And yes, the Wizard of Oohs and Ahhs is anything but normal himself. Which he displayed continuously throughout the evening.






Okay, so here's my review:

I LOVE FREAKIN MRAZ!!! Omg! He is absolutely amazing live…and such a dork..seriously.

Okay, so the whole evening could have ended horrible. We got off to a bad start, Ruth was late, so I’m rushing her to leave, and she lost her homework, then she finds it, and we are on our way. We get gas and some pre-show refreshments, and take off for Normal Illinois (about 2 and ½ hours) and after like 15 mins, Ruth is like ,Oh crap my pen ran out of ink, lets stop at a gas station and get one. So we do.

COOLEST GAS STATION I HAVE EVER BEEN TOO!! Omg, this gas station was humungous and had just about everything you could ever need, it was amazing. The bathrooms were like a friggin palace. Most gorgeous restroom I’ve ever seen. Anyways, I got Maggie a postcard and we headed back on the road.

Then we end up running late so we get there right as TP (Tristan Prettyman) is supposed to be starting, so we park, and try to find a way in the building…it takes us forever…we were in the library somehow cause it was at Braden Auditorium at Illinois State University. We finally get to the auditorium where they’re letting people in, and get passed to about 3 different entrances before we’re at the right one. Then the chick is like, “Do you have your ID’s?” What? Apparently we need out ISU Student ID’s to get in…which we didn’t have obviously, since we don’t go to ISU. Apparently there were a lot of people not aware of this, because these dumbasses sold tickets on freaking Ticketmaster, so hardly any of the people who bought them weren’t students at the college. Anyways, we get shoved somewhere to pay an extra $7.00 fee in order to get in. I don’t have any cash on me, so we first have to find an ATM.

All the while we hear TP singing away in the auditorium. So I find the ATM go back, get in line, pay extra cash, and they give us new tickets. I was like, HELL NO! We still get the seats we paid for right? Cause I got us 2nd row, and I was definitely sitting 2nd row if I paid for 2nd row, student or not. They say we can have our same seats, and we finally get back to our entrance, and the chick won’t let us in this time because Ruth has a camera. So we have to take it and check it into the lockers. Which take us forever to find as well. We do. Pop in a quarter, and lock it up. (I still snuck my tiny digital in my pocket)

Back to line. FINALLY we get in. But the stupid chick tore my ticket in half, instead of just tearing of the detacheable part. I save these things, biatch!

So we get in, get to hear TP sing a few songs. She talks about Weird Al and the song Taco Grande, and some other stuff that was making us laugh our asses off, which make us really sad that we missed most of her set (tear), oh yeah, and also because she has a great voice and is on the way to being a great artist...yes she finally caved and signed with a major label...be looking for her release sometime soon. But she’s like, “Oh yeah…I’m gonna do it” and sings Brittney Spears – Toxic, which Ruth recognizes from my car (I'm sure some of you have heard it too), and is excited about that. TP has some troubles with cuing the audience for the singalong though. She did some awkward head movement each time it was our turn for crowd participation. It was great. Some dude kept yelling at her during her set, and she couldn't understand anything he was saying, and kept asking "What?" and he kept repeating, and she still couldnt hear him, so he finally gave up and yelled, "I'm DRUNK!" which seemed to make sense to everyone, so we all laughed, and the show moved on.

So finally its time for Mraz. I love him. Geek came out in a pink t-shirt (after I purchased my own pink one that says Geek on it from merchandise in between sets---note: Mraz has a song called Geek In The Pink, hence the T’s). So, this kid talks more than anyone I’ve seen in concert. It was pretty cool, he’s just so laid back that it’s just like he’s a friend of everyone’s in the audience, and we’re all just hanging out, and he happens to get on stage and goof off for a while to entertain us. Which he does well, with some funny stories, comments, and of course dance moves. Lots of the Robot, and some other old school moves, one of which he likes to call the “mom” where you basically dance like your mom. He tried to get us all to do it, but apparently it’s harder to dance off the beat than you would think. Ruth enjoyed dancing like this WAY too much. He also tried to get people to make out with eachother in the audience. It was quite interesting. There was also one song that he, Ian, and Bill Bell (other guitar player) lined up and danced to with they're guitars making hilarious faces, and all moving in sync. That was funny..or when he was like " i love it when you guys sing along and then i mix up the lines and your friends are like 'omg girl, like what up, i thought you said you knew the words".

