Mark Ronson, the Grammy-winning producer behind hits from Miley Cyrus, Bruno Mars, Amy Winehouse and more, revisits his early days as a DJ in his new memoir, “Night People.”
Part of Ronson’s teenage years and his early 20s was defined by his obsession with music and DJing, as well as the partying and nightlife that came with it.
Ronson, now a father of two, tells TODAY.com he wants his children to read his book one day, even though it does show what he was really doing as a teen.
“I realize I wrote a lot about the things that I did and maybe the behavior that was not so great, that I feel like one of them is going to throw it back in my face when they’re 15,” Ronson says. “‘Dad, you were doing all of that — you’re way worse than us!’ But I do. I wouldn’t want anything in my life that I wasn’t comfortable telling them about.”
Ronson married Grace Gummer, the daughter of Meryl Streep and Don Gummer, in 2021, and the couple welcomed their first child in 2023 and their second daughter earlier this year.
Mark Ronson and wife Grace Gummer have two kids. He says their daughter Ruthie listens to anything from Chappell Roan to A Tribe Called Quest. “She has a little record player, and she loves her little 45s,” Ronson says. “I don’t want to force it on them, but it’s cool she digs it herself.” (Taylor Hill / FilmMagic)
“Night People: How to Be a DJ in ’90s New York City” published on Sept. 16, and recounts how Ronson became part of the hip-hop DJ scene in Manhattan.
Ronson, the son of Ann Dexter-Jones and Laurence Ronson, was born in London and grew up in New York City, often intermingling with his mom and stepfather’s (Mick Jones, the guitarist of Foreigner) friends at parties they threw at their house.
One of those guests? Robin Williams, Ronson wrote in his book and also shared on TODAY on Sept. 15.
“So my earliest childhood memory, are all of the night,” he said on TODAY. “My parents, they liked to go to the club too. And one night, my mom brought Robin Williams back from the club, and I’m sure she probably said, ‘You got to come into my son’s room. He loves “Mork & Mindy,” that’s his favorite show.’
“And I remember just waking up and Robin Williams is over my bed, and he was leaving,” he continued. “I was like, ‘Mr. Williams, you forgot!’ He was like, ‘Nanu, nanu.’ … He knew what I wanted to hear, it was so sweet.”
While Ronson loved being part of the DJ scene, he quickly replies “no” to a question about whether the 1990s were the best years of his life.
“I think the past few years — having two young girls, my wife and family — this has been the best part,” he tells TODAY.com. “But it was certainly the most exciting, and it was this exciting era. It was the last era of its kind in New York, and, obviously, when you’re in it … you don’t realize, ‘This isn’t going to be here forever.'”
Ronson says he decided to revisit that time in his life due to nostalgia for the music from the time, and what his life was like.
“I love the music from that era, the ’90s and early 2000s — it was a time in my life where I was so excited. You know, you’re 18, 19, finding your passion and your craft,” he says. “And then, to be honest, a lot of my friends in that era were passing, so I wanted to find a way to remember them and this amazing little scene that we made.”
The book ends before Ronson’s producing career took off in the late 2000s, producing hits like Winehouse’s “Rehab” and her cover of the Zutons’ “Valerie.” He’s since gone on to produce songs like “Perfect Illusion” by Lady Gaga, “Uptown Funk” with Bruno Mars and “Electricity” with Dua Lipa and Diplo.
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Ronson says he thinks he would do another book about that era of his life, but he wants to take a break after “Night People.”
“I mean, this took me so long, took so much out of me that I would need to take a little bit of space and get back to making music for a while,” he says. “But I would love to, at some point, make something about the people I worked with.”
Ronson says there isn’t anyone he’s “dying to work with,” but he would work with some of the artists he’s worked with in the past “in a heartbeat.”
“I mean, I love all of them. I would do a song with any of those people again. You know, sometimes there’s this thing where you have this moment where you capture a little magic, and then to try and go back in and you’re trying to chase something that you did,” Ronson says. “But, I mean, there’s people like Bruno and Miley — I would go in a heartbeat.”
For now, Ronson says he’s working with “Barbie” director Greta Gerwig again on the music for her new Netflix film. (Netflix did not respond to a request for comment on if Ronson was referring to Gerwig’s new film adaptation of C.S. Lewis’ “The Chronicles of Narnia” series.)
And Ronson couldn’t leave TODAY without giving a shoutout to beloved weatherman Al Roker.
“I have a memory of the ’90s. I feel like I saw you out on the dance floor. Like, it probably wasn’t often, but I know that there was a night I was like, ‘Holy crap — that’s Al Roker,'” Ronson said during his show appearance.
Al didn’t deny being on the dance floor at the time. “On occasion,” he replied with a cheeky grin.
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
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