JOHN MAYER, MAROON 5, DJ LOGIC, USANA Amphitheatre, Thursday.
Singer/songwriter John Mayer was a little self-conscious Thursday night.
"I was just watching the video of (Wednesday night's) show and I saw myself doing all this," said Mayer while twisting his face into a contorted mask. "If you want me to look pretty, it will sound bad."
The charismatic Grammy Award-winning Mayer enjoyed himself as he dazzled the audience at the USANA Amphitheatre. His own brand of laid-back hospitality and humor enchanted the audience, which collectively screamed at anything he did.
The opening number, "No Such Thing," from the album "No Room for Squares" set the mood as the mixed-ages audience members cheered for their hero.
Backed by a band of two guitarists, a drummer, a keyboardist and a bassist, Mayer looked at ease onstage, regardless of his contorting face.
The mix was balanced, although sometimes Mayer's trademark mumbling-throat vocals were overshadowed by the bass and drums.
"Thank you all for coming out tonight, because you could have just stayed at home and listened to all (the things we're doing tonight) at home," said Mayer. Not entirely true. In Mayer's live shows, he allows himself and his band to take on many tangents.
Case in point being "Something's Missing," from his most recent album "Heavier Things." The extended intro to the rockaby arrangement only highlighted Mayer's guitar solo interlude.
Another treat was Mayer's version of Eric Clapton's "Old Love," which featured a guitar duet with Mayer and David Ryan Harris. (The crowd met Harris earlier, when he crooned out a couple of bars of Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get It On" during a free jam during Mayer's breakthrough hit, "Your Body's a Wonderland.")
Harris and Mayer picked out lead after lead, until the strings began sounding like electric kotos, which fit in nicely to the Japanese sumi-painting screens that backdropped the stage.
The rhythm & blues-laden "Clarity" and the self-deprecating, flip/skip arrangement of "My Stupid Mouth" found their way into the set, to the delight of the crowd. And fans jumped to their feet when the head-bobbing chords of "Bigger Than My Body" swaggered out of the system.
Mayer's humor emerged just before striking the introductory chords to "Not Myself." "This song starts with a little math," he said. "Check this out. One, two, three, four."
Mayer's music speaks for itself, and while he may think he's not pretty, a majority of the women in the audience obviously disagreed.
Opening act Maroon 5's lead singer Adam Levine said he didn't want to look cocky while wearing his sunglasses on stage, but the setting sun forced him to do so.
Maroon 5 played a solid, albeit monotonous, set of mid-tempo works, after a half-hour, turntable-mix set by DJ Logic. "Harder to Breathe," "This Love" and "She Will Be Loved" sounded great, but the beats dragged a bit. Still, it didn't stop the fans from screaming their approval.
E-mail: scott@desnews.com