CHAPTER THREE
THE BUTTON-DOWN TYPES
‘In this country working-class people don’t take things from the middle classes, they take it from America and then they twist it round. Which is why no one can work out where The Look originates from.’
James Ferguson – illustrator
* * *
MODERNISTS DON’T DIE. They just give themselves away to the new when they feel too old. It was their younger brothers and sisters who carried on the tradition. In the mid-’60s, if you were young and working-class, you were either a Mod or you were a nobody. And it was from this period that a new youth cult – sharp and uncompromising – would have its genesis. For three years it had no name, but what this generation signified – consciously or not – was a total rejection of the unstyled masses brawling on the beaches and a true return to the Mod principles of exclusivity and secrecy.
The most striking element of this new leaner look was the cropped haircut, taken from the American GI and deliberately used to shock, subvert and frighten. Not only did this severe cut succeed in its mission but it also served a dual purpose by uniting the differing clothing styles that were now appearing all over the capital. For example, in west London – Acton, Chiswick and stretching out to Harrow in the North-west – the Mods favoured the Ivy League style. There are reasons enough for this choice but one of them was the close proximity of the Ivy Shop in Richmond, which specialised in imported American clothing.
Moving across London and into the inner city areas, the style differed. It was here that the Rude Boy look, which had emanated from Jamaica and was based on the Ivy League look, now asserted itself as second-generation Caribbeans moved deeper into British society. For the very first time, West Indian fashion would play a major part in influencing young British street fashion. Braces, pork-pie hats and the return of the Crombie coat, were some of the clothing items that were taken from the Rude Boy by his white counterpart.
In tandem with this increased influence, Jamaican music now came into its own through the success of performers such as Prince Buster. By slowing down its frenetic beat, ska had now transformed itself into rock steady and with labels such as Stax, Atlantic and Motown still operating at the height of their powers, this musical mix – reggae got soul! – became the soundtrack for the new breed.
In 1967, many teenage wardrobes consisted of – amongst other items – Ben Sherman shirts, Fred Perry tops, Dormeuil Tonik suits, Levi jeans, red socks, loafer shoes. But it was the adoption of the closely cropped haircut – triggering a series of nicknames such as peanut, baldhead, boiled egg, which echoed down London’s streets – that unified the participants. It was only when the Daily Mirror newspaper used the word Skinhead, on 3 September, 1969, in an article headlined, ‘No Love From Johnny’, did this movement finally find itself christened. By then, however, the smartness of the original look had been usurped for a much more functional and populist style that consisted of boots, braces, button-down shirts and Harrington jackets. As with the Modernist movement of the early ’60s, the media had picked up on the tail-end of the movement. The result was that the extreme care and style that had gone into the making of the Skinhead was crucially missed in favour of lurid stories concerning violence, racist behaviour and outright thuggery.
Just as the original Mods were destined to be remembered by spurious Bank Holiday anniversaries, so the Skinhead has been commemorated for his anger rather than his original, exquisite style.
* * *
‘I was walking along Great Yarmouth going to see a band and I said to my mates, “Look at these Mods here, they’ve all got their hair very short now.” That was in July 1967. They’d cut their hair very close, like a neater Mod not a Skinhead cut as you might know it. I remember saying, “This is a different kind of Mod.” And it was moving in. But the funny thing about the Skinheads was that they didn’t like rock’n’roll music. You had the people that were Mods and grew their hair and turned into hippies. And the ones that didn’t want to do that turned Skinhead and went into reggae.’
Jesse Hector – musician
‘The influence came from west London. I remember I went on holiday and I met a girl from south-east London and I don’t think it was strong over there as it was over west London. I am pretty sure it was more west. That said, there weren’t that many pukka Skinheads in Harrow where I lived. It was more a thing with the blokes from Acton, Ealing, Chiswick and possibly a few in Wealdstone.
‘See, I always said Skinheads were Mods. The papers gave them the name Skinheads but in my heart they were Mods. Mods had different styles. Regency style, this style, that style. This was another style. Now don’t forget, just before the changeover, the Mods were wearing bomber jackets with elastic collars and they had college-boy haircuts which isn’t far off the Skinhead. The start of it was geezers wearing Cherry Red boots. So the bomber jacket became a Harrington, the jeans stayed the same or some went onto Sta-prest. I remember the ones that liked the rucking had the bomber jackets on and the boots. It was rucking gear that they felt comfortable in. But the original Skinheads wore American clothes. Right from the beginning, it was all American clothes, trying to look like Yanks.
‘I was sixteen at the time. Then the next thing I noticed was that it started changing from the mohair – which they got from the Mod. I think a lot of the clothes came from the Mods. If you look at the Mod clothes, they might not have been wearing Sta-prest but they were wearing different coloured slacks and that was what Sta-prest were.’
