* * * * <i> Great Balls of Fire</i> * * * <i> Good Vibrations</i> * * <i> Maybe Baby</i> * <i> Running on Empty : </i> : MELLENCAMP: PROTESTER IN HEARTLAND

* * 1/2 “THE LONESOME JUBILEE.” John Cougar Mellencamp. PolyGram.

If the rumors are true that Bruce Springsteen brought in some country-flavored instrumentation for his upcoming release, then this is one instance where John Cougar Mellencamp--rival for the hearts and minds of the common folk of America--has actually beat him to the punch.

Though Mellencamp’s recent folk-rock compositional sense hasn’t changed a whit, and the chief motifs are still a heartily strummed acoustic guitar and popping snare drum, “The Lonesome Jubilee” has violin and accordion running constantly throughout the proceedings, and even a bit of dobro, banjo and dulcimer here and there as well.

If that sounds a little too white, well, throw in a couple of female singers who sound like they’ve been hanging out with the circa-’70s Rolling Stones (and who only occasionally wail too soulfully), and you’ve got what is easily Mellencamp’s most terrific-sounding record ever. The title of the lead-off track and single, “Paper in Fire,” isn’t misleading; at times, the record fairly smolders.

But , Mellencamp is a man on a mission, and his odyssey of American surveillance is far from purely musical. He wants to string together as many anecdotes about economic-cum-spiritual oppression as possible. It’s as if for every Reagan story about someone out there in the heartland enjoying the dawning of a New America, Mellencamp made up a quick couplet presenting an opposing view--and then he stuck them all on this album.

There are about 16 characters delineated over the course of 10 songs, and none of them seems to have a job. Which is fine, except all of them are stock thumbnail sketches of the unemployed and down-and-out, and none of them comes to life within the song. They’re loser icons, used just long enough to impress a point, just like the President’s winner icons.

Mellencamp is one of the rare rockers whose themes reach for mass empathy and not focused self-pity, but he might make more interesting music if he spent less time looking for Joe Workingman and more time examining his own heart.

He’s a protest singer who can’t really find anything external to protest, and rarely does it seem to occur to him that the Grail-like New Deal that seems so out of reach might be inside the people he writes about, or inside him. The best protest singers protest against themselves , but with the exception of a few lines here and there, John Cougar Mellencamp doesn’t even seem to exist as a character amid all the other anecdotal Americans he’s summoned into existence.