Mohnny Jayer

After an afternoon of getting re-obsessed with John Mayer, getting my fingertips painfully reacquainted with their guitar string calluses, I've finally figured out why John Mayer is great.

It's because he's not. Great. He's actually a pretty big oaf, thinks much too highly of himself, and makes this last characteristic way too easy to see during his interviews. At least in the interviews that I watched when he was first getting big; when I was first getting obsessed with him, on the cusp of adoring fan-dom but never quite freeeeeee-fallen. I can't speak for any developments on this front because I stopped looking after that first off-putting bit. At least in me, he lost one avid youtube video watcher of his Him-related-internet-things, from the very beginning.

But I've realized that John Mayer is an artist I will keep getting re- re- re-obsessed with throughout my life (albeit from that distance of "Slightly Disgusted"), because he is an incredible singer-songwriter-guitarist making art about dickishly ended relationships; a pompous, ego-maniacal brat of a man crooning so expertly into his mic usually with a hideously contorted facial expression that makes your eyes hurt while his voice pampers your ears so movingly -- it's all goosebumpsland in the most confusing way. You want to love the man while also punching some of his values.

He sings about love in the best combinations of words, but picks the most confusing girlfriends. He is a genius lyricist who writes cringe-worthily perfect lines about weakness. A broken genius, who shows you  all his genius, brokeny insides. Which sounds like a good thing, and something that all artists always say they're doing, making art out of darkness, but this guy's level of honesty about his brokenness makes me embarrassed; kinda like asking your parents about their sex life or...that other ingenious example I was going to use but immediately forgot because the mere mention of asking parents about sex life was so distractingly disturbing. Despite his artsy tendencies I don't think he was a popular kid in high school and never managed to not care about that. And Battle Studies keeps asking "Who says I can't get stoned" and insisting that he is only "perfectly lonely." And though comparing love to a military conflict isn't the freshest metaphor ever, these songs - and his honesty they carry - make me cringe in a genuine and original way.

But probably, all this is just an outdated rant about a man who has amended the contemptible ways of his youth, whose virtuous progress I never really witnessed because I stopped watching youtube videos of his interviews so early on in his career.

But then again, maybe not.

~98% of videos related to him force you to endure through an advertisement, which means people will endure through an advertisement to watch them. As I've been doing all evening long, spending the nighttime chunk of my last full day of winter break writing this indecisive, lopsidey post about this genius-freak.

"No Such Thing"

"Welcome to the real world", she said to me
Condescendingly
Take a seat
Take your life
Plot it out in black and white
Well I never lived the dreams of the prom kings
And the drama queens
I'd like to think the best of me
Is still hiding
Up my sleeve

They love to tell you
Stay inside the lines
But something's better
On the other side

I wanna run through the halls of my high school
I wanna scream at the
Top of my lungs
I just found out there's no such thing as the real world
Just a lie you've got to rise above

So the good boys and girls take the so called right track
Faded white hats
Grabbing credits
Maybe transfers
They read all the books but they can't find the answers
And all of our parents
They're getting older
I wonder if they've wished for anything better
While in their memories
Tiny tragedies

They love to tell you
Stay inside the lines
But something's better
On the other side

I wanna run through the halls of my high school
I wanna scream at the
Top of my lungs
I just found out there's no such thing as the real world
Just a lie you got to rise above

I am invincible
As long as I'm alive

I wanna run through the halls of my high school
I wanna scream at the
Top of my lungs
I just found out there's no such thing as the real world
Just a lie you've got to rise above

I just can't wait til my 10 year reunion
I'm gonna bust down the double doors
And when I stand on these tables before you
You will know what all this time was for

"Stop This Train"

No I'm not color blind
I know the world is black and white
Try to keep an open mind but...
I just can't sleep on this tonight
Stop this train I want to get off and go home again
I can't take the speed it's moving in
I know I can't
But honestly won't someone stop this train

Don't know how else to say it, don't want to see my parents go
One generation's length away
From fighting life out on my own

Stop this train
I want to get off and go home again
I can't take the speed it's moving in
I know I can't but honestly won't someone stop this train

So scared of getting older
I'm only good at being young
So I play the numbers game to find away to say that life has just begun
Had a talk with my old man
Said help me understand
He said turn 68, you'll renegotiate
Don't stop this train
Don't for a minute change the place you're in
Don't think I couldn't ever understand
I tried my hand
John, honestly we'll never stop this train

See once in a while when it's good
It'll feel like it should
And they're all still around
And you're still safe and sound
And you don't miss a thing
'til you cry when you're driving away in the dark.

Singing stop this train I want to get off and go home again
I can't take this speed it's moving in
I know I can't
Cause now I see I'll never stop this train