He began his career on local newspapers, before starting work as production editor at Melody Maker in 1969.
[3] In 1979, he was responsible for coining the term "New Wave of British Heavy Metal" (NWOBHM), as a headline for an article by Barton.
[3] Lewis left journalism for some time to run a pub, but returned to edit pop music magazine No.1 in 1983, and then as editor of NME in 1987.
[2] There, he recruited journalist James Brown, who later became NME editor, as well as writers including Stuart Maconie and Steve Lamacq.
[4] Lewis became responsible for both NME and Melody Maker, and launched the magazines Vox and Muzik.