I thought he didn't want to be no pop singer

One of the many that stunk after he peaked with "Darkness On The Edge Of Town."

 

Springsteen peaked? Wow, when did he even get off the ground?

 

Read my post, did I say anything it being GOP propoganda? I merely saw a tidbit about the 1984 election and added to it. I'm with you on this -- there's no party lines here, just slices of Americana presented to sell cars.

 

The Mellencamp commercials suck, I hate how he's sold out.

Worse? The Wrangler commercials from a few years back that totally bastardized CCR's Fortunate Son because it has the line, "I was born to wave the flag." It ran complete with patriotic imagery, cynically ignoring the fact that CCR's song was anti-propangandist, anti-brainless patriotism, anti-everything that ad stood for.

Though I'm sure John Fogerty likes jeans.

 

Yes, the commercials suck, AND I'VE SEEN THEM 500 TIMES TODAY!!!!!!

 

I think "Fortunate Son" is the greatest song John Fogerty ever wrote. I read that he wrote it on the same day he got his discharge from the U.S. Army.

 

The talented Seth Stevenson agrees: Those Chevy ads blow goats.

http://www.slate.com/id/2151143

 

In Fogerty's defense - I don't think he owns the rights to his own songs. He probably had nothing to do with it.

 

You think he's dead?

 

I'm not sure where Fogerty's rights to his songbook stand now. As you probably know, Chris, it was subject to one of the longest, nastiest lawsuits in musical history, between JCF and Fantasy Records, headed by Saul Zaentz. (Hence the JCF song, "Zanz Can't Dance.") The wrangle was at the bottom of that bizarre suit in which JCF was accused of plagiarizing from himself on "The Old Man Down The Road." My guess is that he owns them now, since he's playing them all again after saying he never would as long as Zaentz owned them, but whether JCF owned them when Fortunate Son turned up on the jeans commercial, I have no idea.
And J. Cougar Melonball is a hack.

 

When you think about it, the lyrics of "Fortunate Son" only protest that he "ain't no millionaire's son." I don't recall him ever singing or saying that he didn't want to be a millionaire.

Given the choice between "artistic integrity" and $$$$$, I'm taking $$$$$ every time.

 

F_B, you say this all the time, and you could not be more wrong. The commercials are a sellout, as were the ones with "Now More Than Ever" playing last football seasons. But shit, the Stones were doing Rice Krispies radio jingles in 1963. They seemed to keep their artistic integrity intact (at least for a while).

I understand that there is a whole "Midwesterners are red-state rubes" vibe going on here, but for Christ's sake, a hack doesn't write "Minutes to Memories." A hack doesn't write "We Are the People." A hack doesn't write "Love and Happiness." Or "Pink Houses." Or "Human Wheels." Giggle about it all you guys want while you bow to the Strokes and all the other East Coast bands-of-the-moment, but John Mellencamp's music hits home with a whole of people in this part of the country for all the right reasons. We are different here, yes. But we're not simple in the way you guys think of it, and Mellencamp has always spoken to that.

You know, I watch shows like "The Daily Show" where they have a bit about how nobody knows which one is Iowa, which one is Illinois and which one is Indiana, and everyone just laughs and laughs and laughs. Meanwhile, there are just as many people over here who couldn't pick Vermont and Delaware and New Hampshire out of lineups, either. But a lot of the Easties wouldn't understand that.

You guys laugh about Reagan wanting to use "Pink Houses" to campaign on, but the Democrats in this country have let the heartland get away from them because they've let guys like Reagan and GWB appropriate the vibe of Heartland workingman's heroes like John Mellencamp. You laugh because you think they're simple and beneath you. The conservatives laugh all the way to office while all of us cry all the way to the unemployment line.

Amy I being far too heavy-handed about a perceived slight of a mere music artist? Oh, sure. But I feel passionate about his work and what he (usually) represents.