Justin Lewis grew up in South Wales and, after a spell in London, is back there now. He is an author, editor and artist. He specialises in material about music, broadcasting, comedy, popular culture and social history. He is fascinated by the past, but wouldn’t want to live there for too long, so he’s not a nostalgist who thinks it was all better back then. He sometimes writes in the third person.
None of what follows is paywalled content but if you do want to throw a quid or a dollar or a Euro at what I do, you are very welcome: ko-fi.com/firstlastanything
BOOKS
I have written several books, and contributed to many more.
Don’t Stop the Music: A Year of Pop History, One Day at a Time was published by Elliott and Thompson in November 2023. The paperback edition followed in May 2024, and the book was first published in North America in November 2024. It features several events, stories and incidents for every single day of the calendar year – yes, even 29 February. For more information on the book and how to get hold of it, click here: https://eandtbooks.com/books/dont-stop-the-music/
‘A brilliant musical almanac, compiled by an engaging writer whose musical knowledge is not just detailed but wide-ranging and generous.’ Jonathan Coe
‘An astonishing book… a book of events that’s an event in itself.’ David Quantick
A wonderful ride through our pop universe amongst thousands of bright stars, gnarled debris and twinkling nuggets of music and events made distant over time.‘ Peter Curran
Into the Groove: The 1980s: The Ultimate Decade of Pop History, Justin Lewis’s month-by-month guide to 80s pop, will be published in October 2025, again by Elliott and Thompson. For more information and links on how to pre-order it, please click here: https://eandtbooks.com/books/into-the-groove/
CONVERSATIONS
FIRST LAST ANYTHING – It’s a textcast, not a podcast
In 2022, and 2023, I published two series of text-based conversations entitled First Last Anything, in which guests – musicians, writers, fans – selected and talked about earliest, most recent and noteworthy records they have bought. I wanted to get away from ‘all-time favourites’ in music discussion, and this seemed a good way to do something a little different. Hope you enjoy them, either if you saw them at the time, or if they’re new to you.
A third series of conversations began in August 2025 (episode FLA 25 onwards), and is ongoing. New episodes will be uploaded every Sunday morning.
FLA 1: Lev Parikian (29/05/2022)
FLA 2: Suzy Norman (05/06/2022)
FLA 3: Meryl O’Rourke (12/06/2022)
FLA 4: Philip Clark (19/06/2022)
FLA 5: Fenella Humphreys (03/07/2022)
FLA 6: David Quantick (10/07/2022)
FLA 7: Alasdair Mackenzie (24/07/2022)
FLA 8: Kirsten Parnell (31/07/2022)
FLA 9: Cheryl Frances-Hoad (07/08/2022)
FLA 10: Peter Curran (14/08/2022)
FLA 11: Jenny Landreth (21/08/2022)
FLA 12: Ian Greaves (28/08/2022)
FLA 13: Juliet Brando (04/09/2022)
FLA 14: Lynne Phillips (11/09/2022)
FLA 15: Helen O’Hara (18/09/2022)
FLA 16: Jonathan Coe (25/09/2022)
FLA 17: Bernard Hughes (11/06/2023)
FLA 18: Penny Kiley (18/06/2023)
FLA 19: Moray Hunter (25/06/2023)
FLA 20: Madeleine Mitchell (09/07/2023)
FLA 21: Sangeeta Ambegaokar (16/07/2023)
FLA 22: Sioned Wiliam (23/07/2023)
FLA 23: Joanne Limburg (30/07/2023)
FLA 24: Alison Eales (06/08/2023)
FLA 25: Matthew Rudd (03/08/2025)
FLA 26: Gary Panton (10/08/2025)
FLA 27: Ben Baker (17/08/2025)
FLA 28: Dr Leah Broad (24/08/2025)
FLA 29: Shanine Salmon (31/08/2025)
FLA 31: William Ham Bevan (14/09/2025)
FLA 32: Joanna Wyld (09/11/2025)
FLA 33: Mark Watson (16/11/2025)
FLA 34: Emma Anderson (23/11/2025)
FLA 35: Michael Gillette (07/12/2025)
ART
In September 2017, I began a year-long project called When Is Births, in which every single day, I uploaded an art card of noteworthy birthdays. You can see the whole archive of that year at my Instagram account WhenIsBirths. It’s this kind of thing:
In October 2019, I began a new project – still ongoing – called When Was Things, in which I design a card featuring the events of a month in history, sometimes a long time ago, sometimes more recent. New instalments of this are uploaded to my BlueSky account and at my Instagram account (both called WhenIsBirths). But here are some sample instalments:
Both of these projects have had lots of pleasing feedback, and have led to requests for exclusive commissions, in which a recipient’s name is included on the card. Perfect for birthdays, anniversaries or Christmas presents, these handmade exclusives are designed and completed with the recipient’s own relevant interests covered (whether sport, arts, entertainment or anything else really). One example here (thank you, Alasdair Mackenzie):
The When Is Births and When Was Things cards are available in a variety of fonts and colours, all in my own style, and NOT computer generated in any way!
The A6-sized When Is Births cards currently cost £45.
The A5-sized When Was Things cards, which are a bit more ambitious, and have an extra design concept built in, currently cost £90.
Other design sizes and options can be discussed too.
If you’d like further information, do email me at whenisbirths@yahoo.com, or contact me via the Contact page on this site.
WRITING ARCHIVE
This site was originally called whenisbins.wordpress.com (it’s a long story, maybe I’ll blog about that one day), and below is the archive of posts amassed in 2016-17. I’m hoping to get back into this soon, and write some new pieces. Stay tuned.
FIRST LAST ANYTHING 