In The Rearview Mirror: John Mayer - "Why Did You Mess With Forever" - Feb. '01

Almost exactly eight years ago, John came home to Fairfield for a few days during a short break on his 2001 tour. Some of you may remember this tour, opening for Glen Phillips (Toad The Wet Sprocket). I had just caught the show in Philadelphia a few days earlier and happened to be back in town when John returned home. When we found out he was coming back, we got about ten good friends together and gathered at our buddy (and Villanova Junction member) Joe Beleznay's house. John stopped by, acoustic guitar in hand, and gave us about a 2-hour impromptu show.

I had been recording a lot of stuff at the time so I had my little DAT recorder handy and set it up so we'd have something to remember the night. This was an exciting time for all of us, seeing a good friend getting his career off the ground, we all just had a feeling that John was destined for big things. Regardless of where you are in life, or where you're going, there's just certain things that you can't put a price tag on and I'm lucky to have some great memories of those early days.

The show consisted of about fifteen songs, some that are well known, some that aren't. Very few people have heard the recording from start to finish, mostly just the gang that was there that night as I've kept it pretty tight (and plan on keeping it that way). We nicknamed the session, "John Mayer @ the Beleznay Ballroom" and it's been something we've had fun listening to over the years.

"Why Did You Mess With Forever" was a song that John was working on and playing occasionally. Some of you may have been lucky enough to hear it at an early show or on a bootleg, but I thought this might be cool since there's absolutely zero crowd noise, almost like a demo version. I decided to load it online this evening and took some "creative liberties" with the set design on the video below. Hope you enjoy this, have a great weekend.