I just let the song go where it wants to go and say what it wants to say.” "When I was younger, I used to try to control my songs," he says. Mellencamp, whose past hits include “Jack and Diane,” “Pink Houses” and “Hurts So Good,” doesn't labor over songs like he used to. Many of the pool of 30 songs that were edited down to a dozen were written before the pandemic, but some were inspired by it, like “Driving in the Rain.” They come very quickly to him these days. And it ain’t me, but it’s observations and it’s gone through my filter.” “This album really is one guy speaking about himself and his life. “They just are sent to me and I am an open vessel,” he says. ![]() A voice in his head tells him to write them down, he says. “Strictly a One-Eyed Jack” - with a cover painted by one of his sons, Speck - may be a Mellencamp album, but he's mysterious about where the songs come from. I know that sounds clichéd, but it’s true.” “As you get older, you realize that you really don’t know much of anything. “If I laugh out loud once a day, I’ve had a good day,” the singer-songwriter says. Other songs include “Driving in the Rain,” a euphemism his grandfather used to warn a young Mellencamp when he was living dangerously, “Sweet Honey Brown,” a song about a life wasted by heroin and “Chasing Rainbows,” which is advice to recognize your blessings. You’re watching the news - I don’t care which side of the rope you swing on - you’re hearing lies,” he says. “You’re watching television, you’re watching false advertising. Mellencamp was inspired to write the song after finding out that the average person hears several hundred lies a day - and tells about 150 of their own. “Don’t think that happened by accident,” he says with a raspy laugh. It is Mellencamp’s 25th album - even he loses count, calling it is 27th at one point - and it's filled with world-weary truths, like the opening song “I Always Lie to Strangers.” It’s important to be sung because, ultimately, your takeaway from that song is you need to squeeze every bit of happiness and life out of every day and not waste days.” “Not many people would sing a song starting with that line.
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