LOS ANGELES — "What song you wanna hear?" Bruno Mars asks, his question doubling as both a flex — any song I name, he most definitely can play — and a friendly challenge. "I need to know you heard this album," he adds with a grin.
Mars, the smooth and versatile pop superstar, is hanging out in a Burbank rehearsal studio, smoking American Spirit cigarettes and sipping an iced brown-sugar, oat-milk shaken espresso — "It's a fancy milkshake," he says — before starting up a recent practice with the 10-man live edition of Silk Sonic, the 1970s-style soul duo he shares with Oxnard-born singer and rapper Anderson .Paak.
Actually, the musicians are in the studio next door. Mars, 36, rented this second space just to go over wardrobe options for the monthslong residency Silk Sonic opened last week at Las Vegas' Park MGM. Dozens of brightly patterned shirts hang on racks; a long folding table is arrayed with fedoras and bedazzled eyewear. In the middle of the room, a small mountain of shoes awaits careful inspection: Gucci loafers, Florsheim boots, Vans slip-ons the color of banana Laffy Taffy.
