with degrees in English and Communications. Graduated from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore. He grew up, in order, in California, Arkansas, Kentucky and Oregon. He regularly covers the Oscars and the Emmys, goes to Comic-Con and Coachella, reviews pop music, and conducts interviews with authors and actors, musicians and directors, a little of this and a whole lot of that. Peter Larsen has been the Pop Culture Reporter for the Orange County Register since 2004, finally achieving the neat trick of getting paid to report and write about the stuff he's obsessed about pretty much all his life. “Movies also taught me how to smoke,” he added, but, since that wasn’t on grandma’s list, that probably won’t keep him from heaven. “And the characters seemed like people from the places I grew up.” “Movies of the past just seemed to tell stories that need to be told,” he said in the voice over that accompanied a clip of “Giant” stars James Dean and Elizabeth Taylor. Of the James Dean and Elizabeth Taylor film “Giant,” which premiered at the Chinese Theatre next door to the Dolby Theatre 67 years ago, Mellencamp said he’d taken inspiration for the kinds of people and lives led by folks in dusty, isolated places, towns like Seymour, Indiana, where he’d grown up watching these stories. The movies included Marlon Brando in “On The Waterfront,” “A Streetcar Named Desire” and “The Fugitive Kind,” Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe in “The Misfits,” and Paul Newman in “Hud.” “Rain On the Scarecrow,” a terrific heartland anthem, gave voice to the sentiments that led Mellencamp to co-found Farm Aid decades ago, and from there, the rest of the set rocked hard as more and more popular songs surfaced: “Lonely Ol’ Town,” “Crumblin’ Down” mixed with the Van Morrison-led Them’s “Gloria,” and “Pink Houses,” a big hit and a song that like many of his best examines the hard lives and struggling times of ordinary Americans.Īfter “Chasing Rainbows,” which included introductions for his terrific band, most of whom have played with Mellencamp for years, and one – guitarist Mike Wanchic – who’s been with him for more than 50 years – the night wrapped with a pair of sing-along classics, “Cherry Bomb” and “Hurts So Good.”īefore Mellencamp and the band arrived on the stage, the opening act, such as it was, arrived in the shape of 30 minutes of clips from classic films, chosen by Mellencamp who spoke about their importance to him over time. (There’s probably a fine for that, right?) The band returned for “I Always Lie to Strangers,” one of two tracks from his 2022 album “Strictly a One-Eyed Jack,” the tune arranged as a kind of cabaret blues number that delivered the today rare sight of a singer on stage smoking an actual cigarette. “Jack & Diane,” another of Mellencamp’s signature odes to small town life, was also done solo acoustic – with backing vocals by several of his young grandchildren, and eventually the entire theater on the a cappella break: “Oh, let it rock, let it roll, let the bible belt come and save my soul.” “Longest Day,” inspired by more of grandma’s wisdom – “You’re gonna find out real soon that life is short even in it’s longest days,” she told him once – added accordion and a second acoustic guitar to Mellencamp’s acoustic. (Turner Classic Movies is the sponsor of the Live and In Person Tour, the first time the cinema-loving Mellencamp has ever allowed corporate sponsorship.) Related Articles Four life-sized figures dressed as film stars such as Marlon Brando and Marilyn Monroe stood amid the musicians. The backdrop on stage was a French Quarter street scene drawn from the movie “A Streetcar Named Desire,” one of the classic movies from which scenes screened with Mellencamp’s commentary mixed in before the show started. The curtain raised on a show that spread 20 songs over two hours with Mellencamp and his six-piece band kicking off the roots-rock tune “John Cockers” before sliding into “Paper In Fire” and “Minutes To Memories,” popular album tracks from “Lonesome Jubilee” and “Scarecrow” respectively. And that’s true, whether the thoughts dealt with the human heart or the world in which we all live – one big community, as Mellencamp urged the audience to become. “We’re gonna maybe make you think about some things,” Mellencamp said at the close of “Small Town,” one of his signature hits, and the first song of the night to get the crowd up on their feet to dance and sing.
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