Jason Mraz
We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things

THE REVIEW

I was in the car, just about to pop in the usual disc, when a song caught my ear, delaying the fateful pressing of the play button. I paused to listen. <Oh, this track is nice, acoustic, catchy melody, not bad, who could it be?> Hardly a minute into the commercial FM waves hitting my ears, my damn phone rings, forcing me to lower the volume, it caught me, I wanted to record it, would have posted it on some forum to find out the title, but I forget my phone is a post-war Nokia 2626, can't record, can't take photos, videos, make coffee, or give blowjobs, I resign myself, and for the entire day that damn tune sticks in my head. I don't watch or get MTV, All Music and the like, I don't listen to the radio, I don't use 64 kbps ringtones with the latest hits (faithful to the Nokia tune!), so apart from the urban scene I follow with some consistency, I know little to nothing about commercial or pop releases; everything I know in that genre I hear in stores, on the street, in passing... wait a minute... but if it was on the radio, it must be famous, COMMERCIAL! I dive into the Billboard Hot 100, browsing through the previews of the best-selling singles, when at position 22 I come across the song that's been buzzing in my head. With no small satisfaction, I gaze at the title: "Jason Mraz - I'm Yours", even released in the summer, I have no idea who he is, I listen to it fully on YouTube, some ecstatic comments from people who also have some weighty stuff among their favorites catch my eye ("Amazing, luv' Mraz, Best song of the year, regà ndo posso scaricà sto pezzo??? baci xXxTriLLiNahOuSe94xXx"), I read swiftly on Wiki, and I realize this Jason has plenty of previous work, EPs, albums, unnoticed songs, years of career on the margins of the limelight, and only this year has he found some success with this "I'm Yours", and what a success: sales through the roof, 50 million-plus views on YouTube, thousands of homemade videos with unfortunate people crooning to it on guitar, remix after remix, re-edit, hundreds of live videos. Well, well, the song ends up constantly on loop on Winamp, even though the version heard on the radio (acoustic) turns out to be a promo released years earlier, and the current version isn't all that great. I opt nevertheless to give the album a listen, I read good impressions, the word "eclectic" in his bio urges me further to listen, the photos showing a sober and simple look, far from the exaggerations-schemas-flashy looks typical of many music biz characters, confirms he's worth a look, he must be a nice guy, plays the guitar decently, has a nice voice, let's listen to the latest album, it's "We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things"!

The impression? It’s an album filled with more or less trivial songs, many are catchy, not too pretentious, rich with various influences (not all successful), ranging from the sweetest pop, to more intellectual acoustic stuff, with bursts of dance, tinges of funk, ragga chants, hip-hop beats, many retro callbacks. All very nice if not for the fact that when the songs are taken individually and not as mere background noise, they are of a shocking anonymity and blandness; I was hoping not to find a typical album with 3 hit singles and 10 filler tracks, but that was the final impression. He has an acceptable voice, for goodness sake, fresh, clear, very pleasant and youthful, the arrangements are always well done and stick in your head, there's an appreciable quest for a certain variety in the genres proposed, not a manufactured artist, clearly, this guy has been making records for 9 years that no one has ever bothered to notice. The beautiful acoustic version of I'm Yours that I had sought so much I find to be vastly inferior to the promo contained on "Sampler 01" (2005), which has happened with other songs as well, since several have already been released in past works, and now they are being re-offered with new arrangements, needless to say, the old versions seem less studied for audiences with easy tastes, more heartfelt, more personal, in short, BETTER.

And so it's easy to range from dancing uptempo tracks like "Butterfly" and "Only Human", structured with good horn sections, sax, funky rhythms, fast beat, catchy choruses, a bit of a lustful, a bit of a relaxed, a bit of a disco atmosphere, (clearly recalling some of Jamiroquai's best times), to the vintage tones of "The Dynamo Of Volition", the hip-hop beats of "Coyotes", moving to boring end-of-year dance ballads worthy of the worst American Pie, like "A Beautiful Mess" "Details In The Fabric" "Love For A Child." Three redeemable episodes, ironically, include the hit single "I'm Yours", with its reggae and pop flavor, in its easy listening truly beautiful and captivating (though I always recommend opting for the guitar-voice version), "If It Kills Me" (a ballad with not too many pretensions, yet stands out for a studied arrangement, very "pianobar," surely appreciable), but especially the duet "Lucky," where he collaborates with the charming voice of Colbie Caillat, a sweet and slow track with beautiful chords and a nice riff, though it does find weak spots in the very banal lyrics ("I'm lucky because I'm in love with my best friend, blah blah blah," Yawn.).

So, if Mraz had given good expectations with his interesting past works, those can't certainly be said to have been fulfilled with this commercial boom. If breaking into the mainstream means ruining everything good that was built during the long grind, rearranging and re-singing great tracks with a modern hyper-radio oriented sound, crafting a product of 13 mediocre tracks, good for pimply teenagers, then I would have been better off stopping at the listen of the beautiful I'm Yours and that's it, farewell to Jason. The album's production is simply excellent, sounds divine, mastered as it should be, all packed and refreshed for a public with easy tastes, worth noting, I preferred his lo-fi side, the unknown products where his passion for music and offering a bit more sophisticated songs were on full display, but success gets to your head, it's well known, while waiting to see what Mraz has in store for the future, a 2.5 rating is rounded down to 2, due to the already mentioned reasons. And to think I've seen rave reviews for this album, critics welcomed it warmly, well I didn't, next time in the car I'll pop in Surkin, make the windows shake, and screw the radio and Mraz.

Avoidable.