Mayer, whose fifth album Born and Raised is released this weekend, is in temporary retirement from performing due to a recurrence of an illness he developed last year.

The 34-year-old New York-based singer, guitarist, writer and occasional stand-up comedian has granulomas - tiny growths - on his vocal cords, which were first diagnosed in September last year and for which he had surgery a month later.

At that point his new album, a sharp left turn into stripped-back Americana territory after the polished pop of 2009’s Battle Studies, was finished and Mayer, after recovering from the operation, made plans for a world tour this year. In March,however, the granulomas came back and he was forced to cancel a US tour and give up singing indefinitely. He’ll have more surgery in September. After that, it could be another nine months before he can take the stage.

In the circumstances, the Grammy-winning, multi-platinum-selling star is remarkably upbeat. “It’s just an ordeal,” he says. “It’s very stubborn, the thing in my throat, but it doesn’t pose any health concern. It’s like a blister in the worst possible place if you’re a singer.”

He admits, however, that not being able to do what he has been doing professionally since 2000 has caused him some grief. “I remember it being very frustrating even before there was surgery on the books,” he says. “It’s frustrating to go to an ear, nose and throat doctor, get a scope, have a very hopeful outlook and then see that it’s still there. After that it was disappointing to have it recur, but ever since then I’ve sort of accepted it.”

If he didn’t do that, he adds, “it would be frustrating for the next eight months and I think my brain is protecting me from having to deal with that”.

Mayer’s brain hasn’t always been so helpful. He made tabloid headlines two years ago, and not for the first time, when in an interview with Playboy magazine he described his former girlfriend, singer and actress Jessica Simpson, as sexual napalm. Mayer has dated a number of high-profile stars during his career, including Cameron Diaz, Taylor Swift and Jennifer Aniston. He’s also on record as saying that the break-up of his relationship with Aniston was one of the worst times in his life.

When Mayer released Shadow Days, the first single from the new album, in February, some US media reported that the song was about his break-up with Aniston. He won’t confirm that but said recently he regrets making those kiss-and-tell comments in the past.

Indeed, the Mayer of today seems a lot less the archetypal rock star and much more the reflective, thoughtful male trying to connect with his inner, sensitive soul. That’s as apparent on Born and Raised, a collection of 12 songs with titles such as If I Get Around to Living and The Age of Worry, as it is in his conversation.

He insists this new, almost folkie twist to his music is not a reaction to the fame and notoriety that came immediately before it. “No, and I didn’t want it to be that,” he says. “I don’t think it would be a very good record if it was a reaction to that. It’s a lot more thoughtful than that. It’s not reactionary. It’s not upset. It’s not pissed off at anyone. It doesn’t have any of that darkness in it.

“I never thought that I wanted to step away from fame. I just wanted to refocus my energy back on the basics and the things you should never be tired of. You should never be bored writing songs on the guitar with a piece of paper and a pen and then going on tour and playing it to people.

“You can go two ways as a musician or as an artist of any kind as you get older,” he goes on. “You can either judge the future you want based on how well known you are and how high you are on the charts … or you can base it on how true you are to your path. Some people choose to live in this industry in a certain way. I’m 34. It’s OK to stop trying to keep up with the times.”

FOR all that Mayer is a changed man, fame, Grammys and celebrity girlfriends might have been the dream when he left his home in Fairfield, Connecticut, to study at the renowned Berklee College of Music in Boston in 1997. Mayer, then 19, had been playing guitar for six years and had a particular fondness for the blues. His considerable guitar chops had been honed from studying artists such as Eric Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughan. (One of Mayer’s many tattoos features the initials SRV on his shoulder.)

His Berklee education didn’t last long, however. He moved to Atlanta, Georgia, the following year and it was from there his solo career evolved. His first album, Room for Squares (2001), boasted a hybrid of pop, blues, folk and soul that would become the template for later releases. It also gave him his first Grammy when the song Your Body is a Wonderland was named best male pop vocal performance in 2002.

The albums that followed, Heavier Things (2003) and Continuum (2006), brought more Grammys and increasing worldwide acclaim. Mayer was the whole package, an artist with rock cred, good looks and the ability to craft radio-friendly pop songs.

His pop leanings reached a peak in 2009 with Battle Studies, an album that to some degree dumped an organic approach to recording in favour of a more technology-enhanced sound. It was a commercial success, debuting at No 1 on the Billboard chart, and produced the hit singles Heartbreak Warfare and Half of My Heart (featuring Swift). Reviews, however, were less favourable than for his previous albums, with some criticising it for being too safe and lacking direction.

Today Mayer has mixed feelings about it too, and it’s no accident that its successor is a largely acoustic, organic and inward-looking affair. It’s a reaction, partly at least, to “songs that were developed through technology”. “You get a different song when you use a piece of technology to write it than when you rely 100 per cent on the idea and the melody and the vocal and the connection,” he says.

