Our Mraz sent this photo in to help out the site’s collection of school laser photos. I had one. Did you?
I clearly remember thinking how cool the pink and blue lights made me look. I was so hip, so modern, so 80s.
Visit laserportraits.com for more 80s radical tubularness.
I just peeked at cnn.com to see if they had any more news about Michael Jackson maybe being dead and I spotted a tiny picture of our Mraz.
It’s a good thing I recognized him because his name wasn’t in the headline. It just says, “Million-selling artist intimidated by ‘Idol’“, which is a lame, non-search-friendly title. It also has almost nothing to do with the story, which only briefly mentions ‘Idol’.
I really should have been a headline writer.
Freaky about MJ though, hmm? And freaky about celebrities always dying in threes. Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett…
Blame it on the boogie,
Lisa
This will make you happy.
There is a new, Spanish version of “Lucky” out there. The part of Colbie Caillat is being played by Ximena Sariñana, a Mexican singer, actress and Latin Grammy winner.
I love Jason’s “La Nueva Belleza” even more than the original “Beauty in Ugly” so I was excited to hear this version of “Lucky”, but it’s not quite the same thing. Jason’s verses are still in English, Ximena sings hers in Spanish, and then they both sing the chorus in Spanish. It’s ok, but not as exciting as “Belleza”.
The video has the same cut-and-pasted feel as the song. There’s no new footage of Jason – although I love him in the suit, so that’s alright – they just deleted Colbie and added in Ximena, also standing on a beach looking dreamy and wearing something flowy. The dubbing isn’t too bad, but I had to laugh a little, listening to Jason singing in Spanish while his mouth was moving in English.
It’s pretty brilliant, really, switching out Colbie. The way the video was filmed, with the two of them in such different locations, they could have cute pop sensations all over the world record the female part, stand on a beach, and quickly have a video ready to take the local charts by storm. Jason doesn’t even have to break a sweat, which is good because it sounds like he has enough to be getting on with for this summer’s tour.
You’ll hear the music fill the air,
Lisa
Thursday, June 18th, Jason will be presented with the Hal David Starlight Award at the Songwriters Hall of Fame Awards 40th Anniversary Gala. The award was created and named after Burt Bacharach’s longtime songwriting partner in order to recognize talented young songwriters.
Johnny Rzeznik of the Goo Goo Dolls got it last year, and Rob Thomas, Alicia Keys, John Mayer and John Legend have also been recipients, so I guess that puts Jason in good company.
Also in attendance will be hall of fame inductees Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora, Crosby, Stills & Nash, Andy Williams (the man who brought us “Moon River”), and well, some people who, I’m sorry to say, I’ve never heard of.
I don’t see anything about the ceremony being broadcast on TV or online, but maybe we’ll be able to catch clips on YouTube later.
Also, you have until June 30, 2009 at 12:50:00 p.m. EDT to bid on a meet-and-greet with Jason at a concert. This is part of a charity auction for the Songwriters HoF.
The current bid is $950, but that does not include airfare or any kind of transportation to the show, which is in New York. I’m a little surprised they didn’t put that in huge, bold letters. Actually, it doesn’t even say the show is in New York. I had to look up the theater.
Congratulations, Jason. And congratulations to the future winner of the auction, which is not going to be me, because I’m trying very hard to be more fiscally responsible these days. It’s not fun, but it will pay off in the long run, right?
Lisa
Not that I’ve ever gotten close enough to him myself to find out.
Just found this clip of James Morrison doing Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and couldn’t share it fast enough. James covers a lot of songs well, but this is one that I wouldn’t have expected him to try. I’d love to see it live.
As grateful as I am for Jason Mraz in and of himself, I am especially grateful to him for introducing me to James Morrison.
And Bushwalla.
And the Makepeace Brothers.
And Chocomole.
And regular bursts of the kind of pure joy that you don’t experience much past the age of six when the Tooth Fairy, Santa and the Easter Bunny have all turned out to be not quite what you thought they were, although coloring, running til you fall down and things that glow in the dark are all still really amazing.
Wait, just found this clip. James Morrison is busking for charity – awesome on its own – and he’s singing “Wishing Well”, a song that doesn’t get nearly enough appreciation.
I’m falling in love with you,
Lisa
This is really weird. The tour page on jasonmraz.com as well as the official Ironside Ampitheatersite say that tickets for Jason’s August 28th show go on sale Saturday, June 6th.
Ticketmaster’s website says that the Ticketmaster pre-sale starts Friday, June 5th. I had that date on my calendar.
Today, I saw on Facebook that the pre-sale for this show started yesterday, June 3rd. (Go to http://jasonmraztickets.musictoday.com for details.) And now I see that a news item was posted on jasonmraz.com yesterday saying the pre-sale started on the 3rd.
