November 20, 2009 Coming to America: Oi!! Oi!! Oi!! In the late 1970's in Europe the Punk music scene was expanding and developing. European punk music was an imitation of what musicians had heard while the Ramones (Stim 2006) and Sex Pistols (Morley 2006) played their shows in London. UK rock and roll bands would be seen speeding up their material and shows to emulate American punk music. As the punk scene would become more commercialized in the UK, several bands were breaking off from the punk songwriting standards; instead their sound would fuse ideas from early punk, British rock band, football chants, and pub rock bands. In 1977 a UK punk band named the "Cockney Rejects" (Turner and Bushell 2005) would form in East London, three years later in 1980 Garry Bushell, a rock journalist, would take a title from one of their songs to name this movement. The song "Oi! Oi! Oi!" would lend its name to describe this sub genre's style of music, and thus Oi!! was retroactively born. In the early 1980's Oi! would make its way to America, however changing from its UK roots. (Rollins 1994) Oi! would dovetailed with the punk, hardcore punk scene that was already prevalent in the early 80's in the US. The hardcore punk scene was comprised of punks, Neo-Nazi's, the American Front, Skinheads, and Boneheads, a different composition than found in the UK Oi! fan base. (Bushell n.d.) The Origination of Oi! The UK Oi! originated out of a wide array of people, the sub genre of punk would be comprised of punk rockers and non punk rockers, skinheads and non skinheads, a kind of whoever wants in gets in open society. Garry Bushell would describe Oi! as "the most exciting, despised and misunderstood youth movement of all time" (Bushell n.d.), while the followers of the Oi!! movement were seen "as a kind of cultural cancer. To the establishment, Oi! was an upstart from a tower block slum who wouldn’t keep in line. He was raucous and obnoxious, a human hand-grenade with a menacing disregard for authority. At best, Oi! bands and their fans were viewed as gurning barbarians gleefully pissing in the coffee house latte. At worst, they were seen as modern day brown shirts responsible for the riots in Southall, Toxteth and the rest. Either way, Oi! was too hot to handle." (Bushell n.d.) He continues, "To the fast-talking wide-boys who adopted its name however, Oi! was something else entirely. Stripped down to basics, it was about being young, working class and not taking shit from anybody. It was anti-police, anti-authority but pro-Britain too. A lot of the Oi! kids liked a fight, and yeah, this is no whitewash, there was a far right element among them but this was 1980 when the far right were polling 15 – 20 per cent of the vote in inner-city wards. It would have been a miracle if there hadn't been (National Front) sympathisers in the audiences. What matters is 1) Oi! never suffered from Nazi violence the way Sham 69 and 2-Tone had; the ag that blemished those early Oi! gigs was strictly football related. 2) Oi!'s legacy is a worldwide street-punk movement which is vocally pro-working class and against racism, unemployment, state bureaucracy and repression." (Bushell n.d.) The racial problem's that would arise would be due to Oi!'s similarity to the new hate-punk music which was being created by fascist skinheads. "They said Oi! was for skinheads (but it was always more than that), that all skins were Nazis (and only a minority ever were) and that therefore Oi! was the Strasser brothers in steel-capped boots..." (Bushell n.d.) The issue with Oi! being a skinhead genre is that many people believed that if you were a skinhead you were automatically associated with the National Front. The National Front was a far right, white only, fascist, British political party. As a genre of music and a culture, Oi! was not intended as a means of hate, predominantly Oi! was strongly anti-fascist. The message of anti-fascism would be one conveyed constantly in the UK Oi!! movement. (Adam 2006) I digress for a moment, A skinhead is a term for a member of the UK working class youths. "The original skinhead subculture was created out of distinctive elements of clothing organized around the cropped hair: Tight Levi's jeans or StaPrest pants, Ben Sherman button-down and Fred Perry tennis shirts, work boots, suspenders (braces), and Levi's or Harrington jackets. Suits modeled on those of the Jamaican rude boys were often worn in the evening, but day or night, the skinhead look was hard, masculine, and working-class. With his boots, sturdy clothing, and cropped hair, the skinhead became, in