CHAPTER ONE

1977–1979

National Front

By the mid-1970s Britain was polarised like never before. The reason for this was the emergence of the National Front. Founded in 1967, the National Front [NF], a right-wing political party, campaigned for an end to ‘coloured’ immigration, the humane repatriation of immigrants living in Britain, withdrawal from the European community, and the reintroduction of capital punishment.

Even though the NF regarded ‘International Communism as the number one enemy of civilization’ and ‘International Monopoly Capitalism’ as dangerous an enemy as communism, only one issue was ever likely to arouse the feelings of the masses and that was race. And racial tension was running high because of the large influx of immigrants from the Commonwealth, which the NF exploited to the full. Indeed, the expulsion of all Asians with British passports from Uganda by General Idi Amin and their arrival in Britain had ignited widespread popular protests. If ever the political climate was favourable for the growth of an openly racist right-wing party the time was now.

The 1973 West Bromwich by-election shocked many when the NF candidate, Martin Webster, managed to poll 16.2 percent of the votes, coming in third and saving his deposit for the first time in the NF’s history. This was a danger sign to the major parties that NF support was on the increase in certain areas, particularly those badly hit by the recession with considerable social problems.

In the general election of February 1974, the NF fielded 54 candidates, polling only 74,000 votes. Eight months later and another general election its candidates attracted over 113,000 votes. In some Greater London constituencies the NF share of the vote was as much as 9.4 percent. Nevertheless, with every one of their candidates losing their deposit, the NF still remained a long way from winning even one parliamentary seat.

As the recession deepened the NF made considerable improvement in its electoral showing. In the local elections of 1976 48 NF candidates in Leicester received some 44,000 votes, a staggering 18 percent of the total vote. In the Greater London Council elections of May 1977 the NF polled over 119,000 votes, beating the Liberals into third place in 33 of 92 constituencies and winning 19 percent of votes cast in Hackney South and Shoreditch. This time it seemed as though the National Front was on the verge of an electoral breakthrough and poised to become Britain’s third political party. The left looked on with real concern, if not alarm.

Pogo on a Communist

Arguably, the story of ‘Rock Against Communism’ starts with Eddy Morrison, the National Front Leeds District organiser, who had a taste for punk music, attending many early punk gigs. Notably, he saw the Sex Pistols at the Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall and again on the Anarchy tour at Leeds Poly, supported by the Clash. And if that were not enough to tell the grandchildren, at the Leeds gig he met a Pistols groupie by the name of Sid Vicious: ‘He had a ripped swastika T-shirt on and was skint so I bought him a bottle of Pils lager. He noticed my sunwheel badge and muttered his approval, a bit blurry as he was well out of it.’

Eddy Morrison recognised that punk rock, which was fast becoming the dominant youth cult, would be a ‘powerful weapon for anyone who could turn it politically.’ However, the left had already stolen a march on the National Front by forming in late 1976 an organization called Rock Against Racism [RAR], which embraced the new sounds of punk, and later the Anti-Nazi League [ANL] to promote action against the National Front. For Eddy Morrison, this situation could not continue. He explained:¹¹

Memoirs of a Street Soldier, Eddy Morrison.

             We either had to condemn Punk or use it. I chose the latter option and started a spoof fanzine called Punk Front which featured a NF logo with a safety pin in it. To my great surprise, Punk Front was a huge success and soon, especially in Leeds, NF members and supporters were going to the biggest Punk club around — the infamous F Club. I started to regularly go to the club and NF Punks were recruiting other punks.

                  In a few months, the NF was the dominant political force on the big punk scene in Leeds. Music papers such as Sounds and the New Musical Express were taking an interest in us. Gary Bushell was sent up to look into the phenomenon. We had pro-NF letters published in many music papers and other punks started bringing out pro-NF fanzines. We even started two bands — the Ventz and the Dentists. Both these bands were to feature later on in the start of ‘Rock Against Communism.’

His local branch was very supportive of his activity. Admittedly, some of the older members were shocked by the punk appearance of the new recruits, but they were very happy when they saw the numbers being recruited. By 1978, Leeds NF had some four hundred members. Indeed, such was the NF stranglehold on the punk scene in Leeds that Eddy Morrison could claim:

             We controlled the F Club basically. The F Club actually started in a room at Leeds Poly, then to Brannigans, then to Chapeltown, then back to Brannigans. The club in Chapeltown was actually called ‘The Continental Club’ and downstairs was a black-only gambling club. Upstairs was all White. Weird and actually quite hairy! We also held a weekly Friday Bowie/Roxy night at the Adelphi pub in Leeds city centre with some nationalist stuff in between — strictly ‘All-White Music Night’ we billed it. Those Friday night events were 100% NF whereas at the F Club, although we dominated, a lot of normal punks came along too. The reds attacked the pub three times, but the landlord was very pro-NF and we kicked them out of it each time. The Adelphi, the Prince of Wales and the Scarborough Taps were all NF/RAC pubs. The Prince of Wales was basically 100% NF customers. Alan the manager was totally reliant on our customers to the extent that once when John Tyndall came up and we had lost the main city centre venue, we went to the Prince and put the pool table out into the street to give room inside for John Tyndall to speak! We had three punk discos there.

                  The red bands, in particular the Mekons from Leeds, stopped playing the F Club because we brought every one of their gigs to a halt. We ghettoed them back to the student areas and out of the city centre pubs and clubs. It kicked off big-time when 999 played the F Club. 999 weren’t left — they weren’t nationalists either — but with them being a big band at the time they attracted a lot of non-NF punks and quite a few were RAR. Well, we started ‘removing’ their badges. That’s what started the bother. West Yorkshire NF members had an unofficial ‘league’ for how many ANL/RAR/Commie badges a unit could rip off in a month. That’s rip off a red in broad daylight. Leeds won and at our unofficial HQ (some of the lads had a sort of high-class squat in Headingley) we had a nicked SWP banner where you came and attached your badge haul. In the end it was covered in hundreds! I remember Darren in Hull walking up to a red who was talking to a copper (I kid you not) and ripping his badge then walking away and not getting nicked!

Reporting for the New Musical Express, journalists John Hamblett and Phil McNeill wrote a piece called ‘NF prints punkzine’²²:

New Musical Express, 17 June 1978.

             LATEST ENTRANT to the wonderful world of literature is a creepy little leaflet called The Punk Front, which has been spotted in the Leeds/Bradford area. Adorned prominently with the National Front symbol, it sets out the attitudes that are expected of the NF-supporting punk about town. See the picture of Tom Robinson! See the speech bubble. “I’m against the Front coz they’ll ban Vaseline.” What wit! See Paul Simonon! “I hate the National Front because they don’t like me turning the new wave into commie propaganda.” Quite a new twist, huh? The NF as defenders of the new wave…

                  In the middle of the sheet is a cartoon of a Jewish-looking guy with long hair, glasses and a moustache. His talk bubble: “We in the Anti-Nazi League tell you the NF eat black babies for breakfast and gas their own mothers — we haf pictures, already.” In the corner, a cut-out picture of four men carrying Anti-Nazi banners: three black, one white with a huge nose drawn on and glasses again (why do they think all Jews wear spex?) – and underneath, the caption: “‘British’ people stand against the National Front.” Opposite them, a couple of young punks are positioned to gaze malevolently at the picture of the demonstrators. “If that lot’s against the National Front,” says one, “then me and my mates are joining.” Which, believe it or not, is what a few Leeds punks — a very few Leeds punks — are actually doing.

                  Apart from the outbreak of fighting at a recent Buzzcocks gig in Bradford — reported in Thrills three weeks ago — they’ve also been known to dance the goose-step at the ‘F’ Club, much to the disgust of the left-wing local bands who supplied the backing — the Gang of Four and the Mekons. Both bands, in fact, have decided not to play the club again until it changes its current ‘apolitical’ stance and bans the NF aggravators. ‘F’ Club promoter John Keenan, however, dismisses them as “basically yobboes. There’s never more than half a dozen of them. I’m doing my best to keep politics out of the club.” The latest incident involving these guys — who claimed to be supporters of the ultra-right-wing British National Party until that folded recently — came on May 24, when Sham 69 were due to play the ‘F’ Club but had to pull out to record a Top of the Pops appearance. Keenan turned a bunch of people away, and later that evening they turned up in the Fenton pub, where members of both the Mekons and Gang of Four were drinking, and began singing “Tomorrow Belongs to Me” as performed by the Hitler Youth in Cabaret. Inevitably, a fight broke out. One student received a badly cut eye which required immediate surgery, and among other injured parties was a girl student who took a serious kicking in the head. Police arrested students and Front supporters…”

Photocopied, Punk Front ran for five issues. As well as the Punk Front fanzine, British News, the Leeds-based newsletter of the National Front edited by Eddy Morrison,³³ started to devote a surprising amount of space to punk and new wave. Anti-fascist magazine Searchlight reported:⁴⁴ ‘In August Morrison wrote a page about David Bowie in British News describing him as a ‘force to be reckoned with’ and an influential star who was moving youth away from the left and therefore deserving close attention from nationalists. This was because Bowie had made public statements like ‘Hitler was the first rock star — he really got it together’ and ‘Britain needs an extreme right-wing government’ which, as Morrison correctly points out, along with one or two other such comments from rock heroes, led to the formation of RAR.’

British News had actually started life in 1974 in support of the British National Party. When Morrison wound up the BNP in late 1977 British News continued as an ‘independent paper which gives its support to the National Front — the biggest White Nationalist movement in the world.’

Searchlight #44, February 1979.

The September issue of British News contained an interview with the lead singer of a band called the Ventz, who stated that they were ‘definitely’ anti-communist. He explained that they had been forced to come out and support Rock Against Communism by ‘lefty groups such as Tom Robinson Band, pushing homosexuality and all that trash.’ He talked bravely of the future: ‘There is a lot of things to be done. We would really like to make a record with a straight Rock Against Communism message — but of course we need some backing for a big project like that.’

The existence of Leeds right-wing band the Dentists made it into the pages of Sounds following a piece about the formation of Skins Against the Nazis. Eddy Morrison and his friends wrote in supporting the Dentists and the Ventz, and a couple of their letters were printed. Searchlight investigated, but could not come up with much, other than ‘both groups consist of the same small circle of Morrison’s friends’ and ‘their support was limited to a small following of ex-BNP and YNF people in Leeds.’⁵⁵ This was true, but there is much more to the story of the Dentists.

Ibid.

The Dentists comprised Mick Redshaw on vocals, Howard on guitar and Chink on bass, who was a member of the British Movement. Eddy Morrison knew Mick Redshaw from the F Club where he had also met Julie, his soon-to-be second wife, and Denise, Mick’s then girlfriend. Julie and Denise were ‘best mates.’ When Mick Redshaw first started to think about forming a band, just a straight punk band which was not going to be overtly political, Eddy Morrison ‘intervened.’ Mick Redshaw did not take much talking round and joined the Punk Front the following week. Eddy Morrison and Mick Redshaw soon became the best of friends. Indeed, Mick was Eddy’s best man at his second wedding in September 1979.