Terry Wheeler – fashion consultant
* * *
According to musician Kevin Rowland’s essay, ‘1969 and what the Media called the Skinheads’, the style came directly from Mod culture. He recalls the phrase, ‘Top Mod’ often being employed as a compliment. He recalls the Mods in his area of Harrow sporting items such as long gabardine, single-breasted, fly-fronted raincoats, V-neck lambswool sweaters, parallel trousers with pleats, MA flying jackets with elasticated cuffs and collar, Levi 501 jeans, made to measure suit jackets with three buttons, single vented, waisted with not only a breast pocket but three other pockets with sloping flaps. In terms of hairstyles, the college boy haircut was easily the most prevalent.
The popularity of this look signalled a decline in Europe’s fashion influence and another surge in popularity for the evergreen Ivy League look. Another major American influence was the military look. This sharp style had fascinated so many British people when they were exposed to it, either on their own streets or in flickering, darkened cinemas.
* * *
‘There was a film called Countdown that came out in about 1967. It was one of Robert Duvall’s first films and James Caan’s as well. It was about astronauts and they dressed in white button-down collar shirts, trousers that looked like Sta-prest and they had haircuts which anyone English would recognise as a pure Skinhead cut.’
George Georgiou – interior designer
‘A mate of mine at school said he had bought this LP at the weekend just for the cover. It was a photograph of Frank Sinatra with a slim-brim pork-pie hat, worn at an angle, a button-down shirt with the top button undone, a tie and a suit. We didn’t care about the music, just the way he looked. We thought, yes. Another one was Lee Marvin in the film Point Blank wearing a suit and Royals.’
James Ferguson
* * *
A massive American base, located on the outskirts of west London in Ruislip, was undoubtedly a contributory factor to the fashion shapes of west London. But if anyone was responsible for the ongoing popularisation of American clothing in Britain from the mid-’60s onwards, it was the clothes proprietor John Simon. In 1965, he and his business partner, Jeff Kwintner, opened the Ivy Shop in Richmond. It is a name that will resonate for many. The shop was a massive underground success but not in the way that its owners had first envisaged. John Simon was an East End child who fell in love with clothes at a very early age. Initially, American clothing dazzled him. Then it became his inspiration and driving force.
* * *
‘During the war, the GIs based here were really glamorous to us and that’s because their uniforms were made out of gabardine whilst the British troops all wore heavy shapeless woollen clothes. So of course the Americans looked so much smarter with their polished shoes and well-cut trousers. I remember as a kid in the East End, we would go up to the GIs and say, “Got any gum, chum?”’
John Simon
* * *
Setting out on his own in the ’60s, Simon’s vision was simple. He wanted to popularise the Ivy League look in Britain. He loved The Look and like all obsessives he wanted to share his passion with the rest of the country.
* * *
‘In 1960 there were not that many shops selling American clothing. There was David’s on Charing Cross Road which was an important shop. They had been selling USA clothing since the late ’40s. They based their look on a 1930s American shop. It was full of green marble and chrome and had an art deco look. They sold Lion of Troy shirts and Pendletons which are shirts made of pure wool. Then there was Cecil Gee and Austins, which was a very special shop. For the Modernists it had a great impact. Then there were other shops like Davis’s in the East End or Gray’s in Dalston. These were shops that would sell menswear but in slightly watered down American styles.
‘As for us, in 1962–63 we used to sell clothes in Petticoat Lane, stuff like polka dot tab-collar shirts and Paisley shirts. One of the makers of the clothes we sold had a little entrance to his shop and we got him to let us use the entrance as a little shop. That was called Clothesville. Then me and a friend, Jeff Kwintner, joined together. We had very meagre finance but with it we opened the Ivy Shop in Richmond. If it hadn’t taken money in the first week we would have gone under. Luckily, people came in straight away and that’s how the Ivy Shop started. This was 1965. The address was 10 Hill Rise, Richmond, Surrey. The number was 940 9378.’
John Simon
* * *
At first, John’s intended market was young British executive types, making their way in Britain’s booming industries. He wanted them to dress like their American counterparts.
* * *
‘We were looking for the young executive around town, that American Playboy magazine thing. It was that whole lifestyle – having stereos, nice objects, amazing gadgets. But it didn’t turn out like that. More and more younger people got interested in our stock and that’s how it became famous. We had queues outside. I would say it was the most influential shop of the ’60s. If people are hip they talk about it. If people are treading a slightly dodgy line then they don’t talk about it.’
John Simon
* * *
The Ivy Shop created their own clothes. A shirtmaker in Walthamstow supplied them with their own Albany line which they sold through the shop. Then a chance meeting gave Simon the key to his later success.
