In 2013, memes took over the pop charts. For the primary few months of the yr, nothing was touching Macklemore and Ryan Lewis’ “Thrift Store” or Baauer’s “Harlem Shake” — two vaguely smirky information that got here out of nowhere, rode YouTube success, and obliterated big-swing singles from rather more seasoned pop stars. That transitional second had one thing to do with Billboard’s methodology — the choice to begin factoring YouTube performs into chart place — and signaled the beginning of a brand new period. To this present day, it’s a complete lot more durable for a single to succeed in #1 if it doesn’t have some meme juice on it.
Throughout the music enterprise, sure individuals should’ve breathed a sigh of aid when Bruno Mars’ aching piano ballad “After I Was Your Man” lastly elbowed its solution to #1, even when the music solely held the highest spot for per week. Bruno Mars is in no way against memes, and when he toured arenas behind his 2012 album Unorthodox Jukebox, he would play a little bit of one thing that appeared like “Harlem Shake” on drums. However the success of “After I Was Your Man” confirmed {that a} sharply written old-school pop music, delivered by an industry-vetted old-school pop star, might nonetheless compete with the meme hits. From time to time, it would even win.
Time and again, this column has proven that timing is every part in relation to chart success. Pop revolutions don’t occur suddenly; Bobby Vinton was nonetheless capable of push a observe to #1 after the Beatles arrived. Plenty of individuals had been discovering new music by way of YouTube in 2013, however loads of individuals nonetheless listened to the radio, and a few even downloaded singles on iTunes. Bruno Mars made music for these individuals.
In 2013, Bruno Mars was on a roll; his Police pastiche “Locked Out Of Heaven” was the music that “Thrift Store” knocked out of the #1 spot. Mars additionally knew how you can current acquainted sounds to the world. With “After I Was Your Man,” he intently adopted the sonic blueprint of one other music that had been an enormous chart hit not lengthy earlier than. He did every part proper, and he wound up with one other #1 hit. He’s achieved that rather a lot.
In 2011, Adele’s heart-wrecked ballad “Somebody Like You” turned the primary chart-topper in Sizzling 100 historical past to function nothing however voice and piano. Adele constructed herself a cultural second by means of basic songcraft, sparse manufacturing, vocal firepower, and grand-gesture sentiment. Bruno Mars should’ve taken observe. He should’ve realized that he might do all the identical issues that Adele might do, even when he didn’t have the type of emotional depth that would torch whole forests. A yr and a half after “Somebody Like You,” Mars’ “After I Was Your Man” turned the second only-voice-and-piano observe to prime the Sizzling 100. There hasn’t been one other one since.
Bruno Mars didn’t rip Adele off when he wrote “After I Was Your Man.” That music and “Somebody Like You” have vastly completely different melodies and barely completely different tones. As singers, Mars and Adele don’t have a lot in widespread, and no person was going to mistake “Somebody Like You” for “After I Was Your Man.” Adele evidently admired Bruno Mars sufficient to work with him. In 2015, Mars and his crew the Smeezingtons co-wrote and produced Adele’s deep reduce “All I Ask” — which, come to think about it, is one other voice-and-piano ballad. (“All I Ask” by no means got here out as a single, but it surely nonetheless peaked at #77.) It’s simply that Bruno Mars acknowledged a cultural second the place one other music like “Somebody Like You” might get pleasure from related success. That’s good strategizing. That’s what pop stars do.
Possibly Bruno Mars wasn’t fascinated with Adele when he wrote “After I Was Your Man.” He definitely by no means talked about her when he talked about writing the music. As an alternative, Mars says that the music was impressed by real-life experiences. A 2013 Rolling Stone cowl story claims that Mars wrote the music when he was fearful that he and his girlfriend, the mannequin Jessica Caban, had been near breaking apart. They stayed collectively, however Mars stated that he had bother performing the music dwell, because it took him proper again to that feeling of remorse and uncertainty. He additionally had bother speaking concerning the music: “I’m not answering any questions on this music. It’s too near residence.”