Eddy Morrison liked the Dentists, ‘although they were a rough back-to-basics punk band.’ He was there when the Dentists played for the first time. They were amazingly shambolic. Eddy remembers Mick asking him how they went down as they hadn’t practiced much before their first night and him thinking to himself, ‘It shows!’ He missed the Dentists live just the once when they played Viva’s wine bar: ‘We used to go into Viva’s fairly regularly. One of the lads was going out with one of the barmaids called Linda and she persuaded the manager to let us have a music night which the Dentists played at. I was speaking at an NF meeting in Manchester that night so didn’t go. It was a one-off venue.’ One of his abiding memories of the Dentists is the time they played a hotel in Leeds [the name of the hotel is not known to the author]: ‘It was Mick’s 21st birthday party. We had about one hundred there, stacks of NF turned up and most of the Punk Front. Mick nearly choked me by mistake when we were pogoing and he grabbed hold of my dog collar. The Dentists also played that night. Mick was wearing a Clockwork Orange white bib and braces. I had a marathon hangover so I’m surprised I can remember anything.’

Sometimes ‘over-punk in their dress sense,’ Eddy Morrison regarded the Dentists as ‘quite the fashion setters,’ although they normally wore a uniform of bib and brace overalls.

The Ventz had started life as the Expelairs and changed their name when lead singer Algie reformed them. The Ventz were not as outspoken as the Dentists and explains how they were able to play regular music venues relatively unmolested. For example, on Thursday, 20 April 1978 and again on 4 August 1978, the Ventz played the F Club in Chapeltown, Leeds. Somewhat ironically, on the first of those two dates, they supported the Front, an anti-fascist band from London! The Ventz later changed their name to Tragic Minds because, according to Eddy Morrison, ‘they were getting into the New Romantic/New Wave scene and thought it was more appropriate.’

And then for the Leeds NF and the Punk Front, things suddenly took a turn for the worse as Eddy Morrison explained:

             On a very warm night in August 1978, I was at the head of around 40 NF members, all from Leeds, who gate-crashed a Sham 69 concert at the F Club — we had been banned. The F Club was still situated in Chapeltown, the Afro-Caribbean area of the city. We halted the concert which escalated into a mini-street battle with some rastas outside the venue. Stacks of police arrived and we scattered, meeting up again at a pub called the Fenton in the student area. Unbeknownst to us, the ANL were having a gay/lesbian social in the Fenton that night. The evening turned into a really bloody fight with 29 injured. I was arrested the following day. The Yorkshire Evening Post reported the brawl under a banner headline of ‘All hell breaks loose in City pub.’ Refused bail, I spent the next three months in Armley jail. Eventually I got bail under stringent restrictions — I could not go in any city centre pub; I was on a curfew from nine at night to eight next morning. I also had to sign bail at a police station everyday. I had to reside in one address and inform the police if I left the city. I had pleaded not guilty along with a handful of others. One year later, after being on curfew for 12 months, I was brought to trial and found not guilty, thank goodness, but a lot of those who pleaded guilty went down for three, six and nine months. I pleaded not guilty — my brief told me I was looking at four to six years as the ringleader and I was charged with aggravated affray. The fallout from this brawl took much of the dynamism out of the Punk Front and the Leeds RAC. Most of the lads were on bail, in jail or were on curfew — and the cops were on us big style — we couldn’t move. As I was also banned from all Leeds pubs whilst awaiting trial I couldn’t organise anything so that didn’t help.

Despite the police clampdown, the Dentists gate-crashed a RAR concert at the F Club that Xmas,⁶⁶ much to the displeasure of Paul Furness who wrote:⁷⁷

The date of this gig is not known for certain, but five local bands did play the ‘F’ Club on 21 December 1978. The Ventz may have also played.

Temporary Hoardings no. 8, article by Paul Furness, 1979.

             The ‘F’ Club, centre of the punk industry in Leeds. Fascists crawl around the place every now and then. Christmas is no exception. Xmas party, ‘Butlins style’ the posters announced. Great! Five RAR bands on the bill. So we go along. But for a few weeks previous a nasty rumour flies around about the Dentists playing. Or are they? Recently they’d put pen to paper and survived in the letters columns of Sounds for three weeks. Kev from the Jerks wrote ’em a great letter from York. Leeds has more RAR gigs than any place he knows. Then someone slaps Sounds’ wrists writing that the Dentists can’t even fart in tune. We arrived and there they were, blasting into ‘White Power’ & ‘We Are the Master Race.’ Fucking hell about 30 fascists sieg-heiling & jackbooting (after all the ‘F’ club is in a beer Keller) at the front of the stage. The Nazis wearing ‘Hitler was right’ badges, Union Jacks, Pogo on a communist. Not a RAR badge in sight. The Dentists are evil bastards. Martin Webster’s favourite sing-along band are out-and-out Nazis. Intimidation is going on throughout the audience. The atmosphere is electric. I buy a round and this RAR girl tells me there’s going to be violence. Perfectly obvious, I’d have thought. The fascists following us around beer glasses in hand. A few quick phone calls & a quick bus ride and we fetch down some RAR people. The Dentists get unplugged and from then on it’s fuck the managers and the promoter, RAR’s doing the stewarding…

Also among the Dentists’ repertoire of ‘heartwarming ditties’ was ‘Kill the Reds.’⁸⁸

Rock Against Cretinism, article by Gary Bushell, 1979.

As the new year of 1979 dawned, British News edited by Eddy Morrison started to feature news from an apolitical organization calling itself Rock Against Communism, RAC for short, which had formed in Leeds to ‘combat Rock Against Racism’ and ‘show up Rock Against Racism for what it is — a puppet of the extreme left.’ The Dentists’ vocalist Mick Redshaw was once quoted on the subject of Rock Against Communism: ‘It is necessary because people need to be given an alternative to RAR.’⁹⁹

RAC News, Bulldog no. 14.

Rock Against Communism booked the Dentists, the Crap, Column 44 and two other bands to play a gig in Yorkshire in March 1979. Speaking out against the gig, Leeds punk Steve Eccles complained to a local newspaper, The Leeds Other Paper:

             I read with great interest A.G. Holder’s letter about the Nazi band the Dentists. However this is nothing new to some of us anti-racist punks, who support the Anti-Nazi League. We watched them do a gig at Viva’s wine bar about six months ago. We were appalled by what we saw. What is even more distressing is for us to find out that they are not alone. A certain other band who call themselves appropriately Tragic Minds are also National Front members but whereas the Dentists openly admit they are Nazis Tragic Minds are a little more discreet — they don’t shout about it in public. This does not mean to say they don’t admit to be fascists. When Eddy Morrison had his local British National Party Tragic Minds who were then called the Ventz performed at B.N.P. discos to try to raise funds. Us punks in the A.N.L. are now amused to find that these two bands have said that they will do a Rock Against Communism gig which should be good for a laugh. I wonder what would happen if any anti-communist black people should try to attend it or need I ask?

Contrary to what Steve Eccles wrote, Tragic Minds were not billed to play. The concert did not go ahead as planned. The only RAC activity remained in Leeds with a spillover to Bradford.

Meanwhile, and similarly, NF punk band White Boss were making a nuisance of themselves in their hometown of Coventry. The lead singer, Rob Morton, was a builder’s apprentice and explains how the band actually came to be named after Boss White, a well-known pipe joint sealant. The band sometimes borrowed the services of Fred Waite, the bassist of fellow Coventry punk band Criminal Class. The band rehearsed at Caludon Castle School in Coventry. Gigs were hard to come by, but somehow they managed to play. Local left-wing magazine Alternative Sounds angrily reported on the time White Boss supported Flackoff from Leamington:

             Flackoff don’t appear to have any deep-seated prejudices about colour, sex politics or money, but they have recently been linked with the NF because they let White Boss have a support slot at a recent gig. White Boss were booked through Flackoff’s ex-vocalist Alison (who can only be described as misguided). She convinced Flackoff that they were just another bunch of misunderstood kids struggling for recognition, lying about their bigoted lyrics and self-righteous fascist supporters. She was also supposed to collect money on the door but arriving late spent the rest of the evening testing her womanly wiles on some unsuspecting homosexual, so out of the 100-plus crowd only about 25 paid. The gig was wrecked (and a lot of equipment) by this hip clique who dragged themselves away from their mirrors for the evening to pose and fight and act like moronic animals that the Sunday papers always claimed they were. The total cost of the evening to Flackoff was approximately £75 in replacing equipment which they had borrowed and in repairing damages. (This does not include replacing their own equipment or record collection which was stolen.) As White Boss were prepared to share any profit made perhaps they would share any losses too?

Vocalist Stu Knapper of Coventry band Riot Act said of their ‘association’ with White Boss:¹⁰¹⁰

Interview with Stu Knapper of Riot Act on website sites.google.com/site/bandsfromcoventry/home

             There were a couple of right-wing NF bands doing the rounds in Coventry at the time. Without much support I might add! One of the bands was called White Boss, and had approached us to play a gig with them at some venue or other. We had of course declined their very kind invitation with a very firm “Fuck Off.” However, they went ahead and played the gig without incident. But to my surprise I walked into Virgin Records one afternoon and was confronted by John “Brad” Bradbury (Specials drummer) and some other faces on the scene at the time and questioned about my political beliefs. As you can understand I was very taken aback and before answering any questions I asked the reasoning for the questions. I was then shown a NF/right-wing magazine article claiming that the Riot Act ‘riot’ at the Heath Hotel had in fact happened at the White Boss gig, but the most galling thing of all was that they claimed that we had played and the riot had been between black and white youths. I was fucking furious!! When we had started the band we honestly had no political vision, we just wanted to write songs and play to anyone who would listen to us. We now had an issue that we had to resolve as none of us wanted the band tagged with an NF image.

White Boss produced one issue of a fanzine that ‘made an art form of photostatting.’

Like British News, Bulldog, the self-styled ‘Paper of the Young National Front,’ also started to carry a Rock Against Communism supplement, which was called RAC News. The Young National Front had been established in August 1977 and Bulldog had first appeared the following month as a duplicated news-sheet with Joe Pearce as the editor. The first supplement of RAC News, which appeared in issue number 14 of Bulldog, reads:

             For years White, British youths have had to put up with left-wing filth in rock music. They have had to put up with the anti-NF lies in the music papers. They have had commie organizations like Rock Against Racism trying to brainwash them. But now there is an anti-commie backlash! RAC is going to fight back against left-wingers and anti-British traitors in the music press. We hate the poseurs in RAR who are just using music to brainwash real rock fans. Rock Against Communism consists of skins, mods, punks and Teds, and not long-haired lefty poseurs. Over the next few months we are going to hold concerts, roadshows and tours. The message to the commie scum is clear. Rock Against Communism has arrived and Rock Against Communism is here to stay.

We Are NF booklet: Note the young skinheads.

National Front Ted with White Power badge, London 1980. (from the ‘We Are NF’ booklet)

RAC News also featured RAC bands (the Dentists from Leeds were the first to appear), an RAC track which could range from the alleged anti-communist poetry of ‘Red Is a Mean, Mean Colour’ by Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel to ‘Original Sin’ by Theatre of Hate, and the light-hearted RAC Bird. To be a RAC Bird, girls were encouraged to send in a photo along with their personal details. Joe Pearce got the idea from a picture of Julie, Eddy Morrison’s soon-to-be second wife, in the ‘We Are NF’ booklet. She also graced the pages of Bulldog as one of the first RAC birds. Rock Against Communism launched through Bulldog an official membership club and members received [or were due to receive] a free RAC badge and a quarterly magazine called Rocking the Reds, which was not available elsewhere.