So in front of the stage they had this pit area, where people were standing, and then there was this little half-wall/barricade thing, before the rows of seats started (in which no one sat during the entire concert) and during one song, Jason and Ian (the bass player) walked out on it (how? They were like cats or something, it was only like a foot wide) from each side of the stage and met in the middle…RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME! It was awesome. It was just a part of the venue not the stage that they set up, so I guess during rehearsals they decided it would be cool to walk out on it. It was. I tried to take some pics, but Jason was dancing around so they’re kinda blurry. And all I got of Ian were his blurry sneakers.

Mraz 2ft away from me (you can see Ians hand in the upper right, lol)


Blurry Dancing Mraz



At one point, he mentioned that the music playing (softly, while he was talking about the next song) made it sound like we were in a planetarium, so he starts going off on this tangent (which happened quite often) about “If you look to your left *pointing at ceiling* you’ll see the Aurean Galaxy, which is really a large circle of stars formed by lots of smaller circles of stars….and if you look to your right, you’ll see the Borealis Galaxy. Which is quite interesting, because it is made up of a large circle of stars, made from lots of smaller circles of stars…” All the while, as he points and bullshits everyone looks where he points, even though it’s at nothing. It was hilarious. Then during Common Pleasure he would change the words from "common pleasure" to "argh! TREASURE!" and do this little hook handed gesture. Also hilarious. I think I might like his antics more than his music. Nah That can't be the case. But he sure is one funny fella!


He also got to sing a few songs without a guitar and just held the mic and kinda rapped, it was awesome, because, well, Mraz is awesome. So when his guitar comes back out, it has a note on it that says, "TP thinks UR Hot!" (Tristan and Jason are dating) so he just says that it's good that people in the back can't read it.

No luck with hearing the new single "Wordplay" though. It's a big secret, but I thought he'd at least play it in the show since it's supposed to be hitting radio now. Although I lucked out when I got home, a nice fellow fan online had gotten ahold of it, and Im'ed it to me. So I included a link at the bottom for anyone who's interested.

It was sadly the last night he was playing with the full band (dubbed the Take-It-Easy-Buddies) before the fall tour for the new album. (This summer he will be on an acoustic tour w. Toca-the bongos player) so the band had some fun, at the end of the set, just he and Toca were on stage for a couple songs, so the band members and TP were leaping and interpretive dancing across the stage behind him.





Eventually TP joined him for their duet “Shy That Way” and she asked if he liked the dancing. He said he did. He asked if she taped the note to his guitar. She faked innocence and was like, “What note?” and he was just like, “Okay” in this cute voice. They were really cute.






Overall, it was just a really great concert. I enjoyed myself tremendously, and now I have no doubts about spending more money on an acoustic tour with Alanis Morrissette. (Tickets will probably be like $50 for the two of them, and at The Fox Theater here in STL) because I know it will be freakin awesome. Seriously, I am going for sure, so if anyone is interested let me know. July 2nd. I’m excited.


Some links if anyone is interested...

Wordplay (new single for album coming out July 21st):
http://s48.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1VXO3YP4TGCS63NU608STDM41Z

Shy That Way w/Tristan Prettyman:
http://s48.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=200G9DMOVGBT427EL7FKR0ZBEJ

Gypsy MC Live (some good ole fashion Mraz playing with some rapping/rhyming):
http://s29.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1H6YB08JM4C3W2EA23QRV9A09Z

On Love In Sadness (Live..and good):
http://s29.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2LWYKVXWA9VSQ0DSSAGLDT0S9Z

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