At numerous factors, Bruno Mars has stated that he had no real interest in writing emotionally intense ballads when he was making Unorthodox Jukebox. In that Rolling Stone story, Mars says, “I’m not a fan of self-indulgence. For me, music is ‘I need to really feel good’ or ‘I need to dance,’ versus me singing about me rising up in Hawaii and ‘my battle to narrate.’ Ain’t no person making an attempt to listen to that. I’m not even making an attempt to listen to that, and that’s my story!” In a unique Rolling Stone story, Mars stated, “After we began the file, I used to be like, ‘I’m by no means singing one other ballad once more.’” Mars has recorded ballads since “After I Was Your Man,” however they’ve been crushed-velvet loverman affairs, not emotional purges. Nonetheless, “After I Was Your Man” got here collectively rapidly, and Mars described it as “probably the most trustworthy, actual factor I’ve ever sung.”
I’m positive Bruno Mars means what he says. However Mars can also be a cipher who obtained his begin by impersonating the idealized pop stars of the previous. That’s what he was doing when he was a toddler, barely sufficiently old to face. It solely is sensible that the person can solely course of his personal emotions by means of the medium of classically constructed pop music. In 2013, Philip Lawrence, Mars’ right-hand man within the Smeezingtons, instructed American Songwriter, “Bruno and I are each big followers of older music, like Billy Joel and Elton John. We at all times beloved these moments the place you may sit on the piano and emote… We at all times needed to discover a stripped-down music like that, which is how that music got here to be. The subject material was actual life; Bruno had skilled that, so we tried to say it in the most effective and catchiest means we might.”
It should be so laborious to search out the road between pop pastiche and emotional outpouring, but it surely positive appears simpler for Bruno Mars than for many of us. Unorthodox Jukebox is an album filled with style experiments, and “After I Was Your Man” is a type of. When it was time to file his wracked, regretful ballad, Mars didn’t all of a sudden flip into Cat Energy. As an alternative, he merely consulted his pop-star playbook. This was the sensible transfer. If “After I Was Your Man” was something apart from a pastiche of identifiable, acquainted parts, it wouldn’t have hit the way in which that it did.
Bruno Mars is the one human being that we hear on “After I Was Your Man.” That’s him singing the music, and that’s him enjoying the piano. However this isn’t a “When Doves Cry” scenario. Different individuals helped Mars write the music. He wrote and produced it along with his Smeezingtons buddies Philip Lawrence and Ari Levine. Andrew Wyatt, the Miike Snow singer who’s already been on this column for co-writing Mars’ “Grenade,” additionally will get a songwriting credit score. When he needed to translate his most intense emotions right into a pop music, Mars turned to the buddies and collaborators who he trusted. I believe that’s good.
It’s straightforward to admire the economical nature of “After I Was Your Man.” Like so many pop songs earlier than it, the observe addresses difficult emotions in easy phrases, losing no phrases in sketching out a psychological state. On the music, Bruno appears to be like again on a damaged relationship and realizes every part that he did improper: “My pleasure, my ego, my wants, and my egocentric methods/ Brought about a great, robust girl such as you to stroll out my life/ Now I’ll by no means, by no means get to scrub up the mess I made/ And that haunts me each time I shut my eyes.” He ought to’ve purchased her flowers and held her hand. He ought to’ve gave her all his hours when he had an opportunity.
I’m vaguely fascinated by the concept Bruno Mars didn’t really break up with the lady who impressed “After I Was Your Man.” (Mars is nice at protecting his private life out of the media, however so far as I can inform, he and Jessica Caban are nonetheless collectively.) As an alternative, he’s enjoying a personality. On the music, Mars actually has blown every part, and his ex is with another person. When he sings the music, Mars isn’t making an attempt to win her again. He’s merely letting her know that he is aware of what he did. Now, she’s dancing with one other man, and he hopes that the man buys her flowers and holds her hand. It’s like Mars beams himself right into a doable alternate future, singing from the attitude of that timeline’s Bruno Mars after which returning to his personal.
