I hear Cameron Diaz play’s everyone’s instrument, which makes him a canidate for the free clinic, at least.
Excellent advice. Just walk away man. Something tells me that a monsoon of a shitstorm is poised to dump on you if you don’t.
He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day.
Fuckin’ A, Euthansiast. Talk about a one punch, flat on your back KO!
As for the Timberlake vs Mayers “debate” must admit I don’t know shit about either one and I aim to keep it that way.
Then again, that was some impressive reply…
There are some smokin’ tracks on the live John Meyer Trio disc, but Justin is clearly a better singer. Hunt down some of the harmony singing he used to pull out with N’sync. I’m not kidding.
Euthanasiast, I thought linking to your (brilliant) “Suck it down” pit was a touch self-congraulatory for my taste, but otherwise…damn.
A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A (Electric Avenue)
I’ve heard that she blows his pink oboe.
Problem is, all of Euthanasiast’s studying aside, he’s chosen to vouch for a shitty songwriter. So you like Mayer, fine, we all have a guilty pleasure. And he can play the guitar, true. I saw him on I believe it was a Townes Van Zandt special and he was a quite good * guitar player *. I’ve heard his songs, as he’s particularly popular with twenty something girls in Atlanta (a demographic my wife and her friends falls squarely within) such that every dinner party is set to the same soundtrack that really moves the cinnamon scented candles at Potter Barn and surges the sale of moca-crapa-chinos at Starbucks – I swear, were he to breed with Snora Jones, we could eradicate insomnia. Bottom line, his music is uninspiring. Jack White, now there’s a freaking genius. Or, how about the uber-prolific Ryan Adams? Whoever does the Scissor Sisters song writing can really produce some good pop music. But not Mayer. Nice ad hominem attack though.
Personally, I would have gone with “text-based, third-term abortion.” Outside that, HOLY FUCK, what a beatdown.
Jammer
Is anyone else amused or amazed to see this much passion in a discussion about John Mayer? To me his music is inoffensive pop. It fails to rouse in me so much as even dislike as that would at least be a reaction and not mere difference.
I can’t read this discussion without thinking of this article from Something Awful on Jack Johnson and John Mayer.
Oh, Pokémon! With the Poké and the mon and the stuff and the thing and the ha ah ah ah ah!
Do not EVER get into a pitting contest with Euthanasiast. Just don’t.
Heh,
A debate over John Timbermeyer verses Justin Lake…Whooda thunk?
Not a debate of Justin Timberlake vs. John Mayers. JT was the first random artist I picked when Euthanasiast “challenged” me to find someone who makes better music than John Mayer who’s in the Top 100.
So you came back in two hours. And this is all you brought with you? It’s a bit light.
Well, I do know better, and there’s definitely different kinds of musical listeners in the world. Some are lyrics-centered, some are music-centered, some are a combination of the two. For me, I’m one of the people who prefers a good tune with passable lyrics to a passable tune with good lyrics. (With the exception of songs forms like blues and folk and country where lyrics are more central to the songwriting.) I’m driven by the music in the song, and not the lyrics themselves. For me, a great song transcends language and lyrics are secondary to truly good songwriting. And technical virtuosity is definitely not important in good songwriting.
But I’m speaking in terms of pop and rock songwriting. Like I said, different styles, different values. The fact that John Mayer is good with a guitar does not automatically make him a good songwriter. He’s got some decent tunes and I think his newest album is actually pretty damned good. However, I can see how somebody like Soapbox Monkey would value Justin Timberlake’s music as being a better example of good songwriting. I would actually agree that mainstream Justin Timberlake has better songs than mainstream John Mayer, even though I think the entire argument is a bit silly.
You must be full of self-loathing, then, because only a congenital idiot would dismiss the blues out-of-hand.
Overall I feel like I got off pretty easy seeing as how in that entire reply you only mustered 4 sentences that actually addressed the actual debate we had going. Though I will commend you for your excellent use of defamatory adjectives.
Secondly, the most important thing in this thread that many of you seem to be missing is that I was playing devil’s advocate with my support of Justin Timberlake (whom I picked at random).
In the John Mayer thread I made the true claim (albeit cliched), that songwriting abilities are for the most part determined by the imagination of the musician, and has much less to do with their actual technical proficiency (so long as they are at least capable of playing the songs they are writing). I placed John Mayer in this camp.
Euthanasiast called me on it, and not particularly in the mood for a lengthy debate for what was meant to be a mildly arrogant cheapshot, I obliged.
He then “challenged” me to name artists on the Top 100 who are better songwriters than John Mayer, which is a trap to begin with, by expecting me to wade through a lot of shit to try and find something that was superior to someone else I think is crap. But I decided to humor Euthanasiast and give the ol’ Billboard a look see, and I picked two individuals, one represented by name on the charts, and one who acts as a producer to many of today’s pop and hip hop acts (Justin Timberlake and Timbaland respectively).
Falling into Euthanasiast oh so clever trap, he proceeded to berate me for having the gall to suggest that JT is a better songwriter than John Mayer! He then asked me to provide some JT lyrics that show his musical superiority over Mayer. But I don’t recall the relevance of lyrics ever being brought up (nor did it need to be, as a good song is more than virtuoso guitar or poetic verse).
Did I know of Mayer’s supposedly superior side projects (the stuff he apparently isn’t fighting to have heard by a wider audience)? No, but I’ve heard his mainstream fluff, and it was enough to write him off as a talented musician who simply lacked the ability to properly congeal those talents into a great song. But I can hardly be faulted for not knowing offhand about John Mayer’s side projects. If you had heard that Fred Durst had some side project that was actually good, would you really waste your time and effort seeking out the music of someone who has already presented themselves to be lacking in originality or spark?
John Mayer, through the music that he has no problem displaying for all to see, has shown himself to be completely lacking in edge, energy, or ingenuity. His music all comes out like glossed over snooze-rock along with James Blunt and Jack Johnson. I’m sure it’s great to have on to woo a woman into bed (Not that I’d know anything about that of course).
Please cite where I dismissed blues as a genre.
I did facetiously said “those same old scales and licks that are used over and over again” as a point against Euthanasiast’s criticism of sampling. But I clearly didn’t dismiss the genre nor did I attack any particular blues artist, save John Mayer.
I’m glad you see what I was going for, but if you’ll refer to my big post above I explained how JT was my first random choice from the options presented to me (by generous Euthanasiast). I don’t value Justin Timberlake’s music. But given the choice between JT and JM, I’m gonna choose the one who is at least trying to do something that sounds different compared to JM’s ho-hum lullabies.
John Lydon, Michael Stipe, Morrissey, Shane MacGowan, and Chuck D are all tons awesomer than John Mayer, and none of them play instruments.
I read most of the orginal thread, and Euthanasiast lost all musical credibility with me the second he suggested that Mayer’s peers were (just) those also within the top 100 on billboard. I mean holy fuck, his peers are just the people who sell to the masses? Instead of his peers being all his contemporaries… For someone who claims to be all about music, this is a stunningly supid tactic to take in order to try to win an argument.
By that yardstick Jewel must be a much better poet than John Berryman because she has a collection that ranks 193,231st best seller at Amazon vs his at an inferior 314,522nd. I mean fuck, I’m a better poet than Jewel.