On Saturday 3rd November 2018, the Ossia crew returned to the Wire basement to let loose one of Amsterdam’s finest selectors, Marco Sterk AKA Young Marco.

Following his stellar performance at Hifi earlier this year, the Dekmantel superstar’s return was hotly anticipated, and Wire was fittingly chosen to host the Leeds leg of his Forever Young UK tour. A venue often described as a time vacuum, in which ‘forever’ feels like minutes, it was the perfect space to showcase Marco’s retro-futuristic song selection.

Marco has risen to fame over the past few years thanks to sets that mirror his unique production and it was clear within the first hour that this was to be another blend of his universal style. As the club began to fill up, Marco spun tracks rooted in the Dutch electronic scene, laying the sonic foundations for snippets of his acclaimed 2012 Biology album. It was these wholly instrumental pieces, which transcend genre, era and place, that allowed the set to descend seamlessly into minimal techno shortly after midnight, or tribal house tracks in the early hours of the morning.

Whilst the club only reached half-capacity, energy remained at a maximum. Reminiscent of his Dekmantel Selector’s mix, Marco wasn’t afraid to remind people that inspiration could be found in the most bait of sources. Anthemic vocal lines from Derrick May’s ‘Simply Just a Ventage’, a controversially released rework of John Rocca’s ‘I Want it to be Real’, revived a dwindling crowd and Marco brought the set to a climatic close with the final, epic three minutes of Andronicus’ house classic, ‘Make you Whole’. But the tunes that left a lasting impression were Marco’s own reworks. In combination with the Biology album, tracks from the Dutch Connoisseur’s 2018 Dance Forever album knitted together a diverse bag of influences, to create a set which throughout retained an unapologetically ‘Young’ stamp.

Natalie Layng

(Main image: Ossia)