Bruno Mars Covers Adele's 'All I Ask'
If all you asked for was an Adele cover from Bruno Mars, your wish has been granted.
Covering the 25 song he co-wrote with the British songstress, Mars and his band performed “All I Ask” during their visit to BBC Radio 1’s “Live Lounge” on Wednesday (Nov. 2).
“This next song we ’bout to do for y’all,” he said, “is a song that means a lot to me.”
“All I Ask” came up during Mars’ second Rolling Stone cover story, where the singer explained an argument over the “this is my love” lyric.
“We were aiming for that big, diva, ballad thing – that’s what I envisioned,” he explained. “But ‘lovers’? I don’t know if anybody really says ‘lovers.’ ‘Yeah, we’re lovers.’ ‘This is my lover.’ I was like, ‘Should we rethink that?’ But [Adele] was so gangster about it. She was like, ‘Nope. That’s what it has to be.’ And she was right. It’s this grand word that makes the song bigger because no one says it. Because nobody talks like that, it pops out. It’s not ‘what boyfriends-and-girlfriends do’ – it’s this over-the-top ‘lovers.'”
It’s likely that Mars was thinking about that argument during his performance of the song. “Sometimes I play it on the piano, and I look forward to singing that part,” he said. “It’s fucking perfect.”
In addition to “All I Ask,” Bruno and his Hooligans delivered an upbeat performance of “24K Magic,” the title track off his new album, due Nov. 18.