[3] Mellencamp found success in the 1980s starting in 1982, with a string of Top 10 singles, including "Hurts So Good," "Jack & Diane," "Crumblin' Down," "Pink Houses," "Lonely Ol' Night," "Small Town," "R.O.C.K.

Mellencamp drew interest from Rod Stewart's manager, Billy Gaff, after parting ways with DeFries and was signed onto the small Riva Records label.

During the recording of Uh-Huh, Mellencamp's backing band settled on the lineup it retained for the next several albums: Kenny Aronoff on drums and percussion, Larry Crane and Mike Wanchic on guitars, Toby Myers on bass and John Cascella on keyboards.

According to the February 1986 edition of Creem Magazine, Mellencamp wanted to incorporate the sound of classic '60s rock into Scarecrow, and he gave his band close to a hundred old singles to learn "almost mathematically verbatim" prior to recording the album.

Within the context of what was still undeniably the sound of a rock & roll band, he began incorporating instruments more characteristic of folk and roots music—dulcimer, mandolin, fiddle, accordion, dobro, and pennywhistle, among them.

"Shortly after finishing Scarecrow, Mellencamp helped organize the first Farm Aid benefit concert with Willie Nelson and Neil Young in Champaign, Illinois on September 22, 1985.

As Frank DiGiacomo of Vanity Fair wrote in 2007, "The Lonesome Jubilee was the album in which Mellencamp defined his now signature sound: a rousing, crystalline mix of acoustic and electric guitars, Appalachian fiddle, and gospel-style backing vocals, anchored by a crisp, bare-knuckle drumbeat and completed by his own velveteen rasp.

[18] In his second painting exhibition, at the Churchman-Fehsenfeld Gallery in Indianapolis in 1990, Mellencamp's portraits were described as always having sad facial expressions and conveying "the same disillusionment found in his musical anthems about the nation's heartland and farm crisis.

Happy Go Lucky and a subsequent four-month tour from March to July 1997 to promote it, Mellencamp signed a four-album deal with Columbia Records, although he wound up making only three albums for the label.

Issued a day before his 47th birthday in 1998, his self-titled debut for Columbia Records included the singles "Your Life Is Now" and "I'm Not Running Anymore," along with standout album tracks such as "Eden Is Burning," "Miss Missy," "It All Comes True" and "Chance Meeting at the Tarantula".

In August 2000, Mellencamp played a series of unannounced free concerts in major cities on the East Coast and in the Midwest as a way of giving back to fans who had supported him the previous 24 years.

In October 2002, Mellencamp performed the Robert Johnson song "Stones in My Passway" at two benefit concerts for his friend, Billboard magazine editor-in-chief Timothy White, who died from a heart attack in 2002.

The album was a quickly recorded collection of folk and blues covers originally done by artists such as Robert Johnson, Son House, Lucinda Williams and Hoagy Carmichael.

Mellencamp sang "Our Country" to open Game 2 of the 2006 World Series, and the song was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award in the Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance category but lost to Bruce Springsteen's "Radio Nowhere."

USA Today wrote:"The musical high point in a night of many highlights was probably John Mellencamp's interpretation of 'Highway 61 Revisited;' with a vocal tone and timbre that channeled Tom Waits,' he made this usually scorching rocker into a blues dirge.

In contrast, Mellencamp wrote the music to "My Soul's Got Wings," giving life to a previously unheard lyric written by American folk singer Woody Guthrie.

[35] In addition to his work on Sad Clowns & Hillbillies, Mellencamp wrote the title song to the 2017 American war movie The Yellow Birds, which was released on June 15, 2018, by Saban Films.

[42] Springsteen himself provided additional details on his collaboration with Mellencamp on his Sirius XM radio station on June 10, 2021, saying: "I worked on three songs on John's album, and I spent some time in Indiana with him.

Green contributed lyrics to numerous Mellencamp radio hits and classic album tracks, including "Human Wheels," "Minutes to Memories," "Hurts So Good," "Crumblin' Down," "Rain on the Scarecrow," "Your Life is Now,", and "Key West Intermezzo," in addition to songs recorded by Barbra Streisand, Hall & Oates, Jude Cole, Ricky Skaggs, Sue Medley, The Oak Ridge Boys, Percy Sledge, and Carla Olson.

His songs document the joys and struggles of ordinary people seeking to make their way, and he has consistently brought the fresh air of common experience to the typically glamour-addled world of popular music.

… John has made fiddles, hammer dulcimers, Autoharps (sic) and accordions [into] lead rock instruments on a par with electric guitar, bass, and drums, and he also brought what he calls 'a raw Appalachian' lyrical outlook to his songs.

[70] Mellencamp has made several forays into acting over the years, appearing in four films: Falling from Grace (which he also directed) (1992), Madison (2005, narration only), After Image (2001), and Lone Star State of Mind (2002).

In 1980, Mellencamp turned down the lead role in the movie The Idolmaker because, as he told the Toledo Blade in 1983, "I was afraid that if I made too much money, I'd have no motivation to make records anymore."

"[71] Mellencamp wrote the score for the Meg Ryan movie Ithaca, which premiered on October 23, 2015, at the Middleburg Film Festival in Virginia and was released in theaters and on-demand by Momentum Pictures on September 9, 2016.

"Sugar Hill Mountain" is a fiddle-driven folk song that describes an idyllic location where there are "bubble gum and cigarette trees," no clocks, every day is spring, and anything you need is "gratis."

Meanwhile, the piano-heavy "Seeing You Around" has the sound of a 1940s standard (the movie takes place during World War II) and is made all the more authentically '40s-sounding by Redbone's gruff baritone vocals.

The soundtrack includes Rosanne Cash, Sheryl Crow, Elvis Costello, Taj Mahal, Ryan Bingham, Will Dailey and Neko Case among others singing the songs Mellencamp wrote.

The question is whether or not he can bring himself to tell the truth in time to save his own troubled sons and whether the ghosts left behind by an act of violence will help him – or tear the McCandless family apart forever.Ghost Brothers of Darkland County received mixed reviews upon its initial run in Atlanta.

Mellencamp's publicist, Bob Merlis, noted to the Associated Press: If [McCain is] such a true conservative, why [is he] playing songs that have a very populist pro-labor message written by a guy who would find no argument if you characterized him as an ardent leftist?

"[105] Mellencamp had a minor heart attack after a show at Jones Beach in New York on August 8, 1994, which eventually forced him to cancel the last few weeks of his Dance Naked tour.