A Musical Mystery: John Mayer

All indicators point to the fact that John Mayer is someone I should totally love. He's a guitar player, which increases a fellah's hottness factor by at least 78%, in my opinion. He's got the lugubrious good looks of Lancelot du Lac (at least how I would picture LdL). He's got a beautiful voice and heaps of charisma.

I like the sound of his music, though I'm not familiar with his entire discography. Some of his album titles appeal to me: Inside Wants Out, Room for Squares, Any Given Thursday, Continuum. His voice appeals to me very much. I like the tone and its expressiveness.

So why don't I own all of his albums?



Exhibit A: Daughters

The first time I heard this song, I was wandering around Best Buy with my daughters. We were looking at DVD's or something and it was momentarily quiet enough that I could hear the music playing through the store's sound system. I turned my head slightly to listen carefully to the appealing lilts of the guitar and the soulful and sincere sound of his voice.

Having been an instrumental musician for most of my life, I've developed the habit of hearing the voice as another instrument and, usually, I don't take in the words. Not that lyrics have not gotten through to me before, but on first hearing of any song, I am overwhelmed by the notes and really have to concentrate if I want to hear what the singer is trying to say. Usually, pop singers don't have much to say, in my opinion, so I don't waste a lot of time trying to suss meaning out of songs such as "Oops, I Did It Again." For example, I watched the entirity of last season's American Idol, where they did a sending off video for each contestent who left the show each week and that video, without fail featured the song, "So you've had a bad day". That means I heard that song at least once a week for two months and, when it came on the radio this morning, I could only sing along to "So you've had a bad day..."; the rest was all "la la la la". This is the case, even with songs I genuinely like and with lyrics that speak to me.

So, for a few moments, in Best Buy, I really enjoyed listening to John Mayer's music and I was about to start my search for this gifted artist's album, until the song made its way to the chorus and the words were made manifest in my mind. This is what I heard:

Fathers be good to your daughters;

Daughters will love like you do, yeah.

Girls become lovers who turn into mothers,

So mothers be good to your daughters, too.

Boys you can break,

You find out how much they can take.

Boys will be strong, and boys soldier on,

But boys would be gone without warmth

From a woman's good, good heart

On behalf of every man, looking out for every girl,

You are the god, and the weight of her world.

On behalf of every man whose looking out for every girl,

You are the god, and the weight of her world.

Fathers be good to your daughters,

Daughters will love like you do, yeah.

Girls become lovers who turn into mothers,

So mothers be good to your daughters, too.

So mothers be good to your daughters, too.

It's not that I don't agree with the sentiment here, but come on! Who died and made you Captain Wisdom? I was immediately turned off and disgusted. Musically, this song was so up my alley. Then he had to shit all over it with his Circle of Life fucking philosophy of child-rearing. I mean, couldn't he have used the music for this song and put in lyrics that weren't so holier than thou? Why not sing about flowers or something abstract. Jesus.

Perhaps it is ageism on my part. If Willie Nelson were singing this song, I don't think I would have had such a visceral reaction to it. Willie would give it a perspective of wisdom earned over a long life of observing human nature and hard living. But from such a youngster as JM, it feels like a sermon given by a college freshman who just finished his first psych class.

However, no matter who said it, it still begs the question: Aren't people supposed to be good to their daughters? I mean, that was my plan. But I wasn't going to be good to them so that they could "become lovers who turn into mothers". I mean, I'd like them to be mothers some day, after they finish school, college, and see the world. I'm not training them so that sleepy-eyed junior philosphers can take them as lovers and turn them into mothers. Keep your hands of my, daughters, Jack!

Ahem.

It never fails, though, when this song comes on the air, I am lulled into its trance. And then, as if I'd stepped on a rake, I'm slammed in the head with the unwarrented advice of Junior here and I feel betrayed anew. Stop making such nice music with such preachy lyrics, John Mayer. Either that or stop preaching and start scatting.