John Mayer is currently touring North America on "The Search For Everything" World Tour; and that's exactly what fans found Tuesday night at Bridgestone Arena - everything John Mayer.
Mayer hasn't been on a solo tour since 2014, when he started recording new material for his latest studio album of the same name.
The record dropped in April of this year, marking the singer/songwriter’s seventh studio album, and debuted at number two on the US Billboard charts.
Since the release of his debut 2001 album "Room For Squares," Mayer has carved out a special place in music history. Delicately walking a tightrope between pop sensation and bluesy rock guitarist, with even a dash of western folk artist for good measure, John Mayer has amassed a huge following, garnering recognition from even the great legends such as Eric Clapton, B.B. King, and The Grateful Dead.
Each of Mayer’s previous LPs have embodied very individualistic sounds, and his style has changed along with those sounds. With any artist as dynamic and versatile as Mayer, it's difficult to ever get a complete image of his artistic integrity through one performance in one moment of time. Before this tour the closest you could get to an experience like that was his "Where The Light Is" concert DVD, filed live in Los Angles in 2007.
So what makes this tour so unique? Just as can be experienced by watching “Where The Light Is,” fans along each stop of the tour are privy to a special setlist that features not just Mayer and the full band, but also acoustic and John Mayer Trio performances. Even more impressively, the setlist for each night features at least one song from each album in the Mayer catalogue, giving fans of each stage of his career an experience to relieve that particular era and sound.
Legendary drummer Steve Jordan and master bassist Pino Paladino joined Mayer onstage to reform the John Mayer Trio. Their energy onstage was unmatched. With only a bass, drums, and guitar, the three virtuosos continuously fed off each others’ talents creating an extremely powerful set of rock and blues. "It's almost mythical as a live act," says Mayer speaking of the Trio and its rareness on the live circuit.
In addition to the Trio set, the band performances, and the acoustic moments, Nashville also got to take in three covers – Tom Petty’s “Free Fallin’” Robert Johnson’s “Crossroads,” and “Gentle On My Mind,” by Glen Campbell. Mayer chose the Campbell tune to play homage to the country western legend who passed away Tuesday. Before starting the song he commented that he would “play this song with more love than precision.” In actuality he played with both an evident love and precision.
The twenty-one song set gave the packed house at Bridgestone a night to remember. Mayer’s vocals and guitar were spot on and he didn’t miss a beat throughout the entire night. The tour is continuing throughout the U.S. through September and then hits South America, finishing up in Santiago, Chile on October 31.