Marlon Motlop is an

Indigenous Australian Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...

former

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

er who played with the

Port Adelaide Football Club Port Adelaide Football Club is a professional Australian rules football club based in Alberton, South Australia, Alberton, South Australia. The club's senior men's team plays in the Australian Football League (AFL), where they are nicknamed ...

in the

AFL AFL may refer to: Sports * American Football League (AFL), a name shared by several separate and unrelated professional American football leagues: ** American Football League (1926) (a.k.a. "AFL I"), first rival of the National Football Leagu ...

. His final season was with

Glenelg Football Club Glenelg Football Club is an Australian rules football team, which plays in the South Australian National Football League. The club is known as the "Tigers" (or the "Bays"), and their home ground is ACH Group Stadium (formerly Glenelg Oval), lo ...

in the

South Australian National Football League The South Australian National Football League, or SANFL ( or ''S-A-N-F-L''), is an Australian rules football league based in the Australian state of South Australia. It is also the state's sports governing body, governing body for the sport. O ...

(SANFL) in 2021. He has been developing a career as a

musician A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who wr ...

since 2020, with the alias MARLON, and performing at WOMADelaide as half of a

musical duo A musical ensemble, also known as a music group or musical group, is a group of people who perform instrumental and/or vocal music, with the ensemble typically known by a distinct name. Some music ensembles consist solely of instrumentalists, ...

known as MRLN x RKM. He is also involved with his cousin

Daniel Motlop Daniel Motlop (born 16 March 1982) is an Indigenous Larrakia Australian rules footballer who played a total of 130 senior games for the North Melbourne Football Club and the Port Adelaide Football Club in the Australian Football League (AFL). ...

's native food business.

Early life and family

Marlon has

Aboriginal Australian Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait I ...

, with his father a Larrakia man and his mother Kungarakany, as well as

Torres Strait Islander Torres Strait Islanders () are the Indigenous Melanesian people of the Torres Strait Islands, which are part of the state of Queensland, Australia. Ethnically distinct from the Aboriginal Australians, Aboriginal people of the rest of Australia ...

(

Thursday Island Thursday Island, colloquially known as TI, or in the Kawrareg dialect, Waiben or Waibene, is an island of the Torres Strait Islands, an archipelago of at least 274 small islands in the Torres Strait. TI is located approximately north of Cape ...

) heritage. His father insisted that he learn to play the

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected string ...

around the same time as developing his footballing career as a junior, and he would write songs with his cousins

Daniel Daniel is a masculine given name and a surname of Hebrew origin. It means "God is my judge"Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 68. (cf. Gabriel—"God is my strength"), ...

, Shannon and Steven, who would also go on to be AFL footballers.

Football career

Originally from

Wanderers Football Club The Wanderers Football Club, nicknamed, Eagles, is an Australian rules football club, currently playing in the Northern Territory Football League (NTFL). The club was formed in 1916 as a founding member of the NTFL. It has produced Australian ...

in the (

Northern Territory Football League The Northern Territory Football League (NTFL) is an Australian rules football semi-professional league operating in Darwin in the Northern Territory. The league is one of few (and the highest level) Australian Rules competitions played during ...

(NTFL), Motlop first gained the attention of AFL talent scouts when he won the Allan McLean best-and-fairest medal for the

2006 File:2006 Events Collage V1.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2006 Winter Olympics open in Turin; Twitter is founded and launched by Jack Dorsey; The Nintendo Wii is released; Montenegro votes to declare independence from Serbia; The 2006 ...

Division Two NAB AFL Under-16 Championships. Motlop was selected by Port Adelaide in the

2007 AFL Draft The 2007 Australian Football League draft consisted of four opportunities for player acquisitions during the 2007/08 Australian Football League off-season. These were trade week, the national draft, which was held on 24 November 2007, the pre-s ...

using their second pick, the 28th overall. Motlop debuted against

Melbourne Football Club The Melbourne Football Club, nicknamed the Demons, is a professional Australian rules football club that competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's elite competition. It is based in Melbourne, Victoria, and plays its home g ...

in round 21 of the

2008 AFL season The 2008 AFL season was the 112th season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989. The season featured sixt ...

