John Cougar Mellencamp
Life, Death, Love and Freedom

There are records made to last.

Records that get stuck in your CD player and never come out.

Records increasingly rare that delve into the past with the aim of making true music, connected to the roots, still relevant.

"Life Death Love And Freedom" belongs to this category. Skilfully produced by the great T-Bone Burnett, this remarkable work is yet another demonstration of style offered by an artist miraculously more and more inspired, who hasn't missed a beat in recent years. An artist, John Mellencamp, who has always traveled against the tide, offering the music he enjoys most and completely ignoring what his record label or the printed press thinks.

"Life Death Love and Freedom" is not an easy album and decisively deviates from the previous successful "Freedom's Road". In fact, listening to it closely, one realizes how this album is the inevitable continuation of "Trouble No More", the splendid album of blues and folk covers that in 2003 brought Mellencamp back to his usual artistic standards. A work, "Trouble No More", resulting from in-depth research into the immense songbook of the American musical tradition, during which John Mellencamp brought to light songs from the obscurity of the past, letting new generations discover tracks written in the thirties and forties that spoke, coincidentally, of life, death, love, and freedom. A record that courageously went back in time to look at the roots of current music.

"Life Death Love And Freedom" is composed entirely of original pieces. All highly successful pieces that in T-Bone Burnett's hands take on the contours of simplicity and spontaneity. Tracks that in the former Cougar's intention aim to be modern folk and electric blues songs. This album, "Life Death Love And Freedom", is by no means instantaneous, to be savored gradually, and it must be listened to with extreme attention before being judged. An album that is reflective, introspective, deep, and measured in which Mellencamp prefers to lower the tone to highlight his narrative voice.

This is what happens in the opening "Longest Day", the most folk episode of the album, in the desolate "Young Without Lovers" or in the splendid "For the Children" where the duet between John and the talented Karen Fairchild offers moments of pure poetry. "Life Death Love And Freedom" is an album with a strong character and a personality all its own. A character that comes to light in the electric blues of "If I Die Sudden", reminiscent of Dylan's "In My Time Of Dyin'", in the decisive "Trouble Land", in the teasing "Jena" and in the direct "County Fair". Tracks driven by the guitar of an Andy York in a state of grace and increasingly emblematic of Little Bastard's sound. A sound that in a couple of tracks still manages to surprise us thanks to an always lucid writing ability that doesn’t lack inspiration.

"My Sweet Love" is influenced by the fifties and closely resembles Buddy Holly's style, while the delicate and romantic "A Ride Back Home" is an enchanting ballad suspended between the past and the present. It is not an easy John Mellencamp that emerges in "Life Death Love And Freedom". On the contrary, the final impression is that of a musician at times challenging, in the full awareness of his artistic maturity. An artist who is not interested in sales numbers, charts, or cheap promotion. John Mellencamp cares only about the quality of good music, and "Life Death Love and Freedom" certainly does not lack this quality.