* * *
‘The first button-down shirts we had from America were called Tigers Foot and they were made by Dickies, but not the Dickies you know today. This is how it happened. We were in the shop one day and this Porsche drew up outside the shop and this young American executive got out. Jeff Flood was his name and he was wearing the total Ivy League look. He had been sent over by Dickies to check out Europe. He said, “I’ve got these shirts here.” We went, “What!” It was exactly what we had been looking for. He became our good friend then. He was always coming into the shop because we bought everything he had. He used to give us these shirts in packs of four, tied up with string. The collars were quite small, not unlike the Ralph Lauren collar.’
John Simon
‘We always called them Ivy jackets. Even after Peyton Place started and people started calling them Harringtons, we never did. They were always Ivy jackets.’
Terry Wheeler
* * *
The first brand of shoes the Ivy Shop sold were Timpson’s brogues, usually known as Royals. They also sold other versions of the shoe known as plain caps and wingtips.
* * *
‘The reason they were called wingtips was because they had a wider rim than English brogues. There were plain caps which had no pattern on them. They used to shine up like glass. There were Gibsons with a rim on the top. They were made in Northampton to American specifications, shipped over there and then shipped back again. You could buy English brogues but they were not the same. They had no rim on them.’
Terry Wheeler
‘The best Royals were made of cordovan (horse leather) and I got a pair on Kilburn High Road. I went down for a wedding and snuck out and got this maroon pair which were the most expensive. The smell! It was like sniffing a drug. I couldn’t stop.’
James Ferguson
‘I’m from Slough and I remember Johnny and Billy Robinson. Their dad was a bit of a face and they all had Royals shoes. One of them bought a pair and they were too small for him so my mum bought them with her Bingo winnings, £2.50 or something. They were smooths, they were fantastic and they were too small for me. I still wore them for three years, though. Both of my toes have got bunions now.’
Terry Farley – DJ
* * *
A little later loafers were put on sale in the Ivy Shop – penny loafers (featuring coins which American students used to slip into the shoe for luck) or the popular fringe tasselled or just plain.
The raincoats were British-made and fly-fronted with Peter Pan collars and raglan sleeves. This clothing soon attracted a young, mixed clientele. But they weren’t the executive types that John originally sought. These were young, working-class kids obsessed with style and who spoke a new language. He remembers his young black customers referring to brogues as, ‘blockbusters’ and loafers as ‘canoes’ because of their boat-like shape.
* * *
‘It wasn’t a very big shop. It had a wooden floor, which was unusual for that time, so it looked oldie oldie. I think they were going for what was known as the New England look which was an American interior style based on a British look. They had glass cabinets in the front with a few bits and pieces in them and behind that racks and racks of shirts. There were tables with shoes all the way down the middle of the shop. There was always a tailor’s dummy with a jacket or a shirt on it.’
Terry Wheeler
* * *
But there were other factors to take into consideration.
In 1967, Enoch Powell made his famous inflammatory speech concerning immigration. Powell was a worried, misguided, reactionary man, his anxiety triggered by the number of Caribbean families that had now settled in Britain. He transmitted his concerns by using emotive metaphors, warning of the ‘rivers of blood’ that would flow on the streets of England thanks to the Caribbean presence. The next day, after his inevitable sacking, the dockers took to those very same streets to march in support of his prophecy.
Against their and Powell’s wishes, Britain was turning into a multi-cultural society. A sizeable number of Caribbean families, pooling their finances and selling on now-owned property, were carefully watching their children assimilate into British society. For the first time, second-generation blacks mixed with their white counterparts, the two groups heavily influencing each other in the areas of fashion and music. It was a healthy mix, although ironically it was taking place against the backdrop of an escalating immigration battle.
Bowing to public pressure, a Labour government had started a policy of restriction on entry into the UK. Culturally, this meant that second-generation Caribbeans were cut off from their natural home and its influences. Where fashions might have travelled from New York to Jamaica and then into Britain through the arrival of family members, new styles now took much longer to make the third part of the journey.
At this juncture, many second-generation Caribbean youths sported the classic Mod look, but with slightly different details. Trousers were Sta-prest but worn shorter. Ties would be displayed, but with the top shirt button undone. This was in keeping with tradition. Jamaica had been swamped in American culture and heavily influenced by its music.
The premier outfit at this time were The Impressions. When this Curtis Mayfield-led group visited the island for the first time, the crowd reaction at the airport was akin to that of the Beatles landing in America. The Impressions added to reggae’s musical depth and history. Their influence could be heard in the harmony sound of many reggae groups, such as The Heptones, who adopted it for their own use. Image-wise, their influence was equally strong. An early press shot of Bob Marley’s group The Wailers found them wearing shiny mohair suits and adopting a pose directly taken from an Impressions’ Greatest Hits album cover. Again, the Ivy League look was the template.
This style was adopted by young ghetto teenagers who called themselves Rude Boys. The Rude Boy emerged around 1964, triggering off a period of political violence in Jamaica which badly scarred its towns and villages. The two main political parties – the JLP and the PNP – turned a blind eye to this intimidation carried out on their behalf, but the reggae records of the time were quick to mythologise the Rude Boy. Soon, his influence was felt in London.
