Some Rock Against Racism gigs and related events from 1976 and 1977
Carol Grimes and the London Boogie Band, Matumbi and Limosine at Royal College of Arts in London; RAR disco in Walsall (Socialist Worker, 11 December 1976)
Plummit Airlines at Hatfield Poly; Special Brew and The Derelicts at Queen Mary College, Mile End; Tom Robinson Band at North London Poly (SW 29 January 1977)
RAR May Day gig a the Roundhouse in London with Aswad, Generation X, Carol Grimes and more (Socialist Worker, 30 April 1977)
Manchester and Ealing RAR gigs, the later with Misty plus a Hackney anti-racist festival (Socialist Worker 15 October 1977)
Black Slate & Wire in Stoke Newington, Steel Pulse in New Cross + Manchester and Birmingham (SW 22 October 1977)
Hackney Town Hall - Generation X and Cimarons (SW 13 August 1977)
Crew RAR with Any Trouble (SW 13 August 1977)
Brighton (including Piranhas), Maidstone, Bangor (SW 1 Nov 1977)
Bury Rock Against Racism with the Nosebleeds (SW 1 October 1977)
Newcastle and Darlington Rock Against Racism gigs (SW 1 Oct 77)
A tour of England with Bill Hampton, brother of murdered Chicago Black Panther Fred Hampton, hosted by Flame (source: SW 1 Nov 1977). The latter started off a black paper linked to SWP but most ended up going their own way (see this interesting piece). The tour included a couple of socials with Silver Camel Sound System, who were linked to central London reggae record shop Daddy Kool, and Matumbi (including Denis Bovell).
Found while browsing through old copies of Socialist Worker:
A respectable turn out on the 'Stop the Far Right' demonstration in central London yesterday, with around 5,000 people mobilising to oppose a similar size demo called by 'Tommy Robinson' (Stephen Yaxley-Lennon) supporters. Back in October the latter managed to turn out a much bigger crowd, good to see their momentum on the streets of the capital stalling, even though internationally they are on the rise.
'Never again - remember history - fight fascism' - banner from lively black bloc
LGBT Against Racism
Ealing National Education Union banner remembers Blair Peach, anti-fascist teacher killed by the police protesting against the National Front in Southall in 1979
Good to see at least one banner from Luton there (another NEU one), the home of Mr Yaxley-Lennon.
'Borders and classes we will abolish them' - I don't know much about Turkish radical left, but good slogan!
I've seen mention of the Clash's London Calling being played at the Tommy Robinson rally, beyond irony as obviously The Clash were hardcore anti-fascists including playing for Rock Against Racism. Kudos to Phoebe and Lilly from Brighton punk band Lambrini Girls for speaking at the anti-racist rally. In times like these it's not enough to be personally non-racist, the far right are taking power across the world and need to be contested on the streets and wherever they show their face.
In 1993 the far right British National Party achieved a breakthrough in the East End of London when one of its members was elected as a councillor on the Isle of Dogs in Tower Hamlets. This was a period of racist murders, including the killing of Stephen Lawrence not far from the BNP HQ in Welling, SE London. The BNP still had a street presence in East London too, selling papers on Brick Lane.
It was also a period of mass opposition to the far right, one of the largest manifestations of this being the 'Unite Against Racism' demonstration called by the Trades Union Congress (TUC) on 19 March 1994. Around 50,000 people took part in the march through the East End, from Spitalfields to London Fields. This was part of a wider mobilisation that among other things led to the BNP losing their council seat in new elections in 1994.
As has been confirmed in the Undercover Policing Inquiry, anti-racist groups were infiltrated by undercover 'spycops' who dutifully reported on everything that moved. In July 2024, the Inquiry published a series of reports seemingly written by Trevor Morris who had infiltrated the Socialist Workers Party and Anti-Nazi League using the name Bobby Lewis (HN78). This includes an assessment of the SWP/ANL's planning for the TUC march, in the context of which it is mentioned that David Bowie had recently made a donation of $1000 to the ANL. Thus we have the unusual billing at the end of the report where the list of 'Special Branch References' - usually referring to people/organisations of interest to Special Branch - is headed by David Bowie and followed by Anti Fascist Action, the Anti Nazi League, Newham Monitoring Project and several Turkish revolutionary organisations reported to be joining the TUC march.
