Album of the Day — June 20
John Cougar Mellencamp — Scarecrow
John Cougar Mellencamp — Scarecrow
21.June.2020
John Cougar Mellencamp
Scarecrow
1985
Love him or hate him, John Mellencamp has sold some 60+ million albums worldwide.
His other accomplishments include being a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame & the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, writing a musical with Stephen King and T Bone Burnett — Ghost Brothers of Darkland County — directing and starring in a feature-length movie — Falling from Grace — based on a script by Larry McMurty … oh, and he has a solid reputation as a painter … so, whether you like it or not — whether you want to admit it or not — John Mellencamp has secured his place as an artist of tremendous prestige and respect.
His road to success has been well documented as being bumpy and littered with poor career and business decisions. Yet he kept moving forward … with a tenacity that may or may not have contributed to his nickname of “Little Bastard” — I don’t know, I’m guessing.
Brief History
The “Reagan Revolution”, led by the egregiously flawed “trickle-down economics”, which promised that giving more money to the rich would then “trickle-down” to everyone else and economically “lift” all Americans. By 1985, it was in full swing … to the detriment of most Americans.
Simply put — the rich were getting richer and everyone else was getting fucked.
Greed was the name of the game in the ’80s, and the hard-working middle-class Midwesterners and farmers that were part of Mellencamp’s community were not invited to play the game.
The agricultural and farming crisis in the ’80s occurred a result of many things:
Record agriculture production that led to a fall in the price of commodities.
The 1980 grain embargo against the Soviet Union.
Farm debt for land and equipment purchased soared.
Land prices plummeted.
High-interest rates & high oil prices.
The Farm Credit System experienced its first losses since the Great Depression.
Living in Indiana, Mellencamp witnessed this anvil that was crushing the lives and dreams of his friends and family — John Cougar Mellencamp had a lot to say about that.
By the time he broke through to the mainstream with American Fool, Mellencamp (then known as John Cougar) was anything but a fool.
The follow-up, Uh-Huh (now known as John Cougar Mellencamp) built his commercial momentum and marked a noticeable artistic growth — with songs like “Pink Houses” and “Crumblin Down” Uh-Huh provided a peek in the direction he was headed as a songwriter.
After promoting that record, Mellencamp began rehearsing his long-time band for a month straight before popping into the studio with producer Don Gehman. Hunkered down in Mellencamp’s recording studio in Belmont Indiana, they emerged just over five weeks later with his career-defining Scarecrow.
He has said that it was on Scarecrow where he found his voice as a songwriter:
“I realized what I thought I wanted to say in song … I wanted it to be more akin to Tennessee Williams, John Steinbeck, Faulkner, as opposed to The Rolling Stones or Bob Dylan.”
A haughty claim to be sure, but consider the themes of William Faulkner: tradition, family, community, the land, history and the past, race, and the passions of ambition and love.
Those are the very themes on Scarecrow.
The title song “Scarecrow” opens the album and relays the plight of the American farmers and the crushing debt they were experiencing:
The crops we grew last summer weren’t enough to pay the loans
Couldn’t buy the seed to plant this spring and the farmers bank foreclosed
Called my old friend Schepman up to auction off the land
He said John it’s just my job and I hope you understand
Hey calling it your job ol’ hoss sure don’t make it right
But if you want me to I’ll say a prayer for your soul tonight
The song that would become one of Mellencamp's biggest hits (peaking at #6 on Billboards Hot 100), one of his signature songs and fan favorite, “Small Town”, is a song that’s as honest and earnest as the Midwest that John Mellencamp still calls home:
Well I was born in a small town
And I live in a small town
Probably die in a small town
Oh, those small communities
All my friends are so small town
My parents live in the same small town
My job is so small town
Provides little opportunity
Educated in a small town
Taught the fear of Jesus in a small town
Used to daydream in that small town
Another boring romantic that’s me
But I’ve seen it all in a small town
Had myself a ball in a small town
Married an L.A. doll and brought her to this small town
Now she’s small town just like me
No I cannot forget where it is that I come from
I cannot forget the people who love me
Yeah, I can be myself here in this small town
And people let me be just what I want to be
Got nothing against a big town
Still hayseed enough to say
Look who’s in the big town
But my bed is in a small town
Oh, and that’s good enough for me
Well I was born in a small town
And I can breathe in a small town
Gonna die in this small town
And that’s probably where they’ll bury me
Consider the present and past coming together on “Minutes to Memories”, co-written with Mellencamp’s childhood friend George Green:
On a Greyhound thirty miles beyond Jamestown
He saw the sunset on the Tennessee line
He looked at the young man who was riding beside him
He said I’m old kind of worn out inside
I worked my whole life in the steel mills of Gary
And my father before me I helped build this land
Now I’m seventy-seven and with God as my witness
I earned every dollar that passed through my hands
My family and friends are the best thing I’ve known
Through the eye of the needle I’ll carry them home
Chorus
Days turn to minutes
And minutes to memories
Life sweeps away the dreams
That we have planned
You are young and you are the future
So suck it up and tough it out
And be the best you can
The rain hit the old dog in the twilight’s last gleaming
He said “son it sounds like rattling old bones”
This highway is long but I know some that are longer
By sunup tomorrow I guess I’ll be home
Through the hills of Kentucky ‘cross the Ohio river
The old man kept talking ‘bout his life and his times
He fell asleep with his head against the window
He said an honest man’s pillow is his peace of mind
This world offers riches and riches will grow wings
I don’t take stock in those uncertain things
Chorus
The old man had a vision but it was hard for me to follow
I do things my way and I pay a high price
When I think back on the old man and the bus ride
Now that I’m older I can see he was right
The button at the end where it’s revealed that the narrator was Mellencamp himself is still a powerful hook. Getting older kinda sucks … getting more mature? Not so much.