‘Violence in our minds’

By now, left-wing and punk gigs in and around the capital often descended into violence at the hands of NF and BM skinheads. One punk fanzine even wrote of a ‘right-wing backlash against punks.’ Most notably, in October 1978, BM skinheads disrupted the Lurkers when they played Woolwich Polytechnic. Skinheads also disrupted a gig by Penetration [date unknown].

The violence continued into the following year. On 1^st June, skinheads smashed up a gig by Crass and the Satellites at Ealing Technical College, causing it to be aborted. One review of this gig concluded: ‘In 1977 we posed with swastikas to piss off the Second World War generation, and dabbled with violent shock-imagery. Now the swastikas are real and so is the violence.’

On 29 June, a RAR concert featuring Crisis and Beggar at West London’s Acklam Hall ended in chaos when skinheads stormed the venue.¹¹¹¹ The Jobs For Youth concert organised by the Socialist Youth with Misty In Roots and the Ruts in Gladstone Park, Brent was abandoned after one hundred skinheads stormed the stage and sieg-heiled at the crowd. Arguably, the violence came to a head at Sham 69’s ‘Last Stand’ at the Rainbow on Saturday 28 July. Val Hennessey, a reporter with The Guardian, went along to the gig with her teenage daughter and later wrote:¹²¹²

The NF also attempted to disrupt a RAR gig by Crisis in High Wycombe, date unknown.

The Guardian, 21 September 1979.

             Perhaps it was an unforgivable intrusion into her world but, being curious to obtain a wimp’s-eye view of gig-going, I chose SHAM 69’s farewell concert for my initiation.

                  In the ticket queue outside the Rainbow Theatre I was jostled by hundreds of bristle-headed, braces-wearing boys and girls whose ebullience boiled over spasmodically into jungle chants and a pounding of fists. Standing there in my T-shirt dress I felt more conspicuous than a hairy-legged woman in a Miss World contest.

                  A girl with a pink crew-cut nudged her friend on the shin with a laced-up boot and hissed: “What’s that nosey old bag staring at?” Feigning mateyness I offered them cigarettes. “Bit old, entcha?” observed pink crew-cut. Ankle-deep in beer cans, an army of thuggish youths, tattooed with swastikas, chanted: “There’s only one Hitler.” The girls explained: “That’s the British Movement mob. They’ve had it in for Sham ever since Jimmy joined Rock Against Racism.” I was feeling sick and definitely jumpy.

                  Jimmy Pursey leaps through swirls of dry ice and, in a voice like a pneumatic drill, howls about dead-end jobs and being united, until the fillings in your teeth rattle. A faction of BM toughs (exclusively male) form a procession, chanting, thumping and shouting Sieg Heil. By Sham’s fifth song they had clambered on stage and halted the show. In the ensuing imbroglio beer cans were hurled and bottles flung. A girl got a cigarette end in her eye, another had her glasses smashed. After 20 minutes the thugs caused Sham’s Last Stand to end and I felt sad for Jimmy Pursey, who attempted, in vain, to calm things down.

RAR issued a letter to everyone in the music business demanding action against the BM/NF. They even recommended the vetting of audiences at gigs! The exact timing of this letter is not known, but may have been issued in response to the first RAC concert in London.

The first London RAC concert

Rock Against Communism now started to turn its grandiose words into reality by holding a concert in the capital. On 11 August, Sounds reported: ‘BAD NEWS: Disgusting leaflet circulating London gigs suggesting that Skrewdriver have reformed to play gigs for Rock Against Communism — believed to be a National Front organisation. The first will be on August 18 ‘somewhere in London’ with the infamous Dentists and a band called White Boss. Meanwhile closer to home we hear that the Mods’ own Waterloo Wellington is in danger of becoming a British Movement venue with Leatherhead band The Head playing this Friday performing amusing ditties like “Hitler Was Right”.’

And so it came to pass that on Saturday, 18 August, with a helping hand from the Young National Front, Rock Against Communism managed to stage its first concert in London at Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, Holburn. The Dentists supplied by the Punk Front, and White Boss, who Joe Pearce had contacted direct and travelled to Coventry to audition for the concert, both played. Rugby band Column 88, who stressed they were a ‘totally non-political band’ although their name would suggest quite the opposite, had signed up to play the gig, but had pulled out after learning that they would be playing ‘for the cause.’¹³¹³ Skrewdriver, the defunct punk band which had turned skinhead, failed to show. White Boss provided the drum kit for the night. The back wall of the stage was adorned with a huge Rock Against Communism banner produced especially for the night. Paid for by the NF, the banner also carried a blue, white and red roundel, the RAC logo.

Interview with Column 88, Alternative Sounds #14, 1980. Column 88 was the name of a small and shadowy neo-Nazi paramilitary group.

The Punk Front was well represented at the gig by the likes of Eddy Morrison, Weasel and the Ventz/Tragic Minds, who had all made the long journey from Leeds to be there. Also in the audience were small firms of Chelsea and Leeds hooligans, who put away their football club rivalry for the night. The British Movement, whose agenda was openly national socialist, also made an appearance to support this purely NF venture. Only a handful of the 20 or so British Movement present were young skinheads, among them 19-year-old Paul ‘Charlie’ Sargent, Gary Hitchcock and Tony ‘Panther’ Cummins.¹⁴¹⁴ Hoxton Tom, the future bass player for the 4-Skins, was also at the concert but he was not a nationalist. Charlie Sargent liked punk music, which he got into years before at the age of 16 or 17. At the concert, the young BM skinheads drank with Weasel and his mate Plum of the Leeds Punk Front, who they had met at the nationalist rally at Diksmuide in Belgium. Weasel and Plum were a little older than the BM skinheads, but they got on quite well.

Steve Powers may have also been present.

Eddy Morrison’s overriding memory of the concert was the ‘sheer novelty of it all.’ One person who went along out of interest recalls: ‘White Boss were the best received of the two bands, having the most original songs.’ Fred Waite would later claim that he played with White Boss. This is not true. He was not in White Boss at the time and never even went to the concert. Charlie Sargent thought the Dentists and White Boss were not very good, but acknowledges the fact that this was the first time anything like this had been done before. He recalls the sight of carrier bags of smashed Skrewdriver records left outside the venue as a protest against the concert.¹⁵¹⁵

Ibid.

The following week, New Musical Express covered the concert and the RAR demo against it, but had very little to say about the actual concert after their reporter was recognised and ‘told to leave’:¹⁶¹⁶

Mark Ellen, New Musical Express, 25 August 1979.

The Dentists at the first RAC concert (from the ‘We Are NF’ booklet)

             THE RAR demo against the National Front’s ‘Rock Against Communism’ gig at Conway Hall on Saturday turned out to be a very temperate affair, due mainly to the strict precautions taken by the police.

                  Over 200 RAR supporters assembled at Russell Square tube station, to be met by two coaches containing at least 60 police. The march was led by a rented 3-ton truck flying the banner “We’re all your ‘Alien’ Kulture,” with the rock band Charge playing a short set on the back.¹⁷¹⁷ A brief meeting was held before the demonstrators dispersed. In his speech at the meeting, RAR picket organiser John Dennis claimed that when the NF issued leaflets a week ago advertising the gig, they never mentioned the venue as they were “shit-scared of RAR opposition. The NF,” continued Dennis, “are against rock music, in fact against everything we represent, and although we’ve only had three days warning, this demo has shown that the RAR will take a positive stand against further gig violence.”

RAR asked anarcho-punk Crass to play on a truck outside the RAC gig, but they refused to do so, explaining ‘if RAR feel that they have the right to promote their political ideology, they have no right to prevent others from promoting theirs.’

                  Your reporter, and photographer ‘Fearless’ Mike Laye, later attempted to gain entry to the Conway Hall gig and were actually halfway in before being recognised by NF organisers as members of the RAR rally. To the tune of “Oy, Red — Fuck Off!”, and various less subtle threats, we were forced to make a swift exit.

                  Those who did manage to get inside reported that there were upwards of 200 NF supporters and two bands — Homicide and White Boss — and that the atmosphere was ‘Manic,’ ‘utterly horrible,’ and that there was much chanting of ‘Right Wing pop songs.’ Later, a spokesman for the NF told Thrills that “the two Young NF organisers connected with that concert” (one of whom was Joe Pearce) “had no wish to talk to the New Musical Express.”

Homicide from Coventry did not play and were not a RAC band. There was no apology from New Musical Express though¹⁸¹⁸:

New Musical Express, 1 September 1979.

             Homicide, the group who were supposed to have played the Rock Against Communism tea party the other weekend, would like it to be known that they didn’t actually play, and had absolutely no intentions of doing so anyway. They were asked to play by NF organiser Joe Pearce, but refused when they discovered what the gig was promoting, though their names nonetheless appeared on the bill. “None of our lyrics have anything to do with right-wing politics,” complained guitarist Ian Marchant, to T-zers, “and we certainly didn’t play that gig.” Our reporter, unable to gain access, was led to assume they had played by various witnesses, who obviously haven’t learned to identify one white supremacist band from another yet…

And yet, months later, when anti-fascist magazine Searchlight reported on RAC and the Conway Hall concert, Homicide were once again tagged as a RAC band:¹⁹¹⁹

‘Head-banging for Hitler,’ Searchlight no. 51, October 1979.

             Rock Against Communism, the NF’s attempts to make fascism seem like fun (see Searchlight No. 44) had its first event in Conway Hall, London, on August 18th. A journalist from Sounds music paper described what she saw inside.

                  “There were about 150 youths — I say youths specifically because there were only about five women, including a couple of skins and a punkette in a Ramones T-shirt.

                  “The lads were mostly skins with steel toe-caps and braces fresh from seeing Chelsea draw 0–0 or burly-looking characters in NF T-shirts like mercenaries gone AWOL.”

                  She then got into conversation with Tony Williams, organiser of Ipswich NF branch, who told her, “The first time British men have ever been able to get together and enjoy themselves like this! It’s different from anything I’ve ever seen!” He explained that women were frightened of coming out politically because of social pressure to be feminine. “We do have some nice girls in the NF, but not enough,” he said. “I mean, look at that one (pointing to a skinhead girl), isn’t that the ugliest thing you’ve ever seen?” Outside there was an RAR picket and demonstration, led by a band on a lorry, and accompanied by large numbers of police. Joe Pearce, hand-picked YNF entrepreneur and editor of Bulldog, apparently has plans to set up the NF’s own record label and recording studio and to recruit bands to play the RAC circuit. Apart from the Dentists and White Boss, other groups known to be involved are Damaged, Phase One, Beyond the Implod, Homicide, the Raw Boys and Skrewdriver.

The Conway Hall concert was a stunning success for the far right, which had never held anything like it before. It brought RAC and the NF a lot of publicity. Under the headline ‘First RAC Concert — Huge success,’ British News reviewed the concert as follows²⁰²⁰:

British News no. 51, September 1979.

             On August 18^th over 300 youngsters packed a central London hall to hear the first Rock Against Communism concert. Two all-NF bands were playing — The Dentists from Leeds, and the Coventry-based band White Boss. Against a big Rock Against Communism backdrop hundreds of anti-communist youngsters danced, clapped and cheered as the bands exhorted them to free music from the domination of the left. Outside a Rock Against Racism flat wagon, full of SWP garbage, toured the area, blaring out its anti-British message until it had to stop at some traffic lights when local NF youths made them see the error of their ways in a straightforward sort of way!

