John Mellencamp Shares Rare Insight into Relationship with Girlfriend Kristin Kehrberg: 'So Far, So Good' (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

John Mellencamp on ‘Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen’. ; Kristin Kehrberg attends the Patrick Demarchelier Exhibit Fashion Week kick off party on September 9, 2015 in New York City.Photo:Charles Sykes/Bravo/Getty  ; Mireya Acierto/FilmMagic

Charles Sykes/Bravo/Getty  ; Mireya Acierto/FilmMagic

John Mellencampis enjoying his time with girlfriendKristin Kehrberg.

The “Hurts So Good” rocker, 73, has been linked to Kehrberg since early 2023 and tells PEOPLE that he’s found a solid partner in the producer.

“We’ve been going together for a couple years, and that’s good for me. That’s good for me,” he says. “As lucky as I am, I’m not a day at the beach.”

When asked about the status of their relationship, he offers up a rundown: Kehrberg, 58, is an Iowa native who moved to New York after college, and was widowed in 2022 when she lost her husband, Richard “Dick” Tarlow. Mellencamppreviously revealedon Bill Maher’sClub Randompodcast that they met at a house party in New York City.

“So far, so good. Knock on wood,” he says. “We get along great. She’s been married, I’ve been married. You know, we’re adults, so you don’t have those kind of jealousy, young things.”

John Mellencamp during his statue ceremony in Bloomington, Indiana on Oct. 18.Jeremy Hogan/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty

Jeremy Hogan/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty

An art exhibition of oil portraits and multimedia pieces, titledCrossroads: The Paintings of John Mellencamp, is also on display at the IU Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art through Dec. 15.

Kehrberg helped the star celebrate his birthday earlier this month, he says, as the couple marked the occasion with a low-key get-together that also included his daughter and his friend and guitar tech Scooter Davis.

“It’s what I call living. You know what living is?” he says of enjoying his big day. “You get up when you want to, you eat when you want to. If you don’t want to do something, you don’t have to do it. You kick a can down the road. You whistle, you rock, you paint, you do whatever the f— you want, on your own time. That’s it. That’s living.”

John Mellencamp in 2022 at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction.Amy Sussman/WireImage

Mellencamp was previously married three times, most recently to modelElaine Irwin. They split in 2011, and he went on to dateChristie BrinkleyandMeg Ryan.He and Ryanended their engagementin 2019.

“I’ve only been really in love two and a half times, when I was older,” he told PEOPLE in 2022. “When you’re really in love with somebody, it’s like that Nat King Cole song: ‘A trip to the moon was on gossamer wings/Just one of those things.’”

On Maher’s podcast in 2023, Mellencamp joked it was “hard to believe” that he had a girlfriend, but said she has “a really high threshold for tolerance.”

“[We met] seven months ago and she has not left my side in seven months,” he said.

source: people.com