News from the Music Industry

It has to be said that some readers still express surprise, even consternation, that The Spectator has such a thing as a rock critic. I then point out that these days we actually have two. One man I met at a wedding turned so purple I began to fear for his health. But the magazine has always been more adventurous than some people would prefer, and the devil’s music had already been much written about before I turned up on the doorstep. In 1986, reading the magazine every week, I had spotted three such articles in the arts section. They were spread out across the year, each was by a different writer, and none of them was particularly good. Influenced at the time by Yosser Hughes, I thought: I can do that.

So I did the naivest thing any aspirant journalist can ever do. I wrote three sample columns and a covering letter asking for a job, and sent them all to the editor, Charles Moore.