Published 2024-03-14 01.00
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full screenJohn Mayer has dreamed of doing a solo solo concert for two decades. Photo: Andreas Bardell
CONCERT When the god-sent guitarist with the soft voice stands alone on stage, there are no filters between him and the audience.
Perhaps the person John Mayer has never been more present.
John Mayer
Place: Tele2 Arena, Stockholm. Public: No task, but the mighty rectangle of the arena that is open is well filled. Length: Almost two hours. Best: ”Walt Grace’s submarine test, January 1967”. Worst: A couple of songs from the debut, “No such thing” and “Neon”, don’t work as well in stripped-down form.
Every time I accidentally forget John Mayer he appears in a context that is as surprising as it is logical. Most recently the TV series “The bear”, which so brilliantly set simmering San Marzano tomatoes and intimate smoke breaks with Refused, Sufjan Stevens and John Mayer in particular.
He comes to Tele2 Arena alone, with a solo tour that reaches Europe after a break of a couple of months. The entrance is discreet. Mayer sits down on the left edge of the dark stage. The camera captures him in blue light, as if through a half-closed blind. A fine-print brave opening that does not lack coverage. In Mayer’s case, the fireworks live in phrasing, in the way he moves from one note to another on the guitar.
And in the songs. The Connecticut artist is underrated in more ways than I can even think of right now, but one of the most overlooked sides is his songwriting. The blue-eyed soul ballads replace each other. He fills them with a spaciousness that shouldn’t be possible with just a voice and a guitar. The presence and dynamics are dazzling.
“Who says” reaches Harry Nilsson heights. “In your atmosphere” – a deep cut that Mayer never recorded in the studio because he wants to keep it in its proper, live element – is brilliant.
On “Born and raised” and “Paradise valley” Mayer downplayed his career into an idealized form of Americana in the footsteps of Neil Young and Bob Dylan. The tracks from those albums fit especially well tonight. The more campfires and Indian blankets the better. This culminates in a deeply heartfelt “Walt Grace’s submarine test, January 1967” performed to a spinning mother earth on the monitors.
Between the songs, the 46-year-old talks to the audience with American cross-confidence as well as open-heartedly and spontaneously. In a navy blue sweater, light jeans and suede boots, he is not only visually reminiscent of Jerry Seinfeld – he’s just as witty when he bandages his guitar thumb and talks about a guitarist’s fingers as something as fragile as an opera singer’s vocal cords.
He also wants to share an honest little story. He hasn’t been on stage for a while. And he has gotten used to being a person rather than the “star” John Mayer, whatever that means, he says. Before the concert in Stockholm, he suddenly gets nervous. How is he supposed to be able to go up on stage, maybe he’s forgotten how to do it?
– Don’t go up as a star, go up as a person, he says to himself there in the dressing room at Tele2 Arena.
After the confession, he plays the tender ballad “It shouldn’t matter but it does”, which, like almost all of Mayer’s best songs, revolves around the longing for true love, a fixed point, or the longing for a lost one.
Somewhere in here is the essence of John Mayer. Beautiful as day, god-sent singer and guitarist, but at the same time as insecure and broken as the rest of us.
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FACT
All the songs
1. Slow dancing in a burning room 2. Shot in the dark 3. Queen of California 4. It shouldn’t matter but it does 5. No such thing 6. Who says 7. Waitin’ on the day 8. Neon 9. In your atmosphere 10. You’re gonna live forever in me 11. Changing 12. Stop this train 13. The age of worry 14. Your body is a wonderland 15. In the blood 16. Walt Grace’s submarine test, January 1967 17. If I ever get around to living 18. Edge of desire Encore: 19. The heart of life 20. Free fallin’
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