John Mellencamp - Dark As A Dungeon Lyrics

very gooooood !!!

John Mellencamp has easily inherited the Woody Guthrie mantle -- even more so than Dylan and Springsteen. His voice is totally Americana, filled intensely with soil and wind, mud and whiskey. Not a hint of commercialism. John Hartford and Pete Seeger would have been proud. He should do an album with Emmylou Harris and Dolly Parton with Garth Hudson (The Band). This is superb.

I can see him and more him than him in his little "me john" complexion. who cares, right? Bless him.

Love this song

Me too love good song

Cool.👍

Mr. Mellenkamp I are a Fan from your Beginning. Great that comes a new Album. Greetings from The Netherlands. Good luck.

Describing the hard work of coal miners: "Dark as of a Dungeon". This is a great interpretation of John Cougar Mellencamp!

Wow - chills. Didn't know Mellencamp had it in him! Perfect choice for this song. Now to watch the documentary. https://www.fromtheashesfilm.com/: From the Ashes is available for purchase on iTunes, Amazon and GooglePlay, as well as on DVD.

Dark as a Dungeon (Merle Travis) - Folkarchive.de
www.folkarchive.de/darkas.html
DOWNLOAD AND LISTEN TO AN EXCERPT OF MERLE TRAVIS' SONG (REAL AUDIO FORMAT, 67 ... I parked my car under a street light and wrote the verses to "Dark As A Dungeon." I got the idea from growing ... Lyrics as recorded by Merle Travis on Aug 8, 1946, Hollywoood, CA, originally released as Capitol 48001.

Aw, DAMN!! My boy John done lost his voice!! Crap!! Too many cigarettes, i guess. It sux, though, bc i love his old music SO much! He was always 1 of my faves.

"Lost his voice"? I hear it an it sounds fine. Maybe you lost your pretty on the inside, try eatin some makeup.

so bad..

Who told him this hair was a good idea? Nothing worse than a mature person trying to look young. He's a good looking man, he doesn't need to try to look younger.

briarrose29, I don't think he's "trying to look younger." I think his hair has always looked like that. And there's a lot of things "worse" than how someone's hair looks.

Catherine S. Todd...not sure why you are so offended but maybe you are his hairstylist? If so, you should have done your research before over exaggerating his pompedour. His style has NOT always been like that. He's had mullets and long hair too. In recent decades, a similar style, maybe, but not so high off his head and so gray. I'm sorry, but it looks like he's trying too hard to stay young, and my point was that he should embrace his maturity! Many of us change hair styles as we age, as recommended by a good stylist! Second, it was a form of expression for me to say "nothing worse..." It wasn't meant to be taken literally, but somehow that got under your skin. So, allow me to rephrase. It's a shame when a older man tries to look young, especially when he's so handsome and he doesn't need to. It's the exact same advice I have given my own father. I doubt Mr. Mellencamp would be so sensitive about it.

Love it!

thank you for making still making me thinks

This is the very best rendition of this song ever! I have always been a big fan of your music, but you really nailed this one! The 'videography' (is that a word?) is perfect as well. Having based my livelihood on the coal industry for 35 years, it really hits home. And now it seems the world is changing again...and this way of life is endangered even more than the inherent dangers of the job.

Rogue Warrior https://youtu.be/qkgDRgpWAks

Good tunes

John > Johnny

AWESOME!! Extremely well done by John. Shows John's enormous talent to adapt to his material. Absolutely best version!

John, stay out of the mines.  The darkness will consume you.

God bless coal miners.

A wonderful rendition by JCM. From the Ashes was spooky in its truth. As a geologist, I can say fossil fuels are causing increasing harm as population (and use) increases exponentially. Collateral damage is immense; I have seen it during my decades in the oil fields.

John Jelks stop spreading your ignorant lies! Global warming has nothing to do with fossil fuels.

Ryan Rasmussen did you watch the documentary, coal troll?

Ryan Rasmussen By now you see that trump can not reopen the coal mines.
You got royally conned.

Thanks, John Jelks. I reported that ignorant Rasmussen and hope his comment stays gone!

You're so full of it, John! You really do need to stop with the fear mongering. You should also stop lying about being a geologist, fakes are very easy to spot and you made it even easier by just calling yourself a "geologist".

This song is wonderful and I could listen to it all day. "Dark as a Dungeon" was written in 1946 when we had possibly 700,000 miners producing possibly 500 million tons of coal per year. This was truly dangerous work then and many miners were killed each year. I remember in my home state of Illinois around 1949 several hundred miners were killed just before Christmas in Centralia, Illinois. Not a happy Christmas in that state that year.

Mining today is far safer due to vast improved technology. One tenth the number of miners used for greater production. Don't let this song be used to shut down mines today.

james rust, the mines will be shut down as renewable energy comes to the forefront, as it should and has it has in many other developed countries. Coal miners can and should be retrained and we should not be destroying our environment for an energy source that causes so much damage. The sun shines EVERYWHERE (except the coal mines!) and is FREE. Think SOLAR.

so does Johnny Cougar support Coal or Solar energy?

... I feel kinda dumb now thinking that this was a Johnny Cash penned song, but hey, still sounds epic!

Great work to both artists!

Sunday blessings!  Today is the day ... God is with you!  What one man can do, another can do!

Nicely done, but I like Willie Nelson's cover of it better. It's a great melody.

John look for John Cowan doing this ...

Hey Trump!  You listening?  JCM for the working class!

Tildenberry Tracks Trump tax cuts for the working class. Not Pelosi-Schumer tax and regulation increases

Sorry we can't all make a living singing protest songs. I am sure Johnny uses his fair share of electricity. Nice use of old coal powered factories...great propaganda. Mellencamp is throwing middle Americans under the bus to make his own bucks.

No, but don't demean someone else's job and livelihood.

You are way off base, Ronald. Merle Travis, who wrote "Dark As A Dungeon", came from a family of coal miners in Muhlenberg County, Kentucky. He wasn't demeaning miners when he wrote the song; and Mellencamp's cover version isn't meant to demean miners either.

The songs written in the 1960s, when coal mining was a more dangerous and not under assault as a source of energy, is a very different than being a coal miner 60 years later. It may not have been viewed as demeaning then....but wait to today's National Geographic releases this program and you will see who is off base in his assumptions.

Horse shit. Trump, W Bush and his gang of war Criminals, the Republic Party have done that good and proper.

Ever heard of Upper Big Branch mine explosion-2010 -29 miners died that day because the owner decided not to follow the rules of safety YOU extoll......and how many have been hurt and the like since 1960.

You talk a bunch of noise about how this is a protest song which is A LIE...this song is NOT a lie. It is a salute and a reminder of the risk that STILL exists and as others have pointed it was written BEFORE the 1960s'......you could look that up yourself rather than talk trash

Love your music Rock on.

That was fricken awesome!! Thumbs up John Mellencamp. You've reawakened the spirit of folk with your truly excellent cover of this Merle Travis song; "Dark as a Dungeon". This is a must share with my network and new addition to the Best music of 2017 & Best Folk music of 2010 to 2019 playlists.