Introducing: MF TOMLINSON

We sat down with MF TOMLINSON and got to know a bit more about the Australian Singer-Songwriter who is getting a lot of buzz from music critics with his new EP.

The left-field songwriter is celebrating the release of his new single ‘Nietzsche’s Day Off’, which is a killer cosmic slice of infectious boogie funk.

The new single follows the release of the upbeat swaggering ‘Sum Of Nothing’, which we love and his suave debut single ‘Nature Boy’ released earlier this year.

The emergence of MF Tomlinson in 2019 has seen him achieve great support at BBC 6Music, BBC Introducing and Radio X, while also gaining critical praise from Clash Magazine, Fred Perry Subculture, Beat Magazine, Happy Magazine and many more.

He’s played in support of Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever and also sold out his own headline shows at The Lexington, Moth Club, and Sebright Arms.

Hi, could you introduce yourself and tell us a bit more about you?

My name is MF Tomlinson and I am a songwriter. I live in London, I’ve lived in London for the last nine years, I’m originally from Brisbon in Australia. The reason I write songs is to give an […] understanding of the internal feelings associated with transcendental moments in your life where there is a big feeling, a small action or also whether it’s just about the current political climate or love or anything. It’s about right now! It’s about My life, our lives. I’ve been doing it for… since I was... I’ve been doing it my whole life, so this is my most recent and I think best iteration of this writing.

Your music video for ‘Sum of Nothing’ was shot in Los Angeles how was the experience and do you have any plans to move out there?

It was an incredible experience, I met the director Susie Francis when she was living with me in London, I guess probably about 6 or 7 years ago. Ellis Ball who graded the clip was living with me too. I’ve been to LA a few times when I was 19 I went out there. We recorded an album with my first band. So, I’ve been to LA a bunch of times, but my old bandmate Shaun was out there, so I go there to record. Basically, I go there to visit my friends and they just happen to be really talented people that I can do some really fun stuff with. So, when Susie wanted to do the video for ‘Some of Nothing’ I couldn’t like… you know… she just said get yourself over here and that’s all you’ll need to do, so it was really a no brainer and it was so much fun. She made it happen all happen, […] she drove around the desert finding all the locations, she got this shopping trolley from the local grocer and when we were done she brought it back; she’s just so talented and amazing, such a dynamo!

How would you describe your (fashion) style we got Napoleon Dynamite 70’s vibes from the Sum of nothing video?

Ha! I would not say, Napoleon Dynamite! But, you're entitled to your opinion. Musically, It’s definitely inspired by a lot of music from the ’70s. I sometimes describe it to people as Lou Reed meets Curtis Mayfield, but I think that kind of… that would be true my previous single nature boy maybe, The Some of Nothing people have said like Arcade Fire and Talking Heads […]

I was also wondering if your clothing style was possibly linked to the song Sum of Nothing which is about the environment, which is why you wear vintage or vintage-inspired clothes?”

I try to be as environmentally conscious as I can, but I don’t wear vintage clothes because they are good for the environment, but I guess I don’t buy that many clothes, I don’t know my life is not that environmentally sensible. I mean I flew to LA to do the video so there you go. Interviewer- I guess it’s quite hard to be quite completely environmentally friendly.

If you were to tour with any other artist of your choice who would you choose?

I would really like to go on tour with John Cale.

Your music has been described as hard to place within a genre and even Genre-defying in other articles. How would you describe your genre of music?

It’s basically about telling stories. I would describe it as storytelling music.

Your music has received critical acclaim and radio play, who do you make the music for and do you care what the critics think?

I make music for … like with this project it is more important to me than ever to make music that I just really love and not think at all why that is or to put out a song just because. It’s an artistic expression and they are all very sincere and from the heart, if really people like them that obliviously makes really happy. And obviously, I would quite like people to like them, but it doesn’t really matter to me. I don’t know…I’m always extremely appreciative. It’s nice. I make music for people to hear it. There are definitely some people that make music and they don’t really mind if anyone hears it. I’m making music and I would love for people to listen to it, so it’s wonderful when they do. I guess that’s what we all like in art is someone expressing something and then other people recognizing that within themselves and that creates a beautiful moment.

What is the next thing you're doing?

I’m going to Australia for Christmas to see my family, and then I’ll be back in the new year with lots of exciting things there’s tons of great music that I’m finishing up now […]. I’m really excited about 2020.

Are you more of a cat or a dog person?

100% dog person.

What question would you like to be asked in this interview or what would you like to share with people?

When I was trying to think for a name for this project there are so many amazing collaborators that give their performances and also co-writing, so this project, in the end, I’m kind of administrating mainly, but also guiding the project and the lyrical content. But anyway, it sounded almost impossible to figure out what to call the project and then I kind of sort of went into this sort of weird rabbit hole where I was trying to like come up with some kind of theory. No! Some ways to understand… your own existence? And then I realized the name for that is what we call someone’s experience of the world, we basically call that their name, because they’re like an entity and collection of experiences. Anyways, so all that is to say that basically sometimes the level of self-reflection is too great and I have no idea what I would ask myself even though I’m completely extra and have a lot of self-reflection.

Check out the in-person interview on Youtube, with MF Tomlinson, where we ask a few more questions.

Check out our TOP 3 TRACKS from MF Tomlinson’s EP

SUM OF NOTHING

2. NATURE BOY

3. Nietzsche's Day Off

STAY UP TO DATE WITH MF TOMLINSON

CREDITS
Cover Photography | Andrea Zvadova

B&W Story | Shingi Rice

Videography + in-person interview | Leva Lasmane | @Ievalasmane

Main Interview & Video Editing | John Burbidge

We sat down with MF TOMLINSON and got to know a bit more about the Australian singer-songwriter who is getting a lot of buzz from music critics with his new EP