During the 1970s of course Bowie's brief apparent flirtation with fascist imagery had been one of the instances that prompted the formation of Rock Against Racism, but his subsequent actions show that he decisively moved on from that time. Doubt if he had a Special Branch file (I believe that the letters n/t next to his name stand for 'no trace' in their records), but who knows?
Mussolini's ascent to power in Italy in 1922 was the start of a terrible period in European history, followed by similar far right dictatorships in Germany, Spain, Romania, Hungary and other places - leading to war and genocide. Mussolini's admirers in Britain set up their first organisation, the British Fascisti, in 1923. There was opposition from the start, so 2023 marks the centenary of both organised fascism and anti-fascism in Britain.
In his excellent history of 'Anti Fascism in Britain', Nigel Copsey dates anti-fascism here from efforts to disrupt the founding meeting of the British Fascisti in London's Hyde Park in 1923: 'The roots of Britain's anti-fascist tradition can be traced back to 7 October 1923, when Communists disrupted the inaugural meeting of the British Fascisti (BF). This rally of Britain's first fascist organisation, attended by some 500 people, ended in 'pandemonium'. Two further meetings, both held in November 1923 in London's Hammersmith, were also disrupted'. These early British fascists were a wannabe paramilitary outfit with a main focus on anti-communism and defending King, Country and Empire (with anti-semitism never far behind).
Their public launch in October 1923 followed several months of secretive organising but it was described in the Daily Herald (8 October 1923) as 'British Fascisti's Comic Show' interrupted by hecklers:
There does seem to have been a slightly earlier anti-fascist effort in London associated with the milieu around Sylvia Pankhurst's Women's Dreadnought (later Workers Dreadnought) paper. Sylvia, the most radical of the famous suffragette family, had by this point helped established a Communist Workers Movement independent and critical of the mainstream Bolshevik inspired Communist International.
In March 1923 Sylvia Pankhurst spoke at 'A protest meeting against the fascist reaction in Italy' held at Signor Dondi's Club in Clerkenwell (Eyre Street Hill). Also on the bill was Pietro Gualducci, a long term anarchist exile in London who had once been jailed in Italy for singing anarchist songs.The paper also advertised 'Il Comento', an Italian anti-fascist newspaper.
In May 1923 it was reported that 'An Anti-Fascist Organisation, specially appealing to young people between 15 and 30 has been formed. It proposes to attend demonstrations, carry banners. collect, sell literature, and so on on. It will organise classes and meetings for the young. A Red Shirt uniform is being discussed. Secretary, Mr H . T. Noble. 157 Church Street, Stoke Newington'. Copsey dates the first anti-fascist organisation to 1924 when the People's Defence Force was established in Soho, but this seems to predate that. How long it lasted is unclear but this does seem to be the first specifically anti-fascist organisation in Britain.
Interesting to see that the Dreadnought crew held a series of jazz dances in this period at Circle Gaulois in Archer Street off Shaftesbury Avenue. The fascists too were dancing, with a Black Shirt Gala Ball held at the Cecil Hotel in the Strand with Italian fascists and their supporters in February 1923.
[sorry to have missed Alfio Bernabei’s exhibition “Sylvia and Silvio” is at the Charing Cross Library earlier this year, which covered some of the above - see his article here]
The Redskins were one of the few avowedly revolutionary socialist bands in mid 1980s Britain. They also had some decent tunes as well as a very sharp look. Two members of the band were active in the Socialist Workers Party and their musical output reflected this, indeed their first and only album took its name from the SWP's defining tagline 'Neither Washington nor Moscow' (but International Socialism). The band played numerous benefit gigs, especially during the miners strike.
We might expect the party hierarchy to have been pleased at having such a band talking up its politics in songs and in the music press. But when the band were covered in Socialist Worker in September 1984 the tone was decidely lukewarm. After acknowledging their use 'to raise funds and fuel the spirit' Ed Warburton's article 'Powerful music, political pitfalls' goes on to warn that 'the dangers are great'. Some of the arguments are not particularly controversial - yes, the music press builds people up then knocks them down again, and 'the music business turns everything into a commodity. Rebellion is safely packaged'. The final sentence 'you can have revolutionary rock'n'roll but you can't be a revolutionary rock star' does though read a little bit like a direct warning to the band and a lot less than a glowing endorsement.