the words of Phil Cohen, a "caricature of the model worker." (Brown 2004) The term skinhead does not imply a fascist viewpoint, politically the skinhead view ranges from the far left to the far right, to no affiliation at all. The term Bonehead refers to a Skinhead with a fascist viewpoint, all Boneheads are Skinheads, but not all Skinheads are Boneheads. (Marshall 1991) Oi! In Europe Oi!! in Europe was the music of a movement for the working class, that had yet to find its voice. The movement would come to find its voice in the music of the Cockney Rejects, the Angelic Upstarts, and The 4-Skins. These three bands were soon followed by The Business, Blitz, The blood, Combat 84 The Burial, and The Oppressed. Songs by these bands would be penned about everything from unemployment, to worker's rights, to the police and other authority figures, government oppression, street violence, sex, alcohol, and football (soccer). (Robb 2006) The Cockey Rejects would form in 1977 in the East End of London, standing for "being young, working class, and not taking anything from anyone, resulting in aggression and violence being the main staple at their shows." The Cockney Rejects wrote politically rousing sounds touching on topics from the British Movement, to street fighting, to soccer. Their songs would cause fights to break out amongst members of the audience, often requiring band members themselves to step in and break up the fighting. (Turner and Bushell 2005) The Cockney Rejects originally consisted of Jeff Turner on vocals, Micky Geggus on guitar, Chris Murrell on bass guitar, and Paul Harvey on drums. (Cockney Rejects n.d.) Bassists and Drummer have come and gone, but The Cockney rejects still hold true to their ways today. Between 1980 and 2007 they have released 12 records, along with several compilations and EP's, their release are considered to be in the genre's of Oi!, punk rock, and street punk, as all three are similar in style. The Angelic Upstarts were formed in South Shields, England in 1977. They were a political thought provoking skinhead band, whose records would attack fascism and racism. Lead singer- Mensi, guitarist- Mond, bassist- Ronnie Wooden, and drummer- Sticks, would pen the song "Murder of Liddle Towers"... The lyrics to the song begin..."Who killed Liddle?/ Did you kill Liddle?/ Who killed Liddle?/ Police killed Liddle Towers", (Upstarts n.d.) the song is about police brutality, the murder of Liddle Towers, and the subsequent not guilty verdict. "The record caught the attention of Sham 69's Jimmy Pursey, who produced their debut album Teenage Warning, which, like its 1980 follow-up We Gotta Get Outta This Place, roundly ridiculed the oppressive policies of Margaret Thatcher while offering an outpouring of sympathy for the working class." (Ankeny n.d.) With such politically pressing songs the bands popularity would grow quickly, in 1983 the would release Reasons Why, followed up by the single "Brighton Bomb", "a celebration of the IRA's attempt to assassinate the Conservative cabinet" (Ankeny n.d.). Clearly the Angelic Upstart were a politically motivated band, speaking up for the working group. However poor sales would cause their break up, they would reform several times over the next 20 years. During the 90's and early 2000's their lead singer Mensi would arise..."as a leader of the Anti-Fascist Action group. They managed to reunite occasionally, cutting a live album for Mordam Records (2001's Live from the Justice League) and even revisiting the United States for their first live show in almost twenty years." (Ankeny n.d.) In 2006 their lead singer, Mensi, would retire. In his thank you and goodbye letter to his fans, he speaks to how close the Oi! community is, how much fun he had over the past 30 years, and to some of the hooliganism he did along the way. He ends his letter, "Yours truly, Mensi... anti-fascist till I die xx." (Adam 2006) The 4-Skins (the name holds a double meaning for the bands name, due to the members being skinheads) formed in 1979 in the East End of London, England (Cassidy 2004). Many of their songs dealt with violent topics, but the band has claimed they were discussing the realities of inner city life, not promoting violence. Other song topics would include, much like Cockney Rejects and Angelic Upstart, police harassment, politics, war, and unemployment. The band would disband in 1984, going through a large personnel change over the time period, only bassist/songwriter 'Hoxton' Tom McCourt would be present for all 5 years (Cassidy 2004). At one point over the 5 year period (1983-1984) a guitarist