves & More

This morning's column has several new music videos and a couple of exciting project updates for potential release later in the year. (Click on the blue link to watch the performances or get additional information on the news tease.)

- Lee Brice has a new music video for his song, "Boy".

- Keith Urban performed the new track "Never Comin' Down" off last week's album release live on Late Night With Seth Meyers.

- LeAnn Rimes "reimagined" her hit "One Way Ticket" and filmed the live performance video from one of her concerts. It's a great reminder of the pipes that young lady has.

- Kacey Musgraves released her new music video for the song, "Butterflies".

- Lindi Ortega released her new music video for the song, "Liberty".

- Luke Combs released his new music video for the song, "Beautiful Crazy".

- John Mellencamp recently released a live DVD of a concert featuring he and Carlene Carter and unveiled a music video of him performing "Pink Houses" from the project.  

New Music Video From John Mellencamp - "Troubled Man"

John Mellencamp’s career in music, spanning more than 42 years, has seen him transition from pop star to one of the most highly regarded songwriters of a generation. Filmed at the landmark Chicago Theatre, just 250 miles away from his upbringing in Indiana, this stunning cinematic concert video captures John with his full band, along with special guest Carlene Carter.

That Nashville Sound Thursday Newsbytes: Merle Haggard, Maggie Rose, Red Marlow & More

There's some news and a couple of new music videos that are all yours in one big post this Thursday morning. Happy reading...

* Rachel Lee Rubin, Professor of American Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston, USA, and Director of the Center for the Study of Humanities, Culture, and Society, has written a book about Merle Haggard's iconic song in her upcoming book, Merle Haggard's Okie from Muskogee. The book is released today. From the press release:

"Every now and then, a song inspires a cultural conversation that ends up looking like a brawl. Merle Haggard's Okie from Muskogee, released in 1969, is a prime example of that important role of popular music. Okie immediately helped to frame an ongoing discussion about region and class, pride and politics, culture and counterculture. But the conversation around the song, useful as it was, drowned out the song itself, not to mention the other songs on the live album-named for Okie and performed in Muskogee-that Haggard has carefully chosen to frame what has turned out to be his most famous song. What are the internal clues for gleaning the intended meaning of Okie? What is the pay-off of the anti-fandom that Okie sparked (and continues to spark) in some quarters? How has the song come to be a shorthand for expressing all manner of anti-working class attitudes? What was Haggard's artistic path to that stage in Oklahoma, and how did he come to shape the industry so profoundly at the moment when urban country singers were playing a major role on the American social and political landscape?"

* The Voice star Red Marlow will be releasing his album Country as Cornbread on April 6- here's the official announcement and album cover.

* Maggie Rose has a new 2-song mini EP coming out tomorrow with tracks "It's You" and "Smooth."  Here's the source if you're interested in adding it to your music collection.

* John Mellencamp released a new performance video filmed at the landmark Chicago Theatre of him performing his iconic hit, "Small Town." 

* Kelly Clarkson released a powerful new music video considering all going on with the #metoo movement for her song "I Don't Think About You."

* British Nashville-transplants The Shires have a new album forthcoming on April 20 called Accidentally on Purpose on Decca Records.

Barnes & Noble Quietly Developing Unique Vinyl Exclusive Projects

The largest brick and mortar book retailer in the country has been expanding past their core business for some time- adding cafe's into their stores and having a push to rebrand Barnes & Noble as more than just a bookstore by expanding its offerings of toys, games, gadgets and other gifts and reshaping the nation’s largest bookstore chain into a “lifestyle brand.” 

This includes a vast collection of exclusive vinyl projects including reissues as well as exclusive distributions of new album introductions as well. This isn't just some fad. According to a recent Billboard story, "The comeback of vinyl records, covered just a half-decade ago as a wacky trend, is now a bona fide business story: vinyl accounted for $182 million in sales in the first half of 2017, according to the RIAA. And although the format represents a small percentage of unit sales, revenue from deluxe packages means that it accounts for 29 percent of revenue from physical retail."  Yep- you read that right: 29 percent of revenue from store music sales are coming from vinyl. Sony Records announced earlier this year that they were getting back into the vinyl business after a 28-year break.

