Exclusive Interview: Ellen K with Jason Mraz on His Latest Release!

Happy birthday Jason!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Jason Mraz is here. We havesomething for you before we begin talking.
Wow, one, two three,Happy birthday. Wow, thank you so
much, I love. Have youever had an introduction like that? Wow?
Bunch of geese just landed on thewindow. What's that? I have
not had an introduction like that?Thank you is the first. It's always

(00:22):
a good do I inhale. Whatdo I do with this? You blow?
Oh? Yeah, you have strongerlungs than that. Jason, You're
a singer. I'm taking it easier. Happy early birthday. Thank you so
very much. You want to knowabout your birthday plans? Today is the
day. Today is the day.I have a new album that I'm putting

(00:43):
out, which I'm very excited about. It's called Mystical, Magical, Rhythmical,
Radical Ride because this life that we'reon is I'm mystified by it.
What a miracle that we're even hereat all. And I want to stay
awake and enjoy the ride as longas I can stay. Yeah, And
so that's what this album is out, you know, Awakening Yes, Um.
And then I'm gonna go roller skatingwith a lot of our friends who

(01:07):
helped us make this record and helpus put it out. We're having a
little party at the roller rink.That's a great party idea. We need
to remember, we need to callJason because we're always looking for stuff to
do together as a team, andthat is definitely team building. Plus you
can dance on Can you dance onyour skates? Absolutely? Yeah? Can
you skate backwards? Yeah, sideways, backwards, every which way. Then

(01:30):
afterward, do us a favor,take the team. Okay, go across
the train tracks and the road SanFernando Road, and then you're going to
go to Golden Road Brewery where you'revegan es. Yep, most of you
have eggs, cheesebreads. You couldhave avocado tacos and they'll give you four.

(01:53):
You'll only build e two. Okay, they're really feeling so I'll bring
a friend. Yeah, bring afriend, all right? You beer not
all the time? Okay, youmight want one after roller skating, okay,
And I have to drive, soi'll smell. Maybe you'll split a
beer. You bring a friend.Yeah, and then something shocking happens while

(02:13):
you're enjoying yourself there. The metroLink train comes by and blows its horn.
Oh my god, unexpectedly and it'sa big You feel it in your
soul. Everything shape. It's agreat way to spend a birthday. It
is. I thought you were goingto tell me that they put the avocados
on the track and the metro comesby and turns it into guacamole and then
they scoop it up and put iton the tacos. That would that would

(02:36):
get me to Golden Road. Well, what do you want to talk about
first? Do you want to talkabout music or do you want to talk
about hot yoga? Gosh? Howabout hot music? Okay? Inspiration?
We know that this is an awakening, This is waking up, being here,
enjoying life. We love your useof color, We love your sunny

(02:59):
attitude. Thanks. Yeah. Ifeel like when you write a song,
you're you're creating something that is hopefullygoing to captivate someone's time and attention.
And our time and attention is ourgreatest wealth. So where we place that
attention matters, And so I wantto make purposeful music that maybe can help

(03:20):
tune your awareness to your own experiencesin life so that you remain grateful and
uplifted and vibrating at a high level, so you can just enjoy your life
experience, and so I've always triedto create songs that have this positive uplift
and are woven together with optimistic andinspirational thoughts or ideas. So many times

(03:40):
we get in our own heads andwe speak badly to ourselves, which we
would never do to our best friendor someone who live So why do we
do that? And thank you forthe music to chase away those thoughts?
Yeah, I don't know exactly whywe do that, but you know,
it's this duality of life where wehave this one version of our lives and

(04:03):
then we have this other version onthe inside of our lives. And that
inside could be created by very veryearly programming in life. Things we heard
our parents or elders or friends sayto us when we're younger, and they
just get imprinted. You know,if someone called you smelly or ugly when
you're a little kid, that mightstick with you forever. No one ever

(04:24):
called you smelly, Yeah, sothen you smell or what ugly? You
know? Little kids? Little kidscan be so mean, but that can
really live with you even into youradult life and affect you so um.
We have to constantly like renew ourinner child, even our inner selves.

(04:46):
And every day we wake up kindof reset the system and choose higher path
for ourselves. Sometimes I just randomlyskip. Yes, I love the sky.
I love skipping. Is what's sofun? Skipping? I know you
don't and I love to skip.Yes, Well, don't skip over my
new album which today and I Feellike dancing. Are you a good dancer?

