Reason to Even Watch VMAs

As I recall, The Raconteurs have been the house band for an MTV awards show before. This year, it will be Mark Ronson's turn. I suppose it's a reason to watch. Hopefully they won't cut him off mid-song for commercial break like MTV did with The Raconteurs which pissed me off cause they deserved so much better than that. Truthfully, I'm not too fond of the whole house band idea.

From NME:

Mark Ronson to provide tunes for MTV awards

Super-producer will be joined by surprise guests

13.Aug.07 5:42pm

Mark Ronson and his live band will provide music for the MTV Video Music Awards, it was announced today (August 13).

Ronson, who his known for his production work with Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen, has been named the house band for the Las Vegas ceremony, set to take place September 9 at the Palms Casino Resort.

Members of Winehouse's band The Dap-Kings and Stu Zender of Jamiroquai will join Ronson, as well as guest vocalists who have yet to be announced.

Winehouse is nominated for three VMAs, including Female Artist Of The Year, and is competing with Allen for the Best New Artist Award, as previously reported.

Source

10 Things You SHOULD Know About Mark Ronson

From Harp Magazine:

10 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Mark Ronson

By Jose Martinez

Born in the U.K. but raised in the States, producer/DJ/label owner Mark Ronson grew up to be a dirty white boy who plays his own funky music and helps craft other artists’ jams (see: Amy Winehouse, Lily Allen). Ronson’s Version (on his Allido Records via RCA) is a groovy collection of reworked favorites with Allen singing Kaiser Chiefs, Winehouse taking on the Zutons, and the late-great Ol’ Dirty Bastard doing Britney’s “Toxic.” But enough about the music. Did you know Ronson is the stepson of Foreigner’s Mick Jones? Well here’s another 10 things you didn’t know about him.

1) My guilty pleasure song is “Drops of Jupiter” by Train. For some reason whenever I bring it up I’m the joke of the room. I even went and bought the sheet music to it.

2) I used to read Judy Blume books in high school, which is weird because they’re books for girls who are just beginning to develop their estrogen count. I think I related to the characters.

3) I like chicken nuggets. Some people come home from a late night of drinking and brush their teeth so their wife doesn’t know. I have to brush my teeth so she can’t tell I’ve had McDonald’s. I actually didn’t have McDonald’s for about six years after I read Fast Food Nation, but I caved in because they’re so good when you dip them in honey.

4) I did the music for a Hanes commercial. In the beginning when I was supporting my record label from my DJ career I needed the money. The music wasn’t so bad, but the fact that I had to write jingles—I think the caption was “It’s the same for everyone, everywhere”—was pretty bad.

5) Happy Gilmore is one of my favorite movies. There are so many lines from that movie that I use all the time. Every line is a winner.

6) I DJ’d Martha Stewart, Inc.’s Christmas party in 2002. I was looking at a long night of Deee-Lite and Michael Jackson.

7) I ran the wrong way in a relay race in fourth grade, thus earning the name Wrong Way Ronson. It sounds like a character from Fat Albert.

8) I only learned how to drive a stick shift two days ago in L.A. shooting a video for “Stop Me.” I specifically told them that I didn’t know how to drive stick and they proceeded to get a classic 1960 Pontiac GTO stick shift car and mount $300,000 worth of camera equipment on the driver’s-side door. They were freaking out, but I said just give me five minutes and I’ll learn, and after 10 minutes I was fine driving around downtown L.A. with a police escort.

9) I’m a terrible singer. If it weren’t my band I’d be fired by now.

10) I read this ridiculous thing in the tabloids saying how angry I was at Timbaland for keeping my song out of the number one spot. That’s the most ridiculous, made-up thing. So I want to set the record straight with you.

Source

Mark Ronson in 'The Sunday Times'

By the way, one of Mark Ronson's US fall tour dates have been announced. He will be performing live at the Mezzanine in San Francisco, CA on Thursday, September 20th. It seems a lot of other things are going on that day. Anyway, if you're 21 or older, see Ronson live before he explodes with his latest album. Here's an article on Ronson from today's The Sunday Times:

Mark Ronson mixes in

An album of cover versions has taken the producer and DJ Mark Ronson into the charts. Will his single with Lily Allen send him into the stratosphere?

