ATQPOD024 || A Friend Of Marcus

Updated: Dec 21, 2020

By day, Tony Plowman, a proficient business man who is the brains behind TigerStyle touring agency, responsible for the incredible Solomun, Jamie Jones, Sven Vath, Apparat shows, to name a few.

By night, A Friend Of Marcus, one of Sydney's hottest artists in electronic music, with releases on Balance Music, Natura Sonoris and Last Night On Earth, among the likes of legends Henry Saiz and Petar Dundov.

The relationship between this incredible multi-faceted, creative business titan and Arteq started in early 2017. Since the glory days of our first Raxon show, we have built a beautiful bond, and we are honoured beyond words to present to you all, the 24th Arteq podcast by A Friend Of Marcus.

Listening to this mix upon submission, we were blown away. Tony, thank you so much for creating our final podcast for 2020. You sure have closed it off better than we could have ever imagined. We look forward to bringing you down from your home town Sydney soon, and watching you show our community who you are, and what you're about.

Arteq family, enjoy this masterpiece, and Happy Holidays :-) <3

More from Arteq and A Friend Of Marcus below.

What direction did you take on the podcast? Why did you decide to go this way?

I didn't want to go down a typical "club mix" route. I wanted to put together a mix that people can enjoy listening to over the holidays, whether they're celebrating with friends, preparing a meal, traveling, or just chilling at home alone.

When I was told I could make this as long as I wanted, I went down a bit of a rabbit hole as there are some tracks from the last couple of months I've been wanting to play, and I also had time to dig out a few older tracks too which add some nice contrast to the mix. I've included recent releases from Re.You, Adriatique, Agents of Time, Mind Against, Butch, Alex Banks, Nandu as well as some unreleased stuff, and some older tracks like Ed Davenport - Kuromaku and Hunter/Game - Dial which never seem to leave my record box. As you'd expect from me, there's a few twists and turns so strap yourself in!

Describe A Friend of Marcus in 5 words.

#iamnotonlycolour

What’s in the pipeline with your production?

Since covid hit, I've actually been holding back a lot of music. I felt that with the lack of shows, the releases aren't getting as much attention as they usually would, and I wanted to focus more on developing my sound. I've actually got around 2 hrs of originals that I'll start sending out to labels in the new year, so watch this space...

There’s 10 minutes left before the world self destructs, what song do you put on?

It would have to be M83 - Gone. One of my all time favourites, and has a nice "euphoric apocalypse" kinda vibe, it's a great end of the world song. ;)

How have you been during the turbulent year of 2020?

I'm not going to lie... it's been a tough year. I own TigerStyle touring agency and it was soul destroying to face the tidal wave of show cancelations due to covid-19; after a summer of bushfire cancelations, it was a real kick in the guts. Even worse, I was announced to play Tronic in Ibiza in May, which would have been my first time playing on the island, and a dream come true but the entire season was unfortunately cancelled as well. It was quite depressing to wake up and know that there would be no bookings, no shows, no travel, no plans, no income, it was hard to begin with, I kinda felt like I lost my identity in a way. I am not one to let these feelings linger however and to be honest, I thought covid would only last a few months, so I got really busy right away and it's been a really productive year. Covid has actually been great for my production. It gave me the time I needed to dive deeper into a lot of software and machines, and I've been learning piano as well. It also gave me time to work on other parts of the project. As I manage myself there's a lot of back end planning and organisation to be done - bookings, social media, branding/design, networking, contracts, promotion, logistics etc and that stuff never really ends. So now I'm super organised and have a stack of new music heading into 2021 which is a great feeling.

What are you most looking forward to in 2021?

Well my first gig back is Jan 24th at SubRosa in Brisbane so really looking forward to playing in front of a crowd again. I'm actually really looking forward to traveling again. It's been quite a change, so I'm excited to start playing across Australia and reconnect with a lot audiences I haven't played to in a long time, and hopefully it won't be too long before I can get back up to Asia too. I've had requests from Japan, Singapore, China and Indonesia once things open back up. I'm also hoping that the Ibiza season will take place as I have the slot for Tronic which was postponed from this year pencilled for 2021.

From looking at your Instagram it seems that you're really into your wine and sake... Tell us a bit about that.

Well I've been in the music industry professionally for around 15 years "full time" but I've actually had a side business importing and exporting wine, sake and spirits for the past 8 years which I'd say is my other main passion. I've been taking things more seriously over the past few years and have been accredited as a wine sommelier and also a sake sommelier. I really appreciate the artistry, craft and skill that goes into producing some of these beverages. Like music, there's a lot of really creative, intelligent, passionate people who are a pleasure to work with, so it's always great fun and a great way to learn new creative processes and find inspiration. I'm working on a new club night concept where I can start to incorporate some of the knowledge and brands I've picked up along the way to curate not only the music and venue, but also the drinks, to give people an even deeper sense of what I'm about.

Is there anything on your mind that you would like to say?

Well… I guess we had better mention I’ll be playing Arteq in 2021, so really excited to see all you guys and doing this in person soon! Apart from that, I just wanted to say thanks so much for having me on the show. I've got podcasts with Melodic Deep & DanceTelevision coming up and also guest slots on KISS FM Melbourne and Deeper Sounds on Emirates in-flight radio, and I update my 'I am not only colour' playlist on Spotify every week. Be sure to follow @afriendofmarcus to stay up to date. More gigs/releases to be announced soon..!