[4][5] A year after Mark died in 1969, Murphy, at the age of 16, joined his mother in running the agency but shifted its focus to rock music acts.
[5] Initially called Solo Management Agency,[5] it became part of Murphy Media Academy (MMA) which eventually had offices in Australia and internationally.
[6][7] Murphy continued as a booking agent until late in 1979 when he met with Gary Morris, then-manager of Australian rock groups Midnight Oil and INXS.
[11] In July that year Murphy had brokered a deal with Atco Records for INXS after "[he] had made numerous overseas trips setting up contacts".
[14] INXS encouraged Murphy to sign the group to MMA: under his influence Models pursued a more commercial sound to a radio-friendly format.
[14] Models relocated to Sydney and long-term member, Andrew Duffield, was forced out of the group by Murphy under "controversial circumstances".
[16][17] Under the management of Murphy and Grant, INXS went from a Sydney pub band to playing international venues including headlining a show at Wembley Stadium in July 1991 with 74,000 in attendance.
Murphy also assisted in the commercial success of Models, which achieved two hits on the Kent Music Report Singles Chart in 1985, "Barbados" (March, No.
[18] During October 1986 Murphy and Grant teamed with fellow managers Jeremy Fabinyi (Mental as Anything), Mark Pope (Jimmy Barnes, Divinyls), and Ken West (I'm Talking) to stage the Australian Made series of concerts.
[9] Although the tour had been announced with claims of Australian mateship and cooperation, arguments ensued between various band managers over the proposed concert series film.
He created a large-scale free range/organic chicken operation and ran a business for daily delivery of organic lamb to restaurants around the world.
[26] Later rooArt acts included Wendy Matthews (ex-Models) and The Screaming Jets which also helped the label become more commercially popular in Australia.
[citation needed] In 2008 Murphy rejoined forces with INXS signing them to Petrol Electric and after two years they issued an album, Original Sin (November 2010).