I was never a big John Cougar Mellencamp fan back in the day, and I’m not likely to become one now — when I get nostalgic for The Early 80s I Never Had, I’m more likely to listen to Elvis Costello, or Art of Noise, or the Go-Betweens, or something. If I was going to start listening to Mellencamp I’d have to work my way up through Creedence and Bruce Springsteen first.

But regardless, I like quite a lot of what he has to say in this interview with Salon. For instance:

You’ve always been pretty upfront about the fact that you were playing this game to be on Top-40 radio, to have hits. Meaning if you're going to put time into a project, you might as well have as many people hear it as possible.

You’re right. I always said there’s no reason to make these records if nobody’s going to hear them. What’s the point, unless you can do something positive with the song, or entertain people? These things are too hard to make, they take too long, they cost too much money and there’s no reason to make them unless the record company is going to support you and try to sell the fucking thing.

Arguably he contradicts himself a little later in the interview, but still — file off the serial numbers, and he could be talking about any art form you like, from architecture to winemaking. That’s a pretty serviceable credo for any of them.