By Kyle Horne
Sue Mautner, former music journalist and writer, reflects on her career in her new podcast series She’s With the Band launched just last month.
Produced by Dover Street Productions, the series offers an unprecedented look into the wild, glamorous, and gritty world of 1960s and ’70s rock and roll, through the eyes of music journalist and insider Sue Mautner.
For the first time, her remarkable story is being shared – from ghost writing at NME to going on tour with the most popular band in history: The Beatles – which she references fondly in the podcast.
Casually name-dropping each of The Beatles, Sue says:
“I’ve never known a group like it… the four of them fed off one another – it was just unique!”
“John was my favourite.”
“Paul was always very happy-go-lucky; Mr PR of the group. Everybody had to have a good image… he was always ready to do the interviews when no one could be bothered!”
“George was quiet, because he was a deep thinker.”
“…and Ringo was Ringo!”
“Once they had their first hit – that was it. It was instantaneous.”
Sue didn’t just meet and report on The Beatles – she also knew members of The Rolling Stones well.
“They were all living together in Edith Grove and were always around, shopping in Carnaby Street or at parties,” Sue recalls.
She remembers interviewing Keith Richards at Redlands and describes Mick Jagger joking that they needed a woman to cook – little-known anecdotes that set this series apart.
A highlight of the podcast, and a reality check on what it was like in the ‘60s, Sue discusses her thoughts on being a female reporter back then.
Originally working at Boyfriend Magazine, Sue later moved to NME when the editor, Andy Gray, offered her £20 a week – a staggering pay rise from her previous £11-a-week wage packet.
The catch? They were not allowed to refer to her as a woman, because the publisher had ‘declared he didn’t want any more female reporters. Sue would be credited for her work but not under her full name, instead as a more androgenous S Martin.
“They were all guys!” Sue recalls.
“I was one of the people that was quite instrumental at the time for women in the music business.”
“There were very few females in journalism in the 60s. There was only Maureen (Cleave), Penny (Valentine) and I, and June Southworth – but I can’t really think of any… they were all guys.”
“NME, in my memory and in my mind’s eye, I can’t see another female in that building.”
But it wasn’t all bad:
“It was just so cool! …I get really nostalgic about it.”
“I see certain people that I worked with—not even the bands themselves, but the people associated with them—and I get really nostalgic for it, and I think ‘Oh god, wasn’t it wonderful?’ I worked with all these people and look at them now – I mean, they’re mega now!”
“It could’ve been anybody, that’s now a big producer, and I go, ‘Oh he was the office boy!’ or something like that, and I think, ‘Wasn’t I lucky?!’”
The podcast doesn’t just stop at music journalism: it traces her later career working for EMI Records, where she once nearly signed Cat Stevens, managing artists and even working on the sets of Hollywood films.
The nine-part series of She’s With the Band is available to listen to right now. Episode 1 launched on Thursday 24th July, with new episodes releasing weekly.
The podcast is produced by Graeme A. Scott and Kathy A. LoPrimo, hosted by Olivia Reed and edited by Dean Kader, with original music by Dover Street Records.
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