Mod Culture

1950's Britain and 1950's America contrasted greatly; while there was something of a golden age occurring in the States, Britain was still reeling from the effects of World War Two. In this climate the Mods rose; teenagers rejecting the Technicolor fairytales that were been fed to them through the mediums of radio, TV and cinema. In addition they rebelled against the stuffy, repressed and class-obsessed status quo that their parents generation were sleeping through. Unlike their world weary elders, they benefited from full employment and hire purchase which gave them the freedom to purchase an image. A new movement known as the 'teddy boys' began to spread like wildfire throughout the country; it was greatly influenced by the American Rock and Roll movement. Bill Haley's cult movie, Rock Around the Clock premiered in the Trocadero in London's Elephant &Castle, the teddies went in their droves, joyously rioting afterwards, driving the establishment nuts and sending the media into a rapturous frenzy. Of course the big kahunas in the music and rag trades copped onto the tide and began to produce the goods that the teddy boys needed. It was all about being hip, clean-cut and sharp - they ate up Italian and French art films to get ideas of what to wear. To their hard-working, masculine, men's-men fathers they were like Martians - with their penchant for dandy clothes, spending cash on records, dancing all-night - basically embracing hedonism, consumerism and profligacy. Fathers watched in horror as their sons pranced about babbling about shopping and clothes - topics that were thus far the preserve of women. Their sons however mocked their concerns, laughing at their obsession with class which had got them no-where but keeping them subservient and down-trodden.

Instead of heading down to the local for a pint of bitter, the Mods met up in coffee-shops, attracted by the late opening hours and the R&B jukeboxes. The success of the Mod movement, though proved it's downfall - by the late 1950s everybody wanted a piece of the action- and so the movement became the norm, 'twas no longer underground and rebellious - it fizzled out - the teddy boys were no more. Or at least, they were no longer as one, many fell by the way-side but many got into one of the dozens of sub-cultures that sparked off the Mod fire. Two of the most prominent were the Ton Up Boys and the Coffee Bar Cats - the former donned leathers, rode motorcycles and were fully signed up to the ideals of American Rock and Roll; the latter embraced the neo-Italian look riding around on their Vespas. These two groups would evolve into the Mods and the Rockers and there certainly was no love lost between the two. To the mod, the scooter was a fashion accessory; they customized them by painting them and over accessorising them with luggage racks, crash bars and dozens of mirrors. Practicality was also involved, public transport did not run late into the night, so the scooter helped the mod get around the city, spilling from club to club, allowing all night dancing and partying to be possible. This also led to the ubiquitous fish-tail parka jacket which was worn to keep their suits sharp and themselves warm. The Rockers chose power- stripped down and raw, they spent more dough on their bikes, than they did on themselves. Generally, but not strictly, rockers came from rural areas whereas Mods were more of an urban phenomenon.

Of course the Mods and Rockers clashed, the antagonism reached its peak in the summer of 1964, when hundreds of youths fought running battles with themselves and the police in the seaside resorts of Clacton, Margate, Bournemouth and Brighton. However, the media reports of the time greatly over-exaggerated the severity of these incidents causing some moral panic and vindication by the older generations that these youth movements were decadent rabble.

As psychedelic rock music and the hippie subculture began to become popular in the UK, the Mod lifestyle began to peter out. Some of the great Mod bands such as The Who and The Small Faces had changes their styles and really no longer considered themselves as Mods. The "peacock" or "fashion" wing of mod culture evolved into the Bohemian style of London hippie culture, which favoured the gentle, marijuana-infused contemplation of esoteric ideas and aesthetics, which contrasted sharply with the frenetic energy of the mod ethos. However, there was a small core that did not relate to the middle-class hippie movement's drug-oriented and intellectual music. They began listening to Jamaican Ska and attending underground house parties and clubs and adopting the Rude Boy look of pork-pie hats and too-short Levi jeans. These ‘Hard Mods' soon evolved into the first skinheads, a non-political group who hung with black Rude Boys in West Indian clubs. These early skinheads retained some of the basic elements of Mod clothing such as Fred Perry and Ben Sherman shirts, Sta-Prest trousers and Levi's jeans but they mixed them with working-class oriented accessories such as braces and Dr. Marten work boots.