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••• [Writer] [Stockport] Esquire, Rolling Stone US, TIME, The Guardian, New York Times, Vogue, The FT, GQ, WIRED, VICE
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Recent posts
2025 took me to Vienna, Chicago, Wigan and down a lot of internet rabbit warrens to write about 9/11 conspiracies; paranormal dolls; The Muppets; skull-drilling entrepreneurs; chic baking; psytrance raves; club kid runways; celeb WhatsApp groups; and, obviously, gooning.
So very grateful for all the amazing editors and contributors along the way. And a real pleasure to write more meaty longreads (and be featured on @longreads no less!) Here are some of my highlights. Watch out for more generalist esoterica in 2026!
LONGREADS
1) & 2) The Artwork That Spawned 9/11 Conspiracy Theories and Mystery for @rollingstone US
3) Inside the Very Peculiar and Wildly Popular World of Armored Medieval Combat for @esquire US
4) An American in Wigan for @ft_weekend
5) The Real Life Haunting of Annabelle, a Doll Possessed for @esquire US
6) One Shot to Rule Them All for @empiremagazine
7) This Man Wants to Control Your Dreams for @vice
8) Ringing Up The Dead for @obsmagazine
9) The Endless Voyeurism of Lifestreaming for @newstatesman
10) The Beatific Generation for @dazed
FEATURES & DISPATCHES
11) Can The Muppets Take America Again? for @gq US
12) What Can Fashion Learn from A24 for @voguebusiness
13) How Tribe of Frog Became the UK’s Trippiest Night for @guardian
14) The Fashion Freaks of Manchester for @i_d
15) Hot Gossip for @theststyle
16) A Night of Raving in Manchester’s Retail Ruins for @service95
17) Fashion Can’t Get Enough Cake Right Now for @thefacemagazine
18) The Australian Dream for @the.independent
19) Men on Their Porn Habits Post Age Verification for @cosmopolitanuk
20) The Rise of Goonscrolling for @mashable
22 Dec 2025
A huge pinch-me moment — I wrote a 5,000 word story for @esquire US on the wild world of Armored MMA (AMMA). Essentially, UFC medieval style with actual, sinew-slicing swords, skull-rattling KOs and more chainmail than your old Hotmail account. No wonder it’s all over Instagram.
I was lucky enough to head to Hammond, Indiana with super-sharp-shooter @kevnserna in tow, meeting the magnetic Micky Gallus and Kelsey Lesa, the brains and brawn behind AMMA. And, since I was staying in Chicago, I had to head to the city’s Torture Museum on a Corona hangover the next day to better understand the allure of archaic ultraviolence.
Back in the UK, I joined the dots between AMMA and more traditional Armored Medieval Combat (or Buhurt), charting the chequered history of the activity and exploring why this kind of chivalry is still alive and kicking through a new cage format and elevated production levels.
I also spoke to armorsmiths in Ukraine — still the main production hub for the sport — who are now, in a macabre twist of fate, actually having to engage in actual combat.
To write for such a prestigious publication is a total privilege and to work with the incredible @michaeljsebastian, Esquire editor in chief, and the factchecking team was a career-defining experience. The story really went up a level.
I feel so very blessed to join the sports writing history of this storied title and to have gone on a mad adventure that will never leave my own rattling skull.
Swipe for the introduction. Please read now on Esquire US if you fancy and let me know what you think, eh?
14 May 2025
A fever dream—here’s a 6,000 word long-read for Rolling Stone USA on a mind-bending, monomania-inducing story that completely consumed me.
Twenty-five years ago, in March 2000, Austrian art collective Gelitin illicitly built a balcony, installed it on the 91st floor of the World Trade Center, and stood above New York City. They called this art performance The B-Thing.
It was the result of an art residency in the WTC as part of a Lower Manhattan council initiative. And, above all, it was a momentous act of freedom built on a single romantic ideal: to escape the confines of their studio.
Their modus operandi? Illicitly prise open the window, build a balcony and walk towards the horizon. The mythical act was photographed by their associates in a helicopter as the sun rose over NYC.
A year later (and 24 years ago today) the planes struck and conspiracy followed. How were there so many parallels — aircraft, The World Trade Center, the significance of the 91st floor, the notion of “art terrorism” — between these two events? Of course, the conspiracy is incredibly flimsy and any supposed evidence is entirely unconcrete. But the coincidence is alluring.
