This is funnnnny… i’m off to the show with Crystal Castles. See ya tonight

Kanye West: What’s up, Mark? How you doin’?
Mark Ronson: It depends. If you go by the Jewish calendar, my year is shit, but since January it’s been all right.

KW: I don’t know when the Jewish calendar is.
MR: It’s about September, which is when I went to rehab. How are you doing, man? Congratulations on your engagement.

KW: Thank you. You know, I look up to you in a way. Obviously, I’m going to have rich kids; I would much rather have my kid come out like Mark Ronson than a lot of these rich kids that I’ve met being out in L.A. Their parents are such great figures in pop culture, and the kids are so fucking lame.
MR: Yeah, I think that comes somewhat from a straight English upbringing. Even a total spoiled brat dickhead will still open the door for you.

KW: I want my kid to be raised where they have to get on the train, it’s not just Rodeo Drive every day.
MR: I kind of hate L.A. for that shit. People go out to L.A. and just lose the point. I’m also a little bit burnt out on rap music, to tell you the truth.

KW: Most people hate rap music right now. It’s in the hair-band phase.
MR: It’s like disco. When all the records sound like instructional dance songs, telling you what to do, it becomes [Jane] Fonda-esque: Lean back, rock with it, shoulder lean. When people have to be told what to do to have a good time, that’s when I think music’s sort of lost.

KW: Yeah, you’re in that moment now. You just have to accept it.
MR: I first got really into hip-hop in that classic Def Jam era. Except for the Beastie Boys, it was all pretty edgy. That’s something that I definitely miss in this era of hip-hop. Everybody seems to be in this shallow disco bubble, like half the world might not as well be going on.

KW: Another thing that’s funny about rap, certain rappers do that interview and say, “I got something for everybody.”
MR: When you hear that, you know your album has nothing for anybody.

KW: I hate that concept. Even “Slow Jamz,” which [girls] love, I’m like, “I’ma play this Vandross/You gon’ take your pants off.”
MR: Yeah, you’re a misogynist asshole. I always meant to tell you that.

KW: But because I got a Polo on, I get away with it. Where do designers get inspiration from now that it’s not really cool to dress hip-hop anymore? I make that statement being the dude that gets bashed the most for having pants that fit nicely.
MR: Remember when Versace put bicycle locks on runway models like five years after Treach did it? Fashion people, they’re late on everything. I think it’s kind of cool that there’s this key group of kids that are coming out now that are dressing like EPMD.

KW: The hi-top Flights and shit.
MR: A tight jean jacket and giant glasses. I’m actually glad to see hip-hop fashion head back to that. It’s just like anything that’s been around for 10 years and doesn’t look cutting-edge anymore.

KW: I respect Marilyn Manson and his artistic abilities, his wardrobe. He’s really the real deal. He is the last true rock star.
MR: People don’t want to believe that their pop stars are the guys next door. There’s a reason that people look up to Alice Cooper and [David] Bowie and [Jimi] Hendrix—because you knew that you didn’t have the balls to be like that.

KW: Let me be an asshole for a minute. Even the mistakes I’ve made give me a piece of that. I thought that the Grammy [editor’s note: the Tom Ford chest action] ’fit was the biggest statement of confidence.
MR: Or when Björk wore that [swan] dress to the [2001] Oscars. It was kind of ridiculous, but at least it made a statement: “I’m not the rest of you, walking down here in a fucking Ralph Lauren gown.”

KW: Björk is thorough. She’s got that certain art level, that same thing I’m saying about Marilyn Manson. I read some shit, some excerpts from Amy [Winehouse]. She was bagging on people, like just coming down on any celebrity possible.
MR: Amy’s smart and funny. She’s English when she insults somebody.

KW: Do all those things go together—smart, funny, English?
MR: I don’t know. She said Dido’s the soundtrack to death. I think Dido’s a really nice person, but that’s funny. If she insulted me in that way, I would laugh. Maybe it’s just easier to take coming out of a pretty mouth…

KW: Women can say anything they fucking want.
MR: It’s refreshing, so I started to turn up the honesty in these English interviews I’ve been doing. I said something about Joss Stone and I saw it back in print, and I look like such a dick. Whether I think her liner notes are ridiculous or not, it’s not really my place to say it.

KW: I apologize for putting it in print this way, but when I saw Joss Stone’s first video it was very much inspiration for me to make something that looked nothing like it. [Laughs.]
MR: Oh God, I made this girl’s life worse. Again.

KW: I’m not trying to bash Joss Stone. Sometimes artists need management, a little direction.
MR: On my first record [“Ooh Wee”], Sylvia Rhone was like, “We’re going to make a video in a club and you’re going to be DJing, going ‘wiggy-wiggy,’ and then we’ll have Ghostface and Nate Dogg and it’ll be cool.”

KW: The Ghostface video didn’t capture what I think of Mark Ronson.
MR: No, it was a cheesy video, and I just went along, like, “You guys know better than me!” And that was completely wrong.