As a result, Barnes and Noble has made exclusive agreements with several of the labels and music distributors and developed unique projects that only their stores will be selling this holiday season. What can music aficionados add to their Christmas lists from exclusive vinyl offerings from this retailer?  Here's just a sampling of some of the ones that caught this reader's eye.

- Johnny Cash - Greatest!  This Sun Records classic record has been reissued and has been pressed on a unique distinctive white vinyl.

- Johnny Cash & Jerry Lee Lewis- Sunday Down South - This collaborative album was originally released in 1970 and will be re-released exclusively on vinyl from B&N.

-  Willie Nelson - Willie and the Boys - Willie's upcoming release featuring a collaboration with his two sons will be released exclusively through the retailer.

- Alison Krauss - Windy City
- Robert Plant - Carry Fire
- Margo Price - All-American Made
- John Mellencamp - Sad Clowns and Hillbillies
- Urban Cowboy Soundtrack
- Marty Stuart - Way Out West

Live at Farm Aid- Jamey Johnson, Margo Price, Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp & More

Farm Aid was started by Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp in 1985 to keep family farmers on the land and has worked since then to make sure everyone has access to good food from family farmers. Dave Matthews joined Farm Aid's board of directors in 2001. Farm Aid 2017 was held at KeyBank Pavilion in Burgettstown, Pennsylvania, on September 16 and was another incredible success, raising millions for the cause again. Many videos of the event have come out and each performance below can be clicked on to stream on YouTube:

Jamey Johnson - "Eastbound and Down"

Jamey Johnson - "This Land is Your Land"

Jamey Johnson - "'Til the Rivers All Run Dry"

Willie Nelson and Family - "Still Not Dead"

Willie Nelson and Family - "I Saw the Light"

Willie Nelson and Family - "On the Road Again"

Willie Nelson and Family - "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys"

Willie Nelson and Family - "Still is Still Moving To Me"

Willie Nelson and Family - "Whiskey River"

John Mellencamp - "Small Town"

John Mellencamp - "Lawless Times"

Margo Price - "Paper Cowboy"

Margo Price - "Hurtin' On The Bottle"

Margo Price - "Hands of Time"  

Margo Price - "Weakness"
 
Avett Brothers - "Slight Figure of Speech"

Avett Brothers - "True Sadness"

Dave Mathews and Tim Reynolds - "Crush"


 

New Music Video From John Mellencamp - "Dark as a Dungeon"

In 1946, singer-songwriter Merle Travis wrote “Dark as a Dungeon” to describe the harsh and dangerous conditions that coal miners experienced every day. John Mellencamp recorded a special version of the song in support of From the Ashes, a new documentary about the legacy and future of the coal industry in the U.S. From the Ashes premiered Sunday June 25th at 9/8c on National Geographic Channel.
 

New Music Video From John Mellencamp & Martina McBride - "Grandview"

John Mellencamp Collaborates With Carlene Carter On 4/21 Release of Sad Clowns & Hillbillies

Artist: John Mellencamp (featuring Carlene Carter)
Album: Sad Clowns & Hillbillies
Label: Republic Records
Release date: April 21, 2017

The new album features a mixture of songs written by Mellencamp and Carter, along with direct collaborations between the duo. On the eve of Donald Trump's inauguration, Mellencamp released the brooding political ballad "Easy Target," which addresses income inequality and Black Lives Matter.

Although initially billed as a duets album, Carter has stated in interviews that Sad Clowns and Hillbillies won't strictly consist of duets. “Sad Clowns and Hillbillies is a wonderful conglomeration of [John's] songs and my songs," she told Pacific University. "Some are duets and some are by themselves - it’s different, but really kind of the way John and I roll. We are very like-minded and on musical ground that really feels right. It’s been quite a wonderful ride."

