The Ghosts of Darkland County
Posted: April 11, 2005, 14:45
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Once his mostly-Midwestern tour is done in mid-April, Mellencamp will be making a trip to a different center stage. For the past several years, he’s been collaborating with horror author Stephen King on a stage musical, “The Ghosts of Darkland County.”
Mellencamp has 17 songs
written for the show. King has a 110-page script penned.
Combine, he said, it should come out to be about a 5 1/2-hour show.
“No matter how damn entertaining you think Steve is or I am, that’s long,” he said with a laugh, realizing second and third drafts and edits are in order. “Steve and I are making this up as we go along. Neither of us have done anything like this before.”
Mellencamp’s written songs styles for the musical in styles ranging from jazz to blues to bluegrass to country to zydeco, many of which he thinks are out of character for him.
“I’m able to write songs that wouldn’t be expected of me if I put it on one of my records,” he said. “In a musical, it’s a whole different base, different situation. They aren’t rock songs, they aren’t pop songs.”
Thanks to Rocky Wood.
