Biography
Marxman originated as a quartet devoted to hip-hop and assembled in London during 1989. Alongside outfits such as Massive Attack and Portishead, the group helped shape the “Bristol sound,” an intricate fusion of hip-hop, Northern soul, and electronic textures that supplied the foundation for the trip-hop style. Their steadfast political convictions, paired with a racially mixed membership, generated considerable friction during their brief chart run, prompting BBC radio to blacklist the debut single “Sad Affair” on the grounds that it appeared to offer tacit endorsement of the Irish Republican Army. Although those convictions sprang from militant socialist principles rather than conventional nationalism, Marxman ranked among the earliest hip-hop acts to integrate traditional Irish folk elements, enlisting contributions from Davy Spillane and Sinéad O’Connor on the debut album 33 Revolutions per Minute.
The story began in Dublin, where MC Hollis Byrne and electronic musician Oisín Lunny first connected through their fathers, Michael Byrne and Donal Lunny, who had performed together in the 1970s with the Irish rock pioneers the Emmet Spiceland. Lunny had launched the Mood Club, one of Dublin’s leading weekly club nights in the late 1980s, while Byrne stood among the city’s first graffiti artists. The pair reconvened in London in 1989, at which point Lunny joined the lineup already fronted by Byrne—now performing as MC Hollis—and Bristol rapper MC Phrase, whose given name was Stephen Brown. Lunny shifted to a supporting role as programmer and instrumentalist, and mixer-scratcher DJ Kay One completed the quartet soon afterward.
The debut single “Sad Affair” appeared on Gilles Peterson’s Talkin’ Loud Records, then operating as a Polygram subsidiary, in the UK and Ireland in 1992. A reworking of John Gibb’s modern folk ballad “Irish Ways and Irish Laws,” the track was promptly barred from chart radio after it featured the phrase “tiocfaidh ár lá,” the IRA’s rallying cry in Northern Ireland. With an audience already secured, the group issued a follow-up later that year: the anti-slavery statement “Ship Ahoy,” which incorporated Sinéad O’Connor’s sung chorus and the tin whistle of James McNally, then a member of the Pogues and mainstay of Afro Celts.
In 1993 the album 33 Revolutions per Minute arrived together with the single “All About Eve,” a track that sampled Stevie Wonder’s “My Cherie Amour” and examined domestic abuse from a third-party perspective; Spike Jonze directed the video immediately after completing his work on the Beastie Boys’ “Time for Lovin.” The album reached the United States in 1994 yet made little impression, simultaneously stalling the group’s transatlantic progress. After releasing The Cynic EP they parted ways with Talkin’ Loud; in 1995 they issued Time Capsule on the More Rockers label—an angrier yet more musically restrained effort—before disbanding the following year. Oisín Lunny later succeeded as an electronic artist, releasing the single “The Mood Club” in 1999 on Independiente Records and the album When It Hits You Feel No Pain in 2001.
The story began in Dublin, where MC Hollis Byrne and electronic musician Oisín Lunny first connected through their fathers, Michael Byrne and Donal Lunny, who had performed together in the 1970s with the Irish rock pioneers the Emmet Spiceland. Lunny had launched the Mood Club, one of Dublin’s leading weekly club nights in the late 1980s, while Byrne stood among the city’s first graffiti artists. The pair reconvened in London in 1989, at which point Lunny joined the lineup already fronted by Byrne—now performing as MC Hollis—and Bristol rapper MC Phrase, whose given name was Stephen Brown. Lunny shifted to a supporting role as programmer and instrumentalist, and mixer-scratcher DJ Kay One completed the quartet soon afterward.
The debut single “Sad Affair” appeared on Gilles Peterson’s Talkin’ Loud Records, then operating as a Polygram subsidiary, in the UK and Ireland in 1992. A reworking of John Gibb’s modern folk ballad “Irish Ways and Irish Laws,” the track was promptly barred from chart radio after it featured the phrase “tiocfaidh ár lá,” the IRA’s rallying cry in Northern Ireland. With an audience already secured, the group issued a follow-up later that year: the anti-slavery statement “Ship Ahoy,” which incorporated Sinéad O’Connor’s sung chorus and the tin whistle of James McNally, then a member of the Pogues and mainstay of Afro Celts.
In 1993 the album 33 Revolutions per Minute arrived together with the single “All About Eve,” a track that sampled Stevie Wonder’s “My Cherie Amour” and examined domestic abuse from a third-party perspective; Spike Jonze directed the video immediately after completing his work on the Beastie Boys’ “Time for Lovin.” The album reached the United States in 1994 yet made little impression, simultaneously stalling the group’s transatlantic progress. After releasing The Cynic EP they parted ways with Talkin’ Loud; in 1995 they issued Time Capsule on the More Rockers label—an angrier yet more musically restrained effort—before disbanding the following year. Oisín Lunny later succeeded as an electronic artist, releasing the single “The Mood Club” in 1999 on Independiente Records and the album When It Hits You Feel No Pain in 2001.
Albums
Singles