named Paul Swain would play in the band, after his time with The 4-Skin would join up with a band called Skrewdriver, a white power rock band (Skrewdriver n.d.). Southall On July 4th, 1981, The 4-Skins, The Business, and The Last Resort would perform at the Hamborough Tavern in Southall, a suburb in West London. A group of Asian youths would believe this was a Neo-Nazi gathering due to National Front slogan being written around the area. The Asian youths would firebomb the tavern where the show was being played. In direct response to the firebombing many Oi! bands would outright condemn both racism and fascism as to set themselves apart, not wanting to be associated with the fascist sect of skinheads. "To the mass media, the events of July 4th were manna from heaven: Yobs. Immigrants. Anarchy. The Thin Blue Line… But the Oi! crowd were reluctant participants. As soon as it was obvious real havoc was brewing, the Oi! bands attempted to negotiate with the Southall Youth Movement through the police. They didn’t want to talk. “We didn’t want trouble,” said Tom, “but that’s all they had on their minds”. Under attack, the Oi!-polloi had no other option but to fight a defensive rear-guard action and retreat. The Hamborough Tavern was razed to the ground. And the press distortion began. According to some reports right wing hate leaflets had been found in vans the following morning – the same vans that had been torched. Were the leaflets printed on asbestos? Hacks even descended on the Bridge House and tried to bribe kids into sieg-heiling for their cameras. One was kicked out of the pub by Si Spanner who was Jewish. But who cared about the truth? Storm-trooping skins made shock-horror headlines....Southall proved the catalyst for a spate of anti-government riots and there was no doubt where the Oi! bands stood on that issue, with the 4-Skins, Blitz and the Violators celebrating the popular uprisings with songs like ‘One Law For Them’, ‘Nation On Fire’ and ‘Summer of ‘81’." (Bushell n.d.) Gary Bushell at this time was compiling Oi! music for the second of three Oi!! compilation albums for sound magazine to release. "The first, Oi! The Album, had helped to launch the Oi! movement in November 1980. The second album, released only a couple of months before the Southall riot, carried as its title the unfortunate pun Strength Through Oi! (a play on the name of the Nazi-era leisure-time organization Strength Through Joy). The album also featured on its cover a photograph of Nicky Crane, a well-known skinhead who also happened to be the organizer for the British Movement in Kent. The album was not financed by the extreme right, nor were the bands represented on it necessarily right-wing, but the right-wing connotations of the title and cover art, taken in conjunction with the violence at Southall and the resulting charges of skinhead fascism in the press, solidified the right-wing reputation of the skinhead scene and Oi! music." (Brown 2004) Between Southall and Strength through Oi!, Oi! bands would need to stand united against racism, fascism, and Nazism, a group of problems that until July 4th, 1981 Oi!! had yet to deal with on a large scale. However, "Right-wing skins probably never made up a majority, but by 1980, the sight of bomber-jacketed "boneheads" giving the "Sieg-Heil!" salute at Oi! gigs was common, and by 1982, the skinhead subculture was firmly cemented in the public mind as right-wing." (Brown 2004) Right then and there Oi! was branded as fascist by mass media, though in reality Oi! was strongly anti-fascist. Nazi Punk had been developing since the late 70's with bands like Skrewdriver, and after the Southall incident and Strength through Oi!, Oi! would now be forever linked to the Nazi Punk scene. (Brown 2004) (Bushell n.d.) The music was always different from the main stream, being faster, harder, more political... It had evolved from The Ramones (Ramones n.d.) and the Sex Pistols (Pistols n.d.), with Sid Vicious probably being a poster child for what parents did not what their kids to turn into, to Oi!, with a more political, working class background, with a strong skinhead cultural backing, to having mass media associated the music with fascism. It had gone from Sid Vicious (Sid Vicious Biography n.d.) (the movie "Sid and Nancy" gives a good portrayal of his life) to "Sieg-Heil" thanks to Southall and Strength through Oi!, but the Punk scene, as a majority, would scream anti-fascism (Adam 2006). The skinhead culture as a majority in the UK would stand up against fascism. Musical Cross Pollination Oi! in the UK would be short lived