The Man Means Business
We know him best as the slick production whiz who, armed with a brass section, a gang of celebrity guests and a handful of someone else’s songs, became a household name back in 2007. So why has MARK RONSON ditched the covers and the horns on his new album? Celina Murphy meets the best-connected man in music as he steps away from the trumpet and up to the microphone.
Celina Murphy, 02 Nov 2010
"I don’t have the eccentric genius gene,” Mark Ronson happily points out, and I believe him.
In fact, I believe everything the charming 35-year-old says during our time together. For all his finery, there’s not a trace of ego in this room, at least, not one big enough to fit the tens of millions of albums out there in the poposphere that bear his name. “I think I’m a good producer,” he shrugs, “I know how to get good performances out of people and every now and then turn something decent out.”
So, he’s not a musical genius, but Mark Ronson is a lot of other things. He’s the heir to the Ronson lighter fortune for one, just in case you thought there was anything less than inherently debonair about the man. He’s also Foreigner guitarist Mick Jones’ stepson, Sean Lennon’s best mate, Samantha Ronson’s brother and the only man Bob Dylan has allowed to remix his music. He’s been on a sleepover with Michael Jackson, a coked-up Robin Williams tucked him into bed as a child and Jay-Z, a fan, once called him “a nice nigga” – the more you read about Mark Ronson, the less you see him as a living, breathing person and the more he begins to resemble a curl of fly paper for madcap celebrities. Just this morning he woke up to a heap of Twitter abuse from ex-collaboratrix Amy Winehouse, who inexplicably ranted that he was “dead” to her.
Countless journalists have dubbed Ronson the best-connected man in music and talking to him now, I know why – he’s bloody easy to get on with. Once the howdy dos are out of the way, we get to laying down mutual love for smooth operator D’Angelo, who I agree deserves an award for Scream Of The Year for a squeal on Mark’s new track ‘Glass Mountain Trust’; “No-one else can do that,” he enthuses, “I mean Prince can do it, there’s a couple… but it’s so unusual, it’s like some weird, future space funk!
“I never had that cool, weird artiste song on my own album before,” he notes, reinforcing the lack of the elusive genius gene, “but I love the fact that he’s brought his eccentric magic to it.”
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