John Mayer - Where the light is: Live in Los Angeles

A seriously cool live album. I've always enjoyed artists showing us more than one way to skin a cat. One objection I have to a lot of concerts is the single wall of loud sound and guitars all the way through, with a single ballad here and there.

JM does something different. He starts off the show with his acoustic set-up, yup, 3 acoustic guitars, and some serious folksy plucking, picking, strumming and playing. "Daughters" absolutely shine in this format. Staying objective when it comes to good acoustic music is difficult for me, as I love the format a lot. My objection would be that if this is the start to a show, wasn't it a bit sedate? Shouldn't one move into this format, maybe half-way through the show? Anyways, is still reflects on JM's acoustic chops and got me into the album fairly convinced.

The album moves along at medium shuffle into the trio section, which at all accounts turns it into a blues concert. I'm very impressed by the full sound and awesome guitar-voice syncopation he achieves, considering he doesn't just playing along in open chords. My guess would be that this becomes the less listened to part of the album, as it is purely blues-rock, heavy solo-ing and serious guitar-hero pyrotechnics. These are also his less-known numbers, especially in this packaging, but "Bold Love" stand out as a winner. I can appreciate this, but have to confess, towards the last 2 numbers in this section, it became a bit much, and I was forwarding to the full band section.

The full band section ends with his better known sounds. This is where everything comes together. THis is probably what most people would've expected from his live album. Here I didn't find anything particularly outstanding other than the fact that this guy's chops are up, and he's a great performer.

What would I see as a highlight to the album?
His cover of the Tom Petty classic "Freefalling" on the acoustic set. Pure magic.