The negative tone was certainly picked up by many and there was an outpouring of support in the letters page of the paper. Paul McGinlay from Glasgow described the article as 'cynical, uneducated' and ' that 'The Redskins are the poison in the machine, and if you'd seen them you'd know that they'd go down rather than sell out'.
A Tyneside miner likewise called the article 'insulting and narrow-minded' and said 'I say all power to the Redskins and thank them for their Victory to the Miners gigs'.
'Ed Warburton's friend' came to his defence, claiming that he hadn't been slagging off the Redskins but making a broader point of critiquing those on the left 'who believe that red bands and stars spouting socialism in the NME are the shortcut to getting our message across. All that does is turn socialism into a fashion that the rock business can turn into last year's model and discard at a whim'.
A review of miners strike music in the paper shortly after does highlight the Redskins 'Keep on keeping on' single. Seemingly the band 'aren't to everyone's taste musically, but for sheer hard work, commitment and rock 'ard politics they can't be beat'.
The band split up in 1986. Over at Moving the River I found the story announcing this from the NME with the headline 'A rock and roll socialist fantasy ends'. It reads a little like the kind of state sponsored 'apology' read out by prisoners on Chinese media with the band's Martin Bottomley bemoaning the band's drift away from 'the party and its collective discipline'. He did though make the point that 'socialists should not discount the possibilities that popular culture can present'.
The SWP's ambivalence about the band most associated with it had a number of sources I think. The first stemmed from the top down culture of the party. Essentially a small number of people did the writing and thinking for the party, the job of the thousands of other members was to distribute this by the main activity of selling the paper. Before social media and the internet, there was very little opportunity for people to put their own political views out there unless they started their own publication. People in the SWP who had their own platform independently of the party, such as a band or a zine, were always viewed with some suspicion.
But in the case of the Redskins there was perhaps a more specific issue. To lay claim to the skinhead identity as a socialist in the early 1980s was a bold move: a statement of intent to occupy a subcultural space that the far right thought belonged squarely to them. Inevitably this was going to get a violent response, and it did at on June 10 1984 at the Greater London Council's 'Jobs for a Change' festival in Jubilee Gardens on the South Bank. An estimated 150,000 went along to see The Smiths, Billy Bragg, Misty in Roots, Gil Scott-Heron and the Redskins. As the latter were playing a group of around 100 bonehead fascists stormed the front and attacked people around the stage. I was in the crowd and there was a lot of panic as most people ran to get away, despite the fascists being massively outnumbered. Later there was more fighting as the fascists regrouped and attacked the crowd at another stage where Hank Wangford was playing. I ended up with a motley crew of Red Action, punks and anarchists chasing nazis around the South Bank.
By this point the SWP, who had arguably been amongst those at the forefront of militant anti-fascism in the 1970s, were in no position to respond to such attacks even if they wanted to. It had actually recently expelled some of its most militant streetfighters for the offence of 'squadism' by which they meant putting too much focus on physically opposing fascists. Those expelled went on to form Red Action which was to be the backbone of Anti Fascist Action for at least the next 10 years. When The Redskins next played a London gig it was Red Action who provided the security. The experience of The Redskins showed that the SWP's position at the time of more or less ignoring the far right threat was untenable, not that they would ever acknowledge it. The SWP acted like nothing had happened on the South Bank and neither the event or the fascist attack fiasco were mentioned in the following week's Socialist Worker.
One way or another music was at the heart of the movement against racism and the far right in the UK in the early 1990s. Some of the heaviest confrontations, notably the fighting at Waterloo station in 1992, arose out of mobilisations against planned gigs by bands in the neo-nazi 'Blood and Honour' music scene. Meanwhile Anti Fascist Action (AFA), the most militant of the opposing groups, had its own Cable Street Beat musical arm and put on gigs and festivals.
A rare explicit intervention into dance music was 'Freedom of Movement', launched in 1993 by Manchester AFA and sympathetic DJs associated with Manchester clubs.
The aim was 'to raise awareness of fascism and encourage people at least to identify with the anti-fascist cause and get active'. The title 'arose out of the idea that the largely unpolitical dance club scene is one where black and white, and gay and straight people mix and enjoy themselves together... Under the divisive hate politics of fascism, such a vibrant and multiracial scene could not exist'.
Freedom of Movement put on a number of benefit club nights, including at Home in Manchester and the Venue, Edinburgh in December 1993, with sets from Justin Robertson, Norman Jay, Luvdup and, Flesh DJs.
