Bruno Mars - Doo-Wops & Hooligans color vinyl LP

After the release of the EP It's Better If You Don't Understand, Mars's writing and production team, the Smeezingtons, began working on the album with Needlz, Supa Dups and Jeff Bhasker as producers. The album title was chosen to reflect simplicity and appeal to both men and women.

Bruno Mars is a real all-rounder: a singer, songwriter, producer and musician who feels most comfortable when he can perform. Born into a musical family in Honolulu/Hawaii, he practically grew up on stage. His father, a Latin percussionist from Brooklyn, created a Las Vegas-typical revue in which the entire family performed including his mother, a talented singer. When four-year-old Mars watched his family give old Motown hits, doo-wop medleys and cover versions for enthusiastic viewers on Waikiki Beach, "I was really envious! ", says Mars with a laugh. "So my dad put me on stage; I remember singing an Elvis song. And that's it: Since that moment I have been dependent." And since that moment he had been discovered - at least in his homeland - the Hawaiian newspapers spoke of "Little Elvis" when they wanted to describe Bruno Mars' stage qualities.

Rich in a wide variety of music styles from around the world, Honolulu was an exciting hometown for the budding singer/songwriter. At one end of the musical spectrum were all the classics of the 50s - his father's great passion. "I like the way these old boys performed," Mars recently explained. "There is so much style and elegance in it, and yet they are all about the music. This impressed me: this blend of coolness and passion" - something that can be said about him in the same way. At the same time, Honolulu has been and is still rich in its own traditional sounds, which include reggae, rock and folk, but also the current pop hits. "Hawaii is in the middle of the world," describes Mars. In this way, you can naturally come into contact with any form of music.

Hardly that he had graduated from high school, he left Hawaii still towards Los Angeles - in his luggage the dream of making a career as a singer and performer. For a while, these dreams had to stand behind when The Smeezingtons founded, the songwriting and production team he initiated together with Philip Lawrence and Ari Levine. The two had already written and produced numerous giant hits for a wide range of artists; including Travie McCoy's hit "Billionaire" or Brandy's bang "Long Distance". In these two, he found friends, teachers, collaborators with whom he could play ideas in a loose, purposeful way. Whatever he also promptly did: both Flo Rida's chart breakers "Right Round" and K'Naan's "Waving Flag," one of the big hits surrounding the football World Cup in South Africa, were co-written and produced by Bruno Mars.

If you ask him to describe his album "Doo-Wops & Hooligans", Mars answers: "I find it difficult to sort myself into a category. I simply write songs that I myself intensely believe in that come from my deepest inside. There are no tricks, nothing inflated. It's pure sincerity, coupled with great melodies. And I will blow these melodies with my singing the march properly." His song collection has been written from a wide range of angles and nourishes itself from experiences in his true life, perfectly brought into the mood by his flowing voice and a deliberately simple production. In doing so, he almost always collaborates with his Smeezingtons partner Philip Lawrence in songwriting and production; a duo that results in an absolutely perfect team in vision, sound and the healthy blend of tradition and modernity. And not only in his own works: "Fuck You", Cee-Lo Green's top single comes from their common feather.