Songfacts®:

• Like many John Mellencamp songs, "Check It Out" takes a look at the arc of life and what makes it worth living. His superpower is being able to express these deep thoughts with an understanding of what it's like to be part of the proletariat - it's easy to live life to the fullest when you're rich, harder when you have kids and a mortgage.
  
  The song acknowledges how we all have a story to tell, and wonders if anyone will ever hear it. The opening line sets the stage:
  
  A million young poets screaming out their words
  To a world full of people just living to be heard
  
  Near the end of the song, after a lyrical look at rites of passage like talking to girls, getting married and raising a family, he returns to that same thought:
  
  A million young poets screaming out their words
  Maybe someday those words will be heard
• Mellencamp has explained many of his songs, but he seems to want "Check It Out" to speak for itself. It's one of his most popular live songs, especially in large venues, and he presents it as a very hopeful, positive song. Maybe those future generations will have a better understanding after all.
• You might need to put on earbuds to hear it, but there's a percussive plucking sound that plays throughout the song. That's a hammer dulcimer played by Mellencamp's drummer Kenny Aronoff.
• "Check It Out" was the third single from The Lonesome Jubilee, John Mellencamp's ninth album, following "Paper In Fire" and "Cherry Bomb." Mellencamp was very pleased with the album, which was largely written while he was touring for his previous album, Scarecrow. He used the same musicians to tour and record, so they were a very tight unit.
• "Check It Out" is heavy on accordion, played by John Cassella, and fiddle, played by Lisa Germano. Like many songs on The Lonesome Jubilee album, it has a rootsy musical feel encased in a modern production.
• The music video is all live footage from Mellencamp's concert at Market Square Arena in Indianapolis on December 11, 1987. Born and raised in Indiana, shows in his home state have always been particularly energetic, and that comes through in the video. A lot of the footage was show after the show - fans were allowed to stay for the shoot as a kind of post-encore, and most of them did.
  
  Before the show, Mellencamp shot a video for "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus," which he recorded for the charity compilation A Very Special Christmas.