Mac Miller

Interview from Complex Magazine
All Things Considered: John Mayer & Jerry Lorenzo

JM: I’ll go until the doctor tells me bad news. I swear to you, until that day, I’ve got it figured out, and this is the most fun… Every morning I wake up, I go, “I get another one of these.” And most people figure that out much later on in life. Not drinking has a lot to do with plugging into that a little earlier than other people, but I go, like, “I still get to ride the ride.” And that’s why, when people we love pass away, we go, like, “Oh, you can’t stay on the ride?” When Mac Miller passed away, my first thought was, You don’t get to stay here. You don’t get to keep riding this ride, this beautiful ride that, if you’re lucky enough to have the talent, you get to just keep […]

Complex: You bring up Mac—you played on “Small Worlds,” and you said that you didn’t expect to be on his album.

JM: Well, I didn’t expect to play on his album. He said come over and listen to stuff. This is a true story: I started talking to my manager about splits—I gotta start making a living playing on people’s stuff. For years, it would be, like, a really fun side note. I got to Mac’s house and he played me this thing he had just worked on that morning, and I went, “Give me a guitar. I’m in.” I think it had something to do with him having worked on it that day—it was still wide open and fresh. There are a lot of songs people play for me and I go, “Man, I wish I was on this song, but it’s done.” I picked up a guitar and, I went [Pretends to play the guitar]. We had such a great time and laughed, and I said to him, “No cash. No credit. I’m just happy to do it, man.” He said, “Hey, can I…” I said, “I don’t want people talking about me. I want people talking about your record.” I just wish it wasn’t fatal. I just wish figuring out your life didn’t take your life away from you. I don’t have an answer for how to fix that, but once you get old enough to understand how valuable life is, you look at people and go, “I just wish you could work this out.”

Radio Intros 2023
LIFE With John Mayer on Sirius XM Radio
The dearly departed Mac Miller. That's a song that I played on called "Small Worlds." You might have heard this story already, but I went over to Mac's house just to listen to some stuff, and he had just started that song, and played it for me. And I said those four words: "get me a guitar." I miss him a lot, and I know a lot of other fans miss him a lot. I don't really put plaques up on my wall. I don't have any plaques of mine on my wall at home. But I have Mac Miller's plaque on my wall. That one's really important to me. He played a couple of shows at Hotel Cafe with his band he was gonna go on the road with, and it was stunning. I was blown away and I thought to myself, wait until people hear this band, these songs, at festivals and shows. He was just getting ready to absolutely light the world on fire. Not that he wasn't a huge artist to begin with, but it was a giant step forward. The album's a giant step forward. And I consider myself extremely lucky to have known him for a short period of time, to be able to play music with him, and to be able to see one of those two or three shows at Hotel Cafe, which holds 120 people. And I saw what the future would have been. It's very sad to know that the world will not. And that's why I wanted to make sure, on my very first day on this channel, Life With John Mayer, that I would play something by Mac Miller, and send my love to him and his family on Thanksgiving.
Excerpted from Radio Intros 2023 >