MARK RONSON "THE LONGER I HELD ON TO THESE STORIES, THE HAZIER THEY'D GET"

The producer's new memoir revisits late nights and forgotten stories from his time DJ'ing in New York in the 90s

- LARISHA PAUL

Ghosts of late nights past haunt the streets of downtown New York. Mark Ronson can see them everywhere: in Tribeca, there are remnants of New Music Cafe, where Ronson made the jump to flyer-billed headlining DJ at a party called Sweet Thang in his early twenties. That same address, where Brooklyn legends Jay-Z and Notorious B.I.G. heard him play - and where he became the first DJ to drop 'Hypnotize' before its official release - became an oyster restaurant a few years back. That's gone now, too. But Ronson remembers it all.

"I have so many memories of pulling up to the club and seeing everybody already on line, excited for the night ahead," the DJ turned Grammy Award-winning producer recalls. Night after night, he came to understand the difference between people who enjoy a night out and night people - and he writes about it in his memoir, Night People: How to Be a DJ in '90s New York City.

These days, Ronson is a bit of both. Now 50, a husband and a father of two, he carries the memories in his bones quite literally: he has chronic neck problems and inflamed joints from countless nights spent hunched over turntables. It’s in the music too.

"I hear Busta Rhymes' 'Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See', and I'm instantly back in this club called Rebar on 16th and Eighth. I can smell the fucking stale beer on the floor," Ronson says. "Music, even more than other forms of art, stays in your body because the bass and things like that somehow change the molecules in your body."