His mood suggests that, looking through his back catalogue, it’s the songs without that studio sheen that are the keepers. “There’s a line in the sand between the songs that are still very vital to me and the ones that are more historical relics than forever songs,” is how he sees it.

“The ones that have stuck around in my mind like that are the ones that have a strong compositional essence to them. Not drum machines. I’m going to make whatever record has to come out now. If the goal was still selling millions and millions of copies and headlining shows I think that would trickle down to where you were writing a song and you’d say, ‘This isn’t marketable enough.’

“This album goes back to the time when songwriters had a tape recorder and a guitar and typewriter. That was the essential rule of making this record. No distractions. No trickery. Born and Raised is extremely personal in the sense that there is nothing in the way between the feeling of the song, the expression of it and the recording of it. It’s organic and soulful in that way. It’s not thinking about what it has to be to be soulful, which is a beautiful way to make art. I think when you’re 10 years into your career you can do that.”

What you can do also, if you have a mind to, is take stock of your life and turn it into an album, which would seem to be Born and Raised’s raison d’etre. “I made the decision to evolve in a natural way,” Mayer says. “That means evolving out of constantly making music that can be played on the radio 24 hours a day on four different formats and be on heavy rotation lists.”

More than that, the album is about “deciding that you want to be happy, or fighting to be happy or discovering that there even is such a thing as happiness. They’re all songs that say, ‘Let’s get down to living. I want to be happy. I want love in my life.’ Born and Raised is about realising it before it’s too late.”

Phew. And is he happy? “I’m very happy with a slightly smaller set of expectations,” he says, “which I think is the key for me right now. I’m not asking for the world. I’m not asking for this concept of worldwide recognition.”

LONG before fame, Mayer had a pivotal moment not dissimilar to the one he is going through now with his inability to perform. When he was 17 he suffered from an irregular heartbeat, which at one point landed him in hospital for a weekend.

While convalescing he made up his mind to be a songwriter, and penned his first lyrics immediately after being discharged. Seventeen years later Mayer is planning to put his enforced professional confinement to good use by writing and recording (at least instrumentally) another album.

“There’s not much that can be explored because I can’t promote this record and I can’t tour with it,” he says. “There’s something in the air or in the water around me that might lend itself to another record.

“I’m just trying to make the best of it. It knocks out all of the other distractions. I see nothing left to do but to write another record, because all I really want to do is go out on tour. Instead of being frustrated about not being able to do that for a whole bunch of months, I’m just going to pretend I didn’t want to anyway.”

If the muse does hit him it will be a welcome distraction. The rules surrounding his illness aren’t listed in the rock ‘n’ roll life manual.

“The lifestyle that accompanies surgery and goes on for about six months after surgery is very disciplined,” he explains. “It involves, obviously, no speaking. It also involves perfect diet, which pretty much means anything you enjoy eating or drinking is off the table.”

Mayer knows this because he has been through it once already, only recently, and wasn’t expecting to have to endure it again. For that reason he has delayed having the repeat surgery for a few months.

“Having already done that for six months, actually longer, I couldn’t go right around the block and do it again,” he says. “So I’m going to take a rest for a while, write as much as I can, and then round about September reapply myself to that sort of lifestyle.

“Then maybe by this time next year I’ll have two records,” he adds.

As to his absence from radio, television and the print and digital media round to promote Born and Raised, he’s not overly concerned.

“I’m happy to be able to make a record. Obviously I have no control over not being able to tour, so I don’t think I’ll ever have an opportunity like this to see what happens when people just notice the record on the shelves or however they come to discover it. One thing’s for sure, if people really like this record, if it gets successful, it’ll be on the record alone. It wouldn’t be from any promotion.”

Even if he’s not in interview mode, Mayer is hoping there may be a few other ways of keeping himself busy during this career lay-off. His reputation as a guitar player could be one such avenue.

Mayer has diverted into several areas of the arts during his career. He had a stint as a stand-up comic in the mid-noughties and made a half-hour television program called John Mayer has a TV Show in 2004. He has explored writing as well, first as a columnist for Esquire magazine and more recently as an avid blogger incorporating music, comedy and snippets from his diary. He has also designed signature guitars and amplifiers.

And should he want to play guitar with or for other people, there would be plenty of performers happy to enlist his services. He says that since his voice problems became known a few offers have “come down the line”. Keith Urban is just one performer - and no slouch as a guitarist either - with whom Mayer has shared a stage in recent years.

“I’d love to do more of that kind of thing,” Mayer says. “That would be something I might not be able to do if I was on my own tour. I don’t know that that’s the first thought people have of me, though … as a guitar player. I’d love to spend some time playing music with other people. Maybe you could help with that … the power of the written word.”

Now it’s out there, as is the album. “It’s interesting to put a record out and not be at the breakneck pace of touring,” he says with just a hint of resignation. “For one thing, you have a lot more time to worry about the record. And there’s a lot of free time to worry about things not going well.”

Born and Raised is out now through Sony Music.