Backing Mellencamp were Larry Crane and Mike Wanchic ( guitars, backing vocals), Kenny Aronoff ( drums), George "Chocolate" Perry ( bass) and Dave Parman (backing vocals). The song was recorded at Cherokee Studios in Los Angeles, California and was engineered by Don Gehman and George Tutko. Then I went and picked up the guitar, and within seconds, I had those chords." We exchanged lines back and forth between each other and laughed about it at the time. In 2004, Mellencamp expounded on the writing of "Hurts So Good" in an interview with American Songwriter magazine: "George Green and I wrote that together. The song was first conceived, Mellencamp claims, when he had uttered the phrase "hurt so good.” Mellencamp repeated the lines to Green, and they finished the song very quickly. "Hurts So Good" was written by Mellencamp and George Green, Mellencamp's childhood friend and occasional writing partner. The song was also a critical success with Mellencamp, winning the Best Rock Vocal Performance, Male at the 25th Grammy Awards on February 23, 1983. The others were " Jack & Diane" and "Hand to Hold On To," which were all released in 1982. It was the first of three major hit singles from his 1982 album American Fool. The song was a number two hit on the Billboard Hot 100 for the singer/songwriter. " Hurts So Good" is a song by American singer-songwriter John Mellencamp, then performing under the stage name "John Cougar". Still going strong at 70 years old, Mellencamp is continuing that legacy today, writing songs, playing shows, making jokes, and loving all the good things that can come from them.Ĭheck out more coverage on John Mellencamp HERE.1982 single by John Cougar "Hurts So Good" With that, the decades-long legacy of John Mellencamp really began, taking the nation by storm and providing a crucial foundation for the genre of Heartland Rock. That winter, Mellencamp received his first Grammy nomination, thanks to his vocal performance on the song. 1 spot by Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger,” which was taking the world by storm at the same time. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, only being withheld from the coveted No. Then, they headed twenty miles southwest of Mellencamp’s hometown, Seymour, Indiana, to the small town Medora, Indiana, to film a rousing music video (it was ‘82-MTV was a year old).īy August of 1982, “Hurts So Good” peaked at No. Not too long after, Mellencamp got into Cherokee Studios in Los Angeles with drummer Kenny Aronoff, bassist George “Chocolate” Perry, and guitarists Larry Crane and Mike Wanchic, and the track was immortalized on tape. Then I went and picked up the guitar, and within seconds, I had those chords.” Speaking years later with American Songwriter’s Paul Zollo, he explained that he and Green “exchanged lines back and forth between each other, and laughed about it at the time. Herald-Examiner that the opening quote from this article came from.
“We thought of it as like a Shel Silverstein thing-it was really just a joke,” Mellencamp said in the same 1982 interview with The L.A. With the spark lit, the two immediately pounced on the idea. “I was still dripping wet when I got dressed, walked out of my bedroom, and said to my old songwriting friend George Green, ‘Hey! I just thought of a great chorus.’” “I literally dreamt up that song in the shower in my house in Bloomington,” Mellencamp wrote in the liner notes of The Best That I Could Do (1978-1988). Lord knows there are things we can do, babyĪll elements combined, “Hurts So Good” is an electrifying song, the kind that gets your toe tapping and your head bopping… which makes sense, considering that it was written in a truly jovial fashion by Mellencamp and one of his childhood friends and longtime collaborators, George Green. Now that I’m getting older, so much older With its opening backbeat, its blazing guitar riff, and Mellencamp’s emotive, gravely croon on the lyrics, the song is a brilliant, nostalgic expression of embracing life, regardless of its often-rough edges. By the next year, he was accepting the Grammy award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance, and the rest is rock’n’roll history.īut the spark that truly lit the John Mellencamp flame was a tune that, itself, started as a joke: his single, “Hurts So Good.” “Wasn’t God having a laugh when he made this whole place?”Īt the time, a then 30-year-old Mellencamp (who was using the name “John Cougar”) was at the onset of a very notable “good thing”-throughout that year, he released a string of now-iconic singles (including his signature hit, “Jack & Diane”), all supporting the release of his breakthrough album, American Fool. “I think all good things probably started as jokes,” John Mellencamp said back in 1982.