SOUND Effects

DEREK C. BLASBERG talks to musical mastermind MARK RONSON about his new MEMOIR of his early days on the '90s New York club scene, the SPIRITUAL nature of the BIG BANGER, and why LIFE is like one big ever-evolving DJ MIX where the MAGIC is in the MOMENT

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Florence, Italy—the city that birthed the Renaissance—played host to Gucci's resort-show festivities this past spring. Models sashayed through the 15th-century Palazzo Settimanni before a candlelit dinner at the cloisters of the Santa Maria Novella. The night ended on a sweaty 600-year-old dance floor in the refectory, where Julia Garner, Paul Mescal, and Yara Shahidi were among the throng grooving to the sounds of Grammy- and Oscar-winning songwriter and music producer Mark Ronson, who was DJing at the event.

Models and editors kicked off their heels and jumped on sofas as Ronson presided from an elevated booth bathed in glowing neon light. (Only Bethann Hardison, the pioneering model and activist, dared climb up to confer with him on his playlist.) The vibes were vibing, all big sunglasses and broad smiles. When Ronson dropped “Uptown Funk,” his 2014 banger with Bruno Mars, the thunderous response rattled the glass in the centuries-old window casements. It was an experience that might best be described as spiritual— although I wondered, What must the monks be thinking?

"I love dropping 'Uptown Funk' and seeing the happiness it brings. I'm as proud of it as anything I've ever had a hand in," Ronson writes in his new book, Night People: How to Be a DJ in '90s NYC, a memoir of his early days spinning records as a teen and early 20-something in the city’s pre-Y2K club scene. Watching the Florentine fashionistas lose their minds, I immediately understood why: As both a listener and a maker of music, Ronson has been chasing those kinds of rapturous moments for most of his adult life.