Penny Valentine

Pop-music journalist with glamour in Swinging London

Penelope Ann Valentine, journalist: born London 13 February 1943; married Adrian Monteith (marriage dissolved), (one son with Mike Flood Page); died London 9 January 2003.

Penny Valentine was one of the first women journalists to write about pop music seriously during the Sixties. She was also brought much-needed glamour to a male-dominated business and became an early media celebrity, frequently appearing on BBC TV's Juke Box Jury. Her bubbling personality and charm appealed as much to the stars she wrote about as it did her loyal readers and colleagues.

Valentine was part of a social whirl of receptions, parties and night-clubbing that made Swinging London such fun. With her blonde hair, miniskirts and striking good looks, she created an impression the moment she entered a star-packed room. The Beatles and Rolling Stones certainly preferred to be interviewed by the vivacious young lady from Disc magazine than by some spotty chap in a raincoat.

She was born in 1943 of Italian-Jewish ancestry in central London. Her father was a Covent Garden market trader and her mother worked as a hairdresser. At the age of 16 she became a junior reporter on the Uxbridge Post and later worked for Boyfriend, the weekly magazine for teenage girls. One of her contemporaries, the rock journalist and publicist Keith Altham, remembers her days on the magazine:

She was had a childlike vulnerability that always reminded me of Dusty Springfield. But she looked great and dressed well and was always cheerful and happy. That's why people liked her so much.

I first knew her when I was on Fabulous magazine. We both had agony columns. She was Boyfriend's "Penny" and I was Fab's "Keith". We'd give advice to the lovelorn. It was hideously

embarrassing. We used to meet up and be hideously embarrassed together. So what's your fan mail like this week, Penny? "Oh God darling, horrendous!"

Valentine joined Disc & Music Echo in 1964, where she became an influential record reviewer. In her columns she regularly campaigned for greater recognition of those hot new American soul artists whose work was beginning to have an impact on the charts. She wrote about and interviewed such visiting stars as Stevie Wonder and in particular the Four Tops, whose dynamic hit "Reach Out I'll Be There" was a great favourite. She also promoted the talents of Aretha Franklin and Marvin Gaye and adored Scott Walker of Walker Brothers fame. She was pals with many of the celebrities whose lives revolved around the ITV show Ready, Steady Go!

She left Disc in 1970 and her journalism began to take a more serious direction. First she joined Sounds, a new weekly intended to rival Melody Maker. Then in 1973 she was employed by Elton John as press officer for his newly launched Rocket Records label. This was followed by a period as PR at Anchor Records before she returned to journalism on Street Life, a short-lived British version of Rolling Stone. After the magazine's abrupt closure in 1975 she joined Time Out, where she worked on the TV news section. She later took part in a mass walk-out of staff, after a bitter wage battle, and helped found the listings magazine City Limits, where she became assistant editor.

A staunch socialist, she became involved with Women in Media, Music for Socialism and the National Union of Journalists. She also took part in a Rock Against Racism march against the National Front in Lewisham during the Seventies. Caught up in a riot when police charged the demonstrators, she fled to escape the violence and found herself sharing a shop doorway with a fellow marcher, Tom McGuinness of the group Manfred Mann.

She later took up freelance work, teaching journalism and working shifts at The Guardian. In 2000, she published a critically acclaimed biography of Dusty Springfield, Dancing with Demons, written with Vicki Wickham, an old friend from Ready, Steady Go! days.

Chris Welch