Jason Mraz Concert Review

Jason Mraz - Music, Magic, Make Peace tour with Bushwalla, Justin Kredible, and the MakePeace Brothers. Sunday, April 13, 2008. 7PM at World Live Cafe, Philly PA.
If you are a music lover, and you like live performances, the one thing you must do in your lifetime is see Jason Mraz live. I'm not kidding when I say he is one of the best artists to see live, and his strength as an artist really lies in the shows he puts on. I've seen him about 3 times now, and I have to say, the April 2008 Music, Magic, Make Peace tour is my favorite show of his. Tickets are probably hard to come by at this point because he literally sells out every show within minutes of them going on sale, but if you do get a chance to catch it, you're in for an awesome time.

Opening Acts:
The MakePeace Brothers opened the show, and they are a folk quartet (though they were a trio this particular night) of real-life brothers who are all very cute. Their music was good, and they played 6 songs, including the inspiring "Hero," which you can check out on their website. The very entertaining freestyle acoustic rapper Bushwalla performed 7 songs, and having been on tour with Mraz before, much of the audience was very familiar with him and his songs.

In between all acts, the magician-comedian Justin Kredible performed little vignettes of magic/comedy. He was actually really good, and kept his routine interactive by using audience members in his acts. He is also very cute, and one of the highlights of the night was getting to meet him. This whole comic routine between sets was actually a really good idea, as it kept the flow of the show going, and the audience engaged in those lagging times.

Jason Mraz:
After what seemed like hours of waiting and people pushing us around (it was a standing room venue), Mraz finally took the stage with his trusty sidekick Toca. He opened with Plane, one of my faves from the Mr. A-Z album, and minus Geek in the Pink and a slew of other songs from the olden days, he mostly stuck to new material from his upcoming album We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things (out 5/13). Even though he said he was congested, he sounded amazing, and of course, he is the king of improvisation, which he liberally exercised in his set. He was chatty and charming, and what I love about him is that he's still incredibly gracious and humbled by people coming to see him. He played about 14 songs in total, and when he launched into I'm Yours towards the end, we all went crazy.

And after that long set (about an hour and a half), he came back to perform an encore with everybody from his tour, which was awesome in itself, but after that fun performance ended, he stuck around to perform You and I Both solo, which the entire audience sang along to. Mraz, his guitar, the audience's energy= AMAZING. My boy is back!!!