Today's Pick

Jason Mraz is back with a music video for the tender song "Love Someone," the lead-off single from the 37-year-old San Diego singer-songwriter's newly released fifth studio album, "Yes!" The 14-song release promised a purely acoustic and more intimate sound. The New Age-minded musician does believe that saying "yes" to other things can open an internal door to creativity, and he tries to say "yes" about things in his own life.
"Love Someone" isn't about a specific personal relationship; instead, the love in question is a more general feeling of being lucky, especially as relates to music. "When I let go in a song I feel like the mental chatter, anything that might show up as doubt or fear, that tends to fall away," Mraz says. "You just lock into one beautiful thing, which I feel is love, and when I sing to someone or with someone I feel that's giving the love away. You get it back in return with how amazing you feel." Mraz sure knows how to make love melodic.
He teamed up with the all-female eclectic rock-folk group, Raining Jane, for "Love Someone," and Mraz wrote it with the lady quartet while walking down a dirt road in Virginia with a small herd of goats. "We all grabbed an instrument and we're walking down the road just making things up," Mraz told Radio.com. "That's really what songwriting is. It's taking risks and making things up and seeing what sticks. It was an observation of how wonderful love is," he added. "When you give it away it comes back to you immediately. It really is what gives us life."
The clip truly captures what it means to fall head over heels for a life partner and the progression of a relationship from its early, carefree stages to the days when having that special person by your side. Zoom in on house at night, Mraz quietly strums on his guitar and backed by his flawless band of lady angels in all white while scenes of couples at varying ages flash on screen. The story follows a couple throughout their relationship and the great lengths it takes to maintain a special bond. Feel the joy, laughter, and tears - mixed with a whole lot of heart in the sweet video.

Travie McCoy is probably best known as being the front man for rap rock group Gym Class Heroes (and being a Katy Perry ex-flame). But he has now decided to branch out on the solo tip. Having relocated to Miami, after recovering from his addiction to pain killers, The 32-year-old has started working on his solo project from a completely different aspect. He had initially wanted it to be an acoustic album discussing his drug addiction and break-up with Perry, but scrapped all the original material citing it as being too personal for his first solo effort.
On previous solo efforts he worked with Bruno Mars and Cee-Lo Green. This time around McCoy has paired his rhymes with Jason Mraz's sweet vocals. The new song is called "Rough Waters" and the Gym Class Heroes captain navigates "Rough Water" on his first solo effort since his 2010 debut album, "Lazarus," which spawned the platinum hit "Billionaire." Someone is bound to complain this isn't "Hip Hop," but oh well. McCoy shares some bars about surviving rough waters with Mraz on the hook on the guitar-driven number, produced by Benny Blanco (Katy Perry, Wiz Khalifa).
The mid-tempo, acoustic ballad, which will be the lead single taken from McCoy's upcoming sophomore solo album is expected in 2014, begins with 36-year-old Mraz cooing a sugary intro before McCoy's trademark sing-along ready rapping. There's nothing here that will shock longtime McCoy fans, but if there are shades in the rap-plus-sung-chorus subgenre, it's fair to say that "Rough Water" sounds slightly more like Fort Minor than classic Gym Class Heroes. McCoy's voice just seems slightly more like Mike Shinoda's voice.
As for the Ethan Lader-directed video for rap/pop song "Rough Water," it was filmed in early-October and features McCoy teams with Mraz to kick up the romance on the streets of an upside-down New York City. The world is upside down and right side up and the city hits the sky with mirrored reflections and more for McCoy and Mraz, as McCoy trying to catch the attention of a wandering girl (played by Crystal Kay), while Mraz sporting one of his most mainstream looks ever as he chants the hooks.