For someone who finds it hard to let go, Mark Ronson has chosen some pretty inappropriate friends. When he’s in London, the New York-based DJ and producer – whose second album, Version, shot up the charts earlier this year thanks, in part, to the big-name singers who feature on it – often hits the town with Lily Allen or Amy Winehouse. The Patty and Selma Bouvier of contemporary pop are scarcely shy and retiring types, so how on earth does Ronson cope?

A clue to his survival strategy is offered one evening in Milan, as Ronson and his friend and collaborator, the Australian singer Daniel Merriweather, sample the nightlife following a performance at a Dolce & Gabbana party. Ostensibly, Ronson keeps pace with everyone present, through the subsequent dinner and on, in the small hours, to a club. Sitting with an expression of Zen-like calm on his face, Ronson manages to avoid wincing as the club’s DJs make a hash of the task of whipping up the crowd. The man who span the records at the wedding of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes is no slouch when it comes to building dancefloor momentum. This evening, though, he keeps his own counsel, surveying his companions’ increasing incapacity through amused eyes. The next morning, he’ll be up with the birds; everyone else oversleeps.

Control – and not losing it – is a big deal for Ronson. His critics say that an inability to cut loose is precisely what hampers the music he makes. “It’s hard for me to let go,” the 29-year-old concedes in his mid-Atlantic drawl. “I have this guilt thing, or I feel that I have to set an example. I do have the odd night where Amy will have to pick me up off somebody’s couch and go, ‘Mark, we’re leaving now’ ” – now there’s a scenario to boggle the mind – “but it doesn’t happen that often.”

Ronson rejects the notion that he is musically cautious, too. In part, this perception has arisen not so much because of the records he makes, but because of his upbringing as the child of celebrities, born with a silver mix tape in his mouth – and his subsequent rise to local fame as the New York velvet-rope DJ of choice for stars such as P.Diddy and Prince. The son of the Big Apple socialite Ann Dexter-Jones, and the stepson of Foreigner’s Mick Jones, Ronson grew up in a house along the street from the McCartneys, where David Bowie was a regular visitor; later, when his family moved to America, he hung out with Sean Lennon and Michael Jackson. Musically “bookish”, his act of rebellion was to throw himself into the hip-hop scene, where he earned his spurs as a DJ.

“That was the real thing,” he says. “Not rich white kids throwing parties with a hip-hop DJ, but places where rappers and drug-dealers went. That kind of crowd wouldn’t be able to pick out my stepdad from a lineup if there was a million-dollar bounty on him. Someone could have gone, ‘Mark’s dad is in Foreigner’, and they would have said, ‘Who the f*** are they?’ ” In 2000, he got what he thought was his lucky break when he co-produced an album by the American singer Nikka Costa.

“Everyone was walking up to me after they’d heard [the single] Like a Feather and going, ‘Man, this is going to be incredible, you’re going to be able to retire after this.’ I was DJing at a party for Jay-Z and threw the record on, and he motions me over. I thought he was going to say, ‘Don’t ever use my parties to promote your own records again.’ But what he said was, ‘Promise me you’re going to let me be the one who raps over the remix.’ It was insane. And then it actually came out, and it did nothing.”

He laughs as he says this, and, if anything, it’s this quality – a refusal to get too hot and bothered about life, its highs or its lows – that informs his music, rather than his upbringing or his address book. “I hear things,” he says, “like, ‘Oh yeah, well, if I had his money and connections, I could have made a record like [Version].’ But the album came out of not having money, and just getting my friends to play on it.”

Ronson’s debut, 2003’s sample-rich mash-up Here Comes the Fuzz, was his second crack at the big time. “I had this huge budget to get every rapper and his mother on it.” Again, the breakthrough failed to materialise. In the meantime, the money was rolling in from those DJ bookings, but Ronson was beginning to have doubts.

