The second life of DJ Fat Tony: King of the 90s party set tells how he overcame a drug addiction to become the A-list’s go-to song-spinner in memoir packed with juicy tidbits about his pals Kate Moss and Tracey Emin
- Born Tony Marnoch in Battersea, the 56-year-old DJ has seen his career soar in recent decades, with a host of A-listers including the Beckhams, Kate Moss and Elton John endorsing his memoir ‘I Don’t Take Requests’
- Book documents HIV diagnosis that left him in a coma, and a drug addiction that almost killed the DJ, leaving him ‘planning my funeral every day’ before he turned his life around at 40
- In April, he played three sets at Brooklyn Beckham’s lavish Miami wedding to Nicola Peltz and this month will play for Donatella Versace, with a gig alongside Dame Joan Collins sandwiched inbetween
- Describing his affection for the Beckhams, Tony told FEMAIL: ‘David and Victoria were incredible – they always are, they’re real people and a real family. It’s not a the showbiz family that people think it is.’
DJ Fat Tony might well boast the most impressive set of celebrity endorsements any author has even seen.
His rip-roaring new memoir, which details a wild life as a jet-setting song spinner alongside a drug addiction that very nearly killed him, comes with glowing reviews of his DJ skills from a slew of A-listers.
The Beckhams call him their ‘first port of call’ for a party while Kelly Osbourne gushes he’s ‘one of the most beautiful examples of humanity I have ever witnessed’. Kate Moss was the first person to get a copy of his book.
The opening chapter of I Don’t Take Requests is a far cry from the celebrity carousel he now regularly rides though.
It makes for stark reading, telling how, at the age of 39, Tony – real name Tony Marnoch – embarked upon a five-day bender that put ‘eight-balls of coke’ and a cocktail of prescription drugs on the menu – leaving the star barely in control of his bodily functions and with just one tooth left in a jaw crumbled by the effects of addiction.
He writes: ‘I was so emaciated that you could close your hands around my entire waist.’
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Now 56, DJ Fat Tony – who was born Tony Marnoch in South London, has the career of his dreams, jet-setting around the globe to play sets for the likes of Donatella Versace, Elton John and the Beckhams…but his shocking new memoir, I Don’t Take Requests, lifts the lid on a drug addiction that nearly killed him, and tells how he was left in a coma for four months after his HIV went undiagnosed for 15 years
The DJ says at the height of his drug addiction he would think about dying daily and it took almost a year of ‘rock bottom’ moments before a five-day bender finally sparked a journey to sobriety. Right: The DJ told FEMAIL his teenage self wouldn’t be able to ‘fathom’ the life he’s had…and that he still has ‘pinch me’ moments when he’s performing at parties for the stars
The flamboyant DJ, who grew up on an estate in Battersea – and was given his first line of coke by Freddie Mercury at the age of 15 – first found fame as a drag artist in the 80s before turning to the decks in the 90s (Pictured left with socialite Philip Sallon in the 80s)
His DJ-ing career took off and Tony counts star including Kate Moss as his closest friends – the supermodel was the first person to get a copy of his new memoir, he says
When the DJ’s former partner found him in the back room of a London club that night, he was, he says, ‘a zombie, the lights were out and I was rocking back and forth, wringing my hands and chewing my gums.’
It was a rock bottom moment that would eventually put him on the path to recovery, and start 15 years of sobriety that have seen his career soar since – and his celebrity friendship circle blossom.
The flamboyant DJ, who grew up on an estate in Battersea – and was given his first line of coke by Freddie Mercury at the age of 15 – first found fame as a drag artist in the 80s before turning to the decks in the 90s, and becoming part of a party set that included Tracey Emin, Kate Moss and Madonna.
Predictably, there are juicy tidbits galore in the book. Moss would get so sloshed on cocktails in the 90s, he reveals, that he’d have to wake her up while the party was raging.
‘I used to make her Long Island iced teas and she’d get so p***ed I’d tuck her under the desk downstairs (in the club) to have a sleep and go down every now and again to give her a little kick to check she was all right,’ he writes.
In April, Tony, who’s in a long-term relationship with boyfriend Stavros Agapiou, played three sets at Brooklyn Beckham’s lavish Miami wedding to Nicola Peltz and this month will play for Donatella Versace, with a gig alongside Dame Joan Collins sandwiched in between.
He tells FEMAIL: ‘Brooklyn’s wedding was amazing. We all flew to Palm Beach and I DJ’d for three days, I did the welcoming party, the actual wedding reception and the brunch on Sunday.’
‘David and Victoria were incredible – they always are, they’re real people and a real family. It’s not the showbiz family that people think it is. They’re a real family unit. Their kids are impeccable, their manners…they’re not brats. Cruz and Romeo are probably the two most loveliest people you’ll ever meet in your life – they’re funny, engaging and intelligent.’
And the floor filler of choice for the Palm Beach nuptials? ‘Luther Vandross’ Never Too Much is always the song for them.’
Celebrity life…but Tony says his career derailed just after his 39th birthday, when he a five-day bender left him on the edge of death. Sobriety has brought him success that continues to see him DJ at the world’s glitziest parties (Pictured with Vogue editor Edward Enninful in 2018)
Describing his affection for the Beckhams, Tony said of his recent gig DJ-ing at Brooklyn’s wedding: ‘David and Victoria were incredible – they always are, they’re real people and a real family. It’s not a the showbiz family that people think it is.’