The same issue of British News added: ‘A big expansion of the RAC is now planned — with another concert in October, backup leaflets, badges and stickers. British News also plans to launch a Rock Against Communism magazine, Fallout, as a subsidiary backup.’ Their big plans would come to nothing.

Elsewhere, reporting the concert as a major coup which hit the reds ‘right between the eyes,’ RAC News also proclaimed: ‘The first RAC concert, which was held in London recently, really rocked the music establishment. The music papers went mad when they realised that an anti-communist rock concert had been held… Rock Against Communism has really got the music establishment worried. They know that RAC is a movement of ordinary White rock fans, and they know that it is growing in support all the time!’

In reply, RAC News was definitely being economical with the truth. ‘Rock Against Communism’ was not yet a movement by the wildest stretch of the imagination. The Dentists and White Boss had nailed their colours to the mast of RAC, not so Homicide or DIY punk band Beyond the Implode (incorrectly named Beyond the Implod by Searchlight). Told of being named as a RAC band, Ian, the bassist in BTI, responded²¹²¹:

Research provided by CB.

             This is the first time I’ve heard any mention of a connection between BTI and any racist (or even non-racist) groups! Mike [BTI lead guitarist] had a friend called Tony Tobin whom he worked with who was a BNP supporter, but their friendship didn’t last long mainly because of his political beliefs — but it wouldn’t surprise me if Tobin was responsible in some way, he hated me cos I beat him up when I was nine (he was 11!).

                  Kev [BTI keyboardist] had a tendency towards violence and would start a fight just cos he didn’t like the look of someone, that’s all I mean when I say he was a bit of a fascist; he had no political connections that I knew of.

                  I hope I’m not getting drawn into any kind of political debate because I personally have no interest in politics and I am not by any means a racist — I’m OK with everyone that’s OK with me! There are a damn sight more white people I dislike than any other colours and my best friend is the child of Yugoslavian immigrants. So I think this is another classic example of don’t believe everything you read!

‘Violence grows’ and the end of RAC

On 8 September, violence erupted when Crass, Poison Girls and Dutch band the Rondos played Conway Hall in London’s Red Lion Square. The Guardian blamed the BM for starting the violence. The left blamed the NF. Crass blamed the SWP. Many eyewitness accounts exist of that confused and bloody night, but not one is from the NF/BM present. That is, until now. Mark from Leicester sets the record straight:

             Between 1976 and 1980 I used to go down from Leicester to London for meetings and marches with the NF and BM. I’d heard there was going to be trouble at the Conway Hall gig and travelled down to London from Leicester with several others. We didn’t have tickets and I was the only one who was really into the punk scene so our plan was to try and get into the gig or stay outside on the fringes and see what mischief we could get up to. Pubs around Conway Hall were filled and there was an atmosphere. You could smell the commies and they knew who we were. There were a hardcore of SWP who could and would fight, but by and large the commie only fought when they heavily outnumbered the opposition and that night was no exception. We had a few scuffles but never got into the hall, we met some people, passed on some details but to be honest the real punks didn’t want to know politics. I was 16, always mixing with people older than me, but most of them were never into the music scene, just the politics, so we ended up going from pub to pub to find friends and hit commies and had a good night. Much you hear about the Conway Hall gig has been exaggerated. A few NF/BM did get into the hall and there were some skirmishes inside. If you have ever fought in a packed indoor venue then you know how hard it is to hit and be hit, as the crowd takes over, and sways and blocks. The commies got a kicking outside the gig by either the NF/BM or the punks mainly because they didn’t want to get recruited. If anything we were considered more anti-establishment than the reds. They were right.

Not long after, Poison Girls had a gig in Stratford stopped by the BM. Crass complained: ‘It’s hard to understand why as Poison Girls have always, as we have, remained in a position of refusing to take sides in the present atmosphere of politics in music. They believe as we do that both the left and the right has exploited and misused the energy of music and made it into a political battlefield.’

Crass need not have worried about the threat posed by RAC which soon petered out, after failing to attract any kind of universal punk support. For White Boss, the Conway Hall concert was pretty much their last shout. The drummer left immediately afterwards, followed by the guitarist. The Dentists broke up some six months after the Conway Hall concert. Lead singer Mick Redshaw, who ‘was getting a lot of grief at work and under a lot of red pressure,’ suddenly stopped contacting Eddy Morrison and his fellow comrades in arms. Eddy Morrison has not seen Mick Redshaw since, even though they were once the best of friends. The Dentists had played no more than a total of ten gigs. If truth be told, Eddy Morrison was a bit relieved when the Punk Front quietly faded away: ‘It had been fun while it lasted, but punk was on its last legs with the Pistols breaking up and Sid dying plus I was weighed down with legal problems and still having to run the Front. By that time I had become Yorkshire Regional Organiser so it was a relief. It never formally ended, just fizzled out — like punk — in with a bang and out with a whimper (to quote John Cooper Clarke).’

Asked how he would like Punk Front to be remembered, Eddy Morrison replied: ‘As a child of its time and as a victory against the ANL and Rock Against Racism in that we recruited youngsters who might have otherwise gone to them and they were livid about it.’ Lastly, as for Skrewdriver who failed to show at the RAC concert in Holborn, a journalist from Melody Maker was told that the band had been forced to pull out ‘due to record company pressure.’ Skrewdriver vocalist Ian Stuart would later complain to Melody Maker, although he was not quite telling the whole truth: ‘The biased information that appeared recently in your paper, and which RAR seem to be responsible for, is false. The news that Skrewdriver is reforming to do NF gigs is complete and utter bullshit. I have no interest in politics and never have. I’ve also been told that RAR has solid links with the Anti-Nazi League, an organization who, it seems, are backed heavily by the Communist and Marxist parties, who in their own way are just as much of a threat to this country as the NF or BM. I’m at present forming a new band which is not called Skrewdriver, and don’t intend doing gigs for the RAR, NF or any other political organizations.’

Skrewdriver

The story of Skrewdriver is the story of Ian Stuart. Ian Stuart Donaldson was born on Sunday, 11 August 1957 in Victoria Hospital, Blackpool. His parents lived in a three-bedroom semi in Hawthorne Grove in the affluent market town of Poulton-le-Fylde, some ten kilometers from Blackpool town centre. His childhood was a happy one. In 1968 he attended Baines’ Grammar School in Poulton. Like most teenage boys, he was interested in girls, music and sports. One girl who caught his eye was Carol. The attraction proved to be mutual:

             I first met Don as most of us called him (or Stu as some people at the time called him) when I was 12 at Poulton Fair. He was with mutual acquaintances and even then he made a big impression on me as a large, well-padded, ‘comely’ youth with brown eyes. I remember him as doing most of the talking then too (later he was always ‘holding forth’ over one thing or another).

                  I was nearly 14 when I met him again. (I knew him longer than my first husband, Kevin McKay, the bass player for Skrewdriver, who I didn’t meet until I was 17.) He sent someone over to ask me out, which looking back was quite typical of him. I obviously said yes, and we met the evening after. I remember going to Preston shopping with him on our second ‘date.’ I went out with him six times in all and he finished with me all those six times, which doesn’t say much for my own pride or self-respect, I know, but I adored him, as lots of other people did. I scratched his name all over the library wooden table and my own school desk at Elmslie Girls School in Blackpool and many other places, I’m sure! The very last time I saw him, before he left for London again, he begged me to go back out with him and to leave Kevin, but by then I’d fallen for Kevin, though I do remember the pull he exerted.

                  He definitely had an aura about him — I remember just looking at him — I think I just liked to watch his lips move — I knew he was very opinionated on most things but he was so amusing and to me, attractive, that I didn’t care! Then later, when I was 17 and met Kevin, I remember that every time I saw Don (or Stu) he always seemed to have a group of youths with him who looked up to him and hung literally on his every word. He was also a hygiene fetishist — on our dates, sometimes he used to go home and brush his teeth (or so he said) and come back again. Though this sounds strange now, it didn’t seem so strange at the time as there were a number of lads (he probably influenced them, in retrospect) who were the same, including my sister’s ex and my ex, Kevin, who himself was a bit like Lady Macbeth, washing his hands all the time. The doctor told him he must stop!

Growing up, Ian Stuart was captivated by the music of his generation. An avid fan of rock music, he listened to the likes of the Who, Led Zeppelin, Free and especially the Rolling Stones, whose spirit of rebellion would later define Ian Stuart as a musician and also as a person.

Ian Suart had a life-changing moment one Saturday while watching local rock band Warlock play live. Thereafter, he knew he wanted to be in a band. Phil Walmsley, who played guitar for Warlock, recalls:

             ‘While the Warlock thing was falling apart I started knocking around with Don. He’d always wanted to be in a band but couldn’t find anybody to make it happen for him. Maybe that’s why he got friendly with me. I’m pretty sure it was his idea. He’d never been onstage, he was pretty shy, but he knew this was what he wanted to do.’

John ‘Grinny’ Grinton drummed for Warlock. Ian and Grinny had been friends since childhood. Ian asked Grinny to ask Phil Walmsley if he would teach him guitar. Phil Walmsley said of this: ‘I showed him a few simple chords on the guitar but it wasn’t really his thing.’ The demise of Warlock in late 1975 presented Ian Stuart with the perfect opportunity to get a band together. It was an opportunity he seized with both hands, recruiting Grinny, Phil Walmsley and the McKay twins. The band, which was named Tumbling Dice after a Rolling Stones song, started to rehearse at Ian’s dad’s factory every Saturday and Sunday afternoon. Grinny and Phil Walmsley were the only ones who had any experience. Walmsley remarked: ‘The McKay twins needed plenty of coaching on bass and guitar.’ By the end of 1975, with a line-up of Ian on vocals, Phil Walmsley on lead guitar, Sean McKay on guitar, Kevin McKay on bass and Grinny on drums, Tumbling Dice felt confident enough to perform in front of a crowd.

Belting out cover versions by their rock heroes, Tumbling Dice started to gig relentlessly, playing anywhere they possibly could: holiday camps, discos, talent competitions and social clubs. The band would eventually incorporate a number of their own songs into their set list of cover versions. Grinny, who was proving more and more unreliable, was sacked. He was replaced by a guy named Steve Gaulter, a friend of the band. The gigging continued almost straightaway. Grinny described what followed:²²²²

Interview with Grinny, Nihilism on the Prowl. Interestingly, when interviewed, Phil Walmsley made no mention of the record contract (Phil Walmsley interview #1). Also, no other source confirms the London record label interested in Tumbling Dice as Chiswick Records.

             Ian continued working hard for Tumbling Dice, rehearsing, sending tapes to record companies etc. He got them regular gigs on the Northern circuit with an agency. Finally, great joy, the chance of a record deal with Chiswick. Ian got the band together and proudly told them they had a record deal with Chiswick and would have to move to London. When the band heard this Sean said ‘I’m not moving to London, I’m going to University.’ Then Steve said he would not move because he had a job and a girlfriend. Ian went mad and broke up the band. Not much point having a band that does not want to leave home. Ian came round to my house the next day and said ‘Them wankers had a record deal would not move to London so I have broke up the band.’ Then he said to me ‘You would have gone, wouldn’t you?’ and I said ‘Yes, course I would.’

