Fingers o' fire!

Last night I went to the John Mayer concert in Salt Lake City. First things first: he is AMAZING live. Seriously, watching him play the guitar just made my eyes widen and my jaw drop. The man's got talent, I don't care if you like his music or not. His fingers flew over those frets! No wonder he had to change guitars between every song...they probably got too hot! Ok, not really...

I guess I really began liking John Mayer the summer after high school. I didn't have any of his albums, but I appreciated the radio play he got, and I could sing along to his first tunes. When his second album was released a couple years after that, I splurged (hey, for a poor college student, it was a splurge!) and bought it. Loved it. Still do love it! I was also diving into the world of music videos (having moved into a place with cable), and "Bigger Than My Body" was so enthralling that every time it came on, I just had to stare at John. He is seriously hot in that video! (http://youtube.com/watch?v=ud_DW73ybFA)

But last night was not my first John Mayer concert experience. Last summer, I went with a group of friends and we traveled to Las Vegas to see John Mayer with Ben Folds. A stunning concert, truly. I love Ben Folds, however, his profanity grated me to the breaking point. Seriously, I'm not that sensitive when it comes to swearing, but his frequent use of the f-word really started making me uncomfortable. But I digress...this post is about John Mayer! Ok, so in Las Vegas, he played wonderfully and all, but the audience just didn't get into it. I think most everyone was drunk out of their minds, including John himself. I don't feel like I was jilted in the experience, but we were really far away from the stage and it was hard to get into it.

When the opportunity to get tickets for this year's SLC show arose, I jumped on it. My friend Lynne (who's a way more die hard fan than even me!) and I got online and tried to use our "fan club" status to our advantage in buying tickets. Our persistence paid off because we came away with 8th row seats. That's right, friends....EIGHTH ROW!!! And don't ask how much they cost...because it was worth it.

We got to USANA last night and about died from the heat. After melting in our seats for an hour and listening to some opening performances (Colbie Caillat isn't too bad, but not my favorite), the sun finally went down, I had gotten some ice cream, and we were set to listen to John Mayer. We were so close to the stage! I whipped out my camera and snapped some shots (see below). After the initial excitement wore off, I did start to get a little tired, but that's what you get when you work early (I know, I know!). And my tired-idity did not dampen my spirits entirely! At each new song, I was giddy and excited...and how could I not be? Lynne was jumping and dancing and was seriously a ball of enthusiasm. For good reason! This show compared to Vegas...well, there wasn't really a comparison. The crowd was much more energetic and John was quite lucid and excited about playing.

He played a good two-hour set, and I was pleased as punch. Ben even got into it and sang along with the songs he knew and didn't look at me strangely when I would gasp with pleasedness whenever a song I especially liked was begun. For the encore, I guess there was an online poll where people could vote for the song they wanted...Lynne voted for a George Harrison tune and was crossing her fingers he would play it. When John announced that that's what they'd be doing, she screamed and jumped. Oh fan-dom, how we love thee. :)



Here's a clip from my favorite song from his Continuum album...