, contributing six kicks and eight handballs to his team's 78-point win. The following week Motlop kicked his first AFL goal and collected 16 disposals in a 76-point victory over

North Melbourne Football Club The North Melbourne Football Club, nicknamed the Kangaroos, is a professional Australian rules football club. The men's team competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), and the women's team in the AFL Women's (AFLW). The Kangaroos also ...

. He did not play another game in 2008, but returned in round 9 of the

2009 AFL season The 2009 AFL season was the 113th season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989. The season featured sixte ...

where he had a quiet game, registering four kicks and two handballs in a 55-point loss to the

Sydney Swans The Sydney Swans are a professional Australian rules football club based in Sydney, New South Wales. The men's team competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), and the women's team in the AFL Women's (AFLW). The Swans also field a rese ...

. Round 11 saw Motlop kick 1 goal and collect 12 kicks and three handballs in a 24-point win over the

Fremantle Dockers The Fremantle Football Club, nicknamed the Dockers, is a professional Australian rules football club competing in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's elite competition. The team was founded in 1994 to represent the port city of Fr ...

. In what turned out to be his final AFL match, Motlop did not score in his match against the

Western Bulldogs The Western Bulldogs are a professional Australian rules football team that competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's premier competition. Founded in 1877 as the Footscray Football Club, and based in West Footscray in the o ...

, but did get 16 disposals. While not playing in the AFL, Motlop played with West Adelaide Football Club in the

(SANFL). He was delisted by Port Adelaide at the end of the

2011 AFL season The 2011 AFL season was the 115th season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989. The season featured sev ...

and moved to WAFL club Swan Districts and the year after played for Peel Thunder to continue his career. After a 2 year stint in the WAFL, where Motlop played state representative football in 2013 against Victoria and registered 28 disposals, he went back to the SANFL where he continued his career at the North Adelaide Football Club and went on to play 79 league games including representing South Australia in 2015 registering 24 disposals. During Motlop’s time at NAFC, he came 4th in 2014 in the clubs best and fairest and went on to win the Club Champion in 2015. In 2018 Motlop signed with the Glenelg Football Club, where he has played until the end of the 2021 season.

Music career

During his last year of playing football in the SANFL, Motlop started developing his career as a musician, playing as a band with team-mate Rulla Kelly-Mansell. The duo, as MRLN x RKM, opened for

Midnight Oil Midnight Oil (known informally as "The Oils") are an Australian rock band composed of Peter Garrett (vocals, harmonica), Rob Hirst (drums), Jim Moginie (guitar, keyboard) and Martin Rotsey (guitar). The group was formed in Sydney in 1972 ...

and

Vika and Linda Vika and Linda, also known as Vika and Linda Bull, are an Australian vocal duo consisting of Vika Susan Bull (born 1966) and her younger sister, Linda Rose Bull . They came to prominence after singing backing vocals in Joe Camilleri's band The ...

at WOMADelaide in March 2021, along with other First Nations artists. Their performance was well-received and gained a glowing review in ''

Rolling Stone Australia ''Rolling Stone'' Australia is the Australian edition of the United States' ''Rolling Stone'' magazine devoted to music, politics, and popular culture, published monthly. The Australian version of ''Rolling Stone'' was initially published in 197 ...

''. They released their first single, "Black Swan" in June 2021. The duo also perform as Marlon x Rulla. Also known as MARLON, Motlop has also performed at the Bass In the Grass Festival and AFL Sir Doug Nicholls Round in front of over 30,000 fans. MARLON released three tracks in 2021, and featured

Urthboy Tim Levinson, better known by the stage name Urthboy, is an Australian hip hop MC and producer from New South Wales. He is widely known for his solo music under the moniker Urthboy, as a founding member of the hip-hop group The Herd, and for ...

's ''Jangle Bells'', with their collaboration track "Balmy Christmas Eve" releasing on 15 December 2021.

Singles

Bush food

Motlop is also involved with his cousin

's native foods business, Something Wild, located in the

Barossa Valley The Barossa Valley (Barossa German: ''Barossa Tal'') is a valley in South Australia located northeast of Adelaide city centre. The valley is formed by the North Para River. It is notable as a major wine-producing region and tourist destina ...

References

External links