* * *
‘In 1968, when I was thirteen years old, I was wearing narrow-cut trousers with little turn-ups and worn at half-mast, red socks – which were very important – Gabicci suede-fronted jumpers with large collars and two pockets, and my hair would be short with a razor parting which was a Jamaican style that came about because of the heat. It was called a Rude Boy style and it was almost translated wholesale into Skinhead dress. The way we wore our trousers, for instance. We wore them high above our ankles, which Mods didn’t and which Skinheads did. Also, look at the Crombie.
‘In the suits we wore, the jacket was often three-quarter length. It came down to our knees. Then the Skinheads adopted Crombies, which was the exact same look but in a heavier material because it is so bloody cold here. See, at this point there was a real cultural interchange going on. There were kids who grew up on the same estates, went to the same schools, and they crossed over. Not only with fashions, either. In the same way that Mods were into Stax, Motown and soul, these kids were into Motown, soul and reggae.’
Lloyd Bradley
‘It was only when the offspring of the first-generation parents found themselves neither Jamaican or English that they developed their own culture which took inspiration from both English and Jamaican culture. That’s when they became glamour figures for the young white kids.’
John Simon
‘There’s a story about the singer Desmond Dekker coming to England to play a gig and being given a suit to perform in. He then cut the trouser length by about six or seven inches and went onstage and the day after, everybody was wearing their strides like him. That’s a true story. Now, I’m from north London and in the ’60s, essentially, you shopped locally. No one went down the West End. You didn’t know what the West End was. It was more local things. Like Burtons was a big deal. That’s where everyone I know got their first suit made. You got a made-to-measure suit there. I remember mine was brown and black tonik, three buttons, long centre vent – the longer the better – and two pockets, narrow-cut trousers and braces. You didn’t wear a belt, you wore braces, but under your shirt because you wore your shirt outside your trousers. Polo shirts got big, but Gabicci was the thing, especially a suede-fronted one. Hats were always a big deal. They weren’t quite trilbies but they had a narrow brim. The thing about Burtons is that they used to put tables outside with books of their samples on them. We’d nick them and then sell the material at school as mohair handkerchiefs.’
Lloyd Bradley
‘The whole scene was highly influenced by black culture, the haircut, the length of our trousers, the walk, the dances, some of the talk and of course the music. Much of it was copied from the Rude Boy style. Black and white generally got on well together, intermingled — and if there was trouble, it would be about women.’
Nigel Mann – original Skinhead
* * *
For many west Londoners, the Ivy Shop was easily accessible, which accounts for the Ivy look spreading all over this part of the capital. In other areas of the capital, a slightly different look was being shaped. This was a harder, more stripped-down version of the west London model.
* * *
‘I was born in January, 1951 at Barts Hospital in Smithfield. This makes me a genuine Cockney. Dad in Navy, mum in factory. Raised on council estate opposite Arsenal Football ground, Elwood Street, N5. At this time the Mod scene was at its height. I was a young teenager already interested in music. One of my aunts had given me an old Dansette and some early R&B tunes. I also remember seeing really smart geezers on scooters, 1965–66. I was still at school but I had two part-time jobs in Jamaican grocery shops. I can remember three of us at school in Hackney (me, Dave Arnold, Bob Nelson) reading Exchange and Mart looking at how cheap scooters were. There were loads of them but we never bought one because it was starting to die out. All the Highbury Mods got white Austen champs, like a Range Rover, and they would leave their old scooters in the tram sheds. We ended up making them go and learning how to drive them.
‘I was fascinated by the Mod thing. Mods seemed to have money, clothes, music, girls and they had this swagger. I was a young impressionable teenager. We had this little clique at school that was into black music. Tamla, Stax, Atlantic. Most other kids were Beatle or Rolling Stone heads. In September 1967, one of the boys, my mate Dave, came back from Spain with his mum, dad and sister. Fuck me, he was nearly bald. Turns out he had met two lads from Plaistow – Sean and Paul – who told him about this new look. You can’t imagine the effect this had. While other kids were brushing their hair forward thinking they were the Monkees there were now three baldies in their midst. Teachers used to shake their heads in disbelief. I left school in December, 1967. I can’t remember the trigger for rock steady music but I must have heard it at a party or something. I just know that I loved it (still do) and the first rock steady record I bought was “Move Up” by Al and the Vibrators on Doctor Bird, still got it. Most of us had now started work – January 1968 – apprenticeships, Smithfield market, labourers etc. So we started to buy records, clothes and pills.