“The fashion crowd discovered me,” he says, with a suspicion of a sneer, “and it was suddenly ‘overnight sensation’ – the term ‘celebrity DJ’ was almost invented for me. It was annoying, and it wouldn’t wash off. I realised I would have to stop if I wanted to be taken seriously for my music. I’d get calls saying ‘Will you DJ the Martha Stewart Christmas party?’, and there’d be this voice in my head going, ‘What would [LCD Soundsystem’s] James Murphy do? Would he say yes? Probably not.’ ” Despite pouring all his money into his own label, Allido, Ronson kept the bank manager happy with a succession of production jobs, including songs for Christina Aguilera, Robbie Williams, Allen and Winehouse. He also, crucially, recorded a cover of Radiohead’s Just for last year’s tribute album, Exit Music – which sowed the seed of Version’s concept in his mind and gave him the confidence to refashion tracks by other sacred cows such as the Smiths and the Jam.

In addition, Ronson famously helped Winehouse to hatch her track Rehab, after hearing her describe her manager’s attempts to persuade her into a recovery programme and suggesting the anecdote would be perfect for a song. Allen was an unknown when he met her through her boyfriend, a fellow DJ. She sings on his new single, a cover of Kaiser Chiefs’ Oh My God, and is, along with Winehouse, the chief reason Version initially received the publicity it did. “It is a bit ironic,” he says, “that Amy and Lily turn round as these huge pop stars, and all of a sudden it looks like I have this super-premeditated superstar album.” Not that he sounds remotely vexed by this turn of events. How would he describe his music? “Oh, ‘Mark Ronson and his quirky brand of postBrithop funk dancefloor fillers,” he suggests with characteristic flippancy.

He’s cautious to a degree, watchful while everyone else is seeing double, with a gold disc for his wall but a reputation for fast-track privilege that he has still to shake off entirely. He has just remixed a Dylan song – “The first time he has ever allowed anyone to touch his master recordings,” he says proudly – and it’s unlikely he was asked because of his family tree. He may joke about the night he had a sleepover with Michael Jackson – “I haven’t seen him since; he doesn’t call, he doesn’t write” – but that’s because he can. So, which Mark Ronson are we getting here: the cover version, or the original? I tried to make him reveal the answer, but his body language said, no, no, no.

Oh My God, featuring Lily Allen, is released tomorrow on Allido/Columbia

Source

Mark Ronson & Lily Allen on Friday Night Project

Mark Ronson featuring Lily Allen performing "Oh My God" on Friday Night Project.

Mark Ronson/Lily Allen Interview

This interview is pretty damn hilarious.

Flowered up

She's the pop starlet from LDN. He's the pop producer and socialite from NYC. Together, Lily Allen and Mark Ronson are music's mouthiest couple. Peter Robinson runs for cover

Saturday June 23, 2007
The Guardian

Looking for a nice frock for today's photo shoot, Lily Allen walked into one shop in Ladbroke Grove and saw the assistant virtually dive across the room in an attempt to stop the Amy Winehouse CD playing in the background. She arrives back at the shoot and immediately starts discussing the possibility of gastric bypass surgery due to being "fat", then announces that it is all "off the record", even though she will post the whole thing on her MySpace blog within 48 hours. Mark Ronson, enjoying unexpectedly huge success with his Version album, seems less besieged by life, chatting happily about Prince parties and meeting Mani. She is the sort-of demure English rose. He is the smart-talking New Yorker. They are Dempsey and Makepeace of pop and today, On the eve of this weekend's Glastonbury festival Lily Allen and Mark Ronson seem like the best of friends

To kick things off, please introduce each other to the Guide.

Lily: This is Mark Ronson and he is an overrated, over-hyped pop producer from New York City. He's basically a DJ.

Mark: I think Lily Allen is one of the most gifted pop melody writers of her generation.

Lily: ONE OF? Who are the others? (Guffaws)

Mark: Anyway, Lily and I are friends even though I've never done anything nice for her.

When and where did you first meet?

Lily: It was at [Notting Hill club night] YoYo.

Mark: Yes, you put that smiley face pin badge on my really expensive leather jacket. I was almost crying.

Lily: I told Mark I was a singer and he went, "Oh, give me a CD then".

