John Clayton Mayer's Waiting On The World To Change
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Changing Our World One Step at a Time
“Waiting on the World to Change” is the Grammy winning, first single released in John Clayton Mayer’s studio album, Continuum, in 2006. In his song, Mayer brings attention to the lack of enthusiasm conveyed by his generation about urgent current world issues. He blames the inaction to a lack of power in the system and corrupt leadership. In his music video “Waiting on the World to Change,” Mayer successfully motivates his viewers to take action in regards to current world conditions. John Clayton Mayer is a Connecticut born singer, songwriter, and guitarist. His passion for music derived from Michael J. Fox’s guitar performance in "Back to the Future”. After attending local guitar lessons as…show more content… He brings to his audiences attention the lack of government influence on current world problems by saying "Now we see everything that’s going wrong / With the world and those who lead it” (lines 5-6). This line exposes our corrupt government and their disregards for the environment, war, human rights violations, etc. Mayer also says that nothing is being done toward changing the world and improving the complications that it faces because “…we keep waiting / Waiting on the world to change” (lines 9-10). He is saying that it is time to stop waiting for the world to change on its own and to start putting our intelligence and capabilities to work. In another line from John Mayer’s song he says "It's hard to beat the system / When we’re standing at a distance” (lines 13-14). These lines are saying that people have no say in the government's decisions. Also, the people have no power compared to the system. So, it is difficult for one to make a difference with no voice. In the next stanza, Mayer sings “Now if we had the power / To bring our neighbors home from war / They would have never missed a Christmas / No more ribbons on their door" (lines 17-20). These lines in verse two of the song could have been influenced from when President George W. Bush was in charge of the United States. President Bush sent a great deal of our military for war in Iraq. Mayer’s words states that if the people of America had a say about decisions made for the military, troops would not have missed special moments with their families, and many lives could have been saved. John Clayton Mayer uses his lyrics in this song to bring attention to the bias information given on television and in the media. When the government has control of the information being given, “They can bend it all they want” (line 24), the media can implant unfair opinions in one’s head. Mayer stresses the fact