In 2016, Mellencamp told USA Today: "We wrote a couple of songs together, and she wrote some and I wrote some." Mellencamp and Carter debuted "Indigo Sunset" and "My Soul's Got Wings" during their concert in Tulsa on April 1, 2016 (after opening the show, Carter joined Mellencamp during his headlining set for a performance of these two songs during most shows on the two 2016 legs of Mellencamp's Plain Spoken tour). "Indigo Sunset" was written by both Mellencamp and Carter, while Mellencamp wrote the music to "My Soul's Got Wings," giving life to a previously unheard lyric written by American folk singer Woody Guthrie.

Mellencamp said Sad Clowns and Hillbillies was borne out of his collaboration with Carter on the theater play and musical Ghost Brothers of Darkland County. He said through those that project and their time on tour together that the two became "singing buddies." Mellencamp gave insight into the genesis of the project to Yahoo's Katie Couric when debuting "Easy Target" in January, saying: "It's crazy the way it started - it was going to be a religious record. It started out like 'Look, lets go back and do an old country religious record. We'll try to write songs that sound like those songs, but they'll be new.' And then it just kept evolving and evolving and evolving, and the songs that she was bringing and the songs that I was bringing - they weren't so religious. I write a lot of sad songs, so it's like Sad Clowns and Hillbillies - that's where it came from."

That Nashville Sound Friday Newsbytes

There's so much new news floating around over the last 24 hours, we're going to go The 9513/Engine 145 old-school and do a news round-up on everything happening to get it all in one column this morning.

Little Big Town is releasing a new album called The Breaker and February 24 and it's filled with songs co-penned by one of our favorite writers, Lori McKenna.

It appears that Josh Turner will have his long wait for a new album ended with a March 10 MCA Nashville release of a project called Deep South.

ABC/CMT's Nashville actress and musician Clare Bowen has released a new song called "Love Steps In" and all of the proceeds are being donated to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.

Nikki Lane has released a brand new music video for her song "Jackpot."

PBS will have Hayes Carll featured on Austin City Limits tomorrow night (1/21). Here's a performance of "Sake of the Song" if you can't wait.

Margo Price will be on that same episode with Carll. Here's her doing "Hands of Time." Check your local listings for time(s).

Cody Jinks was on Music City Roots earlier this week and here's his performance of "Hippies and Cowboys." Or if you prefer, his performance of "I'm Not The Devil."

Trio Lady Antebellum is back together after a year working on solo projects. They released their first single "You Look Good" yesterday which will be forthcoming off of their 6th studio album Heart Break being released on June 9.

"Somebody Else Will" is the brand new music video from Justin Moore. You can watch it here.

On the eve of the new President's inauguration, John Mellencamp has released a new politically-charged song called "Easy Target." Somewhat lost in that announcement, however, is the even-better news that he has a new collaborative album with Carlene Carter called Sad Clowns and Hillbillies coming out later this spring.

The impeccable Alison Krauss released the title track off her upcoming Buddy Cannon-produced project, Windy City.

New Music Video From Keith Urban- "John Cougar, John Deere, John 3:16"

New Music Video From John Mellencamp- "Troubled Man"

John Mellencamp, Terri Clark, Kenny Chesney and John Berry Announce New Album Projects

Four different music veterans announced new music projects this past week in John Mellencamp, Terri Clark, Kenny Chesney and John Berry.

John Mellencamp, the veteran heartland rocker behind such hits as "Hurts So Good," "Wild Night" and "Jack & Diane," just signed a "lifetime" recording deal with Republic Records, a division of Universal Music Group, and announced a new full-length album set to come out this fall.  The forthcoming album, titled Plain Spoken, will be Mellencamp's 22nd record.

Terri Clark has announced her next appropriately named album, called Some Songs, will be released on September 2. The first single from the project, the title track, is already available digitally. Terri went to her fans to help out with the new project through the PledgeMusic platform. Brandy Clark has also penned two of the tracks.

And last but not least, John Berry announced that he will be headed back into the studio shortly and will have producer Buddy Cannon at the helm making the record. Cannon has just finished a new project by Kenny Chesney (which is supposed to come out this autumn) and will tackle Berry's next studio album. Berry's shooting for a late fall delivery on his new project as well.

