Sammy Hagar Red Rocker Blog: Sammy Meets Up With John For Rock & Roll Roadtrip
"Just filmed Rock 'n' roll road trip with John Mellencamp. One of my favorite interviews in my life. John is the real deal. It was really great, him and I hit it off even better than I expected.
I've always been a fan, I knew him and I could connect on some soulful level and we did. We played a song which is an old blues folksong called "Delia". No rehearsal or anything so it was raw, rough, and ready, but very cool song.
He's a fantastic artist/painter - he had a collection of work that I went through every piece and chose one called "Puppet". He insisted on giving it to me, but I am writing a check to Farm Aid or some other charity of his choice for the painting. It will be put up on display in my restaurants one month at a time before it goes in my home.
All I can say is John is the real deal, he's an uncompromising artist and has been for a long time and has good reason, heart, and soul behind it. I truly believe and hope we will be friends for a long time after today. I never got close to him before only met a couple times once at Farm Aid in '85 which we had a good laugh about my live shout out to 70,000+ in attendance "here's a song for all you tractor pullin motherfuckers". Ouch. It was on Live TV, live radio all over the country right before I played 55.
Hopefully John will invite me be back to Farm Aid next year and let me redeem myself. He's a good man. Very special show for sure." - Sammy