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  • Random Thoughts On John Mayer

    I will warn you that there’s no real direction to this. Read at your own risk. It’s a bit of a hodge podge.

    My main man Money Mike should have a review up of John Mayer’s new album, Battle Studies pretty soon, but after watching John Mayer’s concert on Fuse and hearing Battle Studies a few times, I felt the need to put some thoughts out there about the man of the hour, the man with power, too sweet to be sour (word to Superstar Billy Graham).

    John Mayer's Battle Studies
    John Mayer’s Battle Studies
    – One of my favorite Twitterers, ToureX tweeted out that the John Mayer concert he was hosting was filled with females and noticed that Mayer isn’t necessarily a guy oozing machismo.
    He said:

    At a John Mayer concert filled with chicks. Guys think machimso wins girls but humble guys like Mayer drive em crazy.

    Is John Mayer humble? He seems kind of smug and smarmy to me. Money Mike calls him “douchey”. I wonder what girls think about the way he handles himself. If you’re female (or wish to be female, or have a female understanding, or simply like to wear pink), comment below. We guys might just be hating and maybe ToureX is on the money.

    – My friend Carletta tweeted out something pretty brilliant the other day.
    She said:

    I think Mayer has relationships only to have things to write songs about. Works for me.

    It does seem that young John likes to love them and leave them and then write about them and sing about them. Who’s next on his list? My money is on him stealing Scarlett Johansson away from Ryan Reynolds who then goes on a roid rage, only to take a guitar to the face. And then Johansson and Mayer leave to Barbados, happily ever after until he needs a new muse for some breakup songs. Works for Usher right?

    – Battle Studies is a pretty good record. It’s doesn’t come close to touching Continuum, which I have given “classic” status to, but there are some good songs on it. Mayer compares the dissolving of a relationship to a battle with lines like, “Red wine and ambien, you’re talking shit again, it’s heartbreak warfare,” in Heartbreak Warfare, and goes a little wacky on us with Who Says with my favorite line, “I don’t remember you lookin’ any better, but then again, I don’t remember you.”

    – I think he might have a hit record with Half Of My Heart if he recuts it with more of Taylor Swift on the hook. She is the it girl. And maybe have Kanye West come on and throw 16 on it. Hey, why not? He and Kanye have already worked together before. Check out Bittersweet.

    – Mayer in concert isn’t too interesting until he gets to go crazy on the guitar. He performed most of his hits, as well as certain songs from Continuum that Mayer fans adore like Gravity and Belief. But he didn’t perform my favorite Johnny Mayer track, which is the last cut on the album, I’m Gonna Find Another You.

    You might have your reasons, but you will never have my rhyme
    I’m gonna sing my way away from blue
    I’m gonna find another you

    – I also noticed that Mayer is way skinnier than you ever thought and that he has arms the size of pipe cleaners.

    – Lastly, in the last song on Battle Studies, Mayer talks about how you can only be friends or lovers with someone, and you can’t really have it both ways. In Friends, Lovers, Or Nothing he kind of shows his ass a bit. I’m proof that you can have a dual relationship after the fact, so maybe my main man Johnny Mayer needs to just be a bit nicer to Jessica and Jennifer and maybe they’ll stick around. But then again, he won’t have a muse for the heartbreaks and warfare.

  • First Look: Shakira

    Shakira is one of the more interesting characters in pop music today.

    Musically, she’s been all over the place. She started off on a sort of Alanis Morissette vibe, and then once she started singing in English, her music became more dance/pop oriented, but not really any more mainstream. “Hips Don’t Lie”, her song with Wyclef, was a huge hit, but it was still a bit odd compared to the majority of pop music out these days.

    Her new single “Give it Up to Me” represents her most obvious dalliance with mainstream pop so far. Featuring the production of Timbaland and the rapping talent (I say that unironically) of Lil Wayne, the song is focus-grouped to hit #1 on the charts. Which it probably won’t, because, frankly? It’s not that good a song. Wayne’s verse is credible, and the song is catchy enough, but there’s barely 2 verses in it and ultimately it just sounds lazy. The video is suitably odd, with Shakira dressed up as Lady Liberty and some bodacious choreography, but…I dunno. Something about the song leaves me a little unimpressed. It’s similar to the transformation Nelly Furtado made when she started working with Timbaland, only nowhere near as good.

    Sounds to me like her record company heard the album, didn’t hear anything they would consider a hit and had Shakira go back into the studio with the most obvious people they could find. Sigh. Some people never learn.

  • ClashBack: Soul Coughing

    In the mid-late Nineties, when “alternative” became mainstream, the term lost it’s meaning. Bands like Counting Crows, who were as traditional a rock band as there ever was, were all of a sudden “alternative”. Alternative to what? A term that was first used to describe bands that were off the beaten path turned into a catch-all for any act that wasn’t dance/pop. I was gonna add R&B and hip-hop to the mix of categories, but there was an “alternative” division of each of those genres as well.

    New York’s Soul Coughing was truly alternative. Led by Mike (then known as “M.”) Doughty, Soul Coughing invaded rock radio with a sound that dipped toes in genres ranging from jazz to hip-hop. They was definitely more cerebral than your average mainstream music, and although they were never huge, they do have a couple of tracks that would be easily recognizable to anyone that was watching MTV in the late Nineties, like “Circles” and “Super Bon Bon”, a live clip of which is included here.

    After the band imploded in 2000, Doughty began making solo recordings that explored a more traditional singer/songwriter approach while still being inspired by beat poetry and hip-hop. He’s also a respected author and blogger (you can catch him at mikedoughty.com). His latest album, “Sad Man Happy Man” was released about a month and a half ago, and I was very fortunate to be able to see him perform a week ago.

    This live clip isn’t the best quality, but it’s still enjoyable.