Back to last summer (June 2012), Jason Mraz and director Elliott Sellers asked fan to tweet what "The Woman I Love" means to them. Now the 35-year-old Atlantic Pop-Rock singer-songwriter and Sellers chose their favorite ideas to create the remarkable Companion music video has finally released via Mraz's Twitter account in honor of Valentine's Day. The track was taken from the multi-Grammy Award-winning tunesmith's incredible fourth studio album, "Love Is a Four Letter Word."
Mraz decided to base his new CD, "Love Is a Four Letter Word," around the theme of love. However, he found the fundamentals of making "an album about love" took some time and hard work. "I thought it would be pretty easy as a songwriter to always write through a filter of love," Mraz told Jam! Music. "But the challenges at first were trying to write songs about love from the heart that weren't cheesy. What I learned quickly was that when a song was cheesy, it usually just came from the mind. It usually came from the craft of songwriting which anyone can do. So what I needed was experience, things that were going to rip my heart open to show me what I'm made of."
Mraz explained this song's meaning to Billboard magazine: "I try to keep my music gender neutral, but this is obvious, its called 'The Woman I Love,' but I'd like to dedicate to the men in the relationships because every so often the woman forgets her own greatness and she goes a little bat sh*t crazy sometimes. So its up to the other half to love that person back into the person we know them to be. That's basically what this song's about."
The new video for "The Woman I Love," shows Mraz singing the romantic tune in a warm scenery as images of this beautiful lady are displayed where she just gets passed a regular day in her life, is the result of an unprecedented online contest where Twitter users were invited to answer the question, "What does 'The Woman I Love' mean to you?" More than 10,000 responses followed, tweeted, of course, in 140 characters or less flowed in with #MrazingTheVideo. The best of those submissions were then used to inspire the storyboarding, which pop up as animations, propel the video's overall concept. Mraz rewarded fans from all around the world whose ideas were used by putting their Twitter handles at the video's end.

Jason Mraz gets emotional in the music video for "93 Million Miles," the second single from the Grammy-winner's fourth studio album, "Love Is a Four Letter Word," in stores now. The clip was shot during Mraz's VH1 Storytellers special, and this easygoing song was wrote with guitarist Michael Natter, who would say when the pair were sitting out in the sun, playing guitar" "We'd look at the sun, this fiery nuclear furnace, 93 million miles away, by the time the heat and light gets to us, it's just right."
Hailed as one of the modern era's most gifted pop troubadours, the 35-year-old Virginia native has built quite an impressive career thus far and he is someone who has always looked on the bright side of life and his music has reflected this optimistic world view. Mraz is a fine, polished performer, and his songs don't lack heart. But these simple arrangements would perhaps work better if they retained a little roughness.
"93 Million Miles" is, of course, the distance between the Earth and Sun, and also quite a nice life allegory for a song. Speaking to Billboard magazine, Mraz explained: "No matter where you are, there you are. And no matter where you are in the planet, you can call that home. I wanted to create a song that acknowledged that home is where the heart is and that's up to you to decide." When Mraz dials back the platitudes just a little bit, something quite enjoyable emerges, the track reminds the listeners that they can always come back home. It's a lilting, lovely tune.
What a simple yet effective and moving video. All the nostalgia and positive energy I get from the song, I get it too from the video for the jam, "93 Million Miles," so I'm very satisfied. Expecting a high budgeted with a super elaborate 'acted' story line video wouldn't have been too Mraz anyway. Sticking to real families, couples, friends sharing their happiness was all it was needed to make a fitting video for this particularly amazing ballad. Mraz reveals why he's simply the best.

Christina Perri has released the music video for "Distance," the third single of her debut studio album, "Lovestrong." As stated by Perri on a video on her Facebook, it featuring her good friend, Jason Mraz. The Elliott Sellers-directed clip sees Perri and Mraz singing the lyrics of the wistful ballad while wandering the same place, but without running into each other. It gives us an antique look inside Perri's heart. She and Mraz croon the melodies in the sweetest ways, making us happy and nostalgic both at the same time!
"'Distance' is a song about loving someone at the wrong time in your life," the 25-year-old tells Rolling Stone. "Maybe it's too soon, maybe it's too late, but nevertheless it's about being around that one whom your heart longs for without being about to show your true feelings, without being able to tell them. It's very hard to keep love a secret, and I wrote this song about the one time I had to." The bittersweet message and haunting duet vocals from both artists carry the clip with plenty of emotional vulnerability and engagement.
"Distance" is a quite beautiful on the ears, and it sounds like a much more restrained performance from the 'Jar Of Hearts' singer and the emotionally engaging combination of her and Mraz really does connect with some resonance. They'd create the type of song poignant enough to leave you blubbering and snot-crying into an empty pint of ice cream, because that's just what happens when you add one amazing singer-songwriter to another amazing singer-songwriter and then throw in a video with hazy sunlight and a white dress.
In the gorgeous clip, Perri and Mraz play lovers who are torn apart. There are a ton of sad faces and stolen glances, which work just as well. Symbolically, the pair are in the same house, yet they can't quite find each other. As Perri roams the property, she eventually stumbles upon a huge wall of photos and mementos that we're assuming remind her lover, as she dramatically rips the photos off the wall only to reveal a real live Mraz, calmly strumming his guitar and waiting patiently for Perri to find him. The clip leaves us in suspense.

