1 	Wildfire 	4:15
2 	Dear Marie 	3:45
3 	Waitin' On The Day 	4:35
4 	Paper Doll 	4:20
5 	Call Me The Breeze	3:27
6 	Who You Love	4:13
7 	I Will Be Found (Lost At Sea)	4:04
8 	Wildfire	1:28
9 	You're No One 'Til Someone Lets You Down 	2:48
10 	Badge And Gun 	3:15
11 	On The Way Home 	4:00

Acoustic Guitar – John Mayer
Backing Vocals – Bernard Fowler (tracks: 7), Lisa Fischer (tracks: 7,11)
Bass – Sean Hurley (tracks: 1 to 7, 9 to 11)
Drums – Aaron Sterling (tracks: 1 to 7, 9 to 11)
Guitar – Zane Carney (tracks: 1 to 2)
Keyboards – Chuck Leavell (tracks: 2 to 5, 7, 9 to 11), Rami Jaffee (tracks: 1,8)
Lead Guitar – John Mayer
Lead Vocals – John Mayer
Pedal Steel Guitar – Paul Franklin (tracks: 1, 9, 11)
Percussion – Aaron Sterling (tracks: 1 to 7, 9 to 11) 
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Vocals – Katy Perry  (tracks: 6)
Vocals, Piano – Frank Ocean  (tracks: 8)

John Mayer's 2013 album, the Americana-tinged Paradise Valley, is an introspective if somewhat more upbeat affair than his similarly country-inflected 2012 release, Born and Raised. With that album, Mayer was coming off a rough career patch that found him issuing a mea culpa for an infamously loose-lipped 2010 Rolling Stone interview. Making matters worse, in 2011 the singer/songwriter announced he would be going on extended hiatus from performing while he received treatment for granulomas found near his vocal cords. Subsequently, with Born and Raised, Mayer moved away from the commercial pop of 2010's Battle Studies and toward an intimate, largely acoustic, '70s Laurel Canyon-inspired sound with songs that featured plenty of apologetic soul-searching. Named after the Montana river valley where Mayer owns a cabin and spends much of his time when not touring, Paradise Valley continues in this more intimate country-folk style and often feels less like a stand-alone album and more like a companion piece to Born and Raised. Which isn't to say it's a lesser work. On the contrary, Paradise Valley actually hangs together better than Born and Raised, with songs that achieve a balance between Mayer's electric Eric Clapton influence and his softer James Taylor-inspired side. Although his self-imposed period of supplication seems to have ended, Mayer still has plenty of troubles on his mind. Whether comparing his life on the road to the life of an old girlfriend he webstalks online, as he does on "Dear Marie," or struggling with his wanderlust and inability to call one place home, as he does on "Badge and Gun," Mayer is clearly still struggling with some of life's bigger issues. As he sings to his old girlfriend on "Dear Marie," "Yeah I got that dream, but you got yourself a family." It's this knack for turning his personal worries into universally relatable ones that helps Mayer avoid coming off as too self-absorbed and entitled. It is also this ability that helps him finesse "Paper Doll" from simply being a nasty swipe at rumored onetime paramour Taylor Swift (Swift purportedly wrote the song "Dear John" after being dumped by Mayer) into a superbly crafted and gorgeous song about romancing someone more emotionally vulnerable than yourself. Elsewhere, Mayer delivers a soulful rendition of J.J. Cale's "Call Me the Breeze" -- the most straightforward blues cut on the album -- and delves into two synergistic duets, the first with on-and-off girlfriend Katy Perry on "Who You Love" and the second with R&B auteur Frank Ocean on "Wildfire." That Mayer fails to cite country legend Ernest Tubb as the inspiration for "You're No One 'Til Someone Lets You Down," which basically cribs the melody from Tubb's "Walking the Floor Over You," might seem more of an oversight if he hadn't made it so obvious from the start that he was clearly drawing from the deep well of country music's past on Paradise Valley. Ultimately, whether it's Tubb's honky tonk twang, or the twang of Mayer's own heart, the sound of Paradise Valley rings true. ---Matt Collar, AllMusic Reviews

Jeżeli wydaje się wam, że miłość nie może inspirować dobrych albumów, John Mayer z chęcią udowodni wam, że jest inaczej.

Kolorowy amerykański świat bardziej przeżywał związek Johna z Kaśką Perry, niż jego poprzednią płytę "Born and Raised" (z maja 2012 roku). I wcale się nie dziwię - nie chodzi bynajmniej o to, że mamy do czynienia z dwójką rozpoznawalnych twarzy, co już samo w sobie przyciąga reporterskie flesze, ale o fakt, że poprzednie wydawnictwo Mayera (a właściwie wszystko, co wypuścił od czasu wybitnego "Continuum"), było dość zachowawcze, pozbawione tożsamości, a w efekcie niezwracające na siebie uwagi.