Songwriter George Green Passes Away

Songwriter George Michael Green passed away yesterday after a long battle with lung cancer. Green went to school with John Mellencamp in Seymour, Indiana and as a result, was a frequent collaborator with him. They wrote over a dozen songs together that appeared on his albums over the years including Billboard Top 10 Billboard hits "Crumblin' Down" and "Hurts So Good".

Green also wrote hits for Van Zant, Lacy Dalton, Kenny Chesney ("Hook in the Heart" and "Girl in the Coffee Shop"), Gary Morris, Jude Cole, Hall and Oates, Ricky Skaggs, The Oak Ridge Boys, Dwight Yoakam and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. ASCAP has a list of many of the song titles HERE. 

Jude Cole, singer/songwriter/producer said this on his Facebook page this morning, "My friend for 23 years, George Green- husband, father and renowned songwriter who wrote the words to songs like HURT SO GOOD, RAIN ON THE SCARECROW, MINUTES TO MEMORIES, HUMAN WHEELS, SPEED OF LIFE, HOLLOWED GROUND and many more, died of lung cancer last night. To my friends in the industry, please help me get the word out. Donations for his favorite children's charity to follow. RIP George, You were a gifted and humble gentleman."

New Music Video From John Mellencamp- "No Better Than This"

CD Reviews- John Mellencamp- No Better Than This

The Background:
In an age of auto-tuned, computerized recordings, John Mellencamp's approach on his Rounder debut, No Better Than This, is very different. The entire album was recorded with Mellencamp and his band all playing live in one room using a 55 year-old Ampex tape recorder and just one vintage microphone. Legendary producer T Bone Burnett captured the thirteen new Mellencamp originals at three historically important locations: Sun Studio in Memphis, TN (where Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, and Jerry Lee Lewis all first recorded); the First African Baptist Church in Savannah, GA (the oldest Black church in North America, dating to 1775); and in Room 414 of the Gunter Hotel in San Antonio, TX (where Robert Johnson made his first recordings in 1936). The songs on No Better Than This reflect classic American musical traditions including blues, folk, gospel, rockabilly, and country, while addressing such themes as the need for hope, the nature of relationships, and narratives that recount extraordinary occurrences in everyday life. Mellencamp says of the album, "It was absolutely the most fun I've ever had making a record in my life. It was about making music - organic music made by real musicians - that's heartfelt and written from the best place it can come from."

The Review:
Going back to the John Cougar days, Mellencamp always flirted back and forth across rock and roll, Americana, folk and country- walking across genres fairly seamlessly. He probably did it better and more seamlessly than any other artist of his time- always being and feeling authentic along the way. No Better Than This is much more acoustic and much more country than anything he’s released previously. He’s also much more mellow on this album. And while there’s some great tracks on the album, this reviewer isn’t ready for Mellencamp to give up his rocking ways quite yet. He’s not quite sixty. And while artists before him have gone to a stripped down acoustic direction- think Cash’s American Series, Kristofferson’s most recent or even Tom Jones’ latest album- they’re much older artists with deeper lyrics that deal with legacy, death and God. Mellencamp’s just too young to completely give up his rock and roll side. What we love about him as much as anything is his ability to get his groove on with such classics as “Paper In Fire”, “Jack and Diane” and more recently, his duet with Me'shell Ndegeocello on “Wild Night.” Those are all great tracks- and a side that’s missing on this album. Ironically, and perhaps a bit counter-intuitive to that last comment, two of the better songs one the album are acoustic guitar only without even any percussion. “Thinking About You” finds Mellencamp looking back fondly on that first childhood relationship and now, several decades later, wondering what she’s doing now. In the form of a phone call, he reaches out to her. The song is at once philosophical, romantic and contemplative. “Love at First Sight” on the other hand is a two-sided comical take on the perils of falling in love at first sight- particularly since Mellencamp has been married three times. The first half of the song is all lovey-dovey and roses with the perfect sequence of events: romance, love, marriage and kids. After the bridge, things begin falling apart with arguments, getting hit with a frying pan and finally being whacked by his wife- doing him in. It is definitely a humorous take on the dating scene. Slightly fuller on the instrumentation depth scale is the opening track, “Save Some Time to Dream.” Mellencamp has been long been a crusader for the working man (25 years of Farm Aid probably tell that tale better than any other stat) and the lyrics preach the importance of saving some time to dream, for those dreams might save us all. An additional powerful song is “Easter Eve” It tells the story of John and his fourteen year-old-son who are eating dinner when a strange man sitting with his wife comes over and threatens them. A fight ensues and his son narrowly escapes death but with a beer bottle across the jaw, subdues the attacker. They all go to jail. But that only stands as a surface story. Behind the scenes, the wife of the crazed husband has been too fearful to leave her spouse. Now jailed, she has the opportunity for her own rebirth of personal freedom. The symbolism and comparison on this Easter- with Jesus’ own rebirth- is a powerful one. Through a fight, trials and tribulations, she is able to have a rebirth of her own- similar to a Phoenix. It’s a great analogy and a great story song- easily the favorite track on the album.

