Uptown Funk

"Uptown Funk" is a song by British-American DJ and record producer Mark Ronson featuring American singer Bruno Mars. It was released on 10 November 2014, as the lead single from Ronson's fourth studio album, Uptown Special (2015). "Uptown Funk" was written by Ronson, Mars, Jeff Bhasker, and Philip Lawrence; it was produced by the aforementioned first three. The song began during a freestyle studio session while they worked on a jam Mars and his band had been playing on tour. Copyright controversies arose after the song's release resulting in multiple lawsuits and amendments to its songwriting credits.

The song is a funk-pop, soul, boogie, disco-pop, and Minneapolis sound track. It has a spirit akin to the 1980s-era funk music. Its lyrics address fashion, self-love and "traditional masculine bravado", performed in a sing-rapping style filled with metaphors, arrogance, charisma, and fun. Upon its release, the single received generally positive reviews from critics, who praised the instrumental, style and influences of the track. Others criticized it for not being innovative as it tried to emulate 1980s funk music.

The song topped the charts of 19 countries and reached the top 10 of 15 others, making it the most successful single of Ronson and Mars to date. In the United States, "Uptown Funk" topped the Billboard Hot 100 for 14 consecutive weeks and spent seven weeks on the top of the UK Singles Chart. It was certified 11 times platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and six times platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). "Uptown Funk" peaked at number one on the Canadian Hot 100, and topped the Irish Singles Chart, taking the Christmas number one spot. The song also reached the top spot in France, spending 11 weeks in the number one position. number one in both Australia for a total of six weeks and in New Zealand for nine consecutive weeks. It also broke its own streaming record three times in the United Kingdom, while breaking the streaming record in the United States and Worldwide at that time.

Director Cameron Duddy and Mars shot the song's music video depicting Ronson, Mars and The Hooligans singing, walking and dancing in a city street. As of March 2025, the official music video for "Uptown Funk" is the tenth most viewed YouTube video of all-time, having received over 5.6 billion views. "Uptown Funk" was performed on television shows such as Saturday Night Live, The Ellen DeGeneres Show and the Super Bowl 50 halftime show. It received several awards and nominations, winning British Single of the Year at the 2015 Brit Awards, International Work of the Year at the APRA Music Awards of 2016 and Record of the Year at the 2016 Grammy Awards. The television show soundtrack of Glee, and commercials for L'Oréal's Garnier line and Skippy peanut butter, have used the song. It has been parodied several times and became a worldwide phenomenon with a major impact on pop culture.

After producing three songs for Bruno Mars's second studio album Unorthodox Jukebox (2012), Mark Ronson said in June 2014, that he and Mars planned on working together again. Ronson ended up working on "Uptown Funk" for seven months, recording it in various locations, in a number of grueling, stressful sessions. Its earliest version was a jam that Mars and his band played on tour. When Ronson joined Jeff Bhasker and Mars for a jam session at the latter's studio, he wanted to finish leftover demos from Unorthodox Jukebox, however, Mars wanted to do something different. He started playing on a drum kit in the studio, while Bhasker and Ronson played keyboard and guitar, respectively. They decided to work on the tour jam and thought it would be "cool" to fit in the Trinidad James song, "All Gold Everything", played during the tour's soundcheck. At this point, they found the opening line: "This hit, that ice cold/Michelle Pfeiffer, that white gold", which led them to believe they had an "exciting idea". However, both Ronson and Mars had busy schedules and could not complete the single. They spent the next several months working on it, fighting over which sections would fit better. Mars was not a fan of early versions of the song.

The trio recorded the song in Los Angeles, London, Memphis, New York, Toronto, and Vancouver. The horn parts were recorded at Daptone Records in Brooklyn with the horn sections of The Dap-Kings, Antibalas and The Hooligans playing the final version of the track. The drum section was first recorded at a studio owned by Mars in Los Angeles, and later rearranged in Memphis. The track took over 100 takes before it was finished at Ronson's studio in London. There were a number of drastic changes made to the track. One iteration featured a hard rock breakdown in the middle and a chorus in which Mars shouted, "Burn this motherfucker down!" At one point, the song was nearly scrapped entirely. They spent months working on a chorus, only to decide not to use it. Ronson affirmed the compositions of American band Kool & the Gang influenced them to only use a "horn line" as the chorus. After a show on the Moonshine Jungle Tour (2013–14), American songwriter Philip Lawrence suggested using an opening bassline; however, as he did not play bass himself, Canadian recording engineer Charles Moniz asked him to sing it. The "doh" vocal bassline ended up on the album. Some of the most progressive parts of the track were done in improvised studios set up by Moniz.

The stress over "Uptown Funk" was so high that Ronson passed out during one session trying to perfect the guitar part. Two days later in Toronto they figured out the guitar part when Ronson was playing it in front of The Hooligans after 82 takes. Ronson explained on NPR's Fresh Air why he was so determined to make the song perfect: "When you're doing something that doesn't sound like anything else on the radio at the time, you almost need to like, iron-clad it, to make sure it gets through. You have to put these hooks in it. You've got to make sure you've got all that ear candy in it to get it through the gate." The record label was hesitant to release the song under the title "Uptown Funk" suggesting the alternative "Just Watch". In October 2014, Mike Mullaney, an assistant program director at CBS Radio/WBMX, listened to the song after it was sent for testing and called it "the greatest song of all time" in a tweet. He added, "The Ronson/Bruno tune is like JamesBrown/​RickJames/​TheTime jamming w/ badass brass band", describing it as "Filthy, funky" and added, "Bruno simply wails". Ronson feels that the song belongs more to Mars than himself.

"Uptown Funk" was initially written by Ronson, Mars, Lawrence, and Bhasker. Since the song embodies some of "All Gold Everything" (2012), Trinidad James and Devon Gallaspy were credited as a songwriters. In May 2015, the track was re-registered as it also contains portions of The Gap Band's "Oops Up Side Your Head" (1979). Additional writing credit was given to Charlie Wilson, Robert Wilson, Ronnie Wilson, Rudy Taylor, and Lonnie Simmons. The single was produced by Ronson, Bhasker, and Mars. Ronson was in charge of the guitars, LinnDrum and programming, while the keyboards and talk box were handled by Bhasker. Mars sang the vocals and played drums. Ronson and several others engineered the song. The track was recorded at six studios. Serban Ghenea and John Hanes, who served as the mix engineer, mixed "Uptown Funk" at MixStar Studios in Virginia Beach. It was mastered by Tom Coyne at Sterling Sound, NYC.