this wasn’t his sound when he came out, bruh made contemporary music and sold 15M worldwide out the gate, no label put money behind him on some “yea, you’re the one we want to do black music”, 24 magic was his lowest selling album, so it wasn’t to his benefit to go so throwback r&b/soul, but he’s an actual musician and lover of that music.
like I said, there’s a large segment of black folk who didn’t know or pay attention to him prior to that album and sound stupid making up these alt facts about him and his popularity
It's funny how people will be outraged at Bruno Mars, but will be silent on Mark Ronson. Not saying we should hate Mark Ronson, but a lot of that wave began with "Uptown Funk YoubUp" and Mark had a couple of other songs with that vibe, but because Bruno Mars was the star, he caught heat from people saying he was appropriating.