James Valentine (journalist)

James Valentine
Born	James Matthew Valentine c. 1962 Ballarat, Victoria, Australia
Occupation	Journalist, musician, radio and TV presenter, writer
Years active	1980-present

James Matthew Valentine (born c. 1962, Ballarat) is an Australian journalist, musician, and radio and television presenter. As a saxophonist he was a member of Jo Jo Zep (1982), Models (1984–87) and Absent Friends (1989–90).

James Matthew Valentine was born in about 1962 in Ballarat. His father was a car salesman and his mother taught elocution and was a part-time radio announcer. He has two older brothers. He attended Ballarat Grammar School where he learned saxophone, he described his performances in the local area, "a really bad jazz rock fusion gig." In the early 1980s Valentine relocated to Melbourne to attend university, he later recalled "First year I spent studying, and then I started getting gigs, and I didn't pay much attention to uni after that because I wanted to be a jazz musician."

In 1982 James Valentine joined Joe Camilleri's group, Jo Jo Zep.

Valentine, on saxophone, and Kate Ceberano (of I'm Talking), on lead vocals, were members of Diana Boss and the Extremes, a covers band which performed The Supremes material. Other members included James Freud (of Models) on bass guitar, Barton Price (also of Models) on drums and Zan Abeyratne (of I'm Talking, with Ceberano) on co-lead vocals. He described his experience, "The rhythm section of that band was The Models. When that finished, they asked me to go on tour with them and then I never left. All of a sudden I was in this pop band wearing black leather jackets."

Valentine joined Models in late 1984, when they relocated to Sydney and he played saxophone with them until 1987, the group broke up in June of the following year. As a member of Models he appears on their studio albums, Out of Mind, Out of Sight (September 1985) and Models' Media (October 1986).

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