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Jason Mraz Plotting Live DVD, Writing Songs For Next Album

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by Gary Graff, Detroit  |   August 03, 2009 10:59 EDT
Justin Ruhl
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As he celebrates the success of his third album "We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things" (which has sold 1.3 million copies according to Nielsen SoundScan) and its record-setting lead single "I'm Yours," Jason Mraz is hatching plans to document his Gratitude Cafe Tour on DVD.


"It is definitely in the works," Mraz tells Billboard.com. "We have chosen a city on this tour (for the filming), but it's too soon for us to announce it. But we are organizing a remarkable team to make a live DVD out of this thing."


Mraz says that his sound crew has been recording each of the concerts, and as the tour has moved to larger venues with attendant video screens, there has also been footage from each show for Mraz and his band to check out on the tour bus. "Grandma likes that, too," the San Diego-based singer-songwriter quips.


The current leg of Mraz's tour wraps up Oct. 10 at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. The singer also has November dates scheduled in South America but plans to start focusing soon on his next album, for which he's already started writing material.


"I'd say there's six songs right now that I would love to put on the record," Mraz says, "plus everything else I've written, who knows how many songs -- countless. I'm just not sure they're there yet. I just keep throwing songs in a bag, and it isn't until later when I can dump that bag out and sort through everything to really know what I've got. So I really won't know what that album sounds like until I get off the road, but I'd say half the record, I'm ready to sing it, so I'm in good shape.


"And I can promise you it's not going to be different from anything else I've ever released," adds Mraz. "It's gonna be upbeat, optimistic, colorful and groove-y, hopefully."


Mraz is also keeping an eye on the chart progress of his single "I'm Yours." It's logged 67 weeks on the Hot 100, the second longest stay behind LeAnn Rimes' 69-week run with  "How Do I Live." "It's really exciting," he says. "I've been all over the world with 'I'm Yours.' That's a song about generosity, about giving yourself or your time to someone else, and countries all over the world are singing it, loud -- I mean, really loud.


"I'm really stoked that that's the kind of song people want to hear right now," says Mraz. "That really inspires me. It makes me want to keep writing songs like that."

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