Too Much Fighting on the Dance Floor...

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Same here. Massive overstatement going on here. He's right, it would be hard for the youth of today to understand, because it didn't happen.

It DID happen. and it was always the skinheads. Forget all that crap about loving looking smart and listening to ska. That's part of it, but it's a small part. At the nasty heart of skinhead in the punk era was a low IQ bullyboy ethos that meant you turned up at punk gigs en masse like a pack of rottweilers and just brainlessly set about hapless punk kids there to enjoy the music. Can recall countless episodes like The Adverts at Fairfield Halls (sincerely hope the skin c*nt wielding one of his crutches like a hammer onto the heads of hapless kids developed terminal gangrene in his leg), like the anti-Nazi gig at Victoria Park where Patrick Fitzgerald lasted about half a song before being smacked in the teeth with a can of lager, like skins infesting a Toyah gig at the Nashville and nicking all the fanzines and terrorising the kids (OK, maybe serves me right for going to a Toyah gig in the first place, but in my defence I was there to, er, support the support band). Even Jimmy Pursey couldn't tame the skins. He gave up and pissed orf to LA. And don't even get me started on how Garry Bushell invented a whole new fake punk sub-genre called Oi! so his pig-thick skin mates could get on the gravy train.

To sum up: any reinvention you hear about skins being all about the music and the clothes is just that, a reinvention. Mostly it was about low IQ psychos on an awayday. A bit like football at the time really...

And... relax

 

[Insel affe]

Mostly it was about low IQ psychos on an awayday. A bit like football at the time really...

Oi Oi

Low IQ Psychos....

I take exception to that fella...

 

[Guinness Boy]

PS:
To listen to the radio programme upon which this article was based. Its on that iPlayer Radio via
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b068xrkt

the article is via
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-34184563 - has some great pix.

Great listen that. I'm just too young to have gone to ska or punk gigs but Peter Hooton talking about raves over that Hardfloor track set the hairs on the back of my neck off.

 

[daveinprague]

When I was a teen I was a skinhead, along with just about everybody I knew. It was either skinhead, biker, or hippy during the times. We listened to Trojan reggae and ska.
I went in the services, and when I came out, it seemed that skinheads had somehow turned into the neo nazis.
Our sound supported Desmond Dekker somewhere (possibly the Gloucester) years back, and the entire audience seemed to be skins, and it was quite unnerving when the doors first opened and a sea of white t-shirts, braces and boots swarmed in.
There are still original skins about, and socialist skinheads, but the perception now is of rightwing street thugs.

 

[AnotherArch]

Does the Syd Dean Orchestra count ? They would have been the only live act at the Top Rank Suite where there were several serious rucks in the early 70's, with out-of-towners (e.g. Guildford?).

 

[Mr Bridger]

2nd gig i went to at Birmingham Odeon was Stiff Little Fingers and fighting broke out there with the bouncers, i was only 14 and made a pair of skin tight bondage trousers out of a pair of Lionel Blairs, 2 x 20" zips sewn up the back of the legs at an angle. unfortunately after a few sly boots into the bouncers one of the zips broke and had to walk home with one straight leg and one flared!

The worst violence though was at Digbeth Civic hall at a Crass gig the year after, load of skins came in , nicking anything they could of the young punks and kicking sh!t out of everyone they could get they hands on.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

The worst violence though was at Digbeth Civic hall at a Crass gig the year after, load of skins came in , nicking anything they could of the young punks and kicking sh!t out of everyone they could get they hands on.

That just about sums up the punk era skinheads perfectly. Low IQ ferals. Probably still blaming everybody but themselves for being the stunted indigenous underclass. Still, at least UKIP finally gave them a voice

 

[Ernest]

I remember a Soft Cell gig at Cinderellas that ERUPTED into violence when Skinheads turned up and it kicked off

 

[Return of the Rev]

Pfui! What rubbish. Yes it was dangerous back then, but not normally at the actual gig. Between 74 and 82 I went to close to 1000 gig, and there was 'trouble' at maybe 5 (I mean a actual punch up); The Ruts at Brighton poly, Reading festival 74 (people chucking glass bottles), The Lurkers at the Nashville in Fulham 1978 (the only time I was caught up in a bit of handbags myself), The Stranglers at Brighton Top Rank 77, and The Jam at the Embassy 77 springing to mind.

But it was mayhem outside on occasions. As a 'punk' in the late 70s I was a target for 'teds'. I was hit walking down Wardour street in Soho by a ted (from behind, then he ran away), and in the middle of a Saturday afternoon near Great Portland street station by a skinhead, while crossing Euston Road (there were two of them; one said 'what do you think of the British Movement, pal? while the other hit me quite hard from behind on the back of the head. Brave boys. Then they ran away.) My brother had his leather jacket mugged off him outside a Killing Joke gig by a gang of skin heads. I was chased by a group of Teds from Portslade station one night in 76. I managed to avoid anything serious (others didn't) but you had to keep your eyes open all the time.

When I moved to Vancouver in 82, I was amazed to find a mixed scene without any violence at all. It was quite liberating, and it made me realise how much crap we put up with in the UK. I have a sense that things have imporoved here quite a bit.

But as I said, the gigs themselves back in the late 70s were generally safe. Shame if this interesting story has been undermined by a touch of hyperbole . . . .

First concert in 1977 was the jam,got jumped by teddy boys at Brighton station and attacked again by north road,happy days

 

[Return of the Rev]

I remember a Soft Cell gig at Cinderellas that ERUPTED into violence when Skinheads turned up and it kicked off

Find that difficult to swallow

 

[Saladpack Seagull]

Some terrific nostalgia on here, reawakening things I'd half forgotten or just not thought about for decades.... thanks to all posters for sparking some great memories of times and mates long gone...

 

[Return of the Rev]

During the 80's gary glitter concerts got a bit tasty! So i've been told

 

[heathgate]

Sham 69 at the Top Rank.....mayhem, Pompey skins vs Sussex Skins vs London Skins....performance cancelled due to trashed drum kit.

 

[Wellesley]

I went to a Steps gig a few years back that got a bit rowdy. During the interval I even caught a young man doing 'H' in the toilets.

 

[heathgate]

I was at a Teen Beats gig at the Vault in North Road....I got a right shoeing from those skinheads from Hastings, my crime?...I wore a very natty red velvet blazer with my bovver boots and drainpipes....sheeesh

 

[Ernest]

Find that difficult to swallow

Marc Almond had to FLEE for his life through the toilet windows

 

[Ernest]

....

When they went to guest DJ at Cinderella's in Hickstead, East Sussex with Stevo, the crowd turned violent due to their playlist of Cabaret Voltaire, Throbbing Gristle and the Sooty And Sweep theme slowed down and sped up. It seemed to be a warning that provincial England simply wasn't ready to embrace a major aspect of the band's identity.

 

[portslade seagull]

I remember a Soft Cell gig at Cinderellas that ERUPTED into violence when Skinheads turned up and it kicked off

Blimey I was there that night, weren't they Arsenal fans ? ... We fought back though

 

[Perry Milkins]

Does the Syd Dean Orchestra count ? They would have been the only live act at the Top Rank Suite where there were several serious rucks in the early 70's, with out-of-towners (e.g. Guildford?).

You mean the Don Pashley band, no?

 

[Deleted User X18H]

I remember a Soft Cell gig at Cinderellas that ERUPTED into violence when Skinheads turned up and it kicked off

I was there . Marc Almond went nuts . Then some seaman came in and pumped his stomach. Or was that David Cassidy?