Now, I’m on the mailing lists, I get all the emails with news and tour dates and all that, but if I hadn’t noticed the Facebook announcement, I would have waited until tomorrow to get tickets. I’m feeling a little stressed at how many aspects of my life are dependent on visiting multiple websites a day, checking statuses, texting and tweeting, and being in constant contact with technology.
But at least I didn’t miss out this time.
It doesn’t look like too many people have rushed to get tickets yet. I got pretty good seats and it looks like there’s a lot left. I’m excited for a new summer tour, maybe some new songs, new banter, new hats.
How can you sleep at a time like this?
Lisa
If that’s a question you often ask yourself, maybe you should wear it around or stick it on your bag or something.
I joked about it yesterday, then thought maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea. I’m no designer, but CafePress makes it simple enough to stick things on buttons and magnets and other things, so that’s what I did.
If you’re handy with Photoshop you can probably do a much better job.
Reasons I hate carpooling:
Reasons to be grateful for carpooling:
My carpool people know about my…um, mild fondness… for Jason Mraz. He seems to pop on the radio almost as soon as we get in the car each day, unless it’s Country Music Guy’s day to drive, and someone always has to say, “Hey, is this that guy?”
I still manage to have my private Mraz moments though, and I’ll share this one from a few weeks ago with you:
I was smooshed in the middle of the backseat of a mid-sized car whose backseat was not meant for three people – at least not three adult people. The weather was windy and wet and our car was slowly lurching through heavy traffic on the Bay Bridge going into San Francisco and I wasn’t feeling too great.
I was thinking about how much I hated my commute and was this job even worth all the time I spend in my car and maybe I should find something else, but what else? because there aren’t a lot of good writing gigs out there right now and maybe I should just quit and go traveling again, but is that the responsible thing to do and maybe I was just grouchy and needed to get some perspective once I had a little room to move and wasn’t squished between two people who were completely absorbed in their Blackberries.
Yeah, my mind works like that.
And then, I saw that there was a big van in front of our car. We weren’t moving, so I had some time to look at it. Across the back, someone had written, “What are you grateful for today?” And I had to smile, and maybe chuckle a little. It was a good question. A Jason question.
WWJMBGF? What would Jason Mraz be grateful for? (If someone makes that into a bracelet I claim 5% of the profit.)
And I started to think about what I had to be grateful for, and it was a pretty good list. And as traffic started to move and our driver changed lanes to pass the van I saw that it belonged to Cafe Gratitude and I smiled even bigger.
I think it was about a week after that we got the announcement that the summer tour was going to be the Gratitude Cafe tour, and now we all have something to be grateful for.
Taste past the tip of your tongue,
Lisa
Yes, two people sent me messages about it, but WordPress has stopped emailing me when I get a comment on here and I didn’t check Facebook in time to find out and I don’t do the Twitter thing.
James Morrison’s Facebook person sends out updates for everything, almost every day. How does Jason not have someone sending out emails for these types of things? I did get an email that his new shirts are available for pre-sale:
Couldn’t they have thrown in, “Also, Jason is going to be on one of the biggest TV shows of the year, you know, if you’re interested”? No, beacuse the merch people are different from the marketing people and there’s no central person organizing all this information.
Yes, this kind of bad communication happens in my job, a lot. And yeah, I’m a little bitter this week. *Deep breath*
I checked Jason’s blog today to see if he had anything to say about “American Idol”, and he did. Quite a lot. I won’t spoil it for you, other than to say it sounds like he’s finally letting himself enjoy his success a little, which he more than deserves to do.
Obviously, I’m not much of an “Idol” watcher, but I’ve followed it in the news, and the fact that the quiet, sensitive, low-key guy won makes me think this really is the Year of Mraz.
And it’s not even half over yet.
It was incredible. Just, incredible. *Hint, hint*
Got to the Pearl a little after 11:00 last night. It’s a really nice venue, not too big, so every seat in the house has a good view, from what I could tell. They even have drink holders/foot rests, which I appreciated.
The Pearl Theater
The show started promptly at midnight, but not in a way I expected. When the lights dimmed and someone came out to do introductions, it wasn’t Jason. It was Bushwalla. Woo hoo! I was really hoping he’d launch into “Psycho Killer”, but no such luck.
Instead, he started to talk about the man coming to the stage, how he was voted most entertaining college of the year (”stop, switch that around”) and his mother voted him most attractive man in the world two years in a row or something, just general goofy stuff, but that didn’t sound anything like James Morrison. But he wasn’t introducing James Morrison.
He was introducing Justin Kredible.
Ha! Already we had a good idea that this show was going to be a little different. At least, I haven’t heard that these two have been traveling with Jason for this past tour, so I’m guessing it was a “Hey, you should come hang out in Vegas with me” thing.