‘I know of other Skinheads from different parts of London that didn’t take drugs but in Hackney there were plenty that did. The Chesham Arms on a Friday night – straight from work, twenty blues, four a pound. Then home, dinner, bath, get changed, five blues on the bus so by the time I got to the Tottenham Royal I was buzzing, along with many of the other Skins there. We never had any bother chatting the girls up as we all could have talked for England and if you had shares in Wrigley’s chewing gum you would have been laughing all the way to the bank.
‘You didn’t get much reggae at dance halls in those days. It was Tamla, Stax and Atlantic and things like, “Cop A Groove” by Bobby Wells, “Mellow Moonlight” by Roy Docker, “African Velvet” by Black Velvet, “The Pearl” by Jerry O and “60 Minutes Of Your Love” by Homer Banks. I can’t understand why reggae wasn’t played because when “Sufferer” by The Kingstonians was played the place went mad. To me this is a massive Skinhead record. The entertainment was regular battles between Spurs and Arsenal fans as the Royal was situated roughly between the two grounds. I used to buy records from Dykes and Dydens in West Green Road, Tottenham on a Saturday morning. I was usually the only white kid in there. I remember buying, “The Cooler” by The Wrigglers, a very rare tune on the Double D label for fifteen shillings, a lot of money for a single back then. To listen to top reggae tunes we used to go to a club in Dalston called The Four Aces. It was a black club but we never had any trouble. It had speakers like wardrobes.
‘I carried on buying records until the mid-’70s. After that I wasn’t interested in reggae that went on about roots or going back to Ethiopia. Unfortunately, I lost some records at parties but I made sure I came away with compensation, a sheepskin or leather coat. Sheepskins. I love them. Tan-coloured ones were the most popular but I managed to obtain a black one, which I still have. Harrington jackets, superb. Beige-coloured were the most popular. I also owned a Prince Of Wales check one. Sta-prest, most of us wore putty green ones worn with Ox Blood brogues or Doctor Martens. I’ve always worn Ox Blood shoes, still do. Shirts were Jaytex, Brutus or Ben Shermans, checks and stripes. In fact my favourite shirt was a long-sleeved Ben Sherman in pale blue and white stripes which were very wide. I don’t know if other Skinheads remember but this shirt had a lovely smell when it was ironed. I can’t understand why there is a big argument nowadays over white Ben Shermans. (In The Paint House Gang, a 1972 study of Skinheads, one of the participants states that white Ben Shermans were never worn.) I had a long-sleeved Oxford weave, one which I got from Davis’s in Tottenham which was a good Skinhead shop. Sleeveless V-necks and cardigans were also worn. I can remember a phase of wearing Levi cords (blue), crewneck blue jumper with the shirt collar out and brogues, probably late ’69 or ’70. I won’t go into football violence – it’s so fucking boring – but I reckon that London clubs had the smartest Skinheads in England by a long way. I know I keep saying that in different areas there were slightly different attitudes to clothes but I can’t remember any of my mates wearing Levi’s jean jackets. When they were worn with Levi jeans it looked a bit like Man at C&A.
‘We always thought it looked a bit Northern. Southend was an east London, Skinhead’s Bank Holiday day out. The old bill used to hate us. Fuck off back to London etc. Hundreds of Skins running around, some scuffles, nothing serious. I must point out that not all Skinheads had a number one or number two haircut. Some had a very short college boy with a high parting, very similar to the hard Mods that appeared in 1965–66. Anyway, back to music. Many collectors nowadays are experts on reggae and rock steady but you must remember we were only kids so most parties that Skinheads went to jumped along to tunes like, “Long Shot Kick De Bucket”, “John Jones”, “Sufferer”, “Nana”, “Tighten Up”, “Jackpot”, “Vigaton 2” and “Fire Corner”, etc. etc. Big albums at the time were Tighten Up Volume Two and No More Heartaches and most Trojan compilations whilst Pama, Gas, Amalgamated, Big Shot, Blue Cat, J.J., Duke and Unity and Upsetter were all big Skinhead labels. I can remember going up West one night, loads of Skinheads on a double decker bus, refusing to sit down. (Mind the suit mate.) All of a sudden the bus driver has pulled up outside Holborn nick, jumped out and gone into the police station for help. Loads of old bill pile on the bus and literally kicked us off. (I said mind the suit mate!)
‘I had a job driving a Transit pick-up truck for a steel company and I could use it after work and at weekends. One Saturday, driving towards Roman Road market with a truck full of mates, we were stopped by a traffic warden. I wound down the window and as I slowed down I knocked his cap off and drove off. Some of the boys were laughing so much they nearly fell out. I don’t know how I got away with that one. I definitely wouldn’t today. On the same day we wrecked a record shop in the market because they didn’t have a decent reggae section. I think the end came round late ’70, early ’71 mainly because Skinheads had become a high street fashion. We started to grow our hair, get serious with girls and move on. I can remember Village Gate shops, topper shoes, and John Wesley Harding shirts coming along. But the fact is – the Skinhead always stays in your heart.’