The BBC series 'Ridley Road' (2021) is a fictional drama which draws on real historical events - the activities of Colin Jordan's neo-nazi National Socialist Movement in Britain in the early 1960s, and the efforts of its opponents, especially Jewish ones, to stop it through intelligence gathering, demonstrations and ultimately physical force. The series adapts Jo Bloom's novel of the same name and its main story line of a Jewish infiltrator going to the extent of sleeping with Jordan may be a fictional device. But it needs to be restated that much of the action in the series is based on actual events - especially as some including a Daily Telegraph columnist have complained that it is BBC propaganda that overstates the threat of the far right in order to whitewash left-wing anti-semitism. The latter certainly exists in some quarters but to deny the menace of organised far right anti-semitism seems perverse - we are talking about people who actually burnt down synagogues.
Here's some contemporary documentation of episodes featured in 'Ridley Road'
Colin Jordan and George Rockwell
Colin Jordan founded the National Socialist Movement in 1962 having split from the far right British National Party because they weren't explicitly Nazi enough for him. He was a leading figure in the international neo-nazi movement and in 1962 hosted a visit by the leader of the American Nazi Party, George Rockwell. The latter was deported from the country in the aftermath of a far right camp in the Cotswolds.
The camp in Guiting Wood 'was stormed by 100 Cotswold villagers'. A swastika flag 'was hauled down after its centre had been blown out by a 12-bore shotgun, and as the villagers wrecked the camp the party followers fled' ('Fuhrer hunt hots up as Nazis routed', Aberdeen Evening Express, 8 August 1962). The Daily Mirror termed this 'The Battle of Dead and Bury Hollow' after the part of the wood where the fighting took place ('Village Army Routs Nazi Camp', Daily Mirror, 8 August 1962).
Daily Mirror, 8 August 1962
(it seems the Cotswolds anti-fascist mobilisation was started from by a party from The Farmers Arms, Guiting Power, Gloucestershire, including its landlord Walter Morley. The pub is still there today if you want to raise a glass to them!)
Rockwell boasted shortly afterwards that he and Jordan 'had made certain arrangements which will "shock the world within six months''' (Belfast Telegraph, 10 August 1962). It was during his 1962 visits that Jordan and Rockwell established the World Union of National Socialists.
Jordan was married to Françoise Dior
Françoise Dior was the niece of French fashion designer Christian Dior, though as an international nazi activist she was denounced by her family - Christian's sister Catherine (Françoise's aunt) had been sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp for her activities in the French resistance. Dior and Jordan are believed to have met in 1962 and married the following year in Coventry, to anti-fascist protests:
'British National Socialist movement leader Colin Jordan and his French bride Françoise Dior were bombarded with eggs, stink bombs and pieces of turf by part of an angry crowd of about 500 after their marriage at Coventry registry office today. Jordan (40) and his 31 year old bride – she is a niece of the late fashion designer Christian Dior – greeted the crowd with Nazi salutes after the 15 minute ceremony. They were met by a chorus of boo and jeers, and the crowd surged forward in the attempt to break through the police cordon' (Belfast Telegraph, 5 October 1963).
Dior was an enthusiast for Synagogue burning, and was involved in an arson plot by NSM members to put this into action. She was jailed in 1967 in relation to arson and attempted arson attacks against 10 synagogues in the London area in 1965, having told police that she 'would like to make an Act of Parliament to burn down all synagogues by law'. Among the buildings targeted was the Brondesbury Synagogue, extensively damaged in March 1965 and the Herbert Samuel Hall Synagogue in Notting Hill in June of that year (Belfast Telegraph, 7 September 1967).
Trafalgar Square
London's Trafalgar Square was a flashpoint in 1962, with two major confrontations in July of that year. Jordan's NSM held a 'Free Britain from Jewish Control' rally there on 1 July. There was mass opposition: 'speakers were almost drowned by jeers from the 2,000 strong crowd' which 'charged hurling eggs, fruit, tin cans and coins'. The NSM's truck was stormed and its banner 'broken and burned'. 21 people were arrested' ('Battle of Trafalgar Square: Fury at Fascist Meeting', Daily Mirror, 2 July 1962).
A few weeks later on 22 July 1962 another far right organisation, Oswald Mosley's Union Movement, tried to hold a meeting in Trafalgar Square with similar results: 'Stones and tomatoes were thrown, placards and flags torn down and police cordons made helpless by a crowd of 7,000'. There were 55 arrests ('Mosley Meeting Wrecked, Birmingham Daily Post, 23 July 1962).
