Maximum Performance

Jack’s Mannequin Singer Andrew McMahon’s Stripped Away Set At Yahoo! Music

| Maximum Performance – Fri, Oct 7, 2011 2:33 PM EDT

This guy, he should carry tissue boxes around with him. It's almost irresponsible to perform with this kind of emotion.

Andrew McMahon of rock band Jack's Mannequin came by Yahoo! to perform some new tracks off his latest album, People and Things. The kid who made his name as lead singer of the piano-driven pop punk band Something Corporate is almost unrecognizable now as a man baring his soul with the best of them. Even compared to earlier Mannequin work, he's dropped the white-knuckled angst for a reflective honesty usually saved for diaries and therapists offices.

I've always said that acoustic versions of whatever hard or upbeat song almost completely changes its meaning and gives greater depth to lyrics. McMahon with just a piano is like watching a film in slow-motion, allowing you grasp every tiny nuance--so revealing you'd think you could see his skeleton.

Watch McMahon play his stripped down versions of "Release Me," "Amy, I," and "My Racing Thoughts." Jack's Mannequin's new album People and Things dropped this week.

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