John Mayer is unmistakably hot

By Randy Cordova
Arizona Republic

John Mayer burst on to the music scene with his major-label debut, "Room for Squares." The album has sold more than a million copies. His follow up, "Inside Wants Out," was recently released. Gannett News Service

The fast-rising singer-songwriter got a handsome three-page profile from the magazine recently, but the scribe got the name of a new Mayer song wrong.

"It's called Split Screen Sadness, and they called it Split Screen Love," he says in a fast tumble of words. "Like I would write something with a cheesy name like that. It makes me want to do a global search and replace."

Little blunders aside, the media have been enormously kind to Mayer, whose new album "Inside Wants Out" recently was released. He's pretty much the "it" boy of the musical moment, generating blush-inducing raves in Rolling Stone, the Los Angeles Times and USA Today.

In Interview, confessed fan Elton John posed questions to the 24-year-old. Hip music mag Blender featured the dark-eyed Mayer in a bizarre photo session with a chimpanzee.

"I thought it was something I could do without looking like a schmuck," he says. "I thought, 'Cool, let's hang out with a monkey for a day. I'm not an image machine.' "

And, of course, who doesn't love monkeys?

Back to the image thing. Thanks to his tousled good looks and smart, witty wordplay, Mayer has become the poster boy for frustrated sorority girls everywhere. He doesn't mind the persona.

"As long I never perpetuate it myself, I think it's OK," he says. "I can always accept it as being a result of the music."

His image hasn't hurt him with women, either, though Mayer says he's not much of a player on the road.

"I tried to fool around for a while, but I didn't feel so hot with it," he says. "If it wasn't for the advent of the message board, I would probably be more of a dog than I am now. I don't want (sex) so badly as to have people start talking trash about me."

But most fans he encounters just want to talk about "Room for Squares." Without a lot of fanfare, his major-label debut has quietly sold more than a million copies. It's warm, nostalgic and cozy, with his sincere vocals wafting over pleasingly earnest melodies.

"Most people who meet me, it's not like, 'I want to meet the guy from MTV.' It's more like, 'I've got to meet this guy because I want to say what this record means to me.' "

The thought of millions of people being moved by his words doesn't intimidate the Connecticut native, who has already been dubbed this generation's James Taylor by some enthusiastic wags.

"I don't feel overwhelmed at all," he says. "People have a cool relationship with my music, but it's still very much mine.

"When I walk into the bathroom and play the guitar, those songs are mine until I'm done with them. Then I play them for the public, and they're ours. It's not mine and it's not yours — it's ours."