Illustrated London News, 28 July 1962 (check out cool shoes of anti-fascist throwing a stick, cuban heels a year before The Beatles first LP!)
Ridley Road
Ridley Road, Dalston was a key battleground between fascists and their opponents in 1962, just as it had been in the 1930s and 1940s as an area with a well established Jewish community. Just a week after being driven out of Trafalgar Square, the Union Movement attempted to meet there but were opposed by a large crowd:
'Sir Oswald Mosley was hurled to the ground and then punched and kicked in London's East End last night. The 65-year-old leader of the Union Movement was jumped upon as he arrived for a meeting at Ridley Road, Dalston - scene of many clashes with Blackshirts in the 1930s. The rally last night turned into a three-minute-fiasco - that was the time Mosley was allowed to speak before police were forced to stop his meeting because of rioting. And after the meeting police arrested 48 people including Mosley's ginger-haired son, Max. For an hour before Mosley arrived, the police had struggled to control the 1500 strong crowd of jeering, shouting East Enders... Chants of 'Down with Mosley' and 'Sieg Heil' drowned his words. Rotten fruit, stones and coins were hurled at the grey-suited Union Movement leader' ('Mosley beaten up again, Daily Mirror, 1 August 1962).
('The magic words "Mosley Speaks" will spark a riot anywhere... in this stronghold of anti-fascism their appearance was a guarantee of trouble... they cried 'Down with Mosley and down he went' - Pathe newsreel of Mosley in Manchester then in Ridley Road in July1962 - still below shows anti-fascists being held back by police in Ridley Road)
With plans for further fascist meetings on 2 September, the Home Secretary banned all demonstrations in the area - affecting planned events from the British National Party and the anti-fascist Yellow Star Movement, though static meetings were not covered by the ban. Following the announcement there was an explosion outside a synagogue in Stoke Newington described by Rev. Sargent of the Yellow Star Movement as 'fascist activity' (Coventry Evening Telegraph, 1 Sept 1962). Sargent was the vicar of Holy Trinity Church in Dalston and one of the founders of the anti-fascist group who held a position of non-violent opposition to the far right - disagreement with this position led some to form the 62 Group, a militant Jewish organisation set up in August 1962 and who were the main inspiration for the Ridley Road drama. They were to play a major role in fighting the far right for the rest of the decade.
On 2 September the Yellow Star Movement occupied Ridley Road to prevent the BNP holding a meeting. The BNP had gathered nearby in Balls Pond Road where 'they were attacked by several hundred men' - probably one of the first actions involving the new 62 Group.
Birmingham Daily Post, 3 Sept 1962
On the same day, Mosley's Union Movement was forced to abandon a meeting in Victoria Park Square, Bethnal Green, after two minutes. A crowd of 3000 broke through police lines and Mosley faced 'Boos, blows, eggs and stink bombs'. There were 40 arrests (Birmingham Daily Post, 3 September 1962).
There were further clashes on 16 September, when Hackney Young Socialists occupied the space in Ridley Road where Mosley's supporters were planning to rally. As fascists 'marched into the Young Socialists rally... Fighting broke out immediately. It spread through the crowd in Ridley market and spilled out into Stoke Newington High Street' (The Newsletter - Socialist Labour League, 22 Sept.1962)
Colin Jordan was jailed for 9 months in 1962 having established 'Spearhead' as a paramilitary force linked to the NSM. The latter was relaunched as the British Movement in 1968. In the same year he was 'beaten up in a well-planned attack by a group of men in Birmingham... Jordan was in Waterloo Street in the city centre with four other men handing out leaflets for a meeting when about 30 men came running round the corner and set upon them' (Aberdeen Evening Express, 11 September 1968).
Jordan remained an active neo-nazi until his death in 2009. While some of his erstwhile collaborators attempted to tone down their public rhetoric and present themselves as simple British patriots, Jordan never disguised his Hitler worship and virulent anti-semitism.
The events of 1962 sparked not only militant anti-fascism but a wider call for legislation against incitement to racial hatred. More than 100,000 people signed a Yellow Star petition calling for this, and 'Three hundred teenagers from Jewish and non-Jewish youth clubs in the Hackney area' marched from Ridley Road to Downing Street in support of this.
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