Jim Cox – original Skinhead
* * *
The East End of London was an area made famous by the emergence of the publicity-hungry Kray twins whose dress sense mirrored the original Mod style. It is often cited as the birthplace of the Skinhead. If we take the Skinhead in another form, less smart than his Ivy League counterpart, now incorporating Cherry Red boots or Dr Martens, jeans with one-inch turn-ups, a Ben Sherman shirt, and a Harrington jacket into his wardrobe – plus the extreme cropped hair – this fact is probably correct. Again, it has much to do with the local area. Sheepskin coats, a Skinhead favourite, for example, were manufactured in the East End. The area also had a huge Mod presence. Its cloth factories have a great reputation for mohair. Many travelled from all over London to acquire suit material from the East End.
* * *
‘I always thought it came from the East End. That’s where I first saw it, probably at Upton Park when Coventry played them. And then it just evolved. There was no element of racism then. It was all fashion. Pure fashion.’
Gary Kingham – original Skinhead
‘The whole scene was highly influenced by black culture – the haircut, the length of our trousers, the walk, the dances, some of the talk and, of course, the music, much of it was copied from the Rude Boy style. Black and white generally got on, we intermingled and if there was trouble it was usually about a woman.’
Nigel Mann
* * *
The Daily Mirror gave the movement its name on 3 September 1969. Not everyone was happy with the publicity. Reports came in of Skinheads being beaten up for talking to the press. Such intimidation didn’t stop the publicity. Skinheads made great news. Violence, youth, violence – it’s a magic formula that always makes for headlines. In fact, that summer, at the free Hyde Park gig given by the Rolling Stones, Skinheads made their first public appearance, announcing themselves to a rock culture now dominated by the hippy movement. The two movements swiftly became enemies. Many a ‘hairy’ was soon to feel the force of the young Skinhead’s anger.
That this show of force was the first time that rock culture had been exposed to this new youth cult was not surprising, as the style had developed outside of it and become nationalised through the growth of football fens travelling in support of their teams.
* * *
‘The first time I ever saw a Skinhead was when Chelsea came to play Leicester in 1968. Tons of them showed up. I was absolutely fascinated by their dress, their style.’
Nigel Mann
‘Absolutely, spot on. Chelsea versus Leicester just before Christmas ’68 and Alan Birchenall scored the best goal of his life. That was the first time I saw Skinheads as well. They took the Leicester end. They were wearing mainly Levi jeans. They were kind of Mod but a bit grubby looking. They had on donkey jackets and boots. Not Dr Marten boots but any kind of boots. Couldn’t see the shirts because it was winter but they looked kind of East European, the drabbest crowd I had ever seen. Also, they didn’t have short hair. It’s become a myth that they all had short hair. They didn’t. It was fairly short but with a bit on the side. There was a definite overlap between them and Mod.’
James Ferguson
‘Within a week we all had our hair cropped and barbers had never been so busy. It’s hard to convey just how different things were in the ’60s and ’70s. Fashions emanated from London and the further afield you lived the longer it took to reach you. In the very earliest stages The Look was pretty basic. Shirt jeans, Levi’s or Wrangler, and Wranglers-faded were better but Levi’s had that classic French seam that showed on the outside of your turn-ups.
‘The boots were originally ex-army issue, Cherry Reds and in the early days of the winter of ’69, granddad vests and RAF greatcoats. But things moved on quickly.’
Nigel Mann
* * *
Outside of football, another element of their culure that was often emphasised was the Skinhead devotion to reggae music. (Indeed, many commentators have since wondered how Skinheads could love black music in such a strong fashion and yet harbour vicious racist tendencies. The fact of the matter is that the second-generation blacks quickly fought back against Skinheads. Unfortunately, it was the newly arrived Asians that bore the brunt of Skinhead violence.) Reggae was born in Jamaica, the result of a musical battle between Duke Reid and Coxsone Dodd. They ran competing sound systems, playing R&B records from the late ’40s and early ’50s at various dances. As the ’50s came to an end, the supply of R&B records available on the island started to dry up thanks to the huge success of rock’n’roll.
To strengthen his position, Coxsone took some session musicians into a studio to record covers of the new R&B tunes. These records were then sold at dances and later to the public in general. No one knew it but the Jamaican recording industry had just taken its first tentative steps. As recording continued the musicians now began to play around with the tempo and rhythm of these tunes eventually arriving – through the work of pioneers such as Prince Buster – at a style they termed ‘ska’.