The demise of Tumbling Dice mattered not to Phil Walmsley who described Tumbling Dice as ‘a pretty poor rock band’ that ‘was going nowhere.’ Moreover, around the same time, members of Tumbling Dice had become caught up in the fallout of the punk rock explosion. Phil Walmsley recalls:²³²³

Phil Walmsley interview #2. According to Paul London, page 12, Nazi Rock Star, only Ian and Grinny ventured to the Lesser Free Trade Hall to see the Pistols play.

Don and I, and I think the McKay twins, were at the Pistols’ second gig at the Lesser Free Trade Hall, Manchester in July ’76. The experience that night was above all else the catalyst for what we did later. When I started at University in September ’76 a couple of guys who I met early on were really into the up-and-coming punk scene. It was with them that I started going over to Eric’s Club in Liverpool. We’d be there at every opportunity and Don would come over at weekends and sleep on my floor. I was the only one who had a car at the time so I had to drive everywhere. During Freshers’ week at Manchester University the Stranglers played at a dingy little club called the Squat. They caused quite a stir, they weren’t a punk band as such but they had the attitude. During this period we set about transforming what was left of Tumbling Dice into a serious punk band, convinced we could compete with the best.

Punk was new. Punk was exciting. Punk was youthful rebellion. Ian Stuart formed a new band playing ‘punkier stuff’ with Phil Walmsley on guitar, Kevin McKay on bass and Grinny on drums. Once again Ian Stuart started to learn to play the guitar, only this time he was more serious. After months of rehearsing, the band recorded a demo tape, which sounded rough and ready as Phil Walmsley explained: ‘We made the demo at Don’s dad’s factory in Blackpool, the acoustics were terrible, a great big draughty old warehouse, full of machinery. We didn’t have any decent recording equipment, we used Don’s music centre [combined turntable, tape deck, amp etc.] which had a microphone input, it was pretty dreadful but that’s all we had. We ran off a few copies and sent them out. This must have been about November ’76. We liked the New York Dolls sound. We covered “Pills” which was a regular part of our set all through 1977.’

Nevertheless, the demo piqued the interest of Chiswick Records based in London. Chiswick Records, a small independent label run by Ted Carroll and Roger Armstrong, already had the high-charged pub rock bands the Count Bishops, the Gorillas, and the 101’ers on its books. [Records by the likes of the Damned, Johnny Moped, Motörhead, and the Radio Stars would follow.] Roger Armstrong ventured up to Blackpool to see the band in action and was ‘really impressed.’ Chiswick Records were definitely interested. The band still had need of a name so Chiswick sent up a list of suggestions. Nervous Rex, proposed by Ted Carroll, was considered old-fashioned. Skrewdriver was chosen. To properly assess the band in advance of a contract, Chiswick booked studio time to record some demos at Riverside Studio in Hammersmith. Recognizing that Skrewdriver had potential, Chiswick offered them a recording contract for one single. Regarding the signing of Skrewdriver, Roger Armstrong recalls: ‘I think that the motivation for signing them [Skrewdriver] was a reaction against the studied arty side of the Pistols and the Clash as projected by Malcolm and Bernie. Here were real kids from the arsehole of nowhere and very angry at anything they felt like being angry at, but as out-of-town kids they were a bit in awe of it all. They were part of that second generation of punks inspired by the Pistols.’

In February 1977, Skrewdriver made their live debut, supporting Chiswick artist Little Bob Story at Manchester Polytechnic. Soon after [possibly March, even early April²⁴²⁴], the band headed back down to London to record their debut single with Roger Armstrong. The record label and the band had a difference of opinion about the songs that should appear on the single, as Phil Walmsley explained: ‘We’d done the demos from which they [Chiswick] chose ‘You’re So Dumb.’ We weren’t entirely convinced, we thought it was a bit too much of a thrash, but they were the guys in the know, and they paid the money.’

Music Week of 9 April reports that Skrewdriver have completed recording their debut single.

Once the single was recorded, Chiswick Records updated their record deal to two singles and an album, but the deal involved the band relocating to London. Only Phil Walmsley was hesitant. On April 9, Music Week reported that Chiswick Records had signed two new wave bands, Dublin-based the Radiators From Space and Skrewdriver, to ‘three-year worldwide contracts.’ Their signing represented a new move on the part of Chiswick Records. Ted Carroll explained: ‘We have searched further afield for fresh talent. This is because there are more major record company A&R men than punters in the Roxy Club these days, and the general vibe seems to be that if it moves and has a guitar round its neck, sign it. We felt the only thing to do was to look around outside London to uncover new talent and that is what we have done.’

Ironically, on Saturday, April 16, Skrewdriver played London for the first time, supporting Johnny Moped, at the legendary Roxy Club in Covent Garden. Drummer Grinny remembered this gig well:

             The day before the gig on a Friday I was at work as a sheet metal worker, when I cut my hand on a piece of metal. I had to go to the hospital and had four stitches put in the wound, which was across the palm of my right hand. As soon as I got home Ian came running round and said: ‘Shit, what have you done to your hand?’ I told him I’d cut it. He said: ‘We’ve got a gig tomorrow at the Roxy.’ I said: ‘Don’t worry, I’ll tape it up.’ So we hired a van, loaded it with equipment and off we went to London in good spirits. Trouble was, when we got to about 40 mph the drive shaft on the van started squeaking loudly so it drove us mad all the way there. The gig went well and I got my minute of fame by getting my picture in New Musical Express. The picture was taken in the grotty dressing room with me all sweaty and the drumstick taped into my hand. The picture had the headline ‘Whose Skrewing you, John?’

The gig was also reviewed by the influential punk fanzine Sniffin’ Glue, who, impressed by Skrewdriver, could not believe that ‘this was their second proper gig.’ Particular mention was made of Ian Stuart, ‘a stocky front man whose veins stand right out on his forehead — he puts that much into it…’

That May Chiswick arranged more gigs for Skrewdriver. The highlight for Grinny was a sort of mini-tour with the Damned:

             We did quite a few gigs with the Damned. They were on a much bigger tour and we were doing three dates with them in south London and then down to the coast. We did Hastings Pier Pavilion at the height of the summer and the place was full of deckchairs! [This was on Saturday, May 21. The other support band was the Adverts.] The last time I’d been there was on holiday with my parents when I was about 14 and they let me go and see Status Quo. The next time I was there we were playing! It was a huge pavilion and there could only have been about 200 people there, you could see that beyond about 20 rows of people it was just deckchairs. I used to love playing with the Damned, they were great, I think we got those gigs through Effie because of her friendship with Chris. I remember standing in the wings at one of their gigs and what Chris Miller used to do was he’d cover his drum skins with talcum powder and then the first beat at the start of the first number he’d just hit everything as quick as he could and he’d just disappear in a cloud of white dust, it was a great effect especially with a bright light behind.

On May 20, some four weeks after its scheduled release date, the debut single by Skrewdriver eventually emerged, featuring two raw punk blasts. The A-side of ‘You’re So Dumb,’ written by Ian Stuart, was anti-drugs, which ‘didn’t make us too popular in certain circles because it was quite ‘hip’ to take drugs and we were ‘thickoes’ from a northern town who were coming down south and slagging off something that was quite ‘hip’ to do,’ Stuart would later recall.²⁵²⁵ The B-side, ‘Better Off Crazy,’ was a songwriting collaboration between Ian Stuart and Phil Walmsley. The band was happy with the record, but it did attract some negative reviews. Cliff White wrote in the NME of June 19: ‘I have to admit that I haven’t the slightest idea what this raucous and distorted slab of nonsense is all about. I’m so dumb I’ve probably just praised it.’ Paul Simonon of the Clash said in Sounds of June 25: ‘If you were blitzed out of your mind you could probably tap your foot to it. Title’s really bad, too.’ Nevertheless, the first pressing of 1,000 copies, which comes in a green laminated picture sleeve, sold out. Repressed, the second pressing had the same artwork, but the picture sleeve was not laminated. Three weeks after the release of the single, Ted Carroll expressed his delight about the band and the single in Melody Maker: ‘Skrewdriver is a band we like. They have had no press coverage and it is not available in the bigger stores, but more than four thousand copies have already been sold.’ The single was reissued by Chiswick Records in a totally different orange sleeve in November 1977.

Pearce, The First Ten Years, Chapter 1.

On Monday, 23 May, Skrewdriver played the Rochester Castle in Stoke Newington. This was followed days later, on Friday, 27 May, by a support slot for the Movies at Dingwalls, Camden, which was reviewed in the NME of 11 June.

On May 31, Skrewdriver supported the Police at the Railway Hotel, Putney, forever remembered for the violence after the gig as Grinny recounts:

             All night at the gig people were talking about the Teds coming down from a nearby Ted gig featuring Shakin’ Steven & the Sunsets. Near the end of the night punks and the Police began to disappear rather quickly. We hung about packing away gear. We started loading the van up when we heard this noise, I looked up and there was this gang of about 20 Teds coming towards us shouting, ‘Get the bastards!’ I was at the back of the van, outside it with the back doors open. I thought, well, I’m not going to run, as I grabbed a cymbal stand and decided to battle it out. I saw one Ted approach and I swung the stand at him. I caught him somewhere high on the arm. But next thing I knew I was surrounded by Teds, one of them picked up a mic stand. It was one of those heavy ones with the cast iron feet and wham, straight in the mouth. I saw flashes and stars and ended on the floor in the middle of the road. My head was spinning and everything was going in and out of focus. I could not pick myself up. Next thing I remember was police and ambulance men picking me up and putting me in an ambulance. I was taken to Queen Mary Hospital in Roehampton where I had 36 stitches put in my mouth. Two of my teeth had been knocked straight out, never to be found again. Revenge came quickly, though not from me. I was patched up and leaving the hospital with Effie, our manager at the time, when I saw a Teddy Boy coming in on a stretcher with facial wounds. Apparently, after I had been taken to the hospital, the band all got back in the van, minus its windows. Kev was driving, Ian was next to him in front, then there was Phil and Kev’s brother Sean, who had come down from Blackpool to see the gig. As they were driving back Ian spotted a group of Teds walking on the pavement towards the van. He told Kev to get close to the pavement and then put his foot down. The van had sliding doors, so as they got near, Ian slid open the doors and went whack with a mic stand.

In June 1977, Skrewdriver relocated to London. On Saturday, June 4, Skrewdriver supported Chelsea at the Marquee Club in Wardour Street, where every major rock band of worth had played on the tiny stage. Phil Walmsley has fond memories of playing the Marquee: ‘The Marquee we did more than once, three times I think. I remember vividly doing the Marquee with Chelsea on the day England had played Scotland at Wembley, the place was full of football supporters and it was a really great night, we just couldn’t go wrong. I reckon we headlined there once and supported a couple of times, but it was the highlight of the whole thing for me. It was just such a nostalgic place, the dressing rooms hadn’t changed. They’d never painted it. It was just covered in graffiti. It was a real buzz to play there.’

On Thursday, June 9, Skrewdriver and Sham 69 played the Roxy Club. Both bands had started to attract a skinhead audience. Kevin McKay remembers:²⁶²⁶ ‘We attracted skinheads from Chelsea, West Ham and Arsenal and they all came to see us. Ian would go out fighting with them afterwards because he loved all that type of crap and all the fans loved him. So when we did a double headline gig at the Roxy with Sham 69 we played first. When they played, our skinhead fans were running on stage and booing them because Sham didn’t go out fighting with them. It was a bit sad really because it wasn’t about the music, it was just the fighting.’

