Mark Anthony Clair, known as Marc Mac, is a British DJ, broadcaster, producer, promoter and label owner in the UK dance music scene who was influential in shaping dance music of the 1990s. Mac has been instrumental in a number of genres including breakbeat hardcore, jungle, drum and bass, downtempo, broken beat and nu jazz. He is one half of the group 4hero, founded in partnership with collaborator Dego (Dennis McFarlane), and a co-founder of Reinforced Records. Mac's other solo projects include The Visioneers (jazz/hip-hop), Nu Era (techno), and Nature's Plan (Afro-Latin).

Marc Mac was born and raised in London and attended school in Harlesden. His family emigrated to England from Jamaica and are part of the Windrush generation Caribbean-British legacy. His parents were active in the community creating programming to support and advocate for local youth and their families. His family was instrumental in founding the Black Parents Movement and Black Cultural Archives in collaboration with other community members.

Among the works Mac and his siblings grew up listening to were those by Bob Marley, Johnny Clarke, Two Sevens Clash, Elvis Presley, Elton John, and the gospel records of Jim Reeves; while visiting family in the United States, he would listen to underground music from Detroit and Chicago, the early hip-hop of New York City and works by Big Daddy Kane, and works by Roxanne Shanté, Public Enemy, Zulu Nation, and the label Cold Chillin.

Because we're living in a country where – people don't like to say it – there is institutional racism. When we signed to a major label, when you're going global, it's going to be harder for us, with our faces on the cover of magazines. We always wanted to be faceless because we had that knowledge. All the early records on Reinforced were faceless; people didn't know we were Black until we turned up at the rave. We're driving through parts of England and people are maybe seeing Black people for the first time. We were always aware that showing our face might be problematic. That's how it was – it's not like we've gone past it, we're having similar problems but in a different way.

Mac's early works were "faceless" in an effort to circumvent institutional racism. Following in the foosteps of his family and Harlesden community context, Mac steeped his musical practice in anti-oppression practices advocating for equal rights and the protection and continuation of Black cultural legacies. His productions pay tribute to past musical greats, Black visionaries from the Civil Rights movement, Black Panthers, Afrofuturists, and the early days of hip-hop, electro, folk and jazz.

Mac started his career in music in sound system culture. Around 1985 or 1986 he and his friends created sound systems called Solar Zone and Midnight Lovers. His family's involvement in organising the local anti-oppression community afforded him the opportunity to practice and play in the professional context of a large concert hall in Alperton near Wembley. Solar Zone eventually gathered enough of a fan base to sell tickets and perform in blues clubs (then-illegal clubs, often found in suburban neighbourhoods). Like the Jamaican sound engineer/producer King Tubby, Mac experiments with aspects of DIY sound production. Experiments with building speakers led him to create fully fledged mobile sound system rigs for radio and carnivals.

In 1989, before 4hero and Reinforced Records had started, Mac and Dego founded a pirate radio station called Strong Island Radio, based in Dollis Hill where they attended college. Its name came from the station with the same name broadcast from Long Island, New York. Mac and Iain Bardouille also played on the Girls FM station in the midnight slot.

In 1989, Mac and Gus Lawrence founded Reinforced Records, which featured a diverse selection of sounds including breakbeat hardcore, jungle, drum & bass, and a roster including Goldie, Doc Scott, DJ Randall, Nookie, Tek9, Grooverider, Kemistry & Storm, Wings (aka Roni Size, Krust and Die), A Guy Called Gerald, Peshay, J Majik, Photek, 4hero, Manix and Tom & Jerry. Reinforced Records has supported new musical genres and emerging artists, pioneering the sounds of 1990s British dance music scene through mentorship, networking opportunities, collaboration and music production. The Dollis Hill studio that Mac and his Reinforced Records collaborators established had an atmosphere and function similar in spirit to the community centres that they frequented as youth.