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Friday March 6, 2009

Jason Mraz puts on one heck of a show

By MICHAEL CHEANG


Nothing was going to stop the audience who watched Jason Mraz in concert at Stadium Negara from having a good time – not even the sweltering heat.

It was a hot and sweaty night in Stadium Negara. The air-conditioning in the almost ancient complex did not seem sufficient enough to accommodate the thousands of people crammed within its bowels to witness one of the hottest acts in pop music right now ... Jason Mraz.

OK, fine, so he isn’t exactly the hottest act around, but hey, he is a Grammy-nominated artist who has sold millions of albums after all. And say what you want about Mraz’s music; he is still one heck of a showman, and on Wednesday night, he put on one heck of a show.

Jason Mraz was in fine form during his concert at Stadium Negara on Wednesday.

Kudos to organiser Marctensia, for actually bringing a decent international artiste instead of the usual washed-up rock bands or over-hyped boybands.

Even with the heat and humidity in the stadium reaching almost volcanic proportions, Mraz still managed to heat it up further with a performance that had the audience eating out of his hands.

One of Mraz’s greatest song writing assets is the poetic wordplay he incorporates into his songs, which range from profound observations on life, to er ... criticising the new Guns N’ Roses album.

Of course, such complex lyrics would be all for nought if you couldn’t hear what he was singing about; but thankfully, Mraz’s vocals were in fine form, and every single word and line he sang was crystal clear, even when he was motormouth-ing his way through the ultra-fast Dynamo of Volition.

Even leaving out staples like Wordplay and Curbside Prophet; Mraz still managed a solid, comprehensive 14-song set that lasted over 90 minutes, which were made up mostly of songs from his latest album We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things, as well as his older hits like The Remedy, Bella Luna and You And I Both.

The biggest cheers that night, of course, was for his Grammy-nominated mega hit I’m Yours, which Mraz and his band managed to spice up further by adding a noticeably more upbeat reggae feel. Naturally, getting everyone in the stadium to sing along heightened the proceedings.

Earlier in the day, during the press conference, Mraz jokingly mentioned that he used to get hate mail from his Malaysian fans who complained about him visiting Singapore instead of Malaysia.

Taiwan-based Malaysian artiste Penny Tai joined Jason Mraz on the popular track Lucky. The duet was one of the things he did to show his appreciation to his fans.

Now that he was finally here, Mraz really pulled out all the stops to show his appreciation to his adoring Malaysian fans; from getting his horn section decked out in Malaysian national football team jerseys, coming out for the encore in an “I Love KL” t-shirt, and roping Taiwan-based Malaysian artiste Penny Tai to duet on Lucky.

Unfortunately, if there was one disappointment that evening, it was Tai’s cameo appearance. Mraz had never met her before that day (he chose her from a list of Malaysian singers given to him), and it showed in the lack of chemistry between the pair. It also didn’t help that Tai’s vocals that night seemed a little off-colour, making the duet seem a little disjointed at times.

I also couldn’t help but feel it would have been better if he’d gotten a male Malaysian singer to duet with him on Details in the Fabric instead (the song, which Mraz sings with James Morrison on the album ... which wasn’t even included in the set).

Not that it mattered to most of the fans in the stadium though.

In fact, it was perhaps apt that Redbox Karaoke was one of the sponsors that night, as the entire concert was almost like a massive karaoke session, with fans singing along to every line to every song, and even to every bit of impromptu gibberish he came up with.

Speaking of gibberish, while Mraz’s spontaneous vocal freestyling was entertaining for the most part, it did get a tad annoying after a while, making you wish he’d just get on with singing the song.

That said, Mraz also managed to throw in some very cool curveball improvisations into his set too, most notable of all, seamlessly inserting the opening verse of Oasis’ Wonderwall midway through The Remedy. Exactly what Liam and Noel Gallagher would think of that, we will never know, but it was a terrific piece of improvisation on Mraz’s part, and it was a whole lot of fun to listen to.

Ultimately, one line from Mraz summed it all up: “Don’t let your mind stop you from having a good time!” And true enough, by the time he was done, the crowd had already forgotten about how hot and sweaty they all were, and were just basking in the glow of a well-played show.

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