My Next Read: “Hey Hi Hello: Five Decades of Pop Culture from Britain’s First Female DJ” by Annie Nightingale

As a DJ and broadcaster on radio, tv and the live music scene, Annie Nightingale has been an invigorating and necessarily disruptive force. She walked in the door at Radio One in 1970 as its first female broadcaster. Fifty years later she continues to be a DJ and tastemaker who commands the respect of artists, listeners and peers across the world.

Hey Hi Hello tells the story of those early days at Radio One, the Ground Zero moment of punk and the arrival of acid house and the Second Summer of Love in the late 80s. Funny, warm and candid to a fault, including encounters with Bob Marley, Marc Bolan, The Beatles and interviews with Little Simz and Billie Eilish, this is a portrait of an artist without whom the past fifty years of British culture would have looked very different indeed.

Annie Nightingale CBE is Britain’s first female DJ, and longest serving broadcaster on BBC Radio 1. She celebrated her 50th anniversary in 2020. Her radio shows are listed among 50 cultural highlights by the Observer critics’ panel, March 2020. A presenter, documentarian and journalist, she was the sole anchor of BBC’s music TV show The Old Grey Whistle Test and associated TV programmes for 11 years during 1970s and 80s. Her previous published memoirs are Chase The Fade (1982) and Wicked Speed (2000).As well as touring the world as a live DJ, she has also released music compilation collections, including Annie On One (Heavenly) and Masterpiece (Ministry Of Sound).Annie was born in South West London and lives in West London.