It’s the double-whammy of “The Face of the Nation” and “Justice and Independence ‘85” and their incisive lyrics that highlight the growth of John Mellencamp as a songwriter.
The Face of the Nation
So many lonely people
Damn those broken dreams
Oh yes it could be better
You can say that about anything
Some got it worse than me
Some got it worse than you
You see the people starvin’ underneath the tree
And you wonder what happened to the golden rule
Justice and Independence ‘85
He was born on the fourth day of July
So his parents called him Independence Day
He married a girl named Justice who gave birth to a son called the Nation
And she walked away
Independence would daydream and he’d pretend
That some day him and Justice and Nation’d be together again
But Justice held up in a shotgun shack
Wouldn’t let nobody in
So a Nation cried…
Chorus:
Oh, Oh
When a Nation cries
His tears fall down like missiles from the skies
Justice look into Independence’s eyes
Can you make everything alright?
And can you keep your old Nation warm tonight?
Well, Nation grew up and got himself a big reputation
Couldn’t keep the boy at home, no no
He just kept running ‘round and around and around and around
Independence and Justice well they felt so ashamed
When the Nation fell down they argued who was to blame
And Nation if you’ll just come home we’ll have this family again
Oh, Nation don’t cry
Chorus
Roll a rock around the Country, yeah, yeah
Everybody come along
When you’re feelin’ down, yeah, yeah
Just sing this song, yeah, yeah
I’ve never understood that last verse either.
“R.O.C.K in the U.S.A” was a heartfelt call out to all the songs the band had rehearsed for a month before recording Scarecrow. It was also the most successful song off the album, peaking at #2 on Billboards Hot 100 — kept out of the #1 spot by Falco’s “Rock Me Amadeus”.
“Between ad Laugh and Tear” unearthed Rickie Lee Jones to duet with Mellencamp on a sweet song about growing up and the struggle to maintain happiness in a relationship:
It’s just your soul feelin’ a little downhearted
Sometimes life is too ridiculous to live
You count your friends all on one finger
I know it sounds crazy just the way that we live
Between a laugh and a tear
Smile in the mirror as you walk by
Between a laugh and a tear
And that’s as good as it can get for us
And there ain’t no reason to stop tryin’
The dramatic improvement in John Mellencamp’s music did not go unnoticed by critics.
Jimmy Guterman in his initial review in Rolling Stone wrote: “Scarecrow brings both Mellencamp’s Sixties-rock fixation and his fiercely patriotic distrust of big business and big politics into the muck of the modern world, with scintillating results.”
Stephen Thomas Erlewine at AllMusic said that Scarecrow was “filled with lean hooks and powerful, economical playing that make it one of the definitive blue-collar rock albums of the mid-’80s.”
The British weekly magazine Kerrang! gave it 5 out of 5 stars.
Farm Aid
Perennial rabble-rouser, Bob Dylan’s off the cuff comment at Live Aid in July of 1985 saying that he hoped some of the money raised would make its way to American farmers struck a chord in Mellencamp.
He partnered with Neil Young and Willie Nelson to create a one-off music live event, Farm Aid, to raise money to help assuage the American farming problem. With a heavy dose of optimism, the three artists created Farm Aid believing one event would be enough.
Farm Aid is now entering its 35th year, as is Scarecrow, as is the erosion of the American dream.
John Mellencamp’s legacy has been long secured … as has the legacy of Scarecrow — which marks the pivot point of the man as an artist.