By Sean Carey

“Will Uptown Funk! be US Billboard’s Hot 100s No 1 Song of 2015?” is a question that is already being asked by both pop moguls and pop aficionados.

I must confess that I heard the song just a couple of weeks ago (I know what you’re thinking: where has this guy been?). It has an undeniably catchy, retro disco feel while still being part of today’s pop zeitgeist – which, I think you will agree, is a very clever trick to pull off.

Because I subsequently found myself humming the melody (not the lyrics which I could not remember) when I was on my way to do some shopping and not thinking of anything in particular I understood very well why Uptown Funk! had shot to the top of the charts, not only in the U.S., but also in neighboring Canada, as well as Australia, New Zealand, France, Ireland and the U.K.

Then, by chance, I saw the accompanying Uptown Funk! video on TV. It immediately struck me how good, Hawaiian-born Bruno Mars and his four backing singers are at dancing. Quiff-haired English music producer Mark Ronson, from whose album Uptown Special the song is taken, also makes occasional appearances. But for the most part he is either standing or sitting, simply clicking his fingers, tapping his feet or rotating his head on his neck.

By contrast, Mars and his group perform some very intricate moves with their whole bodies, using the street and a nightclub stage as backdrops. Occasionally Ronson pops up in one of the group sequences on the street but you can see for yourself that he doesn’t do very much. Overall he cuts a fairly reticent figure – the nerdy introvert to Mars’s street-wise extrovert, as it were. Perhaps Ronson is purposefully embodying the stereotype that white, middle-class British guys can’t dance – or at least can’t dance very well. Continue reading “Uptown Funk! has the moves – and the endorphins” →