Tony played three sets at the Beckham-Peltz wedding – with ‘Luther Vandross’ Never Too Much ‘always the song’ for the Beckham clan
Pinch yourself moments such as Brooklyn’s Miami nuptials still come thick and fast, he says, particularly for a man whose life was so de-railed by his addiction that he ended up homeless, and with a HIV diagnosis that he lived with unknowingly for up to 15 years because ‘addiction ruled everything’. He was left in a coma for four months because his HIV went untreated for so long.
He’s still surprised that he managed to turn his life around and credits his ex-partner Johnny for helping him to get sober.
‘My addiction was far greater than I was at that point in time. I got to the very last moments before death, all I thought about on a daily basis was dying. I had planned the music at my funeral.
‘I just couldn’t go on like that. The pilot came back came back on. The love of one person changed that.’
Deconstructing a life ‘built around destruction’ wasn’t easy, he says because many of the friends in his life at that time facilitated his addiction continuing. He left London for six months. ‘I had to be taken out of the equation’, he says.
Love: The star, who was diagnosed with HIV in 2001, is currently in a long-term relationship with Stavros Agapiou
Pals: His new book comes with endorsements from Kate Moss (left) and Tracey Emin, (right), who said of his new memoir: ‘If you want to change your life but can’t… I strongly advise you to read this book’
He now compartmentalises his career into ‘before’ and ‘after’ his recovery, saying he was only getting bookings at the height of his addiction ‘out of loyalty’.
It’s a dramatically different story in 2022, he’s regularly flown across the globe by some of the world’s biggest names to play his upbeat sets.
‘I was DJ-ing with Joan Collins last night for a tea party. You have have these moments where, you’ll be in Donnatella Versace’s living room… I going to do Donnatella’s party in Lake Como in a couple of weeks and I have to pinch myself that it’s real. 15 years ago, I was homeless on the streets. It’s kind of mad.
‘I stopped drinking, I stopped taking drugs and I became real, I became myself – I’m doing now what I should have done many years ago. I had a life pre drugs and a life post drugs. I love what I do and I think it shines through.
‘My life is incredible today, I have freedom and self-respect…I love myself for the majority of the day – I still have self-loathing moments because that’s the way I’m wired. You have to put one small foot in front of the other.’
Nowadays the turntables are enough of a thrill to keep his sobriety on track when he’s DJ-ing. He explains: ‘The music makes me high, some of the tracks I play are just so uplifting. I’m on that ride with the dancefloor. Enough is never enough for me and when it comes to music it’s the same thing.’
The DJ pictured in drag during the 80s; he says his mum loved her son’s sexuality, saying: ‘She was big into fashion and studied fine art, so having a gay son was a bonus for her.’
He continues to campaign for better equality for the LGBTQ+ community, though he says his own experience of coming out was a positive one.
‘I was very blessed. My mum and dad grew up in the 60s and they were surrounded by lesbian and gay people all their lives. For my mum to have a gay son was a dream, I would say. She was big into fashion and studied fine art, so having a gay son was a bonus for her.
‘My dad was a 6ft 3 plumber. He never once shunned me for my sexuality but he did shun me for my behaviour. He knew that if I was running around the estate dressed in drag I was going to have a lot of problems and he would stop me doing it; he knew society wasn’t ready for it’.
Growing up queer in 2022 is still difficult, he says. ‘There’s still so much work to do. There’s so much heartache and so many terrible things going on around the world in our community.
‘It’s still illegal in a lot of countries to be who you are, and then we’ve got people in our own community shunning the trans community. It’s a sorry state of affairs – we have to learn from these mistakes and move on. It’s about unity, not segregation.’
Party girl: In the book, he reveals how his friend Kate Moss would get so sloshed at parties he’d have to ‘give her a kick’ to keep her awake
Grief: Tony’s dog Taylor became a guiding light in his recovery he says, and he still says good morning and good evening to the late pet
He watched his community die around him in the 1980s, he says, and doesn’t shy away from the realities of the AIDS crisis, dedicating a chapter of the book to it.
‘There’s so many kids today who don’t know what we went through in the 80s. They’re not educated on it, it was a hidden pandemic.
Just don’t ask him to put a record on: Tony’s memoir pays homage to his hatred of requests at the DJ booth
‘The reality isn’t always engaging, when I wrote the chapter of the book on HIV, I didn’t want to lighten it, it is what it is. How do you make light of losing your entire peer group, how do you make light of losing your boyfriend?’
He was eventually diagnosed himself in 2001, after testing negative in the 80s.
‘I probably had it for about ten to 15 years, I was so lost in my own world of addiction, the last thing I was going to do was go and get tested.’
Getting him through his darkest times was Taylor, his late pet, who he still says good morning to and good night to.
‘That little dog, I had her a year before I got sober, I bought her out of guilt for my ex partner. She had been with me through my entire journey of getting sober.’
He reveals that Tracey Emin had predicted that Taylor might pass while Tony was away on holiday, telling him ‘they don’t want us to see them go’.
Tony explains: ‘I was in Miami and she passed away on the flight back. I truly believe she waited until I was on that plane. I was having the time of my life with my new boyfriend. I was devastated and still am. I still say goodnight to her and I still say good morning to her. I’m grieving.’
Does he ever take requests? ‘I don’t! I’m learning to. I’m doing a job. If you’re a fashion designer and I come into your shop and say: “I really like that outfit but it’d look better in green”, you’d say: “Get out of my shop”.
‘When I’m playing music, I’m reading the energy of the crowd, I’m not playing for one person, I’m playing for everyone’.
I Don’t Take Requests is out now, priced £20
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