mixtape maestro (2.0)

Already earning hype as one of the best singles of 2007, in-demand UK DJ/ producer Mark Ronson hooks up with Aussie R&B sensation Daniel Merriweather for this utterly amazing cover of the controversial Smiths single.

Like the inspired collaboration of Gnarls Barkley’s Danger Mouse and Cee-Lo, Ronson and Merriweather prove an arresting coupling. Ronson’s layered soul arrangement is tense with a big band orchestra; strings zig in and out with punctuated horns and a dizzying drum break perfectly illustrating the manic, homicidal introspection of Morrisey’s over-the-top lyrical heartache (“I crashed down on the crossbar/ And the pain was enough to make a shy, bald Buddhist reflect/ And plan a mass murder/ Who said I lied to her?”). It’s like Barkley’s “Crazy” all over again, but while that one sounded like an obscure cover brought back to life, this one actually is, gloriously reworking The Smiths’ upbeat pop/ rock original in a more fitting context to compliment it’s depressing mopiness.

Merriweather is an impassioned vocalist and gives the songwriting much more weight with his hypnotizing woe-soul delivery. When the song cleverly merges in The Supremes’ defiant “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” in a late-in-the-game twist, Merriweather doesn’t skip a beat, easily flowing into the sudden song shift as if the two classics were always meant to live side by side as one.

A DJ favorite that will slowly seep into the public’s consciousness thanks to it’s droning awesomeness and artful blending, expect Ronson & Merriweather’s “Stop Me” to endure heavy playlist replays for much of the near future until it’s as ubiquitous as “Crazy” as become.