Sounds Like:
Classic gravel-voiced Mellencamp set to Alison Krauss and Robert Plant’s Raising Sand

Track Highlights (suggested iPod adds):
Save Some Time To Dream
Thinking about You
Love at First Sight
Easter Eve

The Verdict:
Three Stars Out Of Five

John Mellencamp Schedules New Country-Folk Album No Better Than This For Aug 17 Release

Rounder Records will release No Better Than This, an album from John Mellencamp of all new original songs that was recorded at a variety of historically significant locations around the South. The album, set for release August 17, was produced by T Bone Burnett who earlier collaborated with Mellencamp on the much-lauded Life Death Love and Freedom. Time Magazine called that album “his best in a decade” and Rolling Stone ranked it #5 in its listing of the 50 best albums of the year. It is scheduled for release August 17, 2010.

No Better Than This was recorded over the course of a few break days afforded Mellencamp when he was on a tour of minor league ball parks last year, sharing the bill with Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson. The album was recorded on vintage equipment – a 55 year-old Ampex tape recorder with just one microphone -- in Savannah at the First African Baptist Church, in Memphis at Sun Studios and in San Antonio in room 414 of the Gunter Hotel.

Mellencamp wrote the thirteen songs included on the album during a thirteen-day span last spring. “I was tightly focused,” he related, “I got up every day and wrote and wrote and wrote.” The songs reflect various American traditions including blues, folk, western, gospel, rockabilly and country and address such themes as the need for hope, the nature of relationship and narratives that recount extraordinary occurrences in everyday life.

As far as the recording locations are concerned, they were chosen based on cultural and music history, each providing a sense of place for the respective sessions. About the experience, Mellencamp remarked, “It was absolutely the most fun I’ve ever had making a record in my life. It was about making music – organic music made by real musicians – that’s heartfelt and written from the best place it can come from.”

The First African Baptist Church is the first Black church in North America dating to pre-revolutionary times. The original congregation and ministry were slaves; the church, in fact, provided sanctuary to runaways before emancipation. Mellencamp, who has a residence in the area, has long been familiar with the church and the role it played in the Savannah community. He and his wife Elaine were baptized there before the sessions commenced.

While Sun Studios actually is a working recording facility, its equipment has been updated since the days of Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis so Mellencamp’s team used the Ampex machine and established a makeshift recording booth in a construction shed in a vacant lot next door. Mellencamp and his musicians did, dutifully, arrange themselves on the studio floor in accordance with markings that had been laid down by Sam Phillips many years before for optimal presence.

Room 414 of the Gunter Hotel in San Antonio is where Robert Johnson first recorded for Brunswick Records in November of 1936; Mellencamp’s version of Johnson’s “Stones In My Pass Way” was the first track on Trouble No More, an album of blues and folk songs released in 2003. The room has been carpeted in the intervening years so a hardwood floor was placed over the carpet to better approximate the ambience heard on Johnson’s records. Mellencamp sang facing the corner of the room that Johnson had almost 74 years earlier.

After the sessions were completed, Burnett took the mono tapes back to Los Angeles and mastered them, per Mellencamp, “in a way that made them coherent.” Sequencing of the album was accomplished by Burnett in a moment that could be likened to an epiphany. Mellencamp was present when his producer recited the running order of all 13 songs in a moment of inspired spontaneity.