One of the great things about live music is hearing an artist perform their music a bit differently than the recorded version. It becomes a unique experience.

During his stop in Detroit while on the Solo tour, John Mayer did an impromptu performance of Wild Blue. Someone in the audience shouted it out and he obliged. At the end of the song, he continued with an adlib that instantly become one of my favourite Mayer moments.

The song is beautiful and the full lyrics are needed to appreciate the context. His improvised lyrics are in bold at the end.

Never seen the sun before
Lyin’ on the ocean floor
I’m walkin’ through the wilderness
And livin’ off the loneliness

Oh, wild blue, deeper than I ever knew
Wild blue on a bed of grey
Oh, baby, what a wild blue
I found myself when I lost you

Yeah, yeah
Oh

All the tears I meant to cry
Dance across the evenin’ sky
And in my sorrow, I can see
That missin’ you belongs to me

Oh, wild blue, deeper than I ever knew
Wild blue on a bed of grey
Oh, baby, what a wild blue
I found myself when I lost you

Wild blue, deeper than I ever knew
It’s a wild blue since you went away
Oh, baby, what a wild blue
I found myself when I lost you

And you’ll never know
The unlikely beauty in letting you go

…I’m letting you go
I’m letting you go
It’s not just for show this time

And I thank you for hurting me
For showin’ me what I can be
And I’m thankin’ you for sending me
Down some tunnel where all this melody
Can come wrap itself around me

You sent these words down to me
And in my loneliness
Growin’ in my loneliness
I grow in the loneliness

But I found myself when I,
I found myself I,
I found myself when I lost you

The image below is right after he says “and I’m thankin’ you for sending me down some tunnel where all this melody can come wrap itself around me.”

You can see how smitten he is with that lyric - it’s as if he’s re-writing Wild Blue in real time, but going further. That feeling comes from a place of hurt, while also acknowledging the beauty in the pain. It’s our job to understand and harness that energy: to grow and accept what has happened to us, especially since most things are out of our control.

But hey, maybe I’m just projecting…