You can’t get much further from small-town America than the pee-scented streets of San Francisco. But there I was on Wednesday, standing at the corner of Market and Montgomery, when John (née Cougar) Mellencamp‘s “Jack & Diane” came blasting out of a passing car.

Like Mellencamp, I was born and raised in Indiana (though in my case, ridiculously close to Chicago, even if my family rarely ventured into the city), so his tale of two American kids doing the best they can always hit close to home. (I did have to swap Dairy Queen for Tastee-Freez, though.) While I felt a geographical kinship with the singer-songwriter, “Jack & Diane” connected with fans across the country, handing the Heartland rocker the biggest hit of his career. This very week in 1982, the song began a 4-week run at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. “Jack & Diane” was the second single off Mellencamp’s American Fool, which simultaneously hit #1 over on the Billboard 200 albums chart.

As I’m sure is true for many, “Jack & Diane” always transports me right back to the kid I was that summer (the song had begun its climb in July). But even years removed from that time and place, with no Tastee-Freez or shady trees in sight, hearing “Jack & Diane” playing at the tail-end of California’s heat wave didn’t feel completely out of context.

The now-quaint music video for “Jack & Diane” was directed by Bruce Gowers, known for Queen’s classic “Bohemian Rhapsody” clip. The director’s resume is quite long today, filled with many television programs, awards shows, and live music specials, including all of the performance episodes of American Idol to date.

Mellencamp credits Foreigner’s Mick Ronson, Mark Ronson‘s stepdad, for making “Jack & Diane” memorable. The song has been sampled for, mentioned in, and served as the inspiration for other artists’ songs, including Jessica Simpson, LFO, and Kenny Chesney. And after years of requests, Mellencamp finally relented and wrote another song featuring his famous couple, 1998’s “Eden Is Burning.”

And proving that the roads one takes in life can be surprising indeed, for a few months in college I interned at a recording studio co-owned by one of Mellencamp’s longtime associates, guitarist/producer Mike Wanchic. I never did have the chance to meet John and tell him how much his music meant to me, but life goes on.

Purchase John Mellencamp – “Jack and Diane” via iTunes, Amazon MP3.