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Wednesday, September 28, 2005
John Mayer Trio
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Sept. 27 at the Tabernacle
By Phil Kloer pkloer@ajc.com
John Mayer’s true fans – more than just the ones who sing along to “Daughters� when it comes on the car radio – know that his hero has always been Hendrix. His love for blues and blues-rock guitar was established long before he parlayed his talent for breathy soft-rock into a huge career. So good for Mayer for having the guts to follow his bliss, re-invent himself and step down the ladder of commercial success from mega-selling, Grammy-wining lite-FM balladeer to fledgling bluesman.
The John Mayer Trio has only been out on the road for three weeks, and when they pulled into the Tabernacle for the first of two nights, the former Atlantan actually thanked the crowd for not walking out on his experiment in re-definition. Actually, most of the crowd seemed to just dig how much Mayer was digging his new musical self, the sheer joy he brought to his guitar licks and vocal tics.
The true blues can be a tough sell when you’re a good-looking, famous, rich guy. “Nobody loves me!� he lamented in the set opener, the standard “Every Day I Have the Blues,� which was shortly after the crowd had shrieked with open-throated ecstasy for his mere appearance onstage. But particularly when Mayer caressed his guitars, coaxing fluid runs and funky solos from them, you could tell he was, as he put it, “home in a lot of ways.�
The trio includes Pino Palladino on bass and Steve Jordan on drums, who serve nobly as pillars to support Mayer. The band covers a fair bit of both originals and standards, but only has two songs out (on iTunes): “Come When I Call� and “Who Did You Think I Was?� The latter, Mayer’s manifesto of image-switching, has a fat groove that wouldn’t be out of place coming from the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And nobody walks out on the Peppers, either.
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