Justin levitated the Music, Magic, Makepeace table and did his balloon sword swallowing, and then we finally got us some James Morrison.
All you need to know about James Morrison is that he’s phenomenal, and his act provides a crazy juxtaposition with Jason’s. Jason shares the stage. He can make even a large crowd feel like they’re hanging out in his living room. He doesn’t need to control the room, he just sort of musically cuddles with it.
James Morrison though could have a big sign behind him screaming, “I’m a fucking rock star, bitch!” I mean, he comes across very likable and charming, but he gives off an insane amount of energy, prowling back and forth, dropping to his knees, never letting up for a second, thrashing and flinging attitude (and a good amount of sweat) all over the room.
Last year, talking about Bushwalla I said:
“Bushwalla took over the stage. I don’t just mean he took his turn, I mean he took the stage over his knee and he owned that bitch.”
And that’s James Morrison too. Just sit back and let him do what he wants with you. Here’s his set list:
1. The Only Night
2. Under the Influence
3. You Give Me Something
4. Broken Strings, with Beverly Brown (I think)
5. If You Don’t Wanna Love Me
6. Precious Love
7. Nothing Ever Hurt Like You -> Uptight (This one got going so fast and so intense I thought he might explode. Phenomenal.)
8. Wonderful World
James left the stage around 12:45, but I really didn’t want him to stop playing. It was my first time seeing him live and he absolutely left me wanting more. At least we have YouTube.
About half an hour later, Bushwalla and Justin Kredible came back out to do a little more magic (the bowling ball trick) and introduce Jason. Again I was hoping for some Bushwalla tunes, maybe “Creatures in the Yard” or “Acoustic Rhymer”, but no joy. Instead, it went like this:
1. Fun, Fun Fun/I Want to Thank You (? – Anyone have a better title for this?) – First time I’ve heard this live. A really good, energetic way to kick off a show.
2. No Doubling Back – I love to hear the oldies that none of the new “I’m Yours” fans know.
3. Remedy -> Geek in the Pink
4. Anything You Want? Love, Love, Love?- Ashamed to say I don’t know the name of this one. It was sort of a reggae thing, but I have no idea if it’s a cover or one of his own. Please don’t think less of me.
5. Live High, with three of the ladies from Voices of Prayze in San Diego – More special guests!
6. Details in the Fabric- This is the song I was most looking forward to, since James Morrison was there to do his part, but it was a little disappointing, probably more for Jason than anyone else. At the beginning of the song he did a little rhyming about traveling around and getting messages from people while he’s on the road. Then he held up a walkie talkie. Knowing that Bushwalla was also in the house, it was safe to assume that he was on the other end, doing the answering machine message.
Unfortunately, the walkies didn’t want to talkie, so the very cool, mellow intro was broken up by feedback and silence and technical difficulties. Bushwalla came out on the stage after a while and got a few words in, but when Jason launched into the song he seemed a little annoyed? Thrown off? Disappointed? James did come out for his bit, but it was like the momentum was all off, so it was good, but not as stellar as I imagined it. (Again, at least we still have the YouTube versions.)
I was hoping James would have stayed out to do another song or two with Jason, but that was it for him.
7. Unfold - With an extra long Dave Matthews-style jam in the middle so each musician could have the spotlight for a bit.
8. Beautiful Mess
9. Lucky - Jason started strumming this one, then said what a very lucky man he was… and Colbie Caillat walked out. I’m not a huge fan, but it was very, very cool to see them perform together. She’s very tall.
10. Make It Mine
11. Dynamo of Volition
12. I’m Yours – No sing along or “Three Little Birds” here. Just ended the song in the normal place.
Musical Intermission as Jason left the stage for a few minutes and the rest of the band kept playing a Miami Sound Machine sort of tune.
13. Plane - Finally! Jason and Toca played this one the way I first heard it: intimate, stripped down, almost haunting. I never really got the Mr. A-Z version with the sweeping orchestra behind it. This song made the whole show for me.
14. All Night Long - So good. An oldie, but still a lot of fun, played with the same kind of fun and joy we got on the last tour with “Build Me Up Buttercup”.
15. Fall Through Glass - Thank you! You can’t show us a Bushwalla in Act 1 and not have him go off in Act 3. They even did the freeze frame at the end, although wihtout J Kreds and the Polaroids.
16. Butterfly - Made even better by having Bushwalla and Tricia, Jason’s Joyologist, (at least I think it was her) hoola hooped through the whole song. Their stamina was very impressive. I could see Justin at the side of stage dancing his ass off as well.
Show finished around 3:00 a.m. and I finally got a cab around 3:45. And now I’m at the airport with just three hours of sleep for the night and ready for some lunch.
I’ll remember where the love was found,
Lisa