Interview with Kevin McKay, The Roxy London WC2, Paul Marko, page 290.

On Saturday, 18 June, Skrewdriver supported the Cortinas at the Marquee, Wardour Street.

Violence also seemed to follow Skrewdriver. Admittedly some was of its own making. On the night of 30 June 1977 Skrewdriver supported 999 and the Boomtown Rats at the Music Machine, Camden. The Rats were poised for big things. Accounts differ of what befell vocalist Bob Geldof that night. According to Phil Walmsley:

             The violence was becoming a regular occurrence, Don [Ian Stuart] had started knocking around with a few people who were that way inclined. We played a gig with 999 at the Music Machine which was also the Boomtown Rats’ debut, we’d played a good set and so had 999, then Geldof came on with long hair and posing about like Jagger. Don was getting very angry and this guy took it upon himself to teach Geldof a lesson on Don’s behalf, or that’s how it was seen. He strode up onto the stage, walked straight up to Geldof and hit him hard, knocking him over, there was blood everywhere. He then just walked off the other side of the stage and wasn’t even thrown out. He came back and stood with us! Don was laughing and patting him on the back. I was very uncomfortable with this. I didn’t want any part of it. I think that was perhaps the start of it. The word got round that these people were acquaintances of ours, although in reality they were acquaintances of Don’s.

According to Kevin McKay:

             We went on and our sound was crap so our fans were really pissed off. 999’s was pretty good and then the Rats came on and theirs was fabulous. We had a fan called Vince (Boots) who was a bad lad and it was rumoured he was later put inside. He got a pint pot, the old type with the handle, and threw it as hard as he could at Bob Geldof. It missed him, hit the front of the stage and smashed. If it had hit him it would have killed him and there would have been no Live Aid or anything! So he walks through all the bouncers, up the steps onto the stage, gets hold of Bob Geldof and kicks the shit out of him. He’s got hold of him at the front of the stage and he’s hitting him in the face and all the bouncers are just too astonished to do anything. Then he throws him on the floor and walks back to us, then goes off to get a beer. Within minutes we are surrounded by bouncers, taken downstairs through the front, into the lobby. We walk up the stairs because we don’t want anything to do with it and then suddenly the bouncers produce coshes and start beating the shit out of some of our poor fans and Ian and Grinny. Last thing I see is Ian is outside and he’s trying to pick up a bike to throw it but it’s chained to some railings and the bouncers are coshing him over the head. He went to hospital I think with Grinny and some fans.

Elsewhere the assailant is identified as ‘Big Vince,’ a punk with a violent reputation.²⁷²⁷ Whatever the truth, Skrewdriver was definitely grabbing its fair share of the headlines, but violence attracted more of a violent audience.

Paul London, Nazi Rock Star, page 21.

More gigs followed in the month of July.²⁸²⁸ On Friday, July 1, Skrewdriver were bottom of the bill at the Roxy Club, supporting Wayne County & the Electric Chairs, Alternative TV and the Tones. On Friday, July 8, Skrewdriver headlined at the Roxy. Misfortune awaited the band at the end of the gig. Phil Walmsley explained: ‘All the gear had been taken out and loaded into the van. We’d locked up and gone back inside for a drink, and when we came out the van with all the gear was gone, never to be seen again. Chiswick had to buy us new gear, but there was a delay with the insurance money while the claim was verified. We had a series of gigs coming up so we had to go on the ‘scrounge’ and Effie [the band’s manager] knew Paul Weller’s Dad quite well. He was managing the Jam, and she arranged for me to borrow Paul’s gear for a week because they weren’t gigging at the time.’

Skrewdriver may have supported the Damned at the Marquee on 5 July. However, one source states the concert was cancelled. (www.whiterabbitskgs.co.uk)

On Tuesday, August 2, Skrewdriver supported Penetration and Generation X at the Vortex. On Saturday, 13 August, Skrewdriver supported Penetration and Cyanide at the Roxy Club.²⁹²⁹ The dates of many other gigs are not known (High Wycombe, Dunstable and Rebecca’s, Birmingham). Birmingham was a night Phil Walmsley would rather forget:

Unconfirmed, although Skrewdriver and Cyanide were advertised to play.

             That was a bad night because we had to come off. The crowd were all tabloid punks who thought it was cool to shower the artistes in saliva. Absolutely awful, it was like standing in a rainstorm, a horizontal rainstorm, we went on and it was just coming at us. After the first number we just stopped. The DJ said it had to stop or we wouldn’t be back, so we came back on and a bit later a fight broke out and they’d started spitting again, somebody threw a glass at the stage, so we had to go off again. The promoter called it off, we’d only done about four or five numbers, but that was it so we were back in the van to London. It was a pretty grim experience. We didn’t really venture anywhere north of Birmingham until later versions of the group. We were really concentrating on London.

By now, Ian Stuart had started to grow disillusioned with punk, which in his opinion had turned ‘a bit left-wing,’ remarking:³⁰³⁰ ‘Whereas before everyone came along and had a laugh and danced about, it got to the stage where it became high fashion and people would just stand there seeing who had the most drawing pins through their nose. When it got to that stage it got really silly.’

Interview, fanzine Last Chance no. 11.

In August 1977, Skrewdriver entered Riverside studio and recorded material for an LP and two singles, which was produced again by Roger Armstrong and engineered by Neil Richmond. Phil Walmsley remembers of the recording sessions: ‘We were back at Riverside and once again it was mainly at night, the engineer was a guy called Neil, good bloke, laid-back long-haired hippy type. He was very experienced which was just as well because we were complete novices in the studio. All the songs were written by Don and I, apart from the covers of course, but he wrote most of the lyrics. That’s an acoustic guitar on ‘Where’s it Gonna End,’ actually I think Don wrote that riff. The recording sessions were great… It was quite a time-consuming process. It would sometimes take several hours just to get the drum sound! We did a few guitar overdubs. Most of the vocals were double-tracked to give it more power which meant that Don had to sing the same vocal exactly the same twice.’

On September 9, Skrewdriver headlined the Roxy with support from the Wasps. On Sunday, 18 September, Skrewdriver supported the Motors at the Electric Circus in Manchester.

Soon after, at a photo shoot at Shepperton Studios, Surrey, ‘things came to a head’ between Ian Stuart and Phil Walmsley: ‘We were having a photo session, Roger Armstrong [of Chiswick Records] came in and said that the album was due out soon and we needed to sort out the publishing rights for royalties. Who wrote what? Don was adamant that I had not had a significant input to the songwriting, we argued about it and he turned to take a swipe at me which I dodged. That was the final straw as far I as was concerned — he wanted to go down the skinhead route, I was not happy about that at all. From his point of view I was going to stand in his way so I think he was looking for some way to get me out. The others had agreed to shave their heads, I was under serious pressure, their view was we were getting nowhere and this was our new direction. Don needed to create some sort of rift to get me out and he got what he wanted.’

Phil Walmsley quit the band. He was replaced by Ron Hartley, also from Poulton. ‘He looked the part; he had been a skinhead in the past and was quite happy to be one again.’ Regarding the new skinhead image of the band, ‘Grinny’ recalls, even if the time frame of events is disputable: ‘All of us had grown up with the skinhead, suedehead and bootboy fashions of the early 1970s. I decided in 1977 that I had always been happier with the skinhead thing than the punk thing. So I got my haircut, boots, Levi jeans and jacket and away I went. Later, when Ian saw me — this was the time between Phil leaving and Ronnie joining — he decided the band should become a skinhead band. Ian was always well into the skinhead thing, he loved the violence. Kev was not too keen, but went along with it.’

Kev’s girlfriend, Kathy, was actually more against the idea of his turning skinhead, commenting: ‘You look ridiculous.’ However, Skrewdriver did not look ridiculous to the skinheads who had already latched on to the band, including a certain Graham McPherson, better known as Suggs. Ian Stuart and Suggs became good friends and Ian got him a ‘job’ as a roadie for the band. The job did not pay, but did have its benefits: the young Suggs no longer had to pay to get into gigs!

Now, as a skinhead band, Skrewdriver attracted more and more skinheads. Many became friends with the band. Most were political, either National Front or British Movement. And still Ian Stuart took no interest in politics, even though he did not like the blacks he had met in London. ‘They all seemed to have a chip on their shoulder,’ he would later comment.³¹³¹ He did not like the lefties either. They reminded him of unpatriotic students. Anyway, despite some reservations about the band’s new image, Chiswick Records arranged a couple of high-profile nationwide tours with the Sammy Hagar Band and the Pat Travers Band.

Ibid.

October 1977 proved a most turbulent month. On October 7, some four months behind schedule, Chiswick Records released a new Skrewdriver single, a double A-side with ‘Anti-Social’ and a cover of the Rolling Stones’ ‘19^th Nervous Breakdown’ (catalogue number NS-18). Dedicated to the Teds, ‘Anti-Social’ was a marked improvement over the band’s previous vinyl effort, boasting an instantly catchy chorus, whereas ‘19^th Nervous Breakdown’ was particularly limp.

The new single met with mostly encouraging reviews. Peter Silverton wrote in Sounds of October 8: ‘This is stupid, crass, crude, maybe even half-witted, and I love it. It’s exactly what happens when rock ‘n’ roll is left in the hands of borstal fodder… How they manage to get away with singing ‘Breakdown’ which is about the kind of neurotic bitch they’d never get near even if they were rich and famous, is way beyond me. Raw punk with absolutely no redeeming features but guts, honesty and chutzpah.’ Ian Birch wrote in Melody Maker of October 8: ‘“Anti-Social” has a stirring chorus and is formularized football terrace drone. Their version of the Stones evergreen is a different matter; assured, uncluttered and exciting.’ Charles Murray said in the NME of October 15: ‘Ere, you lot: no Elvis, Beatles and Rolling Stones in 1977! If you’re going to take the Eternals on at one of their own songs you better be prepared to have more on the ball than this if you expect to get away with it. Nice try, but…’ The single sold some 14,000 copies in the UK in the first two weeks after release, which really does suggest that Skrewdriver had ‘hit back with the weapons of hard, pile driving rock.’ On Tuesday, October 18 Skrewdriver with Ron Hartley on guitar headlined the Vortex, which was packed wall to wall. The support bands were the Tickets, the Menace and the Mutations. In the audience were John Peel, the Who’s Keith Moon who was ‘quite a fan’ of the band, as well as representatives of the Sammy Hagar Band. Yes, it was a big night for the band. Predictably, violence erupted. It was some of the worst the band had experienced. This, of course, put paid to the tours with the Sammy Hagar Band and the Pat Travers Band. Nevertheless, the John Peel session went ahead as planned the next day.

Gary Hitchcock, who was among the first of the second generation of skinheads and a member of the British Movement, said of Skrewdriver and the gig at the Vortex:³²³² ‘Skrewdriver were the first real skinhead band. We met Ian Stuart at a Sham gig at the Roxy in ’77. He told us about Skrewdriver, said they weren’t like Sham, that they were skins, so we spread the word about and there was a massive turnout. Down the Vortex it was. We never knew there were so many skinheads around and they were all geezers. No one looked under 25, and they played all the skinhead reggae stuff that we hadn’t heard for years. It was great, ’cept when Skrewdriver came on everyone went mad, smashing things up. Then skins were banned from the Vortex, the Roxy, and the 100 Club and Skrewdriver got booted off the Pat Travers tour…’

Interview with Gary Hitchcock, Panther and Terry Madden, Sounds, date unknown. Name corrected.

