Sorry about the delay, the show was awesome! I'll post a little more detail when I get a chance :D

Here's a review from a local paper:



Guitar hero, pop star merge
Energetic John Mayer holds Blossom fans in palm of his hand

By Malcolm X Abram
Beacon Journal popular music writer


Published on Saturday, Jul 19, 2008


When singer/songwriter/guitarist John Mayer played Blossom in 2004, he seemed to be a conflicted artist. Between songs he kept ripping off searing guitar licks, stopping himself, then returning to his groovy, adult alternative pop tunes as if afraid to alienate the folks who just wanted to be told their body was a wonderland. Eventually, his inner guitar hero escaped and he played an off-the-cuff and credible take on Jimi Hendrix's Voodoo Child (Slight Return).

Since then Mayer has given that persona plenty of room to breathe, particularly on Try!, his 2005 live trio album with drummer Steve Jordan and bassist Pino Palladino, and his recent multiformat live album, Where the Light Is.

In 2008, the pop star and the guitar hero have successfully merged. Thursday night at Blossom, in front of a large, multigenerational, multicultural crowd, he channeled both sides of his artistic nature, and with his stage charisma and enthusiasm he held fans in the palms of his fretboard-fondling hands for nearly two hours.

Mayer's set lists are usually similar in content (with a few surprises thrown in) but wildly variant in sequence. At Blossom, sporting a tank top that showed off his tattooed arms, he opened the set upbeat and funky with the bluesy riff of Good Love Is on the Way, quickly followed by Bigger Than My Body.

Fronting a septet that featured two horn players, former Pretenders guitarist Robbie McIntosh and singer/songwriter/ex-Follow for Now frontman David Ryan Harris, Mayer was a nonstop ball of energy, and his many guitar solos invoked the styles of Stevie Ray Vaughan, Robert Cray and some Eddie Van Halen pyrotechnics. The crowd gave its energy right back to him by singing along and shimmying in the seats.

For listeners who find the grooves on Mayer's studio albums to be a bit too mannered, in concert,everything is cranked up to 11 (well, maybe more like 91/2). The laid-back Jack Johnson-like beat of Belief actually became funky, and the band turned Vultures into a funk jam with Mayer whistling harmony to his own guitar solo and dropping in a couple verses of Marvin Gaye's Inner City Blues (Makes Me Wanna Holler). He also extended his R&B ballad Gravity with the best, most tasteful and lengthy slow-building solo of the evening and a monologue on the power of love.

While Mayer is no longer shy about his love of leaning way back, scrunching up his face and wailing on his Stratocaster, he still appeared a bit surprised that his audience will pretty much allow him any and all musical indulgences.

''Let me tell you why you're so great,'' he said to the audience after a slow, 12-bar blues take of the classic Ain't Nobody's Business If I Do featuring a flashy solo, filled with tremolo bar theatrics. ''People talk about the death of pop culture, but I just played you guys one of the oldest R&B songs there is. Thanks for letting me do that.''

He peppered the set with other covers,including an acoustic Free Fallin' (yep, it was a sing-along) and dropped in bits of Daryl Hall's Every Time You Go Away and Peter Gabriel's Sledgehammer.

Mayer also is apparently comfortable enough as pop star/guitar hero to delete from his set a few of his breakthrough hits, including Daughters and the musical mash note Your Body Is a Wonderland, but the crowd didn't seem to mind.

If Mayer ever decides to bring that energy and spontaneity to his studio albums, he might work his way out of the (multiplatinum) mellow ghetto his detractors place him in alongside Jack Johnson and Dave Matthews.

But though Mayer is very much a 21st-century, hyper-self-aware pop star (like his Fall Out Boy buddy Pete Wentz) and has referred to himself as ''insufferable,'' he seems to have a pretty good handle on his music and career.

Opener Colbie Caillat should be spending her summer on the side of the stage watching Mayer work an audience each night, because while the Bubbly singer/songwriter's tunes from her debut album Coco are pleasant enough and she sang them well, her stage presence is lacking, a fact to which even she made reference. Singer/songwriter/Brett Dennan also performed.

Blossom is a great venue, and John always seems to give a little extra whenever he's here. I don't know if it's the venue, or Cleveland's reputation as a rock 'n roll city, but it was an incredible show, John was just so full of energy that night! It was 1 hour and 54 amazing minutes, and I really hope someone recorded it (nothing has shown up yet, but someone at msm said not to give up hope).

Setlist:
Good Love is On the Way
Bigger Than My Body
I Don't Trust Myself (With Loving You)
Belief
Stop This Train
Slow Dancing in a Burning Room
Free Falling
Waiting on the World to Change
Ain't Nobody's Bizness If I Do
Why Georgia
Vultures/Makes Me Want To Holler
Gravity

Encore:
Something Missing/Every Time You Go Away
Get Out My/Sledgehammer
Say

Highlights for me were Vultures (I just love this song, and John and the band made it into a really cool jam session); and Sledgehammer, a fun surprise in the encore, really bluesy and awesome sounding! Didn't go shirtless like he did for you, Tracy, but those arms, wow! :P
Plenty of dancing and banter too, seems like the banter was missing at my last couple John shows.

A bat landed on one of the speaker boxes, freaking out the girls in the front row during Stop this Train. That distraction kind of ruined the moment for me, but it was kinda funny watching them. I did wonder if something was wrong with DRH, or his parents, because John hugged him right before, and again right after Stop This Train, and I guess he was crying.

I was happy to find quite a few youtube videos, so I can relive the best moments! I have some good pics which I will eventually show you, but they aren't on the computer yet.

Here's the Vultures jam:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWbFMejjwB4

Sledgehammer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oun3yKye6B0

Love speech:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4kBLbp_o_M

And speech before WOTWTC about making a "Super Today", instead of just the same day over and over on repeat:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=433k41Q1lNA

Wow Lauri, it sounds like an awesome show...I'm sure someone taped!

What is it with John and the wildlife? You get a bat, I get a groundhog!!

I LOVE Everytime You Go Away! It must have been amazing coupled with Something's Missing!

And Makes Me Wanna Holler? Wow! Fun times...reminds me of the tour with M5!

I'm sorry you didn't get the Semi Monty..(Shirtless)....but those arms sure make up for it! Can you say big guns????? lol

I got your email, I'll respond asap.
:D

ETA: Sledghammer. :o Wow. I'd like to have THIS show as well!!!!

I guess the wild animals know good music when they hear it! John is like the pied piper lol

The covers he's doing this tour are great, I knew you'd love Everytime You Go Away :)

Uploaded some of my pics today:
http://s177.photobucket.com/albums/w221/la...-17-08/?start=0

Lauri, those are amazing! You put me to shame!

:D

They were all taken by Tim so I can't take credit, and I guess it's a pretty good camera...we got a new one since the last concert.

If you'd like an mp3 of Sledgehammer, there's a sendspace link at MSM in the Cuyahoga thread :)

Ooooo thanks, I'll head over there and check it out! :P