Former NME journalist Steven Wells died on Tuesday, according to the Philadelphia Weekly. Wells had been suffering from lymphatic cancer and had been chronicling his treatment for the disease for the magazine.
Wells was born in Swindon in 1960, moving with his family to Bradford in 1968. After leaving school in 1977, he became involved in the burgeoning punk scene, and in 1984 began performing as a punk-poet under the names Seething Wells, Swells and Susan Williams. It was under this last moniker that he began writing for the NME in the late 80s, championing punk, hardcore and metal bands mainly, but also disposable pop acts like Daphne & Celeste. His biting, funny and often controversial style won him many fans and he will be remembered as one of the great British music journalists.
In addition to music journalism, he also directed music videos with Nick Small, with whom he formed production company GobTV, wrote for TV comedy shows, including 'The Day Today', and published a number of books, both fiction and non-fiction, via his own publishing house, Attack! Books.
More recently he had settled with his wife in Philadelphia, where he had continued to write sport and music columns for The Guardian, FourFourTwo, 90 Minutes, and The Quietus. He became well known in Philadelphia for his weekly music column in Philadelphia Weekly and also a series of articles on his battle with cancer. It was alongside the latest, and final, of these that his death was announced.
In one of these articles, in which he discussed being diagnosed with cancer he wrote: "I put the phone down and let out a huge, self-pitying 'Why me?' The answer, of course, is the same as the answer to Travis' shit-awful 1999 international breakthrough hit, 'Why Does It Always Rain On Me?' Because you're a fucking dick. Now shut the fuck up and grow a pair".
You can read Steven's final article for Philadelphia Weekly here.