What was on the CD?

Lily: Smile, and a couple of demos from when I was signed to Warners.

Mark: I actually had to ask you twice for the CD.

Lily: Oh come on - you were not interested at ALL!

Mark: But then I listened to it on the plane, and ...

Lily: No you didn't! You listened to it about six months later!

Mark: BUT I WAS ON A PLANE. So anyway, I asked Lily if I could play it on my radio show, and then I asked her to come out to my studio [in New York] and sing Oh My God for my album.

Lily: NO! You asked me to suggest some songs for your album, then you gave all the good ones to other people! Then you went, "Oh, you can have the Kaiser Chiefs". THANKS! And then I said, "Oh, can you do some stuff for my album?". And you said, "Yeah, for $200,000". Hahahaha!

Busta Rhymes is on the new version of Oh My God. Was he expensive?

Mark: Well, as soon as I knew it'd be a single I called him up ... I thought he might not get it, but he understood it immediately. He gets about $60,000 every time he rhymes on a record!

Lily: $60,000 isn't much.

Mark: It's kind of a lot, Lily.

How much did you pay him?

Mark: Erm, something in the neighbourhood of a nice car.

Lily: Bentley or Golf?

Mark: Let's say a second hand Bentley. He got arrested half an hour after he left the studio ... (Distracted by mark on Lily's arm) Are you self-harming? What's this?

Lily: Yeah, I'm self-harming - I just want to be Amy Winehouse.

Mark: AHEM! You see THAT'S why you walk into a shop and the people behind the counter turn Amy's music off! You've got beef Tourette's!

Who's the worst drunk?

Lily: Me.

Mark: Yes.

Lily: I get really aggressive when I'm drunk. None of my label bosses will take me out any more because after one glass of champagne I'm standing up going "And another fucking thing! People like you are ruining music! You're ruining our country! Let me do it and I'll fix it!"

Would either of you say that you had normal childhoods?

Mark: I'll never say I had a normal childhood. My dad would manage bands - I'd come down in the middle of the night and Keith Moon was there playing air drums. That's not a normal childhood.

Lily: For the first 11 or so years of my life things were, well, not so nice, and we lived on a council estate. The thing is, I'm proud of being middle class now - my mum was working class, as was my dad, and they worked really fucking hard to provide me with what I had. Well, my mum did. It's funny when Lady Sovereign said that thing about me, "She doesn't have to work as hard as me because her dad's Keith Allen". Do you know what, Lady Sovereign? HAVE my dad. Go on! I'd love to see how many people buy your records. Go on! Take him!

Having said that, your first deal did come about because of your dad ...

Lily: Yeah, and it didn't work. It was rubbish folk music - my dad and another guy wrote it all. Then it didn't happen. Things only worked for me when I worked really, really hard myself.

Well done, Lily. Do you think the two of you would ever have met without having come from privileged backgrounds?

Lily: Probably not. You bump into people in LA, and they go "Oh, it's such a small world" and really it's not - it's just that you all go to the same places where you spend pounds 7 on a drink. We're bumping into each other in the middle of Ghana.

Mark: At the same time the reason we met is that I was DJing at YoYo. And so we could easily have met anyway. While I shouldn't care those exaggerated myths do just make me cringe. It's all stuff like "You hung out with Stella McCartney and had picnics with Michael Jackson".

Did you have picnics with Michael Jackson?

Mark: No. I did have a sleepover once ...

Lily: WHAT?

Mark: Er, yeah, I did. It was at Sean Lennon's house ... And ...

Lily: YOU DIDN'T! Did he do anything to you?

Mark: Oh, this is just going to get ridiculous. Thing is, Sean was friends with Michael Jackson when he was growing up and when we were about 12 years old he was like, "Michael Jackson's coming over tonight". I remember turning on Channel J which is the public access channel and ...

Lily: ... and Michael Jackson unzipped your trousers and ...

Mark: No, and so Channel J had this picture of this girl with her top off and Michael went (handbag action) "OOOH! Turn it OFF!" And me and Sean were like, "Why? This is great!".

What time did you go to bed?

