By: Karoline Asdal
The Grammy-winning guitarist and vocalist John Mayer had just recovered from a throat surgery when he started recording his new album “Paradise Valley”. Because of this, people questioned the quality of it before it even was released, but the album has generally received very good critics. “Paradise Valley” was out on August 20th 2013 and is the sixth of his albums. The singles from this album is “Paper Doll” and “Wildfire”, released in June and July. Every song, except for one, “Wildfire Pt. II”, where he collaborates with rapper Frank Ocean, is written by Mayer himself. It is nearly impossible to place John Mayer in one genre, and some people would say it changes from album to album and song to song. This album is leaning towards country and folk, and he said he considers this album more of a “summer, cook breakfast and outdoors-y” record; a great example is the song “They Call Me the Breeze” with a very catchy tune.
John Mayer has been a very popular artist in the celebrity press for a long time, and he has been linked to a lot of famous stars, among others the young country star Taylor Swift. Actually, the track “Paper Doll” is speculated to be a response to her song “Dear John”, where she expressed her feelings about how bad he treated her. His lyrics’ says “You’re like twenty-two girls in one/ And none of them know what they’re runnin’ from/ Was it just too far to fall/ For a little paper doll” which is rumored to be aimed directly towards his ex-girlfriend. After a while he got tired of all of these scandals following him everywhere and decided to move out to the middle of nowhere, more precisely Paradise Valley, Montana, hence the album title. He also said this peaceful site gave him inspiration for the record and that it shines through clearly.
Since I’m already a big fan of John Mayer’s music, my expectations for this album were high. It is in many ways similar his previous album, “Born and Raised”, only with even more significant guitar playing and personal lyrics. In my opinion, it’s definitely worth a listen, and I even think it deserves to be re-played over and over again. My personal favorite tracks are the single “Wildfire” or the duet with his current girlfriend Katy Perry, “Who You Love”, which is a soft ballad about falling in love when you least expect it.
