John Mellencamp Quotes

Back in the '80s and '90s, when there was still a record business, there was pressure on anyone who was fortunate to have a few hits on a major label to continue that success.

You have to reinvent yourself.

Take 'Jack and Diane.' I was so disgusted with people thinking the line 'Hold on to sixteen as long as you can' meant to stay a teenager forever. What I meant was keep doing whatever makes you feel alive.

Growing up leads to growing old and then to dying And dying to me don't sound like all that much fun

My thought was I should try to stick with names that people may recognize like Robert Johnson, Son House, and Hoagy Carmichael, so if somebody cared to research, they would find a wealth of material.

Nobody wants to make great albums now because nobody wants to buy them and there's no place to sell them.

Mama, why do I always fall for the crazy ones?

they say life goes on long after the thrill of living

Be careful of those who kill in Jesus' name; he don't believe in killing at all.

I know a lot of funny people in a lot of funny places.

You know, it's cigarettes that killed Jerry Garcia. Everyone thinks it's heroin, but it wasn't. It was cigarettes.

I'm wide open and will entertain anything anybody has to say, but if it's MTV and radio, well, they're great things, but can't be the only thing. I don't know that it would work even for the Beatles.

Country sure has changed in the last 10 years. It was one thing, then it was another. Country has slowly marched toward a rock beat and rock preservation. Country artists of today. Man! That's how I used to sound in the '80s.

Now I do have a choice, and I'm not going to do anything I don't want to do.

Grandma's on the front porch with a Bible in her hand, sometimes I hear her singing take me to the promised land.

Some people say I'm obnoxious and lazy, that I'm uneducated, that my opinion means nothing, but I know I'm a real good dancer.

Future generations, riding on the highways that we built, I hope they have a better understanding.

I think the Internet is the most dangerous thing invented since the atomic bomb.

You shouldn't even be in a band if you can't play Buddy Holly's Not Fade Away.

Give me someone I can look up to, show me someone I can love.

Want me to spend the night? Hey lover boy, you know I will, and my best girlfriend lives down the road, together we will thrill you.

Nobody heard anything ahead of time.

Go to work and be a Hollywood stud, drive your four wheel drive right into the mud.

I remember the first time I saw a CD, a technology guy brought one to my house and said we will be able to sell millions and millions of players, and people will have to restock their record collections. It was all about money. It was all about how much money we would make, "we" being "him."

This is serious business, sex, violence, and rock and roll.

I just think if the song's good, sing it. I don't care who's doing it. I don't care if it's a country act. I don't care if it's a rock act. If the song's good, sing it.

There's a young man in a T-shirt listening to a rock and roll station. He's got greasy hair, greasy smile, he says, Lord this must be my destination.

If Woody Guthrie set the bar for American songwriters, Bob Dylan jumped right over it. No one I know will ever come close to possessing the beauty of melody and the use of language that Dylan shares with us, with ease.

Turning music into digital was just a con, a record-company con.

We lost our way a long time ago with technology. Just because something is an advancement by going digital - that was a huge (expletive) mistake. It was a way for people to make money, but it sure didn't improve sound or quality of record making. It made it faster, cheaper, but it isn't as durable.