Originating from a small village on the outskirts of Scunthorpe, Sophie Walker has made a name for herself in the big city with freelance positions at some of the UK’s biggest names alongside being an associate editor for Line of Best Fit, and a music publicist at Brace Yourself PR.
Sophie Walker (she/her) is a 22-year-old freelance journalist and music publicist thriving in London. With interviews with some of today’s biggest names under her belt, including Paramore, John Legend and black midi, it’s clear the young journalist has put in the time and dedication to the craft. Walker found her calling through a love of writing paired with a want to be a part of something bigger than the rural northern village she grew up in.
“I always knew that I enjoyed writing but it was unclear to me how you could write and make money out of it and have a living and a career. I always had in my mind that you had to have lived a life to be a novelist and being a teenager, I hadn’t lived any really. I had no musical gift but I was very interested in musicians as people. If I couldn’t be in a band then I thought I’d at least write about them and be part of it in that way”
Walker started out writing at 16 while in year 11. After making a Twitter account and connecting with others interested in music journalism, she started writing for small music blogs. “It was a way to write all the time and also a way to make friends that growing up in the middle of nowhere would never have let me”
It wasn’t long before someone picked up on Walker’s talent and passion for writing. After LIFE performed at the local music venue in Scunthorpe, Cafe Indie, she wrote a review for one of the blogs called Sound Check. It was picked up on by the band's drummer, Stewart Baker, who introduced her to other artists at Warren Records asking her to write about their young musicians. This kicked off her break out into the Hull music scene, where she was a part of something for the first time.
“It was 2017 and [Hull] was the City of Culture. It was the first time I’d been in a city and gone out! From there I was introduced to the first people who ever paid me to write. And from then on, LIFE had connections to places like DIY magazine and they introduced me to Lisa Write, who’s the online editor”
Moving to London at 18, Walker attended Goldsmiths University to study Journalism. She worked around the clock working for DIY, later moving on to write as a music journalist for The Guardian, The Evening Standard, Clash, Notion and DJ Mag.
“I think the best piece I ever did was on this artist called Wu Lu. The reason why he’s so great, he’s signed to Warped Records and he makes really great post-rock. He’s not typically my thing but there was a lot of buzz around his name and I was asked by Line of Best Fit to interview him.
The reason why this piece turned out so good was because we just hung out for the whole day together in Brixton. He picked me up, really hungover. I remember mentioning to him that I’d read in another piece that he was going to get a tattoo of Goku from Dragon Ball Z. I asked, ‘Did you manage to get it?’. [He replied] ‘Ah shit, no I haven’t yet. Should I get it today?’. And I was like ‘Yeah you totally should get it today’. He actually did go get the tattoo [and] I was interviewing him while he was getting the tattoo done. That to date is one of my favourite pieces I’ve ever done. The level of access, we spent the whole day together and it was really fun. It’s really rare that you get to do stuff like that”
Walker’s day job is as a music publicist at Brace Yourself PR in London. She feels that that is a certain connection between the roles of a music journalist and a music publicist. “At first I was a bit like, ‘I wish I was doing a full-time job where I was writing’, but I actually am. It just came about in an unexpected way. I have my artists that I choose to do their press and their publicity. Now it’s weird because I’m the one pitching to the journalist when before I was the journalist being pitched to.
I feel like I’m writing so much all the time because there’s not a huge difference to me between music journalism and copywriting. They’re both going to have the same end, you’re just trying to sell an artist whether you’re a journalist trying to appeal to a reader or a publicist trying to appeal to a journalist. It actually pays off to be creative and imaginative as a publicist through writing pitches, trying to be persuasive, trying to be a professional cheerleader. I feel like that’s what I was doing as a music journalist anyway and that’s what had appealed to me all the way back when I was doing blogs.”