(05:12):
I'm not a great dancer, butI can move my body. I
can move to the beat, Ican skate to the beat. I can
do lots of things to the beat. Um, But you know, do
I have all the moves you knowto back up dance for Justin Timberlake?
Probably not right, um, Butpart of creating the song I Feel Like
Dancing was to challenge myself to bea better dancer because I knew I'd have

(05:35):
to show up and dance playing thissong. Yeah, but also just to
celebrate that there are so many typesof dances out there and everybody's expression is
going to look different. So it'sthat's right. Yeah, we love your
video. It looks like it wasa one camera just yeah take. It
was. It was one take.We did many, if not many,

(05:57):
twenty rehearsals, and we filmed itabout seven times, and finally on the
last take, we're like, that'sit. So it's that? Was that
the sandemas Country Country Club? Yeah, I mean we were there for a
football banquet, but you I sawparts of it I had never seen before.
Huh Yeah. Yeah, I meanthe video could have ended up anywhere,
and that venue became available to us, and it had such you know,

(06:20):
a lot of different rooms and abig place to spread out. So
we thought, this is cool,We'll we'll try this. Honorary member,
No, not an honorary member.But I did find out that one of
my crew guys, our drum Tach, worked there as a kid. He
was a golf caddie. So circlemoments. Yeah, and now he's with
Jason Mraz making a video. Yeah, that's so cool. You grow up

(06:42):
here and then all of a suddenyou're like with and then you're still there.
Is it true you have an avocadoranch in ocean side? Oh my
god? Oh it is true.Yeah. And so in two thousand and
four, I was getting ready tomake my second album, and I was
living in LA but I didn't Ifelt like I didn't need to live in

(07:04):
La anymore. I needed to getout of the apartment so I could make
some noise, keep writing songs andpossibly record songs at home. And so
I found a little house outside ofSan Diego and so gosh, women twenty
years now, and I modeled itafter Bob Marley's house in Kingston, Jamaica,
which was a cool house that hiswhole band could live in at a
studio in the backyard. And thenthey also grew some fruit trees and flowers

(07:27):
and some herbs, and and Ithought, that's what I want to do
with my life. So I foundthis little spot and my whole band moved
in, and we made my albumthere, and I built a studio and
we've been making music there ever since. But what I didn't anticipate with falling
in love with all the trees andeventually establishing my own little fruit farm.
That is, yeah cool. Sowhat else do you have besides the avocados?

(07:49):
We have a hundred different types offruit trees. What yeah, yeah,
kinds of fruit. Yeah. Wewe don't do the grafting, but
yeah, most of the trees havebeen grafted. Yeah. Yeah. When
I moved in, it was amono crop of avocados. Okay, And
once I started, I've learned veryquickly that now I'm responsible for feeding them,

(08:15):
watering them, pruning them, takingcare of these trees. I'm the
landlord, right. Yeah. OnceI got into it, I realized I
could just put other things in theearth, just plug it into the network.
And I haven't stopped. So twentyyears of plugging things into the network
creates a really dense agrafood forest.Yeah that's amazing. You you have so

(08:35):
many talents. Oh shucks, Idon't. It's no talent to grow a
tree. I mean that's nature,Nature's talent. Well, you know you've
got a nurture, so you arenurturing soul. Yeah. Thanks, I'm
a nurturer. I was. Iknow you are into yoga. Do you
do it often? Yeah? Becauseyour physique is very toned and you've got
the muscle definition. I was athot yoga yesterday and we were in a

(09:01):
tight room. Oh yeah, Mattto Matt. It was Matt to Matt
because the heat or in the otherbig room was broken. Okay, so
we all cram in. So we'regoing to use your own heat today.
Yeah. And other people's sweat ison your Matt, yes. Yeah.
So next to me on one sideis a shirtless comedic actor okay, Michael,
okay. And on the other sidewas a girl with a big old

(09:24):
fake booty Okay, big what dothey call it? BBL? Is what
it is? A BBL Brazilian belllift, something like that. But these
were implanted, I think, Andthis was the bigger than the balloons we've
blown up for you on your birthday. Here she can moloss to know while
standing up. Yes. And sosince this was hot yoga, we had
weights and we were doing cowboys squats. Yeah, and I didn't have a