Charlie Sargent was another skinhead and British Movement member who saw Skrewdriver and Sham 69 during the summer of 1977. Charlie Sargent had joined the BM in 1976. Only three skinheads had joined the BM before him and they were Gary Hodges, Gary Hitchcock and Steve Hamer, a trio who would later gain notoriety as members of the 4-Skins.³³³³ Charlie Sargent first met Ian Stuart at the Vortex, albeit briefly, and then again at the Roxy. Notably, Ian did not seem too interested in politics. ‘Grinny was the better one with us lot,’ he recalled years later.³⁴³⁴ The BM lot was mates with Kev Wells, who was a roadie for Sham 69. They went to see Sham 69 at Harlesden and Kingston, where it kicked off after they were tricked and locked in the foyer.

Gary Hitchcock would later admit to Sounds [date unknown]: ‘When we started it was really extreme to be NF. There was only a few of us who were BM. I used to think it was great. But the BM hated us and slung us out. They thought we were degenerates for going to gigs. I’m not political anymore.’ Panther, who went on to sing for the 4-Skins after the departure of Gary Hodges, was also joined BM.

Interview with Charlie Sargent, fanzine English Pride no. 1, 1992.

Charlie Sargent recalls the presence of fellow BM member Glen Bennett at both Sham gigs, as well as a young skinhead from North London nicknamed Suggs at the Kingston gig. Suggs’ best mate was Terry Madden, who also knew the BM lot. When Suggs became the lead singer for a group called the North London Invaders the BM lot went to see them at their first proper gig at the City and East London College. Suggs asked them to behave themselves, but it kicked off when an anti-NF film was shown. Gary Hodges threw a photocopier through a window and the hall was smashed up.

Through fighting the Teds, who were very much the enemy, Charlie Sargent got to know Martin Cross, a skinhead who was nicknamed Meathead. He was the Teds’ number one target! Martin Cross was NF, not BM.

On October 19 Skrewdriver recorded a John Peel session of four tracks at BBC’s Maida Vale studios: ‘Streetfight,’ ‘Unbeliever,’ ‘The Only One’ and a new version of ‘Anti-Social.’ Ian and the band were pleased with the output. The session was broadcasted on October 28.

In the aftermath of the Vortex gig and increasing evidence of skinheads’ involvement with the NF, the music press rounded on both Skrewdriver and Sham 69 to denounce the right-wing skinheads in their audience. Unlike Jimmy Pursey and Sham 69, Ian Stuart was not prepared to distance himself from his friends and his audience as a means of hitting the big time in the music industry:³⁵³⁵ ‘We refused and Sham 69 said okay. So Sham 69 became very big and we got banned from everywhere. They banned all of our adverts from the music papers and everything. All this was in 1977.’

Ibid.

Sham 69 did go on to enjoy commercial success, but its skinhead audience never forgave the band for this act of betrayal. BM skinhead Gary Hitchcock said of this: ‘Sham 69 were the first band we followed.… But he [Pursey] used us. He dressed like us and encouraged us to come but as soon he started getting famous he didn’t wanna know. He started slagging us off in the music press.’³⁶³⁶ Gigs were plagued by violence. Sham 69 also went on to play the 1978 Rock Against Racism Carnival 2 in Brockwell Park, Brixton, which clearly stated their intent. Curiously, rather than avoid confrontation, Jimmy Pursey actually welcomed NF skinheads to his gigs in order to win them around by argument. He had created a monster he could not control.

Sounds interview with Gary Hitchcock, Panther and Terry Madden, date unknown.

With the music press growing increasingly hostile, Skrewdriver faced an uphill battle when, on November 18, Chiswick released their album All Skrewed Up. The album was housed in a picture cover printed in four different colours, yellow, green, orange and pink. Featuring 13 tracks, 12 original compositions and one cover version, the Who’s ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again,’ the album played at 45 rpm for a running time of just 26 minutes. The band had different views about the finished product. Even though Ron Hartley appears on the cover, Phil Walmsley is credited and thanked. For Phil Walmsley, the record had its flaws: ‘As a package it was a bit of a novelty record, it spun at 45 rpm and lasted 26 minutes. Some of the tracks were quite good, I’m quite happy with the part I played bearing in mind the limitations of the time, but some of the lyrics are a bit trite. I don’t think we got involved enough in the mixing, the bass sound isn’t good, some of the tracks are just not charged, not angry enough. Actually the earlier session for the single produced a much more powerful sound.’

Grinny, however, was much more vocal: ‘All of the band thought that All Skrewed Up could have been done better. It was commonly thought that Chiswick always did things on the cheap as far as recording, advertising, etc. went. The album was recorded over a few days. It is virtually live. There were just a few overdubs on vocals and guitar. Trouble was all the tracks were over in two–three minutes. I’m no technician. I don’t know why the album came out at 45 rpm. The songs on it were what we played live, so it was a good representation of the band. But we all felt the sound was a little tinny… When All Skrewed Up came out Chiswick only pressed a few hundred copies to put in shops. They sold well and ran out, and we had to wait for more copies. By that time we had lost momentum.’

Nevertheless, All Skrewed Up received some decent write-ups. In his review for Sounds, Mick Hall may have mocked the band with the headline ‘Skroodrivaa: awl thai need iza brane’ and been less than complimentary when he wrote: ‘Their choice of material though on all accounts is almost completely uninspiring. Sincere and honest they probably are. The writers of great songs they definitely are not.’ But he went on to say: ‘There is no doubt in my mind whatsoever that Ian, Ron, Kev and Grinny rightly deserve their place up there alongside their contemporaries as far as sheer rockability is concerned’ and ‘there is no way Skrewdriver can be written off yet.’

Roy Carr, writing for the New Musical Express, praised the band, Ian in particular, but was not so forthcoming about the songs: ‘Skrewdriver don’t need to warm up other people’s leftovers because in singer Ian, these Blackpool boot-boys have (potentially) one of the best gravel-throated vocalists to emerge this year, whilst Ron (guitar), Kev (bass) and Grinny (drums) give the listener the distinct impression that they would be better deployed on more adventurous chords and rhythms.’ Again Skrewdriver had delivered the goods and the album sold well, but Chiswick Records had started to get cold feet about the band they had once proudly championed. Yes, they were concerned about the violence at Skrewdriver gigs, but for Roger Armstrong the fun had also gone out of punk, explaining: ‘The whole punk thing in general was disintegrating a bit by then and the cliquey scene that had started in ’76 had fallen apart.’ To let things blow over, Ted Carroll suggested that the band get away from London. They returned home.

Unlike the year of 1977, the years 1978–79 are not particularly well documented.³⁷³⁷ Little more was heard from Skrewdriver until March ’78 when Ian Stuart wrote an open letter to the New Musical Express:³⁸³⁸ ‘I am writing this letter to put a few things straight. Number one is that Skrewdriver are no longer a skinhead band due to the increasing violence at our gigs. We also realise that as a skinhead band our gig schedule would almost be non-existent due to the skinhead’s violent image.’

What follows is based on numerous titbits of information, some of which appear contradictory: interviews with Grinny and Phil Walmsley, concert adverts for the Mayflower Club, the NME review of 9/9/1978, Ian Stuart’s letter to the NME of 18/3/1978…

New Musical Express, 18 March 1978.

Ian Stuart then went on to complain about Jimmy Pursey: ‘Another matter I would like to bring up is the fact that I keep reading about Jimmy Pursey telling everyone who wants a fight to go to our gigs. Skrewdriver would very much appreciate it if Pursey would keep the problems in his audiences to himself. We have got enough of our own. If he cannot control certain sections of his audience that’s tough, and don’t load those problems onto someone else, especially us.’

That same month Chiswick Records pulled the plug on Skrewdriver’s third single (with catalogue number NS-28), which would have featured ‘Streetfight’ and ‘Unbeliever.’ However, a few acetates of this single do exist. Reasons for the cancellation of the single differ. According to one source,³⁹³⁹ the single was cancelled ‘as the band announced in late February their decision to break up after Stuart was seriously wounded outside a Fairport Convention gig in Blackpool.’ Even if this is true, Skrewdriver were very much a going concern soon after and Phil Walmsley was back in the band. Phil Walmsley remembers:

45 Revolutions 1976–1979, Panciera, 2007, page 637.

             Don and Kev came back to Manchester at some point around January ’78. I think the band only limped on for a couple more months after I left. Don ended up at the flat Mark [Radcliffe] and I rented for quite a while, he was still a skinhead which made things a bit awkward at times. He was as nice as could be because he needed us now. We started going to gigs, he still had the Chiswick contract, he wanted to get something together so he found this guy from Oldham, a sort of entertainments agent, who persuaded us to reform but with Ron on guitar and me on bass. We needed a drummer so Mark was asked and he agreed. Very quickly the agent got us a headline gig at a festival at Groningen in Holland. The week before the Vibrators had headlined and the week after it was Lindisfarne!! We ‘borrowed’ Grinny’s drum kit out of his garage while he was away and began a week of rehearsal in a church hall in Poulton. We had a couple of guys with a big Mercedes van and a great PA to do the sound for us over in Holland. Apparently they used to be the singer and drummer out of Shabby Tiger, a ’70s glam rock band. Anyway it poured down all weekend, it was badly organised, it ran late, and we were blown away by some band from Newcastle. By the time we went on the weather was awful, the sound was dire and people were drifting away. On the way back our agent was stopped at customs and we never saw him again; the main problem was he had all the money. The two lads out of Shabby Tiger were not happy, they just took us to the M6 and dropped us off at the first service station. We had to hitch back.

On Saturday, 5 August, Skrewdriver played AJ’s, High Street, Lincoln. Chiswick booked Skrewdriver a nationwide tour with 32 dates, but again the band found itself shrouded in controversy. Because of the band’s earlier skinhead and violent image, venue after venue closed its doors to the band. With 15 dates wiped off the tour, Ian Stuart complained in the local press: ‘I think it is very unfair that we are branded as a certain type of band just because of an image that was wrong in the first place and is certainly not true of the band as it stands at the moment.’

To play the remaining dates of the tour, Skrewdriver teamed up with punk band Bitch who were led by peroxide girl vocalist Sharon ‘Charlie’ Green, with ex-Drones guitarist Gus Gangrene a.k.a. Gary Callender, Glenn Jones also on guitar, a guy called Gabby Gowen on bass, and Martin Smith on drums. Phil Walmsley recalls two of these gigs in particular:⁴⁰⁴⁰

The author has assumed that the two gigs in question were part of the original tour.

             At the Mayflower in Manchester I cut my left hand quite badly on a broken glass after fooling around with Gus/Gary backstage. There was blood everywhere, I should have been stitched really, but we were due on in ten minutes, so I bandaged it with a towel and went on and played. We did a gig at Sutton in Ashfield which the so-called promoter had failed to advertise and nobody turned up. He paid us in beer and we all got absolutely hammered. At the end of the night we all jammed together, Don with Glenn and Gus both of Bitch on guitars, me on bass, along with the Bitch drummer. The police turned up because of the noise and asked who was driving the van, which was a good question as most of us were incapable of even standing up. They drove us and the van to the nearest lay-by outside their jurisdiction and told us to stay there until the morning. Mark [Radcliffe] and I had had enough by then and quit soon after.

