John Mayer concert review, setlist and photos from his solo tour debut in NJ
John Mayer has been working towards this show for a long time.
“There’s no tour in my entire life I’ve thought about more than this one,” Mayer told the sold-out crowd at the Prudential Center in Newark on Saturday night. It was the opening engagement of Mayer’s solo and mostly acoustic arena tour, and the seven-time Grammy winner was laying it all on the line.
The results were nothing less than breathtaking, two hours of raw, peerless wonder.
Mayer made a habit of showing audiences different versions of himself from over the years, starting with the radio-dominating pop wonder initially introduced to the world with the “No Such Thing” success of two decades ago.
He became a soulful rocker in the “Continuum” days. The John Mayer Trio showcases his undeniable skill as an incendiary guitarist. He spent years as a back-to-the-land troubadour, and, for nearly a decade, he’s stunned as a Jerry Garcia successor in the Grateful Dead legacy act Dead & Company. In 2021, he delivered the wonderful curveball “Sob Rock,” a work of yacht rock revivalism that displayed a disarming amount of wit, vulnerability and self-awareness.
Fans can be forgiven for wondering: So, who is John Mayer?
On Saturday night, it was clear that he’s all of the above, and then some.
Heading into the Prudential Center, the audience knew precious little, beyond the fact that Mayer, following an opening set by JP Saxe, would be alone on stage.
“I began my career on stage with only a guitar and a microphone,” Mayer wrote in an Instagram post announcing the tour in January. “A lot has changed since then, but I knew one day I’d feel it in my heart to do an entire run of shows on my own again, just like those early days. It took a couple of decades, but I feel it now."
As for the setlist?
“I’ll be playing old songs. Newer songs. Songs you haven’t heard that I’ll be road testing — all on acoustic, electric and piano,” Mayer teased.
That utilitarian description belies the impact of Mayer, alone on stage, leading a sea of the devoted through a retrospective sing-along across his career to date.
Everything was in play, and what’s remarkable is how, at this point, so much of Mayer’s repertoire is in conversation with itself.
“Neon,” a guitar showcase that’s been a persistent concert highlight since its introduction on his 2001 debut LP “Room for Squares,” was as hypnotic as ever – but 20-plus years later, it’s grown warmly shaggy, with a pleasantly weathered patina that invokes his near-decade spent in the land of the Dead.
Much later in the night, he used a gorgeous double-neck Martin guitar to traverse through the Dead’s “Friend of the Devil” and made it sound, in the best possible way, like a John Mayer song.
Mayer noted on stage that when he first announced this run of solo dates, fans in the comments section of his social media channels quickly began clamoring for deep cuts. He certainly obliged. “Home Life,” a “Heavier Things” (2003) highlight not played live since 2005, retuned to the stage for the first time in 18 years.
“Home Life” is a song that clearly means a lot to Mayer; he has a tattoo for it on his arm, and he prefaced its most powerful verse – “I can tell you this much, I will marry just once, and if it doesn't work out, give her half of my stuff” – by telling the audience, “These words still ring true.”
The “marry just once” passage of “Home Life” echoed a poignant passage in the “Sob Rock” ballad “Shouldn’t Matter But it Does,” played early in the night: “It could have been always, it could have been me, we could have been busy naming baby number three.” It was particularly striking when juxtaposed with “Driftin',” a new song debuted on Saturday night: “Put my leather jacket on to play the part of ‘Bad Boy John,’ the brokenhearted vagabond who wandered into town.”
A consummate crowd-pleaser, Mayer followed “Home Life” with his biggest hit of the night, the 2001 bedroom eyes serenade “Your Body is a Wonderland." He did so in self-effacing fashion, telling the Newark crowd “I have a thing for stupid (and) sincere,” comedically wincing at the song’s “bubblegum tongue” lyric and telling the audience afterwards, “It’s a balancing act.”
Saturday’s show was a surveying job with Mayer, now 45, taking stock of his life and career so far. Using six-string, 12-string, electric, double-neck and resonator guitars, as well as piano and harmonica, Mayer guided the audience through a meditation on how far he (and they) have traveled over the years, and also glanced towards the future.
Following the Newark debut, the tour plays Madison Square Garden in New York City on Wednesday, March 15. The 19-date schedule ends Friday, April 14, at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles.
Mayer will be back in our area for Dead and Company’s farewell tour this summer. The band plays Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia on Thursday, June 15, and Citi Field in New York City on Wednesday, June 21, and Thursday, June 22.
Setlist for John Mayer at the Prudential Center in Newark
“Slow Dancing in a Burning Room”
“Queen of California”’
“Shouldn’t Matter But it Does”
“In the Blood”
“Neon”
“Why Georgia”
“Split Screen Sadness”
“Who Says”
“Home Life”
“Your Body is a Wonderland”
“Stop This Train”
“New Light”
“You’re Gonna Live Forever in Me”
“Changing”
“The Age of Worry”
“Free Fallin’”
“Driftin'”
“Waiting on the Day”
“In Your Atmosphere”
“Friend of the Devil”
“If I Ever Get Around to Living”
"Edge of Desire"
Encore
“Walt Grace’s Submarine Test, January 1967”
“Born and Raised”
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: John Mayer concert: Setlist, photos, review of NJ tour debut
