John Cougar Mellencamp (Official Thread)

METALPRIEST

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John Mellencamp Musical To Tour

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Ghost Brothers of Darkland County,’ the Southern gothic musical with lyrics by Stephen King and music by John Mellencamp and T-Bone Burnett, will embark on a 20-city American tour beginning in October.

Mellencamp sparked the collaboration, which took place over a 13-year span, when he mentioned that a pair of brothers had met a grisly end in a cabin on his land. The first was accidentally killed as the two siblings battled over a girl, and the doomed couple then died not long after in a car accident. King quickly drew up an outline for a play, and work commenced from there in an off-and-on fashion.

“John can make rock ‘n’ roll records and I can write books for the rest of our lives,” King says in a news release. “But that’s the safe way to do it — and that’s no way to live if you want to stay creative. We were willing to be educated, and at our age, that’s an accomplishment.”

Set in the village of Lake Belle Reve, Miss., the ‘Ghost Brothers’ narrative fills in an imagined backstory even while new songs — performed by an ensemble cast of 15 actors and a live four-piece band — help frame their character’s emotions.

“This is a gothic story-driven rock concert,” director Susan Booth says. “I want the emphasis to be on this fantastic score and our great singers and how the story advances us from song to song. In most musicals, the songs advance the narrative. With ‘Ghost Brothers,’ the story will advance the songs.”

Tickets for the tour, which begins in Bloomington, Ind., go on sale Friday, May 17, at AEG Live. A studio release is also set for release via Hear Music and the Concord Music Group on June 4.

’Ghostland Brothers’ Tour Dates

October
10 – Bloomington, Ind. – Indiana University Auditorium
11 – Louisville, Ky. – Whitney Hall
12 – Knoxville, Ky. – Knoxville Civic Auditorium
13 – Asheville, N.C. – Thomas Wolfe Auditorium
16 – Nashville, Tenn. – Ryman Auditorium
17 – Evansville, Ind. – Aiken Theatre at The Centre
18 – Indianapolis, Ind. – Clowes Memorial Hall
19 – Akron, Ohio – Akron Civic Theatre
22 – Columbus, Ohio- Palace Theatre
24 – Ft. Wayne, Ind. – Embassy Theatre
25 – Madison, Wisc. – Overture Hall
26 – Rockford, Ill. – Coronado Performing Arts Center
27 – Appleton, Wisc. – Fox Cities Performing Arts Center
29 – Milwaukee, Wisc. – Riverside Theatre
31 – Minneapolis, Minn. – State Theatre

November
1 – Sioux City, Iowa – Orpheum Theatre
2 – Ames, Iowa – Stephens Auditorium
3 – Davenport, Iowa – Adler Theatre
5 – South Bend, Ind. – Morris Performing Arts Center
6 – Grand Rapids, Mich. – DeVos Performance Hall
 

METALPRIEST

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John Mellencamp Working on New Album

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Now that his musical, ‘Ghost Brothers of Darkland County,’ is behind him, John Mellencamp is ready to get back to rocking. In a new interview, the songwriter says he’s written a massive amount of songs since 2010′s ‘No Better Than This.’

“I’ve got a notebook with 85 new songs that I’ve written for my next record,” he tells Rolling Stone. “T Bone Burnett is going to come out to Indiana sometime in early January and we’re gonna go into the studio for however long it takes to make a new album. I haven’t done one in five years.”

Mellencamp has already rehearsed a bunch of the songs with his band, and will try out some new ones later in the month. Once the new record is out, he hopes to mount an extensive North American tour, with him playing some different venues than he has done in the recent past.

“I want to play places I haven’t played since the 1980s. I want to go to Hays, Kan. and Youngstown, Ohio. In the 1990s I kept playing these same f—in’ sheds and arenas. It was a drag. I’d walk in and realize I’d been in the dressing room fifty times before.”

Even though the details of the record and tour are still undetermined, one thing is certain: the album will be produced by T-Bone Burnett, who worked with Mellencamp on his last three efforts, including ‘Ghost Brothers,’ “I never want to work with anyone else,” Mellencamp says. “At least, I want to work with him as long as he wants to work with me. He’s a minimalist. He was able to strip down all my songs. My ’90s records were almost paint-by-numbers. He came in and said to me, ‘You don’t need this part. You don’t need that part. Take out these background vocals…’”
 

TheSound

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Nice, and if T Bone Burnett is involved again like he was on the past couple of Mellencamp albums, it has every chance of sounding brilliant.
 

Ar-Pharazon

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I had an interesting video pop up in my youtube feed. A new John Mellencamp album is due in Jan.2022.

But this single/video features another 80's icon.

 

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