Mark: We went to bed at one o'clock and we closed the window because there was a draught and he didn't want it to interfere with his voice. He slept on the floor.

Lily: FUCKING HELL. (Clapping like an excited seal) Ronson! I can't believe you slept with Michael Jackson!

Mark: Nothing happened!

Mark, is Stop Me still attracting hate mail from Smiths fans?

Mark: Not recently. I got two things from this little 15-year-old boy, going, "I want to stab you in the eye ..."

Lily: He phoned me up asking about what to do! I get things like "Give me a grand and I won't slit your mum's throat". So cheers for that. I've got five mobile phones because of all the hate phone calls. "I'm going to kidnap your dog." Please.

What don't you like about each other?

Mark: Lily's one of the few people I'm naturally intimidated by.

Lily: Why?

Mark: Not in a bad way ... But you're a bit "cult of personality" ...

Lily: No I'm not! People say I'm a complete bitch and I'm not, I'm just really insecure and when people meet me I'm just ... not very good at it. But I'm a nice person. I bought Mark a kebab only today.

What has Mark done for you, Lily?

Lily: He definitely needs to do more. It was my birthday the other week and I still don't have a present from him. One time I was on the fire escape of Mark's studio in New York, crying because I'd split up with my boyfriend. He came out, saw me crying, and went back inside! Hahahaha!

Mark: I'm not Joan Collins!

Lily: What?

Mark: Hang on. I'm still trying to think of something nice I've done for you. There must be something.

Lily: Mark, there's nothing.

· Lily and Mark play Glastonbury this weekend. Oh My God is out July 16. The Guardian sponsors Glastonbury

Source

King Mark Ronson

I have no idea when this interview with Mark Ronson was posted by Popworld, but I'm reposting it here. I have to agree with the comment on the Pussycat Dolls even though I do have respect for Interscope Records as a major label:

What's the first thing you'd do as King Of POPWORLD?
'I would ban the Pussycat Dolls from within 50 miles of the kingdom.'

Would you change anything about the music industry?
'I would make A&R people only sign music that they like, not what they think will sell records. I just think you'd just have millions of brilliant acts like Feist and Radiohead everywhere, as opposed to manufactured, chasing the trend kind of stuff that we have a lot of. It's definitely not as bad in England, I'm thinking more of in the US.'

Where would you have your palace?
'I would have it in London somewhere, or maybe on the land in Scotland that the movie The Queen is set. It would be nice to have my palace near to the real Queen because we could be like, 'Hey, we're both royalty.' I like that movie The Queen because she seems like a really strong, iconic woman.'

What would be your National Anthem?
''Tears Of A Clown' by Smokey Robinson'

Describe your coronation, who would perform?
'Stevie Wonder. And maybe the Kings Of Leon, but I'd make them grow their beards back for ceremonial purposes. Oh, and Feist because I saw her last night and it was one of the best shows I've seen.'

So what would the party be like?
'It would be great. It would be a Lord Of The Rings-themed fancy dress party.'

Who would you dress up as?
'Maybe one of the orks, you know, one of the scary ones. Or Bilbo Baggins and attach blue hair to my feet.'

Your motto?
'"If you don't eat your meat you won't get any pudding." My mother always said it, and I remember it from Pink Floyd, too.'

King Mark's promise?
'No war.'

Who would be your advisors?
'I'd have Bill Clinton; Al Gore, because he's good on the environment; Stevie Wonder, he'd deal with the music side of things; David Sedaris, he's an author; and Ricky Gervais. Imagine if you could have that guy around all the time, you would just never be sad. You'd be laughing all the time. I saw Martin Freeman who plays Tim in The Office at the Feist show last night and I was really star struck.'

What would be illegal in your kingdom?
'People rapping out loud when they've got their headphones on. For some reason it doesn't bother me with singing, but rapping's just too much.'

What would be the punishment if people broke the law?
'I'd make them have to do a guest verse on a Pussycat Dolls song.'

Who would you banish from your kingdom?
'Right-wing American radio talk show freaks.'

Who would you have as your queen?
'Can it be my girlfriend? Yeah, I'd go with my girlfriend. She's English but she lives in America.'

