Tracklist front / back album covers
"Paper in Fire" – 3:51
"Down and Out in Paradise" – 3:37
"Check It Out" – 4:19
"The Real Life" – 3:57
"Cherry Bomb" – 4:47
"We Are the People" – 4:17
"Empty Hands" – 3:43
"Hard Times for an Honest Man" – 3:27
"Hotdogs and Hamburgers" – 4:04
"Rooty Toot Toot" – 3:29
"Blues from the Front Porch" (2005 re-issue bonus track) – 2:02
John Mellencamp Band Members / Musicians
John Mellencamp – vocal, guitar
Kenny Aronoff – drums, percussion, backing vocals
Larry Crane – guitars, mandolin, harmonica, autoharp, banjo, backing vocals
John Cascella – accordion, keyboards, saxophone, melodica, penny whistle, claves
Lisa Germano – fiddle
Toby Myers – bass guitar, banjo, backing vocals
Pat Peterson – backing vocals, cowbell, tambourine
Crystal Taliefero – backing vocals
Mike Wanchic – guitars, dobro, banjo, dulcimer, backing vocals
The Lonesome Jubilee is the 9th studio album by American singer-songwriter John Mellencamp, credited as John Cougar Mellencamp. The album was released by Mercury Records on August 24, 1987. Four singles were released from the album, the first two in 1987 and the last two in 1988.
The album was one of Mellencamp's most successful worldwide, charting in ten countries. The album was most successful in Canada where it topped RPM magazine's Top Albums chart and became the artist's highest certified album by Music Canada (formerly the Canadian Recording Industry Association) becoming 6x platinum.
"We were on the road for a long time after Scarecrow, so we were together a lot as a band," Mellencamp said in a 1987 Creem Magazine feature. "For the first time ever, we talked about the record before we started. We had a very distinct vision of what should be happening here. At one point, The Lonesome Jubilee was supposed to be a double album, but at least 10 of the songs I'd written just didn't stick together with the idea and the sound we had in mind. So I just put those songs on a shelf, and cut it back down to a single record. Now, in the past, it was always 'Let's make it up as we go along' – and we did make some of The Lonesome Jubilee up as we went along. But we had a very clear idea of what we wanted it to sound like, even before it was written, right through to the day it was mastered."
