Mark Ronson has revealed he was a 'bit annoyed' when Fleur East performed 'Uptown Funk', somewhat forcing him to rush the release of the original.

The producer superstar told NME about hearing the X Factor version for the first time, as it dawned on him it would stand as it's ownsingle.

"I was in the States and I saw on Twitter that Nick Hodgson [ex-Kaiser Chiefs] said, 'Fleur East killing it with Uptown Funk'. I was like, 'Oh that must be X Factor, that's cool'," said Mark.

"Then I was like, 'Wait, don't the X Factor songs come actually out on iTunes?' and then slowly this logic in my head unfolded. I realised this girl's cover's going to come out before our own.

"So yeah, for a minute I was a little bit annoyed and then we kind of rushed ours, which is good 'cause I think whatever it took to get the song out."

But he doesn't hold a grudge, adding: "It's cool, I can't really be mad at anyone for doing a cover, can I? I made a whole album of it, so it's all good."

'Uptown Funk' is in the running for Christmas number one, with it currently in the number two spot with just 23,000 copies between it and Ben Haenow's debut single.

"I almost feel guilty, maybe we can do a remix with a few Christmas words in there in time… I wish we'd had enough time and we would have made an appropriate Christmas version of it," Mark said of a possible festive chart-topper.