as a major contributor to the music scene. After the incident in 1981 at Southall, and from increasing mass media prejudice Oi! bands would begin to fall back into the punk genre, they would begin to let their hair grow out, they would split over musical differences, over politics, over dwindling record sales. However in the winter of 1981, the U.S. based punk bands Black Flag and The Minutemen would tour parts of Europe. (BF historical) Black Flag would play 7 shows in December of 1981, three shows in London , Manchester, Colwyn Bay (Wales), Preston, and Leeds (Archive n.d.). Black flag would play their 7 shows with such bands as Damned, Anti-Nowhere League, Exploited, Chron Gen, Nig Heist, UK Subs, Chelsea, Vice Squad, and GBH. Black Flag would again tour the UK in February of 1983, London, Holland, Germany, Austria, Milan, Switzerland, and Denmark. As well as a 20 plus show tour of the UK in 1984. (Archive n.d.) Then in 1982 The Angelic Upstarts would play the US punk circuit (Bushell n.d.). Unfortunately there seems to be very little documentation of this tour, no venues, dates, or set lists seem to be floating around anywhere. This does not come a surprise after taking a look at the culture, it was a group of teenage and twenty something's, whose last interest would have been historical documentation. The focus of punk/ Oi! was always the culture and the message and not exactly documentation of the movement, that was better left to the press, or the fans who took most of the video, who kept the show billings, and who kept track of when their favorite bands came to town. These two tours seem to be the first intermixing of the UK Oi! scene and the American hardcore/ punk scene. Oi! as a self standing genre of music would never solidify in the United States, rather it would dovetail in all facets alongside the already exploding Punk, Hardcore, Skinhead scene and push the genre further into development as both UK and American bands would watch, listen, and learn from each other, as well as influence a whole new class of American culture. American Punk/Hardcore "American Hardcore" best explains the American hardcore punk scene as...
"an American phenomenon fueled by British and homegrown Punk scene. It began in Southern California. The first (Hardcore) bands came out of suburban LA beach towns, probably 'cause there they lived as close to The American Dream as you could get. Born of a doomed ideal of middle-class utopia, Punk juiced their nihilism. The typical Hardcore candidate listened to hard-hitting Brit outfits like 999, Angelic Upstarts and Sham 69, as well as the star-spangled sounds of The Ramones and The Avengers. Such outfits had a violent edge, but Reagan-era kids needed something even more primal and immediate. Hardcore extended, mimicked or reacted to Punk; it appropriated some aspects yet discarded others. It reaffirmed the attitude and rejected New Wave. That's why it was hardcore Punk - for people who were fed up. You knew someone was hard-core if they had a shaved head or a crew cut, a threatening demeanor, and a hatred of the mainstream. The few girls into Hardcore appeared severe and unfriendly. What set these kids apart from jocks and rednecks was a vague political consciousness and a vigilante-like do-gooder streak. All in all, it was not a pretty sight." (Rachman 2006) Oi! would dovetailed with the punk, hardcore punk scene that was already prevalent in the early 80's in the US. The hardcore punk scene was comprised of punks and skinheads, who themselves were comprised of Neo-Nazi's, the American Front supporters and members, Boneheads, as well anti-fascist skinheads. As punk would be about the shock value, Sid Vicious used to wear a swastika but wasn't fascist, Nazi regalia began to appear in the Southern California. (Punk and the Swastika n.d.) Black Flag, Bad Brains, and Minor Threat were arguably the most important and influential early bands to hardcore punk. However they usually did not deal with overt political theme. Many of the bands that would follow in their wake would take a strong left wing stance, speaking out against Republican US President Ronald Reagan, (who served in office from 1981 to 1989 during the peak of American Punk/Hardcore). Reagan's policies, including Reaganomics and social conservatism, and other politics were common subjects for these bands much like the Oi!! bands of the UK. While influential bands like the Dead Kennedys, Reagan Youth, and MDC wound promoted anarchist views, hating all government. With bands such as Warzone, Agnostic Front, and Cro-Mags linking the Skinhead culture