I was a skinhead in the late ’60s and gave it up when I discovered it involved fighting and that fighting hurts. Then, in the mid- to late ’70s, I hung out with them again as a photographer and it was a totally different scene.
These photos are from that era.
In the ’60s, it was far more about the fashion. You had to look smart. In the late ’70s/early ’80s, London was very dour and depressing and if you’d been a well-dressed Skinhead you’d have been assumed to be gay (which was very much against the rules). If you spend all day sniffing glue you don’t want it all down the front of a £400 Crombie.
|
|
The guys pictured here were really on edge and on the edge, even of that particular crowd. In the four or five years I photographed Skinheads, I never met one who wasn’t very obviously racist — and that includes the few who were black (they just hated other blacks, or other minorities).
Chris (next page) was a kind of big, lairy, dopey, loud, friendly kid just like you see everywhere. Then one day I saw that he’d had his face tattooed and he never seemed quite the same. He became quiet and much more solitary. Then he got a big flower tattooed on his cheek and after that he always seemed pretty miserable.
For all I know they are all dead now or in jail. I hope I’m wrong because a lot of these guys were not, basically, bad guys. They were just very confused and they had very little hope. Idoubt any of them are doing all right. I still hang out in most of the areas I photographed these Skinheads in, and I still go to a lot of gigs and nightclubs, and I never, ever see any of them.
Derek William Ridgers
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
See all articles by this contributor Anonymous, on Oct 27, 2009 wrote:
Skinhead way of life !! | | Anonymous, on Jul 9, 2009 wrote:
Phwoah...
Those kind of tatts basically say I want to be outside regular society. | | Anonymous, on Mar 9, 2009 wrote:
im turned on | | Anonymous, on Dec 3, 2008 wrote:
ten hole bootboys los angeles skinheads oi! | | Anonymous, on Dec 3, 2008 wrote:
thb skinheads ca.sfv | | |
| |
