Jenny Q: New Mellencamp Album Tells Story We Didn’t Know

Studio album #22 is out today, 10/28, for John Mellencamp. All these decades of K-UVin’ the Plain Spoken John and did any of us know that he barely made it past infancy to share his musical gifts? (Yes, it’s been more than thirty years since his moptop on American Fool… !) Just weeks ago he finally met the doctor, now 97, who performed a life-saving operation in 1951.

“He remembered it ’cause it was the first one they’d ever done,” Mellencamp said.

John had spina bifida, a birth defect that can allow the spinal cord to grow or extend outside of the body and, for most of his life, he knew little about the surgery he had as a newborn.

The hospital still has images of nine-day-old John Mellencamp and records of the procedure.

The new album’s lead-off single, “Troubled Man,” reflects on the challenges that started right at birth.