Jason Mraz took his sweet time creating a buzz for himself. He didn’t pick up a guitar until… Jason Mraz took his sweet time creating a buzz for himself. He didn’t pick up a guitar until he was 18. His debut album, Waiting for My Rocket to Come, came out last October, and it took him the better part of a year to rise enough in popularity to make it to TRL. One might purport that it’s because Mraz doesn’t produce music that teenyboppers can appreciate. More suited for funky coffee houses than TRL, Mraz’s music traverses the frat-boy-hippie genre.

Think John Mayer, Dave Matthews, David Gray and Ari Hest. These are the kind of live shows that are rave-worthy, not just for the stellar performers they feature, but also because they don’t need much more than their bodies and guitars to captivate the audience.

On Waiting for My Rocket to Come is Mraz’s TRL hit, “The Remedy (I Won’t Worry),” a song about a friend who has recovered from cancer. Not getting excessively serious, the tune is a catchy mix of toe-tapping percussion beats, some guitar chords and, of course, Mraz’s coffeehouse vocals.

“No Stopping Us” has a funky, hippie-vibe feel to it, while he sings each word with passion and soul. And he has the uncanny ability to get fairly funky without losing the acoustic feel that is his music, as on “Curbside Prophet,” his autobiographical tune. Background female rap vocals rhyme things like, “Yo, that kid is crazy,” and “What’s up with M-R-A-Z?” on the tune.

After studying performance and musical theater in New York, it was time to abandon the books and hit the streets. Tonight, he hits our streets, as he performs with Norwegian pop sensation Sondre Lerche at Metropol in the Strip District.