Seriously though, my 15-minute of famous chitchat with the up-and-coming pop blues musician was extraordinarily, well, ordinary. It was as if I were talking to a friend I had known for quite a while. John Mayer put me at ease the second he started answering my first question (as I was queasy all over before the interview…nervous excited, anxious, freaking out).
Actually, he let out a big yawn before anything…and promised that it wasn’t about me boring him! He had just gotten up in his part of the globe as I was ready to go to bed in mine.
So here it is…my little chat with John Mayer about how he views his music. (Not to mention everyone else’s.)
Are you ready for your big concert tonight in front of your Cleveland fans?
Definitely. I really enjoy playing outdoors. It’s like playing with the wind…
A bit different from playing for packed clubs back in Atlanta when you started up..
No question about it. But I think I prefer bigger crowds now. It’s way easier.
Going back earlier still, I think it’s been said enough that you started fiddling with your guitar at 13. You couldn’t have been that adept with the blues then. I’m around your age, and the ‘in’ thing was ROCK. You didn’t favor the genre?
Oh, I listened to lots of Rock! Motley Crue, Extreme…
You liked Extreme?! I only appreciated one of their songs…
Yeah, and we probably liked the same one, too.
"More Than Words"?
Exactly! [Laughs]. Then I was turned on by a neighbor to Stevie Ray Vaughn and…he just amazed me. I never heard anything close to it before. And I knew I’d like anything that sounded just like it.
So Stevie Ray Vaughn was that ‘imaginary’ friend who was a huge influence growing up?
Yeah, he’s definitely the biggest one. But I had many ‘imaginary’ friends. Phil Collins, Michael Jackson, Billy Joel, Bonnie Raitt…
I heard you were really into Bonnie Raitt. How curious. Isn’t she mighty country?
Actually, she’s a great blues musician. When she plays…her voice just wrecks me! There’s this one song called "I Can’t Make You Love Me"...have you ever heard it?
Not that I can recall…
Okay, I’m giving you some homework. Head on over to a record store and look it upâ€â€Bonnie Raitt’s "I Can’t Make You Love Me". It’s amazing.
I’ll definitely do that. Let’s talk about your music. It seems to revolve around your pure love for the craft. And there is a great resurgence of that whole ‘me, myself, and my guitar’ genre…none of that clever ‘big boobs’ or ‘washboard abs’ packaging. Would you consider yourself ‘anti-establishment’?
Not at all. Artists like Britney Spears and boy bandsâ€â€it’s about performance talent. Nothing wrong with that. I think the responsibility lies in listening to yourself, doing what your heart tells you, and staying true to it. I’m not standing as an iconoclast. My music is not meant to replace anyone. I mean, I think there’s room for everyone.
Much as I would have loved to continue chatting with the guy, his manager beeped in and announced, "Alright, Lexi from the Philippines, you’ve got three minutes to wrap things up with John." I still had so many questions lined up!
As for juicy bits of our conversation, I promised him I’d keep it off the record…
Just teasing! Of course I tried to ask him about his love life. Silly me, expecting him to give meâ€â€a random writer from a country millions of miles awayâ€â€an honest glimpse into his personal relationships. I would have kept mum just the same.
If there is indeed a God out there, please let it be true that he’s single as he said…not just to increase his marketability to young, stupid chicks like myself.
And if he is, in fact, heavily involvedâ€â€let it not be with that poor-excuse-of-a-singer, couldn’t-act-if-her-life-depended-on-it, silicon-infested Jennifer Love Hewitt!
Then again, that’s just me being bitter. I guess I should be satisfied with my brief encounter with the wonder that is John Mayer.