“After I Was Your Man” is a well-written, well-performed pop ballad. The pianos tinkle superbly, and Mars lets his voice get a bit rougher with out shedding its basic smoothness. The bridge is very good, with Mars actually reaching for some painfully expressive notes. You possibly can hear the work that went into the observe. It’s a pleasant music. I have a tendency to search out gloopy ballads to be painfully boring, and “After I Was Your Man” is just too well-written to endure that destiny. But it surely additionally by no means approaches the identical heights of catharsis that Adele discovered on “Somebody Like You.” It’s only a good music and nothing extra. It doesn’t transfer me. I didn’t know the complete backstory of “After I Was Your Man” when the music was really common, however perhaps I might subconsciously sense that Bruno Mars hadn’t gone by means of it the way in which that Adele had.
Nonetheless: Huge hit. For the “After I Was Your Man” video, Bruno Mars and director Cameron Duddy went for the explicitly old-school really feel of a ’70s TV efficiency. Even the movie grain evoked the image of these outdated YouTube clips. That exacting retro presentation has since turn out to be an enormous a part of the Bruno Mars expertise. Since then, all of his singles have labored, very consciously, as aesthetic time machines. “After I Was Your Man” solely spent per week at #1, however the music arguably caught round longer and have become greater than “Thrift Store” or “Harlem Shake.” The only ultimately went previous diamond, going platinum 11 instances over. The “Thrift Store” video has extra YouTube views, however each songs are effectively over a billion.
Unorthodox Jukebox finally went platinum six instances over, which is simply barely lower than what Bruno Mars racked up along with his debut album Doo-Wops & Hooligans. Jukebox had yet one more large hit, and that music just about established the lane that Mars has occupied ever since. Together with his follow-up “Treasure,” Mars obtained into his high-stepping liquid pop-funk bag, going full Earth, Wind & Hearth. (“Treasure” peaked at #5. It’s an 8.) That’s Mars’ consolation zone, and he hasn’t ventured too removed from it since then.
A few different Unorthodox Jukebox tracks additionally made the charts. I actually like “Gorilla,” an completely ridiculous piece of cartoonishly sexy arena-rock that peaked at #22. The “Gorilla” lyrics are so silly; it’s actually simply Bruno singing about eager to fuck like a gorilla. However he delivers the music with none smirk, absolutely committing to the Prince-doing-Journey sound that he clearly focused. I can’t imagine he obtained away with it, however credit score the place it’s due. In the long run, 5 completely different singles from Unorthodox Jukebox made the highest 40 — wonderful numbers for a 10-song album. As the one that writes this column, I’ve to say that I recognize Bruno Mars for by no means leaving any filler on his LPs. These issues are at all times about half an hour, out and in, and it makes the analysis rather more painless.
With two big albums to his credit score, Bruno Mars made profession strikes. He headlined an area tour and launched his first Las Vegas residency. He performed a romantic rival named Rico within the children’ animated film Rio 2. (That continues to be Mars’ solely actual cinematic function; he’s by no means jumped into the appearing factor.) And in 2014, the 28-year-old Bruno Mars performed the Tremendous Bowl Halftime Present.
It’s mainly unheard-of for somebody to take that Tremendous Bowl gig earlier than reaching a profession peak, however that’s what Bruno Mars did. His Halftime Present didn’t attain the degrees of eye-popping spectacle that we’ve come to anticipate in recent times, and the looks from the Pink Sizzling Chili Peppers felt bizarre and compelled and random. (The Chili Peppers’ highest-charting single, 1991’s “Beneath The Bridge,” peaked at #2. It’s an 8.) Apart from that, although, Mars did simply advantageous. I didn’t have a foul time watching his Halftime Present when it was occurring, and I additionally didn’t have a foul time rewatching it simply now. “After I Was Your Man” wasn’t a part of the present, which makes excellent sense. There are occasions when a weepy piano-ballad is completely acceptable, and the Tremendous Bowl will not be a type of instances.
When he performed that Halftime Present, Bruno Mars was lower than a yr away from releasing the most important hit of his life — a music so big that the NFL needed to convey Mars again to crash Coldplay’s Halftime Present a few years later. However we’ll get to that. Bruno Mars, evidently, will seem on this column once more. Additionally, a decade after “After I Was Your Man,” one other pop star had an enormous hit with an unofficial reply file. That music may also seem on this column at some point sooner or later.