What would be the national food and drink?
'Shepherd's Pie and Ribena. Everyone's teeth would be purple and falling out.'

Who would you knight?
'Maybe my friend Callum. I don't know him that well but whenever I see him he's off to do some charity thing. I think he probably will end up being knighted at some point so I'd knight him.'

Who would be your successor?
'It would have to be someone younger. Haley Joel Osment [the little kid from The Sixth Sense] but he's probably not that young anymore so no, that's no good. He might die before me. I'd pick my little brother Josh because he's smarter than I am and he's only 10.'

SOURCE

Mark Ronson's "Oh My God" Video

Featuring a cartoon Lily Allen. It's very Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

Mark Ronson - Oh My God

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"Stop Me" (Internation Version) Music Video

Here's the international version of "Stop Me" by Mark Ronson featuring Daniel Merriweather. It's the second time they shot a music video for the song that now features Ronson and Merriweather. I'm looking forward to the "Oh My God" music video now.

Kanye West's "Stronger"

Mark Ronson recently played the new Kanye West track that we've all been waiting for on his Authentic Shit show on East Village Radio. It's the track that samples Daft Punk's "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger".

Listen to it here

Mark Ronson's 'Version' and Justice's '†'

I know I have not posted in a long time, but I'll slowly get back on track for the summer after finals are over. The past few months has just been hectic for me I didn't have time to update. Anyway, I'll put up some of my Coachella photos when I have time, but I just wanted to post some announcements of albums that will finally arrive in the States on July 10th: Mark Ronson and Justice.

I had the chance to meet Mark Ronson right before Lily Allen's set at Coachella and compliment him on his latest album, not that my opinion would really matter. I could tell that he was a busy guy and had places to go and people to see, yet he was nice enough (though maybe a little impatient) to take time to speak to me, but I appreciate it since he didn't turn me away or anything. Some girls asked "is he famous?" Well, you'll see. I have to admit that I didn't become a huge fan until I heard both Lily Allen's and Amy Winehouse's albums. It's been over a month since Version came out in the UK and I think it's obvious by now how successful it is there. The album's release date has just been delayed until July 10th, which I'm a little disappointed by. I'm curious to see if he will be doing a lot of touring in the States. As successful as Allen and Winehouse are now, I wouldn't be surprised to see Ronson finally topping the US charts. It's about time.

1. God Put A Smile Upon Your Face (featuring The Daptone Horns)

2. Oh My God (featuring Lily Allen)

3. Stop Me (featuring Daniel Merriweather)

4. Toxic (featuring Tiggers)

5. Valerie (featuring Amy Winehouse)

6. Apply Some Pressure (featuring Paul Smith)

7. Inversion

8. Pretty Green (featuring Santo Gold)

9. Just (featuring (Phantom Planet)

10. Amy (featuring Kenna)

11. The Only One I Know (featuring Robbie Williams

12. Diversion

13. L.S.F. (featuring Kasabian)

14. Outversion

Highlights: "Oh My God", "Stop Me", "Valerie"

For this next artist, I probably would have never heard of them or heard of them before Coachella if it weren't for Ronson. I don't want to call them the next Daft Punk, but they really are amazing an DJ duo from Paris, France. They hit the scene with "We Are Your Friends", and exploded with their song and video (by So Me), "D.A.N.C.E.". If you don't like them, then I don't know what the hell is wrong with you. Justice is one of the reasons I've been so interested in dance music lately, and with their debut album coming out June 11th worldwide and July 10th in the States, I hope the rest of the world will feel the same way. They were one of my highlights at this year's Coachella. Everyone has to experience them live, and if you downloaded their album since it has been leaked for awhile, I hope you will buy it when it is officially released.

1. Genesis

2. Let There Be Light

3. DANCE

4. Newjack

5. Phantom Pt. 1

6. Phantom Pt. 2

7. Valentine

8. Party

9. DVNO

10. Stress

11. Waters Of Nazareth

12. One Minute To Midnight

Highlights: "Genesis", "D.A.N.C.E.", "The Party", "DVNO", "Waters of Nazareth"