I travelled to Vienna to meet Gelitin; called up the the world’s first internet millionaire (and helicopter benefactor) Josh Harris; brought in the leading expert on Osama bin Laden and spoke to as many people as possible involved with The B-Thing.
Crazy chopper rides, all-night parties, the FBI, rare art books, deeply beguiling synchronicity — this one’s got it all. And it even made the Longreads newsletter today, too.
Thanks so much to @gelitin_official and everyone who to spoke to me and @katelstorey and @seanfwoods and @brennaehrlich at @rollingstone for sculpting this one into a dream piece.
11 Sep 2025
@airmailweekly debut ✈️ Exactly 100 years ago, on Halloween 1926, Harry Houdini passed into the spirit world.
It’s often been assumed that a punch to the guts—delivered backstage by a cocky student—was the cause of the escapist’s appendicitis. A recent book made a bowl of chop suey a new suspect. But maybe, it was to do with the fact that he was trying to rid American politics of psychics.
As an unfinished, ghostwritten book put it: there was a growing “Cancer of Superstition.” He was scared of the psychics infiltrating the White House. So much so, he testified to Congress in the year of his death.
Houdini’s warning about magical thinking has proved eerily prescient; if superstition really is a cancer, it has, a century on, metastasized into every vital organ of the American body politic.
Back in the 1980s, as in Houdini’s era, a psychic provided Reagan with counsel from another realm. Today, the MAGA circle have fired the mediums and become the magi themselves. And back in the normal world—we’ve never wanted to be psychic so badly.
Read now on Air Mail. Credits to Ash Carter for the edits!
31 Oct 2026
For Joe Locke, a childhood spent performing on the Isle of Man led to major roles in Heartstopper and a Marvel miniseries. Now, he’s thinking about the actor – and the person – he wants to become. In the New Blood issue, Locke reflects on the Manx roots that have kept him level throughout his rise: “Most people in the Isle of Man couldn’t give less of a shit. It’s great, because I can just go home and be Helen’s son, Joe, again.”
Link in bio to read more.
Written by @kyle.macneill
Photography by @marcinkempski
Styling by @benkschofield
Tailoring by @nafisatosh
Grooming by @jodytaylorhair
Hair by @tariqhowes
Make-up by Natasha Tereshko
Set design by @thomasbird
Retouching by @avantpost.studio
21 Oct 2026
A real buzz to have worked on copy for some stories for the @drmartensofficial DM’s World platform and recent product and campaign words with the amazing @clare.considine. So many ace writers I love reading have also contributed — @olivepometsey @lauren_cochrane_ @t_jsidhu @annagranola @lumpyshrimp @eniitay & more — and it looks mega, to boot. Big up Clare for honing such a distinctive new TOV for DMs and for this exciting new editorial hub. More soon!
18 Oct 2026
New @britishgq longread | Karl Bushby’s step count is enough to break Strava. The 57-year-old nomad has, for the last 28 years, been walking the world. No transport allowed—apart from when he has to temporarily leave and return to his current checkpoint due to wars, visas, or sanctions. But every single sole-blistering mile since 1998—over 30,000 by the end—has been trekked by foot.
Bushby’s return home to Hull in November, via swimming the English Channel, will be an unthinkable milestone. “I swim like a cat dropped in a bathtub,” he sighs.
He’s negotiated with militia, smoothed his way out of jails, tripped in jungles and crossed tundras along the way. It’s an unbeatable feat that eclipses the Huel-sponsored Hardest Geezer or ultramarathon influencers. And now, cult director Werner Herzog is working on a documentary with Beau Willimon to capture the painstaking schlep to the finish line.
But returning to a disunited Britain will be surreal. Crossing the Channel has never been so loaded. He’s also gearing up to navigate tricky personal and political conversations with family—including seeing his son, Adam, now 36, who he has only met a handful of times.
Adam, proud of his Dad, has managed to find a valiant middle-ground. “I get why he’s doing it. But here comes the flipside, and I know he’s fully aware of this – he’s missed out on a hell of a lot,” he says.
Was the walk worth everything he had to leave behind? And does the real catching up begin now? And can anyone, ever top this peak quest?
