This is semi-shameful but I was ready to dismiss the Mayer Hawthorne album all because I didn't like his sound on one track upon first listen. What a difference a full album stream makes because this 29 year-old kid from Ann Arbor, Michigan is totally legit and damn it if I haven't been listening to "A Strange Arrangement" on repeat for the last seven hours. Literally, it's been seven freaking hours and I just can't get enough.

Apparently my skepticism, was shared by the man who would eventually sign Mayer, Peanut Butter Wolf. "The “retro” tag is added to almost any contemporary work that sounds like it was originally recorded between 1966 and 1974, and Hawthorne, among the newest contributors to the genre, is aware of how trends come and go. After being introduced to Stones Throw label head Peanut Butter Wolf by mutual friend Noelle Scaggs of the Rebirth, even his current boss was skeptical. “He showed me two songs and I didn’t understand what I was listening to,” Wolf recalls. “I asked him if they were old songs that he did re-edits of – I couldn’t believe they were new songs and that he played all the instruments.”

Seriously, the album is kind of ridiculous, it makes me feel the same way I did after listening to Raphael Saadiq's "The Way I See It". It's all heart and soul. Check out his song, "Maybe So, Maybe No" and be prepared to use that iTunes gift card on the entire album.

I'm always hot on the lookout for shows to go to and it appears as though I need to wait until September to catch him here in Chicago but if he comes to your town and kills it, let me know how it went (even if he didn't kill it).