John Mayer rolls out smart, sexy hits

BY ROSS RAIHALA
Pop Music Critic

It's pretty easy to figure out what Jessica Simpson — or any red-blooded female, for that matter — sees in John Mayer.

The 29-year-old singer/songwriter's Tuesday night gig at the Xcel Center wasn't so much a performance as it was a seduction. For 90 minutes, Mayer unfurled mid-tempo song after mid-tempo song, each drizzled with tastefully applied dollops of jazz and the blues.

Between numbers, the smart, snarky wit he displays in his extra-musical activities — from his blog to his stand-up comedy act — transformed typical concert speak into wry pillow talk.

Mayer is the aural equivalent of a collegiate fling, one with a fifth-year English lit major who wears ratty vintage clothes, smokes too much pot and can recite dozens of poems from memory (even if he can't hold down a job to save his life). Think of the kind of guy who can give you a single flower for Valentine's Day and make it seem like he was giving you the world.

Assuming there is a problem with John Mayer, that's it. He's just got that one flower. He's got one mood, one flavor and, really, one trick.

To be sure, it's one heck of a trick. More than 13,000 fans sat in rapt awe of the guy, and it was clear the bulk of them knew more than just the big hits (from "Your Body Is a Wonderland" to "Waiting on the World to Change").

Jessica Simpson was there, too. She's been traveling with Mayer on tour and spent Tuesday night perched next to the soundboard, in clear sight of everyone.

Given the sheer number of couples, it was clear the show was an early Valentine's Day date for a good chunk of the audience. And Mayer is canny enough to amp up the charm for the ladies, yet give the guys some meaty guitar solos to keep them happy, too — maybe even a bit too much during the meandering encore.

But divorced from all that gooey love — whether it was aimed toward Mayer, a date or both — the night started to feel really one-note. "I Don't Trust Myself (With Loving You)" was sexy. "Why Georgia" was thoughtful and sexy. "Your Body Is a Wonderland" was jammy and sexy. Mayer's introduction of "No Such Thing" with a snippet of Joe Jackson's "Steppin' Out" was a cute, and sexy, touch. And so on.

Mayer knows sexy. And maybe it's asking too much for the guy to step out of his comfort zone. Whatever the case, given his powerful magnetism, perhaps the real question of the night was what does he see in Jessica Simpson?

Stolen from here.