@bushby3000
Thank you so much @johnsunyer @rebeccahadleydolan @christensenmike @jfrischmuth @murraycl4rk for taking this on and over the line
26 Sep 2026
It’s my first @TIME. And it’s about laughing at robots.
This past week, the World Humanoid Robot Games has seen a headless metal-man called TianGong Ultra thunder past Usain Bolt’s time in the 100m. Elsewhere, in the dystopian competition, titanium entrants have aced the high jump, table tennis and bricklaying. But there’s been something far more entertaining than the toppling records—the toppling robots.
Videos of the old-school, epic fails have spread across social media. Humanoids have been seen glitching out lifting weedy weights and fizzling out after hitting crash mats. This schadenfreude gives us a sense of reassurance that we’re not beat just yet. It shatters the idea that automation is inevitable. And it runs adjacent to us laughing at ChatGPT not being able to spell “strawberry” or dancing bots stacking it on stage.
But it’s a very human response to impending doom. We’re kicking the can down the road. But now, the cans have legs. Very fast ones.
Read it online, now. Thanks very much @devi_lockwood for the commission and edits!
27 Aug 2026
I have written a book! My @hoxtonminipress Opinionated Guide to Manchester is now available for pre-order.
Since I moved to Manchester seven years ago, the city’s changed at a blistering pace. Blink and another skyscraper towers into the air. Wink and a novelty bar pops up. Chanel, the BRITs and the MOBOs have traded LDN for MCR. The Oasis reunion brought the world to Heaton Park. “Manchesterism” is now a political buzzword. Londoners are moving up in their droves. Its cultural mythology has reached a new generation.
This expedited redevelopment has attracted some impassioned opinions on every end of the spectrum. Which makes there no better time, really, to write an opinionated guide to Manchester, right? For me, it’s been the most exciting place I’ve lived in—it’s got a Vimto monument.
In this beautifully-designed little guide are over 70 of my favourite places, with a focus on the city centre, plus some (rain-friendly) perfect day itineraries and walks. And there’s some hat-doffing to my new Greater Manchester home, Stockport via a couple of entries.
Get it now via @hoxtonminipress — thanks so much @kateovery for asking me to do this and being such a dream editor to work with!
24 Aug 2026
Low Res Stock[port] Photos
23 Aug 2026
Over the last few weeks, I’ve got stuck into to some style desk cover and freelance support for @britishgq with dream team @mahaliachang & @adamhycheung
Very, very fun! But I’m currently on, checks tally, strike *five* for not granting Google Docs access. Assuming I stop making this cardinal sin — more to come very soon!
10 Aug 2026
Really stoked to share a new longread for @rollingstone US on, yeap, Skibidi Toilet.
You probably know Skibidi Toilet as the meme of a bedraggled, grinning man dislocating his neck in a toilet bowl. And the earworm song.
But after the 11-second clip went contagiously viral in 2023, Boom, the enigmatic creator, turned it into a fully-fledged franchise of video-game-style, extra-terrestrial lavatorial warfare. Sure, for most exasperated parents, it was brainrot. But it quickly became YouTube’s biggest animated series. And a world of lore opened up.
With the meme-to-movie pipeline rumbling, a digital studio called Invisible Narratives, AKA Inviz, struck a deal with Boom. By 2025, they owned the IP and had licensed it out for toys and shiny Fortnite collaborations. But fans felt that new Skibidi episodes weren’t up to scratch. And a spin-off called Emergence heralded a flop era for the vocal minority.
Then, Boom went AWOL. And since then, the hardcore fandom and Inviz have been locked in an escalating conflict that mirrors the series, with fans alleging that the show is being ruined. Leaked contracts, super sleuthing, a rumoured movie and showdowns on X have made things messy. There hasn’t been a new episode since October.
Could Boom’s Skibidi have been a Backrooms? Was it a Happy Meal toy away from world domination? I tried to find out over the last seven months, speaking to Inviz, fans and academics to evaluate the value of the series and speculate on its future.
In the end, it’s a fable for the new YouTuber economy and the power of fandom—where every side of the war is plunged into a murky world of conspiracy.
Thanks so much Liz, @katelstorey, @brennaehrlich, @seanfwoods for taking this on and sculpting it. Who would have thought Skibidi could teach me so much?
06 Aug 2026
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