Zinya Salfiti
Zinya Salfiti is a research associate and contributing writer at GQ whose music and culture coverage follows how songs, videos and screen moments turn into viral phenomena and second lives across platforms. Her pieces track the afterlife of familiar tracks and formats, paying close attention to the mechanics of revival, reappraisal and fandom in the streaming era. Within the magazine she bridges in-depth reporting and sharp, accessible criticism, moving between music, film, sport, digital culture and consumer life while keeping the focus on how people actually experience these worlds.
Music videos, pop revival and the second life of songs
On the music beat, Salfiti’s through-line is the way visual storytelling and cross-media moments reshape how tracks are heard and shared. In her feature on how music videos got good again, she treats the format as more than promotion, looking at craft, narrative and the renewed appetite for ambitious visuals in an algorithm-driven landscape.
Her profile of “Unwritten” for GQ’s On Repeat series examines how Natasha Bedingfield’s 2004 single found a second life through a key montage in the romantic comedy Anyone But You, unpacking the film placement, social media sharing and meme culture that pushed the track back onto streaming charts.
Across these pieces, she is less interested in isolated releases than in the feedback loop between artists, platforms and audiences, showing how a song’s meaning shifts when it is attached to a scene, trend or communal joke. The emphasis is on reporting and close reading rather than fan commentary, with interviews and scene-setting used to connect the artist’s intent to what listeners are now doing with the work.
Screen culture, cameos and internet-native stories
Beyond music, Salfiti writes regularly on film and online media, with a particular interest in small moments that take on outsized cultural weight.
Her ranking of the six best movie cameos of the year isolates brief appearances that sparked discussion, treating them as a lens on how audiences consume cinematic universes and surprise casting in the social media age. Her Belmont Cameli feature on why the series Off Campus got so huge uses an interview format to explore how a youth-oriented show connects with viewers, covering performance, narrative hooks and the surrounding fan culture. Profiles such as The Sweet Life of Kareem Rahma and her piece on chef Sami Tamimi cooking his own story after working with Ottolenghi follow creative figures whose work circulates heavily online, but the focus stays on process, identity and the stories they are trying to tell.
In her report on an artist spending six weeks undercover as a male OnlyFans chatter, she turns to the infrastructure of digital sex work and performance, tracing how platforms, moderation and audience expectations shape intimacy and labour. Taken together, this strand of her work shows a reporter attentive to how media forms - sitcoms, cameos, streaming shows, subscription platforms - create new kinds of visibility and vulnerability for the people inside them.
Sport, style and the business around culture
Salfiti also covers the intersection of elite sport, fashion and consumer culture, often focusing on the material objects that carry meaning for fans.
Her piece on why you cannot buy Jannik Sinner’s Wimbledon-winning Nikes looks at scarcity and brand strategy through one pair of shoes, situating the story within the wider business of performance gear and sponsorship. Additional coverage around Wimbledon, including a profile of Sinner ahead of the tournament and a feature on Hugo Ekitike channelling his inner Becks, frames athletes as style figures as much as competitors, with attention to menswear, colour choices and the visual language of modern sport.
In consumer-facing work such as The best mattress of 2026, tested by experts over six years, and GQ’s guides to mattresses, she brings that same detail-oriented approach to long-term testing, comfort, and value, grounding advice in extensive research rather than quick reviews. Her contribution to The GQ Guide to Money, co-written with other staff, extends this service journalism to personal finance, merging practical guidance with the magazine’s tone. Even in lighter pieces such as what GQ staffers actually bought in a given month, where she appears as a research associate recommending staple workwear, the emphasis remains on how real people navigate choice amid marketing and hype.
Interviews and reporting across international editions
Within GQ, Salfiti works as a research associate, fact-checking high-reach, high-visibility stories across the magazine’s international markets while contributing features to British GQ, the US edition and GQ Middle East.
Her author page highlights interviews with figures including Ramy Youssef, Khalid Abdalla, Bassem Youssef and Christopher Briney, reflecting a comfort with both established and emerging names across television, film and comedy. Event coverage such as Everything that went down at GQ Heroes 2026 shows her working inside multi-writer packages, distilling panels, performances and conversations into clear, concise summaries that foreground what was said on stage rather than behind-the-scenes colour.
Outside the magazine, her work has appeared in outlets such as the Washington Post, Business Insider, Foreign Policy, MarketWatch, Chicago Magazine and other publications, indicating a portfolio that straddles domestic and international affairs as well as culture. Across these assignments she maintains a consistent reporting style: interviews anchored in specific projects or moments, an emphasis on how cultural products circulate, and careful attention to factual detail drawn from her research role.
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.