“Johnny Cougar was not going to amount to a hill of beans. But, son of a bitch, he’s still hanging around all these years later”: How John Mellencamp went from failed pop star to reluctant American icon

John Mellencamp posing for a photograph in 1980.

John Mellencamp is a great American icon. In 2014, the man who nicknamed himself Little Bastard looked back on a career of ups, down, breakthroughs, bust-ups, heart attacks and survival.

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