“Why You No Love Me” by John Mayer

The title of this song (“Why You No Love Me”) reads like something that a person who has not practiced English as their primary language may say. This is a fact which John Mayer himself has acknowledged. But he has also clarified that in the song he isn’t taking on the role of a foreigner but rather is utilizing “the language of a child” in order to get the main point across.

And no, the aforenoted titular motif is not indicative of the character he is portrayed being generally child-like or anything of the such. Rather, it is meant to illustrate the raw emotion of the story at hand from his perspective. And what we are dealing with here is in fact a breakup song.

More to the point, as presented John’s lover just left him cold one day. And apparently, even while they were together her treatment of him was less than favorable. But now in the present, the situation reads like she is very much gone and on top of that is pretty much behaving like he doesn’t even exist. 

But as for the vocalist’s personal disposition, in addition to being emotionally devastated by the whole ordeal, the addressee remains the woman he desires. Yes, what he suffered at her hands – her promising romantic longevity and instead leaving him – was and still is very painful. But he has developed an emotional dependency on her nonetheless.

So the emotion displayed in this song is verily quite raw, as intended. It’s rare that you hear a singer these days, especially a male, coming off as if his heart has been broken in such a manner that he has no recourse whatsoever to rectify the situation, outside of more or less begging his lover to come back. 

His reaction is not what we typically find in these types of situations, i.e. the victim deciding to counter-offend or perhaps even moving on to another lover, sometimes to later regret such a course of action. Instead he’s just left wondering, once again like a jilted child if you will, why the person he loves so much doesn’t feel the same about him.

This track is from John Mayer’s LP Sob Rock, which Columbia Records put out on 16 July 2021.   It was written by the vocalist himself, who went on to explain that this piece represents the most “brutal lyrics” he has ever ‘written in his life’.  And the song was produced by Don Was, who worked with Mayer throughout the aforementioned album.

John Mayer’s music career may not be what it once was. That is to say at one point, between 2003 and 2009, he took home seven Grammy Awards in a pretty short amount of time. But such a massive level of success, even if experienced only during a particular decade, usually affords one an enduring popularity in the music industry. 

So even though Mayer’s last three albums – Born and Raised (2012), Paradise Valley (2013) and The Search for Everything (2017) – only achieved RIAA gold status (as compared to his previous efforts which all went multi-platinum), all three still placed within 1^st or 2^nd place of the Billboard 200.  And by the early looks of things Sob Rock is going to perform more or less the same.