Old Mod and Skinhead Go Shopping (Tighten Up)

Derek, was a Mod in the 1960s who became a Skinhead in the same decade. He shopped at a lot of the same places, wore the same kind of gear and rode the same kind of scooter. The music changed along with the hair and class attitude, but the Mods had been around for too long by 1968. They'd appeared at a time when a Tory government told the people that they'd never had it so good, and really got going before Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies did for the Conservatives in 1962.

"I became a Skin partly because the nob-end of the hippy scene started taking over our look, and partly because I really didn't like the hippies. Being a Skin meant not having to buy new suits all the time, just shirts, trousers, shoes and braces. Suits were for the middle-class, I were from the working class and proud of it. Mind you, I didn't like Labour neither. They were too soft on the hippies and commies."

"By the end of the 1960s I couldn't be bothered too much with shopping. I knew what I wanted, where to get it and how much it cost. So I'd always go to the places I knew best. And after I got married, me misses bought stuff for me and being a Skin started to come second to everything else. Know what I mean?"

play

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtEpqzPuck4

a baby's brain and an old man's heart (I'm 18…)

The son of a very good friend turned eighteen the other day, and he had a party for the old folks, the guest list hand written by him. Somehow I got through the velvet rope, and found myself enjoying food, champagne and embarrassing stores told by his mom about how l'il Abe used to hate birthday parties when he was a (young) kid. Me too, I thought. Then I thought some more; about my 18th birthday and the non-party I enjoyed. Just me, the love of my life, a turntable, some music, recreational aids and dreams of what might be. I'd left home the year before,  splitting from my 'family' as they spit after me, yelling "don't come back!" The ill feeling was mutual, Ma.

When I got home I recalled the year that I was 18, and tried to piece together what happened. All I could remember were some gigs, learning how to protest, trying new drugs, dancing, driving, traveling, reading and acting. There was a lot if it, too. The world in 1980 was a frightening, inspiring, fascinating and dull place. It was everything and yet little remains to me. Rather than writing too many words, which would struggle to tell a fraction of the story of my 18th year, I thought I'd do it with pictures instead. What follows is in a random order of imperfect recollection. It's incomplete, of course. If you want any words to go with any of the images, just ask.

Old Mod And Rocker Looking Back (Hello I Must Be Going)

Joe and Phil meet for a last wander with the dogs on the common. Joe's moving out West where the sun shines longer and the air is fresher.
"I'l miss ya," Phil nods grimly. "Ooh else is gonna put up with me insulting them?"
"What, the missus left at last, has she?"
"Yeah, says she's movin' out West with some bloke claims he used to be a Mod."
"Hah. Not many of them round 'ere. Mostly a bunch of dirty greasy gits in old boots."
"Oi! I'll have you know I was always clean, liked to do myself up like Marty Wilde or Billy Fury of a weekend, but even in the week I'd wash me 'ands before tea."

"And what about before meeting your bird? Bet you was always full of grease off those smokey old bikes".
"Least I 'ad some wheels, unlike your lot. Those tiny little things sounded like sewing machines."
"I don't know, used to get me about town and with the engine being covered and all, my clothes never got dirty."

"So these clothes of yours. Where'd you get them from?"
"Some I'd buy local, in Burtons—shirts mostly—but others I'd get made up. My old woman was a dab hand with a needle and thread, made me some lovely stuff. Button-down collars, took in trousers to make 'em flat fronted and all that."

"But how'd you know that they should be like that in the first place? If you didn't go down London, where'd you get the ideas for new clothes? Shops round here sold only the usual stuff for work, like."
"Well, there was the telly, though Ready Steady Go was black and white, of course. But mainly I got my look from record covers."

"Had many, did ya?"
"No, but you could always look, couldn't you? Racks of them long playing singles and albums always out on display, me and a mate would spend Saturday mornings in Jarrolds looking through the sleeves, trying to remember what we'd want done to our clothes. Suits from Burtons could be altered, you see. If there was a particularly good outfit, we'd club together to buy the record, give the sleeve to my mum to work from."

"You cheap bastard, getting your poor old mum to slave over her needle so you could swan about looking posh."
Joe grins a wide, leery, cracked smile, the memories flashing by in his mind as the river behind him glints in the weak sunlight.
"Not any more though, eh?"
Phil looks off, trying to hide the fact that he's really going to miss his old dog walking pal.
"No. 'Suppose not."