Five Thoughts After Seeing Jason Mraz OMG You Guys
1) Mraz is an incredible performer. I knew to expect the scatting, mezzo-soprano opera, and entertaining dancing. I was not prepared for him to lie on the frickin’ stage with his head on the floor while playing a guitar riff.
2) The Grooveline Horns are absolutely amazing, as well. The synchronized dance they do is such a little thing, but it makes a trio of amazing musicians into a seriously awesome backup group. I am also impressed/amused/happy beyond belief that he tours with a drummer, a percussionist, AND a bongo/everything ever player. The range of styles and sounds possible when you have that many different musicians playing that many different instruments is exactly why people like Mraz, and like BNL, are my favourites.
3) In a lot of ways, Mraz really is the David Tennant of modern pop-rock. I have long associated Ten with Mraz’s music, but it goes deeper than that, and deeper even than the fact that they both have unbelievable amounts of positive, giddy energy and stamina. I kept thinking of Tennant’s Hamlet while watching Mraz run in place while singing and playing. It's also not just because James Marsters was the last celebrity I watched on a too-far-to-see-him-quite-properly stage that am CERTAIN that, had he spoken as long as Marsters did, I would have gotten just as much of a “beautiful” buzz off of him…and I very nearly did just from the couple of things he DID say (and from this thing I just found). (I’m gonna go ahead and say he counts as a Ja. Mars., btw. And we all know that Ja. Mars.es are the best kinds of Mars.es.)
4) It was kind of a strange choice for a large, outdoor festival to play only one of his singles*; a handful of album cuts, almost all from from We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things**; and a bunch of new material that has not yet been released. Don’t misunderstand - I LOVE that he did it this way, just…I feel like outdoor festivals are usually more about the time-tested crowd-pleasers that everyone can sing along to. Of course, this being a jazz festival, it fit in well with the local jazz groups no one really knew anything about, beyond the fact that they were talented and pretty awesome.
5) “Butterfly” will never not be an awkward song for me. If a movie is made about my life, that song will be the soundtrack cue that things are about to be really uncomfortable, in the way that drawn-out minor chords always precede danger. But, hey, at least the memory that now springs to mind the second I hear the opening horn line - my fairly intense desire to glomp Mraz and dance with abandon withering in the knowledge that he would soon be singing, “Climb into my mouth, now,” while my dad stood right there, oh jeeze, this is not good - has made the previous Memory of Awkward pretty much a non-issue. So, thanks for that?
* “I’m Yours,” natch.
** “Dynamo of Volition,” “Coyotes,” “Make It Mine,” “No Stopping Us” (with scatted bits of “Live High” and either “The Boy’s Gone” or “Sleep All Day” - I can’t remember which - in the extended bridge), “Butterfly,” and “Lucky.”