John Mayer

Many detractors assumed John Mayer would never replicate the crossover smash status of his GRAMMY®-winning single "Your Body Is a Wonderland." Yet, the slinky-voiced singer/songwriter has surpassed expectations critically and commercially with every release since. The whimsical torch ballad "Daughters" recaptured the hearts of college coeds everywhere and earned Mayer a Song of the Year GRAMMY® over Kanye West and Alicia Keys, while the recently released Continuum is already positioning itself as a contender for the Album of the Year crown with its effortlessly cool approach to adult-alternative music.

When John Mayer announced he was going the barroom blues route with his John Mayer Trio and the live album TRY!, the decision seemed like a necessary indulgence at first but quickly revealed itself as a clear creative transition between his genteel acoustic beginnings and later electric work. "Hummingbird" is a career-high duet with the legendary B.B. King; "Vultures" sways to and fro with a soulful swagger; "Slow Dancing In a Burning Room" is as crisp, colorful, and inviting as a pile of autumn leaves; and "Wait Until Tomorrow" rattles and rolls like the loosest of jam sessions.

It took John Mayer only a year to turn a brief brush with classical training at Boston's Berklee College of Music into a buzz-worthy music career beginning with the easy, breezy Inside Wants Out. Quickly touted as a silky-smooth successor to Dave Matthews, Mayer met that preconception while constantly hinting at something more. Sometimes that has meant a stripped-back, self-assured blues approach (Continuum, TRY!); other times it's equaled the kind of heartfelt, hook-filled pop both you and your mom can enjoy (Room for Squares, Heavier Things). All the while, Mayer has quietly become a confident and accomplished voice of his generation, someone we'll be hearing much more from five years from now as well as 20.