Zakochany po uszy w znanej piosenkarce John jakby zresetował się i wrócił do formy sprzed kilku lat. Jego najnowsza propozycja znów ma w sobie lekkość i oryginalny posmak, jaki Mayer od dawna potrafił nadawać swoim utworom. Słucham wzruszającego, minimalistycznego "Dear Marie" i, choć ciągle wyczuwam w nim echa fascynacji twórczością Erica Claptona i JJ Cale'a, to zachwycam się popowym zmysłem autora, który każe mu w drugiej części piosenki zaserwować nam banalnie prosty, ale świetnie uzupełniający tę country'ową miniaturkę zaśpiew "oooo". Cieszę się, gdy obcuję z singlowym "Wildfire", które znów - w pierwszej części nawiązuje do muzyki starych mistrzów, by pod koniec utworu przerodzić się w oparty na brzmieniu fortepianu klasyczny Mayerowski song. Ba, podobają mi się także typowo radiowe, ale misternie ułożone i z gracją zaaranżowane piosenki "Who You Love" (duet z Katy Perry, który skądinąd potwierdza, że ta panna śpiewać potrafi) i "I Will Be Found (Lost At Sea)". Na plus zaliczam także cover "Call Me The Breeze" przywołanego JJ Cale'a. Co prawda jego aranżacja nie jest przesadnie twórcza (ba, jest totalnie odtwórcza), ale w obliczu niedanej śmierci autora, jawi się jako jego piękne upamiętnienie.

"Paradise Valley" ma też kilka słabszych momentów w rodzaju "Badge And Gun" czy "Waitin' On The Day", które są pozbawionymi uroku folkowymi wypełniaczami. Więcej też spodziewałem się po duecie z Frankiem Oceanem: 1,5 minuty, będącej w dodatku czymś w rodzaju repryzy singla? No chyba nie po to wciąga się na listę płac najgorętsze nazwisko zeszłego roku…

Jednakże "Paradise Valley" pokazuje, że John Mayer znów znalazł się na właściwym kursie, że jest artystą, który ciągle ma nam sporo do powiedzenia. Nie tylko, gdy cierpi, ale także wtedy, gdy przeżywa prawdopodobnie najszczęśliwszy okres w życiu. ---Jurek Gibadło, magazyngitarzysta.pl

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01. Heartbreak Warfare
02. All We Ever Do Is Say Goodbye
03. Half Of My Heart
04. Who Says
05. Perfectly Lonely
06. Assassin
07. Crossroads
08. War Of My Life
09. Edge Of Desire
10. Do You Know Me
11. Friends, Lovers Or Nothing

John Mayer – vocals; guitars; keyboards; sound effects; percussion; production
Steve Jordan – drums; percussion; production
Pino Palladino – bass 
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Ian McLagan – Hammond organ; Wurlitzer electric piano; piano; pump organ, celeste
Jamie Muhoberac – keyboards
Robbie McIntosh – guitar
Waddy Wachtel – acoustic guitars
Bob Reynolds – saxophone
Bryan Lipps – trumpet
Taylor Swift – vocals

It's no secret that John Mayer is a 21st Century Fox, wining and dining women all through the tabloid headlines, so it's about time he delivered an album that traded upon his loverman persona -- and Battle Studies is that record in spades. Retaining more than a modicum of the slick soul-blues undertones of Continuum, Mayer fashions a modern groove album, a record that maintains a smooth seductive vibe so thoroughly it spills into a weird one-man band cover of "Crossroads," turning Clapton's contained Cream masterwork into something about vibe, not virtuosity. Mayer remains a disciple of Slowhand, but he shows an unusual interest in the big AOR stylings of Journeyman, along with Stevie Ray Vaughan's In Step, creating a coolly clean blend of synths and Strats, one that's as much about texture as it is song -- something perfectly appropriate for a make-out album like this. Sometimes, Mayer dips too heavily toward the texture -- not just in the sound sculptures in the bedding of "Heartbreak Warfare," but even the strum-n-croon of "All We Ever Do Is Say Goodbye" -- and his love-as-war metaphors land with the thud of a dud bomb, but he can't resist a good, tight melody and builds the bulk of Battle Studies upon them: the elegant "Half of My Heart," the stoned self-deprecating wit of "Who Says," the softly soulful "Perfectly Lonely." Here, Mayer is effortlessly seductive and somewhat irresistible, and it's easy to see why the ladies love cool John. --- Stephen Thomas Erlewine, allmusic.com

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