Rock icon gets candid and melancholic on latest
John Mellencamp’s blue-collar rock
'n' roll takes a somber turn on Life Death Love and Freedom,
his first album since 2007’s Freedom Road.
What a difference
one year can make. Tackling some of the same subjects that fueled
Freedom Road’s rousing sound, the fifty-six-year-old
Mellencamp now pitches his tent closer to home, writing
inward-looking songs that reflect his country’s troubles. “It
seems like once upon a time ago,” he sings on the opening track, “I
was where I was supposed to be.” The album proceeds accordingly,
with Mellencamp singing quiet, rusty-throated declarations like “I
know many, many people, but I ain’t got no friends” and “All I
got left is a head full of memories and a thought of my upcoming
death.”
Perhaps this melancholy seems a bit
forced, given the patriotic Chevrolet commercials that helped
Mellencamp revisit the Billboard singles charts in late 2006.
Yet the songwriter still sounds convincing, while producer T-Bone
Burnett churns up an appropriately sparse mix of acoustic guitars,
organ and upright bass. Only the neo-rockabilly shuffle of “My
Sweet Love” offers up any sort of optimism, and its follow-up
track—the ominous, swampy “If I Die Sudden”—quickly squashes
those cheery feelings.
Classic songs like “Pink Houses”
and “Jack and Diane” once married Mellencamp’s cynical lyrics
with big, radio-ready hooks, but Life Death Love and Freedom
takes a harsher approach to middle-aged Midwestern life. Blunt and
stubbornly engaging, it may be Mellencamp’s most candid effort in
years.