Jason Mraz on positivity, his new reggae album, and being bullied as a teen for having female friends
- Lyrics on the singer’s album ‘Look for the Good’ hint at how being bullied made him more determined to succeed, and how his tormentors ‘made me love who I am’
- In one incident, Mraz had his earrings ripped out by a friend’s boyfriend at her house, who beat him ‘all the way’ to his car
Jason Mraz is happy to be unapologetically positive. Just look at the titles of his 2019 “Good Vibes Tour” and of buoyant songs as I’m Yours, Have It All and The Remedy (I Won’t Worry).
And he is especially happy that the album’s closing selection, Gratitude, celebrates his unabashedly positive outlook. But dig deeper into this song, 10 years in the making, and into Mraz himself, and there’s more than meets the eye to this quintessentially happy-go-lucky singer-songwriter than his all-smiles public persona.
“I am unapologetically positive,” he said. “But it’s only because I’m a pessimist. It’s only because I get so melancholy and down, and because I have thought – for a long time – that the world is out of balance. … I have a pessimistic view of the world, because I’m pessimistic about myself.”
