He had to take a break from working on his new music while he recovered from throat surgery, but John Mayer is on the mend — and he’s close enough to the finish line that he’s ready to start sharing clips from his upcoming album, ‘Born and Raised,’ starting with just over a minute from the first single, ‘Shadow Days.’

“Been looking forward to a post like this since October 14, 2010, the first day I started writing this group of songs,” wrote Mayer on his Tumblr. “Enjoy.”

Like many of Mayer’s songs, ‘Shadow Days’ deals with matters of the heart. A midtempo track with pedal steel accents befitting his cowboy makeover, it kicks off with the lines “Well, I ain’t no troublemaker/ And I never meant her harm” before promising, “I’m a good man with a good heart / Had a tough time, got a rough start / But I finally learned to let it go … My shadow days are over.”

No release date has been announced for the new album, which was originally supposed to be released last fall before Mayer’s surgery forced a delay. It’ll be his first collection of new material since 2009′s ‘Battle Studies,’ which debuted at No. 1 before going on to a platinum certification and three Grammy nominations.

John Mayer, ‘Shadow Days’

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