Live Review: Jaymay @ The Mercury Lounge [3.19.08]

Halfway through her first song, I had Jaymay pegged as a sentimentalist. Another one of those dreamy singer/songwriters reminiscing on past love affairs through a sepia-toned mirror, imparting every lost moment with a poetic significance that relies more on artistic license than reality. I'm no cynic, but my skepticism is not unwarranted - anyone who has sat through one too many coffee shop open mic nights would feel the same. There's a fine line between authenticity and cheese.

But perhaps I should have paid more attention to the facts. Jaymay (aka Jamie Seerman) has been performing in New York for years, her debut album Autumn Fallin' was recently released on Blue Note records, to much media praise. Days before the Mercury Lounge gig, Jaymay performed on Conan O’Brien. The Mercury Lounge was packed for Jaymay's performance. I even saw folks lining up to get her autograph. Turns out, all of these people have not been duped. Jaymay's solid set of songs quickly proved that she is not a silly sentimentalist - she is a realist, 100 percent.

Jaymay sings in a strong, self-assured voice, sounding at times like a less affected Regina Spektor – (they call it anti-folk, but am I allowed to just call it folk music?) “Gray or Blue” stood out as an all-too familiar tale of semi-requited love – the kind you get just a good enough taste of to be irreparably smitten: "You haven’t written to me in a week I’m wonderin’ why that is/are you too nervous to be lovers-- friendships ruined with just one kiss/I watched you very closely I saw you look away/your eyes are either gray or blue I’m never close enough to say/but your sweatshirt says it all with the hood over your face/I cant keep starin’ at your mouth without wonderin’ how it tastes." What I want to know is who hasn't been done wrong by a boy in a hoodie?

I'm not saying that a music supervisor won't be tempted to set a tear-jerking montage on Grey’s Anatomy to one of Jaymay's songs (the thought crossed my mind during the melancholy “Blue Skies”,) but the authenticity of her stories and the simplicity of her songwriting rise above sappiness. Jaymay's songwriting serves as a down to earth counterpoint to all those “baby I need you, baby I can’t live without you” love songs. Although I saw plenty of couples watching Jaymay wrapped around one another, swaying sweetly to the music, I bet there were just as many people standing awkwardly in the crowd next to that guy or girl they really like, agonizing whether it would be an absolute disaster to just take their hand at a certain moment, and then deciding against it over and over.

Sometimes people just don’t get you, sometimes they move away, sometimes they decide to love someone else. You might cry about it, you might sleep with their scarf under your pillow for months, you might take lonely walks to that diner where you shared a 3 AM coffee on your first date, but yeah, real people do those things. Real people need real love songs, and Jaymay is our champion.

[Photo by Rebecca Lewis]