It is my sad duty to inform any ex-readers of Magic Feet magazine of the death of one of its former contributors, Marc Barlow. Known as Wilf to his friends, he wrote under the name of Vilf in Magic Feet for several years.
Wilf, 33, was walking home alone when he was attacked by three men in a street near to his flat in Nottingham in the early hours of Monday 21st August. He never regained consciousness and died in hospital a few hours later. A memorial site has been established at www.geocities.com/marcbarlowuk through which anyone who wishes to do so may send a message of condolence to Wilf's parents or pay tribute to Wilf. A full scale investigation by Nottinghamshire Police's Serious Crimes Unit is underway and news of all substantiated developments will be posted to the site. A memorial club night will be held at The Skyy Club, Nottingham this Saturday (23rd Sept). All welcome. Although Wilf was not a member of this list, he was one of us all the same. The following text is adapted from an obituary which appears in the new issue of Overload magazine (issue 04), just out. Thankyou for your time, TOM --------- Obituary: Marc 'Wilf' Barlow A longtime background figure on the Nottingham underground music scene, Wilf had DJed for years without a break or recognition, always playing only the deepest sounds. He never read the music press or worried about who or what music was 'in' or 'out', he just bought records if he liked them. Needless to say, he was well known to - and liked by - the staff of Nottingham's record shops. His tastes ran deep and wide - from punk and grunge to jazz, funk, dub and soul in equal measure - but techno and house were his overriding passions, with UR, Moodymann, Derrick Carter, Stacey Pullen and Carl Craig amongst his favourites. That said, he was no slavish follower - if he didn't dig a record, he wouldn't buy it or play it, never mind who had made it. He had an unmatched ear for the music and over more than a decade of buying music he amassed a record collection that would make anyone reading on this list weep with envy. I always remember playing him a track off some album a couple of years back without telling him who made it - it took him about about eight beats to correctly identify its creator. For Magic Feet, Wilf mainly wrote single and album reviews, although he also contributed a D Knox interview and some satirical pieces. He couldn't use a keyboard, spell or punctuate, but he often found things to say about the music which would never have occurred to me in a million years and I remain convinced that he could connect to techno and house in a way that very few others could. He also contributed to a now-defunct local listings magazine, Pulse, for who he wrote reviews and interviewed Surgeon. His relish for clubs was also unlike that of few other people I know. If Stacey Pullen, Derrick May or someone similar was in town, he'd be there and any Nottingham clubbers reading may well remember him for his trademark full-length bright yellow workman's jacket. In the early nineties he helped run what became Nottingham's longest-running underground house and techno night, Torch, which played host to the likes of Colin Faver and Luke Slater. Over the subsequent years he regularly helped to try and get more nights going here and when Magic Feet was running its own club sessions a year or two back, Wilf could always be relied on for help well beyond the call of duty. He also went to almost every Lost night - even if no-one else he knew was going, he'd just jump on a bus and go on his own. Recently he had helped launch a Sunday afternoon session called Quit Jivin at a local pub, The Arboretum, where he played soul, funk and jazz-related music. He was enthusing about his hopes for this when I saw him for the last time, on the day of his murder. An intelligent and sensitive man who read a great deal and didn't own a TV, Wilf worked full-time on a production line in the local Pork Farms factory, where he was also a trade union representative and intended to stand as shop steward. A more unpleasant job it is hard to imagine, particularly for a vegetarian, but I suspect that to Wilf, it was little more than a device which allowed him to pay the rent and buy records. To those who knew Wilf, he was truly one of a kind and will be an irreplaceable loss. He is survived by both his parents, to whom we offer our deepest condolences. - Tom Magic Feet Marc 'Wilf' Barlow, factory worker, DJ and writer, born 26th October 1966; died 21st August 2000