It soon found huge acclaim in England, as did its successor, the rock steady sound in which the beat was slowed down and more emphasis put upon the rhythm section. Skinheads loved this new turn of events and just as the Mods lay claim to soul music through the work of labels such as Tamla and Atlantic, so the Skinheads fell in love with Trojan Records. This legendary label had emerged from a record mail order business set up by one Lee Gopthal, a Caribbean living in Neasden. In late 1963, he was approached by Island boss Chris Blackwell. Blackwell had a problem. Distribution of Island records was proving a real problem. Would Gopthal consider setting up a mail order business dealing in records? Gopthal agreed but soon found the business a hard one to enter. At one point he and his associates actually targeted black areas in London and sold their records door to door. By 1966, Gopthal had opened a few record shops including a famous stall in Shepherd’s Bush market where many bought reggae records that remained unavailable in the usual outlets. In 1967, Gopthal moved into another area of the music business; licensing records from Jamaica. It was the smart move. The market was obviously buoyant but more importantly, it was expanding. In London at least, reggae was now ranking alongside R&B in terms of popularity. No wonder other Mods were now looking further afield – the Twisted Wheel in Manchester, for example – to fulfil their need for obscure soul.
Gopthal, aware of the capital’s growing need for the music, responded by setting up various labels to release the work of selected Jamaican producers. For example, the Amalgamated label only released Joe Gibbs productions. In 1968, through sheer necessity, Gopthal and Blackwell found themselves sharing the same business address, 12 Neasden Lane, London, and the same line of work, licensing reggae tunes. To make sense of their dual ambitions, Gopthal proposed that he take over all of Blackwell’s licensing labels and put them under one flagship label. This would then leave Blackwell free to concentrate on other matters. The name of the label would be Trojan which again takes us back to the very roots of the music. Duke Reid used a Trojan truck to transport his sound system. He was soon dubbed Duke Reid the Trojan. In honour of this, Island had set up the Trojan label to issue Reid’s music but in reality it operated and died under the shadow of the more heavyweight Treasure Isle label. Gopthal and his contemporaries now revived Trojan and started business by licensing a succession of seven-inch singles. But Gopthal was not content with mere singles success such as Desmond Dekker’s, ‘007 (Shanty Town)’, a number 14 shot in 1967. He wanted more. He wanted to break into the lucrative album market, an area which reggae had spectacularly failed to make any impact in whatsoever. Thus, through extensive research into the problem, Gopthal discovered that West Indians felt albums were far too expensive and not varied enough. Which is when Gopthal launched his famed ‘Tighten Up’ series, featuring a collection of already released Trojan singles made by different artists and producers and retailing at a much lower price.
Between the late ’60s and early ’70s, these hugely popular compilations were packed with huge hits such as ‘The Israelites’ by Desmond Dekker, ‘Liquidator’ by Harry J. All Stars, ‘Young Gifted and Black’ by Bob Marcia, ‘Long Shot Kick De Bucket’ by The Pioneers and ‘Double Barrel’ by Dave and Ansell Collins.
* * *
‘The music was unbelievable. A lot of the stuff you couldn’t get in record shops unless it was a hit, which I could never figure out. So I used to go to Shepherd’s Bush market for my reggae tunes and for soul there was a place in Rayner’s Lane. I’ll never forget that. Once I was with two black friends of mine and we were in this record shop. This old black woman worked there and she turned round to me and said, ‘How come you don’t go and listen to your Cliff Richard and leave us all alone?’ I couldn’t stop laughing.’
Terry Wheeler
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Trojan enjoyed great chart success, all of their records helped to the top by thousands of Skinheads nationwide. The style had not been confined to London. The fashion had permeated faster and quicker than the Mod style because of the sudden growth of football crowds created in 1966 by England’s victory at the World Cup. Thanks to Britain’s improving infrastructure, fans could now travel to away games without much difficulty and therefore display new fashions. Many of the clothes were now easily available even if they were watered-down versions. The Ben Sherman shirt, for example, gave its owner and designer riches beyond his dreams. Ben Sherman was a tailor who began manufacturing shirts from his factory in Hove in 1958. In 1963, he opened up his first eponymous shop next to the factory. It was at this point that he also added his name to one of his shirts. The Ben Sherman was a total copy of the American style. It had a button-down collar, was usually striped or simply plain-coloured with a button at the back of the collar, a pleat running down the back, a hook at the top of that pleat and then two smaller pleats either side of the back. Ben Sherman’s life was transformed by this shirt. The success of the shirt established the foundations for the huge business it attracts today and it drove its creator towards a life filled with women, gambling and alcohol.
Its main competitor for the Skinheads’ affections was the collarless union shirt which came in plain colours or stripes and later on Brutus – who did create the best tartan styles or the much derided Jaytex shirt. Fred Perry shirts – three-buttoned with piping on the collar and short sleeves were popular.
