Freedom's Road

The first album of John Cougar Mellencamp’s songs for the last six years

Like it or not but the situations when rock heroes of past decades get almost invisible on the modern scene appear more and more frequently. However, these cases carry quite a natural character, very often performers chose their place on the background by them selves when they start releasing new songs that are really worth paying attention with extremely decreasing frequency. And actually, they have their rights to do so. After all, people have to rest, don’t they? But, sometimes the audience gets a bright and loud album that wakes the napping interest to one or another musician again. John Cougar Mellencamp who is still remembered for the success of his albums released in 80’s, has performed a deed of this very kind. His new album Freedom’s Road became not just the first release of his own songs for the last six years but that very record which is able to stand in one line with his best works. Freedom’s Road is a good old American rocker in the finest sense of the phrase, which features influences of many artists of early and subsequent periods of this reach genre.

Freedom’s Road appeals to a common American hard worker

John Cougar Mellencamp is not trying to invent something new, everything that his album presents goes simple and easy. Just like it was on many of his earlier records, the subject matter of his songs appeals to a common American hard worker and makes use of purely American terms like patriotism, freedom and so on. And though the album is somehow a collective image of rock music of the past, its sounding is made on a qualitative modern level. The opening track Someday demonstrates how fresh and life asserting simple songs may be. A deep juicy bass, a beautiful guitar works and catchy vocal melody accompanied by old-fashioned electro organ’s passages can’t let anyone stay indifferent to it. The following mid tempo track Ghost Town Along The Highway is having a completely different character. It features the power of bluesy basis and though the song sounds much lighter it caries an atmosphere of mystique romance. Of course there is a classic rock anthem – potential hit on the album, it is represented by the single Our Country, which in away reminds songs of Bruce Springsteen. Another worthy special attention song is Jim Crow where John Cougar Mellencamp is singing together with Joan Baez.

John Cougar Mellencamp wants his album to be heard by everyone

Despite that Freedom’s Road appeals to a common American with its most intimate essence, what in theory should provide the album with listener’s attention, John Cougar Mellencamp, bewaring of modern music market’s tendencies, enabled single Our Country in TV commentaries of football matches and advertisement thus letting large-scale corporations exploit the song at their will. And here lies a pretty dangerous moment for any rock performer. Apart from the fact that being in telecasting rotation since late September of 2006 this song became recognizable by every inhabitant of United States what made this album doomed to have good sales rates, a gesture of this kind carries a character, which is really close to a negative sense of a term “to sell out”. And this in its turn speaks about shaky condition of such music on the market, and there is nothing you can do about it, times nave changed. But after listening to the album it becomes clear why did Mellencamp have to deal with advertisement companies. He wanted his song to be heard by as many people as it possible only because of one simple reason: Freedom’s Road is his best album for the last 10 or maybe 15 years and Mellencamp just couldn’t let it stay unmentioned because of whims of music fashion.