Hartley left soon after. On 19 August, Sounds reported: ‘Skrewdriver have been hit by a bout of anti-skinhead hysteria. Of their planned 32-date tour only nine dates remain and all six of their London dates, including the Hope and Anchor and the Rochester Castle, have been cancelled. Skrewdriver’s manager claimed: ‘No one will touch us because of our skinhead reputation. Skrewdriver’s remaining dates are Nottingham Sandpiper Club 22 Aug, Leeds Fford Green Hotel 24, Lincoln AJ’s Club 26, Kirkcaldy Station Hotel 27, Oldham Tower Club September 2, and Aberdeen Ruffles Club 6.’

Skrewdriver and Bitch did play Fforde Green, Leeds on Thursday, August 24. The concert was reviewed by Emma Ruth for the NME [which appeared in print on September 9]. Interestingly, she made mention of a Skrewdriver line-up which included Glenn Jones on lead guitar and Gary Callender on rhythm guitar.⁴¹⁴¹ Her review was damning: ‘Very definitely a band which won’t be playing the Fforde Green in a hurry again, Skrewdriver could use some lessons in integrity and commitment — if they have had a rough deal, this was no way for the new line-up to put the record straight.’ The author does not know if the remaining dates were played, but Bitch was advertised as support at Lincoln. Ian Stuart was not deterred from continuing in music. Phil Walmsley recalls of what happened next:

This suggests that Phil Walmsley, Mark Radcliffe and Ron Hartley had quit the band while on tour or Skrewdriver had toured with a new line-up including both guitarists from Bitch.

             Don ended up living at Sean McKay’s student house in Salford. He decided it was time for a change again and that the music scene needed a good rock band! He rang me up and was so enthusiastic and persuasive that I went along with it. Grinny was back on drums, Kev McKay was on bass, I was on guitar and Chris Cummings also joined on guitar. I remember going round to Chris’ house in Blackpool with Don, we persuaded him to quit his job and join the band! I think we did about three gigs, the most memorable one being the support slot with Motörhead at King George’s Hall in Blackburn [on 24 September 1978]. Not long into the gig Lemmy somehow broke his bass and borrowed Kev’s. He practically wrecked that too — it was a sorry sight at the end, covered in deep scratches from the bullet belt he always wore. We were pretty dreadful really. The material was crap, mainly new stuff that Don had written, plus a few leftovers from earlier times, anything that could be done in a rock vein. It all fell apart very soon.

Undoubtedly the support slot with Motörhead came courtesy of Chiswick Records.

Ian Stuart soldiered on. He formed yet another incarnation of Skrewdriver, comprising McKay, plus three former members of the band Bitch: Glenn Jones on lead guitar, Martin Smith on drums, and Gary Callender on rhythm guitar. The sound of the band now progressed (although some might be tempted to say regressed) from punk to rock. This was the influence of Jones. Stuart explained: ‘Glenn was a brilliant guitarist, he really was good. He would have been wasted on doing punk music.’

The new-look Skrewdriver gigged in and around Manchester, playing the Mayflower Club on Saturday, 28 October as support to the Lurkers and the same venue again as the headline act on Friday, 10 November supported by Bitch. Then the band started to venture further afield. On Saturday, 2 December, they played Clouds, Edinburgh. On Thursday, 28 December, they supported mod band Beggar at the Palace in Mountain Ash, a small town in South Wales.

Things started to look up for the band when they signed a recording contract with independent Manchester label TJM [Tony Johnson Music], which had previously released records by local punk groups such as the Distractions and Slaughter and the Dogs.

In February 1979, TJM released the Skrewdriver ‘Built Up Knocked Down’ 7″, featuring three songs recorded two months earlier at Smile Studios with Steve Fowley co-producing. The A-side, ‘Built Up Knocked Down’ written by Ian Stewart [sic], is a rock ballad, complete with lengthy guitar solos courtesy of Jones, whose contribution Stuart described as amazing. Lyrically, the title track recounts Stuart’s experience of the music business, which had built up and then knocked down Skrewdriver. The two cuts on the B-side are punkier, just. ‘A Case of Pride’ is a tale of someone leaving home, ending up with no money, living rough, but too proud to go back home and admit failure:

                  You’re wondering how you’ll make it through the day

                  Pack your bag and then you’ll get up on your way

                  Once you had the money baby, and you didn’t have to steal

                  You’re a case of pride and I know just how you feel

                  You can’t go home cos they’ll see that you have failed

                  Can’t afford much food and you’re looking pale

                  Once you had so many true ambitions in your head

                  Now you sleep in a railway arch but you can’t afford no bed

                  Once they told you about the things that they’d achieved

                  Made you feel so useless that you had to leave

Curiously, the bitter lyrical content of ‘A Case of Pride’ is in stark contrast to the optimistic even romantic ‘Breakout,’ written by guitarist Jones, about a budding musician who breaks out of his mundane life and surroundings by moving to London to seek fame and fortune. Ignored by the music press, the ‘Built Up Knocked Down’ EP sold poorly. Again success had eluded Ian Stuart, who decided to disband the band and return to Blackpool where he joined the National Front. By his own admission, when he joined he was ‘like a little right-wing Tory.’⁴²⁴² He devoted himself to the National Front, becoming the local YNF organiser for the Blackpool and Fylde branch in Lancashire.

Interview with Ian Stuart, fanzine English Rose, 1987.

With music still running through his blood, Ian Stuart went to see local new wave band Section 25 play the Imperial Ballroom, Blackpool in June 1979. Vincent Cassidy of Section 25 reveals:⁴³⁴³ ‘Our first Imperial [Ballroom] gig, playing for the Blackpool Sixth Form College Dance. Ian Donaldson, the singer of Screwdriver [sic], came up to us after our show and told us ‘You need to rehearse more.’ I later helped them out by drumming for Screwdriver at a few rehearsals. Ron Hartley, one-time Screwdriver guitarist, also auditioned for same position in S25 but was turned down.’

www.section25.com/25concerts.html

Fed up with life in Blackpool, Ian Stuart returned to London. Hanging around with people from the National Front, he met Bulldog editor Joe Pearce, who convinced him to reform Skrewdriver and join the newly launched Rock Against Communism. As already stated, Skrewdriver failed to show at the RAC concert in Holborn. Soon after, Ian Stuart formed a new band called the Manor Park Royals, featuring a certain drummer by the name of Glen Bennett, a member of the Leader Guard of the British Movement who had briefly played with the Afflicted, a punk band with a right-wing following. Glen Bennett is also remembered for battering Sid Vicious once at the Roxy Club. The following week he got into a fight with John Harding, igniting the rivalry between East and West London skinheads to a new level. The Manor Park Royals proved short-lived.

The paths of Charlie Sargent and Ian Stuart crossed again in the front bar of the Dublin Castle in Camden where Madness was playing and Ian was doing some roadie work for the band. Ian and lead singer Suggs were good friends. Charlie Sargent was in the company of fellow British Movement skinheads and a couple of Arsenal hooligans. This was the first time Charlie Sargent had a really good chat with Ian and marked the start of their friendship. Later that night, the BM skinheads and hooligans badly beat up a punk selling weed. Ian Stuart was with them, but did not get involved; he just looked on from across the road.

1. Memoirs of a Street Soldier, Eddy Morrison.

2. New Musical Express, 17 June 1978.

3. British News had actually started life in 1974 in support of the British National Party. When Morrison wound up the BNP in late 1977 British News continued as an ‘independent paper which gives its support to the National Front — the biggest White Nationalist movement in the world.’

4. Searchlight #44, February 1979.

5. Ibid.

6. The date of this gig is not known for certain, but five local bands did play the ‘F’ Club on 21 December 1978. The Ventz may have also played.

7. Temporary Hoardings no. 8, article by Paul Furness, 1979.

8. Rock Against Cretinism, article by Gary Bushell, 1979.

9. RAC News, Bulldog no. 14.

10. Interview with Stu Knapper of Riot Act on website sites.google.com/site/bandsfromcoventry/home

11. The NF also attempted to disrupt a RAR gig by Crisis in High Wycombe, date unknown.

12. The Guardian, 21 September 1979.

13. Interview with Column 88, Alternative Sounds #14, 1980. Column 88 was the name of a small and shadowy neo-Nazi paramilitary group.

14. Steve Powers may have also been present.

15. Ibid.

16. Mark Ellen, New Musical Express, 25 August 1979.

17. RAR asked anarcho-punk Crass to play on a truck outside the RAC gig, but they refused to do so, explaining ‘if RAR feel that they have the right to promote their political ideology, they have no right to prevent others from promoting theirs.’

18. New Musical Express, 1 September 1979.

19. ‘Head-banging for Hitler,’ Searchlight no. 51, October 1979.

20. British News no. 51, September 1979.

21. Research provided by CB.

22. Interview with Grinny, Nihilism on the Prowl. Interestingly, when interviewed, Phil Walmsley made no mention of the record contract (Phil Walmsley interview #1). Also, no other source confirms the London record label interested in Tumbling Dice as Chiswick Records.

23. Phil Walmsley interview #2. According to Paul London, page 12, Nazi Rock Star, only Ian and Grinny ventured to the Lesser Free Trade Hall to see the Pistols play.

24. Music Week of 9 April reports that Skrewdriver have completed recording their debut single.

25. Pearce, The First Ten Years, Chapter 1.

26. Interview with Kevin McKay, The Roxy London WC2, Paul Marko, page 290.

27. Paul London, Nazi Rock Star, page 21.

28. Skrewdriver may have supported the Damned at the Marquee on 5 July. However, one source states the concert was cancelled. (www.whiterabbitskgs.co.uk)

29. Unconfirmed, although Skrewdriver and Cyanide were advertised to play.

30. Interview, fanzine Last Chance no. 11.

31. Ibid.

32. Interview with Gary Hitchcock, Panther and Terry Madden, Sounds, date unknown. Name corrected.

33. Gary Hitchcock would later admit to Sounds [date unknown]: ‘When we started it was really extreme to be NF. There was only a few of us who were BM. I used to think it was great. But the BM hated us and slung us out. They thought we were degenerates for going to gigs. I’m not political anymore.’ Panther, who went on to sing for the 4-Skins after the departure of Gary Hodges, was also joined BM.

34. Interview with Charlie Sargent, fanzine English Pride no. 1, 1992.

35. Ibid.

36. Sounds interview with Gary Hitchcock, Panther and Terry Madden, date unknown.

37. What follows is based on numerous titbits of information, some of which appear contradictory: interviews with Grinny and Phil Walmsley, concert adverts for the Mayflower Club, the NME review of 9/9/1978, Ian Stuart’s letter to the NME of 18/3/1978…

38. New Musical Express, 18 March 1978.

39. 45 Revolutions 1976–1979, Panciera, 2007, page 637.

40. The author has assumed that the two gigs in question were part of the original tour.

41. This suggests that Phil Walmsley, Mark Radcliffe and Ron Hartley had quit the band while on tour or Skrewdriver had toured with a new line-up including both guitarists from Bitch.

42. Interview with Ian Stuart, fanzine English Rose, 1987.

43. www.section25.com/25concerts.html