Jason Mraz is back and attempts at a hit around the acoustic guitar again with a new music video for latest single "I Won’t Give Up," the first official single from the acoustic pop singer's upcoming fourth studio album, "Love is a Four Letter Word," out April 17. The video appears to pay homage to people from all walks of life that have someone overcome adversity.
This largely acoustic emotional ballad is a poignant ode to a long-lasting relationship, which the 34-year-old troubadour says he won't give up on her whatever happens. It is likely that the song was inspired by Mraz's relationship with singer-songwriter Tristan Prettyman. The "I'm Yours" hitmaker got engaged with Prettyman in December 2010 after they'd dated for four years, before breaking up with her several months later.
The track is guitar led with some additional vocal landscapes towards the end of the song, which is not for weddings but rather for those moments when partners realize the effort is all worth it and are looking forward to a future together that stretches to the horizon. Being lyrically beautiful and inspiring, it's the kind of song that would make you open up about your feelings or comfort you when you're in a pretty bad phase in a relationship and it will probably be used a lot in weddings and romance flicks.
"The story of the video is that we all have our own stories," Mraz said. "We all have our own version of suffering and everybody has many things to NOT give up on." The Mark Pellington-directed inspiring clip showcases a faceless man and woman taking a trip down memory lane by separately sorting through a collection of envelopes, postcards and scraps of notebook paper; in the end, they find their way back to each other, stationery safely nestled in their hearts.

Atlantic Records newcomer Hope snagged guitar virtuoso Jason Mraz for her sparkling first single - lucky lass. "Love Love Love" gives the world a first glimpse of Hope, and will be featured on her upcoming charming self-titled debut album, which is a revival of acoustic and soul. It bravely explores emotional boundaries, helping to bring her angelic voice and real lyrics to life. Each song carries a different message of love and positivity while maintaining a strong sense of social awareness.
For Hope, her name pretty much says it all. She's a gifted performer with an angelic voice and a naturally sunny disposition. She's a lyricist for whom the word "love" comes easily. Armed with a message as she readies for her major label debut, the radio dial is about to be infused with Hope. Coming from a musical background (Mom singer, dad music director), Hope plans to bless the world with "Love, Love, Love," while drawing attention to other social issues. Sounding like a little bit of Colbie Caillat mixed with a little bit Sara Bareilles, Hope's crystalline voice floats through this sunny, island-tinged tune while Mraz happily strums his guitar. The song's message is just as uplifting as the music: Hope has said, "It's about feeling so much excitement and anticipation that you don't know what to do with yourself. When I listen to my record, I'm so ecstatic to finally be able to share my songs with the world."
The island-inflected tune is an ode to the dizzying experience of a new infatuation, but it also describes Hope's outlook as she nears the release of her album. She said, "It's about feeling so much excitement and anticipation that you don't know what to do with yourself. When I listen to my record, I'm so ecstatic to finally be able to share my songs with the world." The motivation behind the song? She says: "'Love, Love, Love' was a song that wasn't part of a bunch songs we had recorded for the album. And I felt that something was missing. And we needed to have something that people could listen to and feel really good. So, I sat down with Michael Blue and we just started playing and wrote the song."
The track has also a reggae tinge in the background as the two featherweight voices float and mingle. Hope and Mraz are intoxicated lovers, obsessed with the thought of being in love: "Your love's a permanent distraction, a perfect interaction, a feeling so extreme, lost my appetite to eat, I barely get to sleep, cause you're even in my dreams." Even starvation and insomnia don't sound so bad under this bout of love sickness. For now, though, Hope is poised and ready for the release of her much-anticipated debut. "I feel really grateful and emotional all at once. I'm just loving this time and not taking it for granted."

Jason Mraz was born June 23, 1977 in Virginia. "I'm Yours" is Jason's international breakthrough came with the release of lead single from his 3rd studio album, "We Sing. We Dance. We Steal Things". The song was nominated for Grammy Award for Song of the Year and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance at the 51st Grammy Awards. It was a huge commercial success in the US with it receiving a triple-Platinum certification from the RIAA for sales of over 3 million, and also was successful internationally and topped the charts in New Zealand and Norway.
The music video debuted in March 2008. "I'm Yours" was later featured as the Record of the Week on Scott Mills's BBC Radio One show scheduled on November 10, 2008. Since being added to YouTube it has been viewed over 43 million times before being taken down by YouTube authorities as a violation of copyright.It was filmed in Hawaii (Oahu and Kauaiin)in 2008 with veteran music video director Darren Doane.