Tag: Music

John Mayer Solo in 2023

April 4, 2023 / Tom

A few months ago, I wrote about our seeing John Mayer back in Atlanta for the second year in a year.

We’re going to see John Mayer during his acoustic tour in Atlanta later next month. When scouring r/JohnMayer on Reddit to see what people were saying about ticket sales (since everything was through the mess that is TicketMaster),

It’s hard to say if the show was the best we’ve ever seen with him because it was him completely solo. In one sense, it was the best; in other, there’s been no other show like it.

Set List

The following is the set list for his night in Atlanta. Between a couple of a sets, he played videos from when he first released Room for Squares and when he released Continuum.

Slow Dancing in a Burning Room
Emoji of a Wave
Heartbreak Warfare
XO

🎥 Video 1

Why Georgia
Neon
Waiting on the Day
83
Split Screen Sadness
Drifting
Something Missing / In Your Atmosphere
New Light / You’re Gonna Live Forever in Me
Changing

🎥 Video 2

Stop This Train
In The Blood
Who Says
Your Body is a Wonderland
Walt Grace’s Submarine Test, January 1963
A Face to Call Home
If I Ever Get Around To Living
Edge of Desire

👏🏻 Encore
Shouldn’t Matter But it Does / Forever Young
Free Fallin’

If Mayer ever does another show like this, it won’t be soon enough; if this is the only time he’s ever done it, it was worth far more than the price of admission.

And for those of you who have never seen him live – especially those of you who are musicians – you need to see him at least once. He’s the greatest guitar of my generation and you’re going to be missing out on more than a concert if you miss it. You’ll be missing out on an experience.

“Why do double sharps/flats and natural exist?”

December 20, 2022 / Tom

Each morning, whenever I’m reading my various news feeds, there are a few subreddits I review, too. This morning, in r/musictheory, I read this question:

i’m a beginner beginner and i just cant seem to wrap my head around the concept. Like a C double sharp is D so why not just put D instead of C double sharp.

Also, from what i know, Nature cancels out the sharp or flat, and so why not just write the regular note?

As someone who’s played instruments in band in junior high and high school, and someone who still plays guitar and dabbles with other instruments, I was interested in the answers (especially because I don’t read music nearly as much as I once did).

Of all the answers provided, this was my favorite. Here’s an excerpt (emphasis mine):

Why is to, two, and too all to?

Just because they sound the same doesn’t mean they’re spelled the same, and more importantly, it doesn’t mean they have the same meaning.

…

E# is NOT F. Fb is NOT E. They may be produced by the same physical key on a piano, but they are NOT the same note.

And the reason why is, they have different meanings so they must remain separate things. That’s the way the system evolved. That’s the way it is.

The sound has a name that represents itself in the key it exists. In other words, the sound has name for the world in which it exists and, in music, there are multiple worlds.

At least that’s how I conceptualize it.

Using SongShift for the Highest Quality Audio

December 15, 2022 / Tom

For as much as I love the audio quality of Apple Music and as much as I’m digging features like , the service doesn’t do as good a job at helping me discover new music.

That’s why I can’t quit Spotify. Nothing beats it, pun intended maybe 🥁, when it comes to surface other music that I also like. (And yes, I’ve probably given every single service a try).

But I want to be able to listen to my favorite music from Spotify at the highest level of audio quality and that can be done on Apple Music.

This is where SongShift comes into play. Another pun, yes.

Using SongShift

Use SongShift to transfer music playlists across streaming platforms

Here’s the gist of how I use it:

When I find music on Spotify that I like, I create a playlist.
Once the playlist is created, I transfer it to Apple Music using SongShift.

There are a few additional things I do, too:

I’m one of those people who still loves entire albums rather than just a few tracks, so I’ll usually create an entire playlist from a single album.
I occasionally make playlists that are mixes of individual tracks so when I get about 30 songs, I’ll create a custom mix.
I keep my playlists organized by year so at the end of each year, if I haven’t already done so, I’ll sync the playlists from Spotify over to Apple Music.

This makes sure I can continue to find new music and sync it across services and get the highest quality version, if it exists in Apple’s library, for listening to it later.