(09:50):
lot of room to squat. Ohyeah. So I don't know, it's
just what It was a yoga experiencewhere I kept my inner like generosity and
I moved back a little bit lether have more space. Yours was a
cowboy squish. It was do youdo hot yoga or just regular or vinyasai

(10:13):
vinyasa all the time? Regular?I I actually haven't been too hot since
the pandemic. Oh yeah, butprior to that, I was super hot
and juicy. I love it hot. I love it. I love it
every time. No matter how manytimes you do it, your brain says,
I gotta get out of here.I know you. Yeah, yeah,
but there's a there's a science tothat. You know. Our our

(10:35):
blood leaves our vital organs, leavesour brain and our vital and goes to
our skin to cool us down becausewe're burning up right, and so it
goes to cool us down. That'swhere we sweat so much. And because
of that, our brain says,hey, your vital organs are are in
trouble, so you need to leavethis room right now. You need to
find safety. And so, nomatter how many times, no matter how
much of an expert you are,this will reoccur in every class, this

(11:00):
feeling of fight or flight. Yeah, but the beauty of it is when
the class is over all of thatblood going to your skin goes back to
your vital organs, and you getcleansed, you get renewed, and that's
why you feel so great and youngat the end of the class. I
skip out a class and I comein here the next day and I really,

(11:20):
I like, I literally think it'smade me a happier person. It's
life changing. It is life changingbecause also what we're having to do is
train our minds to not run awayfrom uncomfortable situations, you know, and
we get better and better at thatthrough the practice of yoga. I love
that. Thanks for explaining that tome. Yeah, so this is your
eighth album. Can you believe it? When you're just a little boy and
your parents must be so proud ofyou. I'm the mother of a son,

(11:43):
and I would just be bursting withpride if my son grew up to
be you. But eight albums doyou look back and go, oh my
god? Eight? Yeah that youalso put it sideways for him, that's
right. Yeah, it's a wildfeeling. Every time I hit the road
again with a new album, II can't believe I have like a new

(12:07):
body of work, you know,because an album will basically extend your setlist
in a big way, you know, and transform your show. And every
time I make an album, Ithink this must be it can't possibly top
this or go any further. I'mprobably out of words, but you know,
life goes on. You live life, and you enjoy music, so
you just you just keep creating.And so yeah, here we are,

(12:30):
eight albums later, and I'm nowI get now. I'm excited to just
be trying things I haven't tried yet. When I look at my body work
and I look at the setlist,what's missing and what was missing from my
show where songs people could dance to? Oh, because I had a few
and people would jump out of theirseats and dance, and then I'd play
a slow song and they'd sit backdown, and I could tell these people

(12:54):
want to stay on their feet.Yeah, you know, and I want
that feeling as well. I wantto stay on my feet. So a
lot of this album was really aboutthe tempo. Oh that's amazing. Yeah,
yeah, I love that. Well, you're coming here to Irvine,
Yes, five Points Arena. Willwe be getting a lot or most of
your new music? You will begetting some of the new music. Yeah,

(13:18):
I don't. I don't think it'sfair to just go out and play
the entire album, because I haveto assume there's going to be some ticket
holders that still haven't played the newalbum. Hopefully not right. Yeah,
maybe like a friend of somebody,you know, they invite someone that's right,
that's right, and I'm yours andyeah, I've been really blessed to
have quite a few recognizable songs,and so my set list has already got

(13:41):
you know, eight to ten standardsthat are in it um. So that
leaves about ten to twelve songs thatcan move around, so I don't know.
I also try to mix it upeach night, just I see how
we're feeling. Try to Taylor Swiftit on people, you know, leave
him guessing you ever, like,just let the audience finish the song for

(14:03):
you. Sing along when you're playingone of your hits. Oh, take
a break, drink some water,dry your hair. I've not done that
yet because I I whenever I gosee a show and the and the artist
is like, you sing it,like I didn't come here to hear me
sing it said that, because Ifeel like everyone's doing that this summer,
I'm like, not so much.No, yeah, good, So we

(14:26):
get all you. You're all ours. Thanks, I'm yours. That was
good. Oh I have the phone'sdown just about