walking upstream…
Mark Ronson
photo: eva rinaldi · cc by-sa 2.0 ↗Mark Ronson
Mark Ronson is a British-American DJ and record producer who came up spinning hip-hop and party sets in late-1990s New York before turning himself into one of the era's defining hitmakers behind the boards. After a debut album, 'Here Comes the Fuzz' (2003), he broke through producing much of Amy Winehouse's 'Back to Black' (2006) and his own covers record 'Version' (2007), then topped charts across the world with 'Uptown Funk' (2014). His signature is a magpie's love of vintage funk, soul, and girl-group pop, rebuilt with live horns, analog gear, and a crate-digger's ear for a groove.
the sound in question
2007
ValerieMark Ronson
walk the tributaries ↓
The Shangri-Las1960s · Girl group / Pop / Rock and roll
By Ronson's own account, when he first met Amy Winehouse she told him she loved the Shangri-Las and played him their records; the next night he wrote the piano figure that became 'Back to Black,' building the production around the group's cavernous reverb, doo-wop chord changes, and teenage-tragedy melodrama.
listen: upstream & here
1964
Remember (Walking in the Sand)The Shangri-Las
2006
Back to BlackMark Ronson
listen forCue the tolling, reverb-drenched piano and doomed-romance sway of 'Remember (Walking in the Sand)' right before 'Back to Black' — you'll hear the same funeral-march piano and Wall-of-Sound heartbreak, a 1960s girl-group ache transplanted onto a modern soul record.
James Brown1960s–70s · Funk / Soul / R&B
Ronson has said he came to funk backwards, discovering it as a young DJ through the hip-hop records that sampled James Brown, and Brown's blueprint runs through his work: tight horn stabs, on-the-one drums, and a locked rhythm-guitar chank. On 'Feel Right' he builds a raw, single-chord funk vamp for Mystikal, whose barked, grunting delivery openly recalls Brown's bandleader hollers.
listen: upstream & here
1970
Get Up (I Feel Like Being a) Sex MachineJames Brown
2015
Feel RightMark Ronson
listen forDrop 'Get Up (I Feel Like Being a) Sex Machine' next to 'Feel Right' and listen for the shared machinery — the shouted count-offs, the staccato horn hits, and a groove that rides one chord so the rhythm section, not the changes, carries the whole song.
Prince1980s · Funk / Pop / R&B / Rock
Critics have traced 'Uptown Funk' to the 1980s Minneapolis funk of Prince and his circle, and the track sits squarely in that lineage: rubber-band bass, clipped rhythm guitar, and a strutting falsetto-and-shout call-and-response where a lean groove leaves plenty of open space.
listen: upstream & here
1986
KissPrince
2014
Uptown FunkMark Ronson
listen forPut Prince's stripped-to-the-bone 'Kiss' beside 'Uptown Funk' and notice the same trick — near-empty space with a scratchy guitar and a bass hit doing all the work while the vocal struts and teases on top.