John Mellencamp

John Mellencamp is the all-American small-town boy grown-up and his music reflects his life spent in the heartland: roots-rock, country and folk with garage rock sensibilities. His lyrics are frequently liberal and democratic and touch on issues such as racism, patriotism and the needs of farmers and small-town folk.

Mellencamp's sixth studio album American Fool (released as John Cougar) gave him his breakthrough, spawning two massive Top 10 hits -- "Hurts so Good" and "Jack and Diane" -- and launching Mellencamp into the spotlight. He followed that up with Uh-huh in 1983 and Scarecrow in 1985, between them producing the hit singles "Crumblin' Down", "Pink Houses", "R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A", "Lonely Ol' Night" and "Small Town". Together Uh-huh and Scarecrow are considered to be among the best American rock albums of the 80s and also Mellencamp's greatest works.

Mellencamp's music and social attitude has always been focused on small-town America and the blue-collar lifestyle, and all of his 20 studio albums have reflected this. In 1985 Mellencamp, along with Willie Nelson and Neil Young, organised the charity concert event Farm Aid, to help struggling farmers who were facing foreclosure and bankruptcy. The US Congress later passed the Agricultural Credit Act of 1987.

In 2007 he released Freedom's Road which debuted at No.5 on the Billboard 200 album chart and spawned the hit single "Our Country".