Heavier Things

Without a doubt, this is John Mayer's best album to date. Sure, it lacks the musical enthusiasm of his younger days and the musical polish of his latest work, but thematically this is really John at his best... and before you start to argue with me, let me give you three reasons to believe me.

1. The album sits, like everyone's best album, right in the middle (thematically) of the creator's two crazy extremes, holding in remarkable tension his thirst for significance and his longing for home. It is remarkably tempting for all of us (much less an artist like Mr. Mayer with his fame on the line) to cop out of dealing with one or the other of these extremes, or to paint oneself as a martyr in one's failings or hardships, but this album is John in the best possible place he can be... where it is still possible for him to see both extremes clearly before him, and where we feel his understanding of life has caught up with his earnestness of expression just enough to produce a real honest look at his own priorities, experiences, shortcomings and failures. It is his own choices that have taken him away from happiness and brought him to the edge of being disgruntled, and he has both the sense of irony to doubt the purity of his own aspirations in songs like "Something's Missing" and "Split Screen Sadness", and the youthful drive and eagerness to hope for a real solution in songs like "Clarity" and "Home Life". Like Switchfoot's Learning to Breathe, this album represents the pinnacle of the artist's unique creative power and identity, falling into the neither the flat and sometimes shallow immaturity of the early work nor the self-indulgent lamentation of later efforts. The struggle of the album has exactly the virtue of bringing the artist to a breakdown or an impasse without hardening him to the natural response of hopeful longing. Here one finds both responsibility and hope, and I'm all for an honest look at something like that!

2. The album has some beautifully crafted moments. John Mayer has a remarkable way of capturing the essence of a struggle in music and clever lyrics. To reprint them here would be to do a great injustice to the effect, but listen to the seventh track ("Split Screen Sadness") and tell me that you aren't moved by the rendering of the song to feel a certain kinship with the man. You root for him in this album, and listening to his desire for change makes you want to change yourself!

3. This album is the best because home wins. Anyone who really listens to John struggle feels that fame and self-service leave one with "something missing"... and that if anything is worth "kissing the ground" and putting down roots for, it's got to be something like "home". Of course there is a lot to be said about the insufficiency of earthly homes... but in our day and age one really can stand to hear a lot more about settling down and giving up our pursuit of "greatness" for the acquisition of loving, rooted relationships. Personally, I have a hard time keeping myself from tearing up every time I listen to "Clarity". It's worth it, John! It's worth it! Let's both have the courage to make that eternal vow and to hope for something unchanging! Let's give up our seflishness and personal aspirations and look to protect something real instead!

Hooray for divine discontent... and hooray for any album that leaves us unsatisfied with ourselves and makes us want to be more than we are!