Roisin O'Connor
Roisin O’Connor leads music coverage at The Independent with a blend of desk-level oversight, criticism and artist-focused storytelling that moves between global pop moments and close-up work with emerging talent. She is The Independent’s music editor, writing and commissioning features, reviews, comment and live music coverage after more than a decade at the masthead.
Features, reviews, comment and live music
As music editor, O’Connor’s core remit is to set the agenda for the title’s music desk while continuing to file her own pieces across formats. Her author bio notes that she “writes and commissions features, reviews, comment, [and] live music,” which places her at the intersection of news reporting, opinion and criticism rather than in a single niche. Reviews credited to her on specialist sites underline her work as a critic, assessing new releases across genres and contributing to consensus around notable albums. Before stepping into the music editor role she worked across various desks and served as a culture news and music editor at the same masthead, grounding her music coverage in broader news and entertainment context.
That mix comes through in her reporting on live events, such as her coverage of a Harry Styles show at Wembley Stadium that focused on how the venue adapted to an extreme heatwave, blending gig reporting with practical detail about fan safety and logistics. She treats major concerts as both cultural flashpoints and news events, looking at how promoters and venues respond to real-world conditions around the show. Taken together, her work positions her as an editor-writer who can move from assigning coverage to producing it, with a focus on stories that sit where music, news and audience experience overlap.
Taylor Swift, Harry Styles and pop’s defining moments
O’Connor devotes significant attention to the biggest names in contemporary pop, often using them as a lens on fandom and celebrity culture rather than only on music output. Recent pieces highlighted in external monitoring tools include “Inside Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s wedding of the decade” and “As Taylor Swift married Travis Kelce, Blake Lively was nowhere to be seen,” framing a high-profile celebrity relationship as a cultural event and examining the cast of characters around it. Alongside these Swift and Kelce stories, her Wembley reporting on Harry Styles situates stadium shows within wider concerns such as extreme weather, fan welfare and event operations, rather than treating them solely as setlist write-ups.
This combination of artist-centric features and event-focused news gives her pop coverage a distinctive shape. She tracks the narratives that surround superstars—relationships, friendships, guest lists and public appearances—while keeping an eye on how those narratives intersect with live performance and fan experience. The result is coverage that speaks simultaneously to dedicated fans following every development and to general readers interested in why a particular artist or event has become inescapable.
Good Vibrations podcast and emerging talent
Beyond the written music desk, O’Connor hosts the podcast “Roisin O’Connor’s Good Vibrations” for The Independent, where she brings musicians, producers and songwriters from “all genres and walks of life” into the studio for in-depth conversations. The show extends her editorial focus into audio, allowing her to foreground creative process, career journeys and behind-the-scenes perspectives that do not always fit into standard news pieces. Episodes promoted by artists themselves emphasise her role in facilitating open, conversational interviews that give guests room to define their own stories.
Her championing of emerging and independent artists runs alongside her coverage of global stars. A pianist has publicly thanked her for selecting him as her “Spotlight” artist and for a “kind and lovely write up,” indicating a recurring slot where she singles out individual musicians for focused attention. In addition to her editorial work, she co-manages artists through the management outfit Incoming Artists, and describes herself professionally as a music editor, writer and band manager, which brings direct industry experience into her journalism. She also serves as a judge for Youth Music’s awards, reinforcing a sustained interest in supporting the next generation of artists and industry figures.
Across these strands—desk leadership, criticism, pop-event coverage, podcast interviews and artist management—O’Connor’s work is distinguished by its continuous movement between the centre of mainstream pop and the grassroots of emerging talent. She treats music as both culture and industry, using a mix of formats to connect what happens on the biggest stages with the people creating, producing and sustaining the scene behind 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.
Alison Brinkworth
Alison Brinkworth is a freelance journalist who treats music as a gateway into place, history and everyday life, often through exhibitions, performances and city-centre events. She covers music within the wider cultural and lifestyle scene, leaning toward accessible, on-the-ground stories framed by familiar artists, venues and local attractions. Her work often focuses on music exhibitions and attractions built around well-known performers, alongside theatre reviews, live events and city attractions. She brings a lifestyle, travel and human-interest sensibility, using interviews and personal stories to show how people spend their time. With over 25 years of experience across print, digital, social media and internal communications, she writes clear, factual, audience-facing articles with dates, locations and organisers, suited to listings, guides and practical recommendations.