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Broadway is a very different kind of place. It's kind of like Nashville in that there's a certain amount of people that are involved, and those people are what run it.
John Mellencamp
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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.
John Mellencamp
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In so many musicals today, the story is moved forward by a song. I don't think we're gonna try to do that.
John Mellencamp
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I'm the guy who wrote The Authority Song. Did they think I was kidding? Did they think it was only a song to entertain?
John Mellencamp
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Do I think it's OK to fight authority as long as you're only talking about the high school teacher? No.
John Mellencamp
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I want my paintings to look like they were found in a garage. If they get a scratch or a hole in them, it just becomes part of the painting.
John Mellencamp
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Regret should be handled swiftly, and you shouldn't hold onto it. People spend their entire lives regretting what they didn't do and what they should've done. Hey, man, you did what you did.
John Mellencamp
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What's the difference? One guy's the same as the other.
John Mellencamp
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I used to think that eating healthy was ordering a fish sandwich at McDonalds.
John Mellencamp
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All I'm doing is painting. It's my hobby. And that's that.
John Mellencamp
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It's my responsibility as a singer-songwriter to report the news.
John Mellencamp
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Everything I see and hear... I will take ideas from anyplace, anywhere, anytime, and life has become a song to me. I'm always looking for a song.
John Mellencamp
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My grandmother made sure that I went to church every Sunday. And she'd come over and pick us boys up, and we would go to the Nazarene church. And back then, that was about as close to heaven as I ever got, because just the time to be able to spend with her, and she was very, very religious.
John Mellencamp
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Sound quality was supposed to be one of the big selling points for CDs but, as we know, it wasn't very good at all. It was just another con, a get-rich-quick scheme, a monumental hoax perpetrated on the music consuming public.
John Mellencamp
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I'm using my art to comment on what I see. You don't have to agree with it.
John Mellencamp
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There are a lot of actors who try to get records made and try to make record deals, and everybody goes, 'Ugh.' It used to be expected in the entertainment business. I mean look at Sinatra, Bing Crosby. All these guys started out as singers.
John Mellencamp
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Unemployment is sky-rocketing; deflation is in our future for the first time since the Great Depression. I don't care whose fault it is, it's the truth.
John Mellencamp
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I'm your average Joe guy. I don't really care for politicians.
John Mellencamp
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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.
John Mellencamp
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I have to say when a man lives for himself, it's hard to live with him. That's pretty much the story of all my divorces. I've been making records since I was 22 and done things my way, and it's hard for me to compromise. And of course, to have a successful relationship, one has to compromise. Sometimes I'm not good at it.
John Mellencamp
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A lot of Woody Guthrie's songs were taken from other songs. He would rework the melody and lyrics, and all of a sudden it was a Woody Guthrie song.
John Mellencamp
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When politicians use fear, they are playing into the enemy's hand.
John Mellencamp
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I've seen beautiful art on the sides of buildings. I've seen beautiful art in museums. I've seen beautiful art in galleries. Beautiful art is everywhere.
John Mellencamp
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For me to pretend I'm the keeper of the small town mentality or that's all I'm interested in is wrong.
John Mellencamp
