Like many Deadheads, I was skeptical when I
heard that John Mayer was going to the place holder of the legendary Jerry
Garcia for the Dead & Company tour this fall. ‘Your Body is a Wonderland,’
guy…really? But I shrugged it off and assumed that if the remaining members of
the Dead wanted him to play with them, he must be at least passable – after all,
I vaguely remembered hearing about Eric Clapton and BB King playing with him
too. I figured I’d simply watch some of the Dead & Company performances in
passing, as I had done with the Fare Thee Well shows.
My interest piqued when my sister and
brother-in-law returned from Dead & Company’s Madison Square Garden show
this past weekend extremely impressed, raving about how great a job Mayer did.
Their glowing reviews compelled me to check it out for myself. I quickly lost
myself in YouTube video after video, mesmerized by Mayer’s performance. His
ability to find the essence of every single song in both his playing and his
singing left me in awe.
Even my dad, one of the most crotchety, curmudgeonly
and dissident Deadheads that has ever lived, couldn’t believe his ears and also
spent hours watching Dead & Company perform. John Mayer is a musician I had
shrugged off many years ago as a poppy sell-out, admiring his looks and not
much else. But I’m beyond happy he proved me (and I suspect many others) wrong
about his level of talent and potential.
Mayer didn’t merely learn to emulate Garcia’s
style, he put his whole self into the songs and breathed new life into them. In
my eyes, Mayer has joined the ranks of the few glimmers of hope for the future
of music and has also showed me that a musician that once came from a place of commerciality
can break free and move to a place of
authenticity. It is truly a happy, hopeful day for Deadheads and for music in
general.
I have to agree with my dad, who, not
typically one for giving high praise, said “Garcia is smiling.”
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