By 1968, Harrington jackets were also available in Britain as were Dr Martens, Levi Sta-prest and 501 jeans, Crombie coats, sheepskins, trilby hats and braces. The new styles were, as usual, dictated by the normal few Faces but with a crucial difference. Where the Mods had sought to express themselves through their style and taste, mass Skinhead clothing was purpose led; would any item of clothing be a hindrance in a street battle? It was an important point. Clashes between opposing fans at football grounds had soon became commonplace, much of it caused by Skinhead activity. The fact of the matter is that, by and large, the young Skinheads had gained a reputation for hate. They despised just about everyone. They hated students, they hated hippies and ‘hairies’, they hated bikers, they hated Asians, anyone in fact who wasn’t one of them. Their appearance was designed to ignite fear not inspiration. But fashion was changing. Lines were becoming more loose. The popularity of long hair signified a shift away from masculine codes. John Simon noted it.
After the success of the Ivy Shop, he and his partner now opened up another shop, the Squire shop in Brewer Street, London. An ex-butcher’s shop, John and an employee, Stuart Molloy redesigned the shop. They scrubbed clean the big wooden butcher’s tables and stood them in the middle of the shop with shoes and shirts placed on them. There were cubby-holes everywhere, filled with American clothing goods.
* * *
‘No one part of that shop was inaccessible to anyone – customers or people who worked there. Again, we used that New England look. Wooden floor, dark woods, that kind of thing and we also had no counter which was the same as the Ivy Shop.’
John Simon
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For many, the Squire shop was a completely new shopping experience. But trouble was brewing between Simon and his partner. Kwintner wanted to expand, as quickly as possible, and Simon feared a dilution of his vision. The ground was set and in the early ’70s the two parted company.
* * *
‘John was the purist and Jeff the businessman. I worked for them and I think relations got really strained. So John kept the Ivy Shop and maybe Squire and Jeff took over the others.’
Stuart Molloy – head of Jones, Covent Garden
‘I remember five rows of us went to see this film called Bronco Bullfrog. The opening sequence a guy comes out and he’s wearing a penny-round collar and a floral shirt. Everyone just bursts out laughing. But four weeks later we’ve all got the kit on. I remember buying a shirt and tie set with a round collar and I threw the tie away and wore the shirt. Things just evolved. Obviously, the hair grew longer and we went into the Suedehead thing.’
Gary Kingham
* * *
Before, when he walked the street, he and his friends were apart, separate and very noticeable. Now there were thousands of Skinheads roaming the towns and the papers carried reports on them every day. Skinheads were overground and public. Like all such movements which were created away from the spotlight, the glare of publicity was lethal. To ward off its impending doom, the Skinhead now entered a process of change. At first this revolved around a growing out of the hair and a smartening up of his look. This smarter version was named the Suedehead, a title derived from his cropped hair growing out and thus giving the appearance and texture of suede. Many of the clothes remained the same although Suedeheads were never fond of Dr Martens or braces. They much preferred Royals brogues or loafers such as Frank Wright’s or Kingsway. They liked suits made of Tonik material (made by Dormeuil), Crombies (some of whom used the top pocket to display their football colours through the use of various coloured handkerchiefs), Ben Sherman or maybe Brutus shirts, Levi Sta-prest, coloured socks, etc.
* * *
‘It was really a passing fashion. As I remember it, it was just a style that Mods and Skinheads went through. They were semi-smart Skins. They’d wear 501s but with a smart jacket and brogues or loafers. The jeans thing was dead serious. You did buy them and sit in the bath and get out the vim to get them faded and wearable because they were made of big heavy industrial material. But the Suedehead thing was dead by about 1973.’
Ady Croasdell, DJ at 6T’s club
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In between this look there then briefly emerged the Smoothies. The Smoothies pitched themselves somewhere between the Suedehead and the Skinhead – casual but cool with their tank tops and round-collared shirts. But in truth it was all just a variation on a theme, that theme being young British working-class kids at the start of the ’60s adopting an American look and spinning out their teenage years to the sound of soul and reggae. By the end of 1973, it was basically all over. Never again would The Look dominate street fashion to such an extent. The streets of Britain would not be witness to gangs of kids in button-down shirts, smart trousers, smart shoes, brimming with style and attitude. The winds of change were picking up speed.
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‘When the hairy thing really got heavily underway, that undermined the whole shop. The shop went on but there was no big steam on it. We ticked over, put it like that.’
John Simon
‘All good things come to an end and we knew it when a well-respected lad called Willy turned up at the II Rondo club in Leicester one Wednesday night wearing sandals and his sheepskin coat turned inside out.’
Nigel Mann
‘George Melly wrote a book called Revolt Into Style. First he had a go at Mods, saying they were nasty little tykes. Then he had a go at Skinheads saying they were all C-stream drop-out dumbos. No. Wrong. We were everything. I went to grammar school and I was fine. Lots of others were as well. He was judging it on pure prejudice and that happened a lot. It happens because nine times out of ten it’s written about by middle-class people who have never been through this kind of thing. For me it felt great. You’re amongst your own kind with the music and the clothes. I loved it. So when I read these things about fascism, it’s been stolen, they’ve stolen something that meant so much to me.’
James Ferguson