Jake Viswanath
Jake Viswanath is a staff writer at Bustle who covers music, film, TV, and celebrity culture, with a focus on pop stars and their fandoms. He joined Bustle in March 2019 and works across the entertainment team on news stories, long-form features, and reaction pieces. His coverage stands out for treating chart-topping artists, especially Taylor Swift and Britney Spears, as long-running narratives shaped by fans, activism, and online culture.
Pop Stars, Fandom, And Taylor Swift
Viswanath owns many of Bustle’s pop culture beats, including dedicated coverage of Taylor Swift, the #FreeBritney movement, the Kardashians, Vanderpump Rules, and the wider Bravo ecosystem. His Taylor Swift pieces track each new release and announcement, from analyzing bonus tracks on The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore to breaking down the story in the Patient Zero music video and single. Headlines such as Taylor Swift's Patient Zero Music Video Has A Devastating Twist and Taylor Swift's Babylon Might Be A Sequel To An Evermore Classic show him connecting plotlines across albums and eras in straightforward, fan-aware language.
He also writes reaction essays like Y’all Are Doing Way Too Much With Taylor Swift's The Encore, pushing back on fan overreactions while still writing from within the fandom. His social profiles emphasize his identity as a committed Britney Spears and Taylor Swift fan, which informs the tone and detail of his reporting without overshadowing the artists themselves.
In an exclusive interview with musician Rose Gray about the Harris Dickinson–inspired song, he uses the relationship behind the track to frame how personal stories shape pop releases.
Bustle Mixtape And Artist Features
A major part of Viswanath’s music work runs through Bustle Mixtape, where he conducts interviews with pop and R&B artists, songwriters, and composers around new projects and eras.
Recent Mixtape pieces include conversations with Kenia Os about her new music era and karma, Heidi Montag about her Taylor Swift–inspired single and pop star ambitions, and the duo Barlow & Bear about learning to trust their creative process from Bridgerton to Moana 2. He profiles Carly Rae Jepsen returning with a new “Side B” album, Icona Pop reflecting on a decade since I Love It while releasing a new dance-pop record, and composer Kris Bowers explaining how he crafted a more intimate sound for Queen Charlotte.
Further features with Jessie Ware, JoJo, and others focus on how established performers reframe their careers, fan relationships, and stage personas as they move into new albums or roles. Across these interviews, Viswanath keeps questions close to craft, influence, and emotional stakes rather than gossip, letting artists narrate their own arcs while he supplies concise context.
Pop Culture News And Celebrity Events
Beyond artist interviews, Viswanath files regular entertainment news and explainer pieces on music releases, film and TV projects, and celebrity moments. His Bustle author page describes him helping develop and execute live coverage for major music releases, TV events, and award shows, underscoring his role in real-time pop culture reporting. Recent work includes coverage of Hilary Duff’s original song “CATastrophe” for a new animated Cat in the Hat movie, framing the track as both chaotic earworm and genuine children’s bop.
He writes news around tentpole events like the MTV Video Music Awards, including pieces on how Taylor Swift’s Patient Zero video will premiere during the show and what that means for the rollout of The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore.
Taken together, these stories show him moving quickly between breaking news, service pieces that answer fan questions, and reaction articles that capture how online audiences respond. Outside Bustle, his entertainment and culture writing has appeared in outlets such as V Magazine, Paper, Nylon, and Milk, where he has contributed music, fashion, politics, and culture coverage.
Pride Coverage And Diva Narratives
Viswanath also contributes to Bustle’s Pride Yearbook projects, which spotlight queer icons and the pop divas who shape LGBTQ+ culture. He is credited as a contributing writer on Bustle’s 2023 Pride Yearbook and on the 2025 Pride Yearbook: The Divas Who Shaped Us package. These projects align with his broader interest in diva narratives, from Britney Spears and other #FreeBritney figures to the campy, larger-than-life artists who define queer pop fandom.
His work in these packages tends to situate individual performers within a longer lineage of influence, treating them as reference points for how fans see themselves and their communities.
Across beats, Viswanath writes in clear, fan-literate prose, balancing enthusiasm with straightforward reporting on releases, videos, and live events. His portfolio offers a consistent lens on how pop music, celebrity, and fandom reinforce one another, making his work particularly suited to stories that sit at the intersection of artists’ creative choices and the audiences who follow them.
4 more music journalists.
Abigail Kellett
Abigail Kellett is a news reporter at the Halifax Courier who stands out for visually led coverage that shows how culture, nightlife and local life play out on the ground. She documents gigs, festivals and major live shows at venues such as The Piece Hall through curated photo sets that capture atmosphere, crowd and setting as much as performers, and she uses extensive image galleries to tap reader nostalgia for nights out in Halifax town centre. Her beat spans arts, entertainment, going out, heritage, books and literary events, along with community life, people stories, local challenges, milestones, transport, regeneration, lifestyle and food. She reports through photographs, checklist-style features, reader-driven lists and roundups of most-read stories, turning announcements, programmes, author events, festivals, shop lists and everyday characters into stories about place, shared memory and how people spend their time.
Adam Lyon
Adam Lyon is a digital audience and content editor whose news beat sits at the intersection of Ayrshire’s cultural life, business environment and public affairs. He works for the Ayr Advertiser and as Digital Audience & Content Editor for Newsquest in the west of Scotland across multiple weekly titles. He covers Ayrshire news with a strong thread of music and local culture alongside business, courts and public affairs. He reports on music when it has a clear community or national hook, treating songs as news events rather than reviews. His business work explains how local firms and retail policy shape town centres. His court coverage uses round-ups of sheriff court cases to show patterns and outcomes. He also fronts video previews and is active in a football supporters trust community.
Adam Maidment
Adam Maidment is a senior What’s On and LGBTQ+ reporter whose work links big-name gigs, new venues and cultural flashpoints to everyday fan culture and inclusion. He covers music, nightlife and the wider cultural scene for the Manchester Evening News, focusing on how concerts, openings and immersive events land with real people and communities. His beat spans live music, arenas and stadiums, new restaurant and bar openings, food reviews, exhibitions, street art and nightlife infrastructure, with a particular focus on LGBTQ+ audiences and neighbourhoods. He reports on venue ambitions and problems, cultural institutions and equality issues, and franchise-led experiences, using straightforward, on-the-ground reporting and clear description. Drawing on a background in community reporting, he looks for underrepresented perspectives and uses social media, analytics and local sourcing to find stories where culture, identity and place meet.
Alex Rigotti
Alex Rigotti is a freelance music and culture editor and journalist who joins fast-turnaround music news with detailed reporting on artists, fandom and politics. They report breaking stories and live music updates for NME and Paste Magazine, covering pop, rock, club music, underground scenes and cultural debates around art and identity. Their live-music beat includes setlists, tours, festival appearances, cancellations, ticketing, venues and onstage collaborations. They previously served as a contributing editor for NME’s Radar section, supporting coverage of emerging artists and new scenes. Rigotti also writes features on rap lyrics and criminalisation, Eurovision and politics, queer feminist bodybuilding, astrotherapy and contemporary art. Their reporting is direct and specific, using clear quotes, concrete details and artists’ own words to explain what happened and how music fits into wider cultural and industry trends.