into the punk scene. (Rachman 2006) The American Hardcore scene was comprise of people who felt like they were... "working Monday through Friday, here comes Friday night and I'm just going to go off, I hate my boss, I hate the people that I work with, I hate my parents, I hate all these authoritative figures, I hate politicians, I hate people in government, I hate the police, ya know everyone's kinda pointing the finger at me everybody's pickin' at me, everybody's pokin' at me, and now I have a chance to be with a bunch of my, my own type of people, and I have a chance to go off and that's basically what it was." (Keith Morris, Circle Jerks) The punks and skinheads in the scene would be counterculture, something seen as inviting by those who had no culture, or who were anti-establishment... who were fascist. UK Oi! had written songs about everything from unemployment, to worker's rights, to the police and other authority figures, government oppression, street violence, sex, alcohol, and football (soccer). American Hardcore was more in your face, with songs titled "Pay to Cum" by Bad Brains, "Nazi Punks Fuck Off" by the Dead Kennedys, "Fucked up Ronnie" (a song about Ronald Reagan) by D.O.A, "Millions of Dead Cops" by MDC, and so forth, but held to the same basic topics as Oi!! bands, with a very similar if not the same playing style without the UK accent. American Hardcore was all about telling the fans what was on their mind with no censor. With all the free speech going on in the Hardcore scene Nazi punks began to emerge, with the Dead Kennedys gaining a following. The Dead Kennedys would take a strong stance against Nazi Punk. Some listeners of the Dead Kennedys' earlier songs, "Kill the Poor" and "California Über Alles", would missed the satirical intent that Biafra would put into the lyrical content of the songs. As a result to this new Neo-Nazi following, the Dead Kennedys would write and record the song "Nazi Punks Fuck Off!", with lyrics consisting of.. "Punk ain't no religious cult/ Punk means thinking for yourself/ You ain't hardcore cos you spike your hair/ When a jock still lives inside your head... Nazi punks/ Nazi punks/ Nazi punks-Fuck Off!/ Nazi punks/ Nazi punks/ Nazi punks-Fuck Off!" (Kennedys n.d.) As Hardcore began to fend off the Neo-Nazi influence people in the scene began to take a more proactive stance. Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice (S.H.A.R.P.) would be... "founded in New York City in 1986—the same year that Skrewdriver records began to be imported into the US—S.H.A.R.P. was brought to the UK by Roddy Moreno, owner of Oi! Records, and front man for the Oi!! band The Oppressed, after a trip to the States. It subsequently moved to Germany where it became a focus of attempts to re-site the skinhead subculture in a cultural, rather than political, space. The idea behind S.H.A.R.P. was quite simple: "S.H.A.R.P. skins" professed no political affiliation, they merely insisted that the original skinheads had not been racists, pointed out that appreciation for Jamaican culture had been central to the formation of skinhead identity, and argued that, therefore, no true skinhead could be a racist. In practice, Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice did come to fill a "left-wing" function, partly because racist skins accused S.H.A.R.P. skins of being leftists, and partly because S.H.A.R.P.'s policy of allowing non-skinheads to join meant that punks and anarchists—to the scorn of most skinheads—often joined S.H.A.R.P. as a means of fighting Nazis. S.H.A.R.P.'s refusal to embrace any politics—other than being anti-Nazi—meant that its battle to reclaim skinhead identity had to be based on culture. Thus the counter-offensive against the "Nazification" of the scene of which S.H.A.R.P. was the most vocal proponent was organized more around style than it was around politics. The reaction against right-wing extremism was as much a reaction against bad style as it was against bad politics; the two were seen to be, in a way, the same thing. This was a reflection of the nature of the skinhead subculture as a "style community." (Brown 2004) Conclusion The Neo- Nazi influence had been seen in both the UK Oi!! and the American Hardcore scene, the two were linked in the music and the free ability to express oneself in look and idea. The fast paced, guitar riff and heavy drum based music, with its overly in your face lyrics about real life actions and activities, seemed to encourage violence. The intermixing of skinheads, boneheads, Neo-Nazis, American Front members in America would mirror the post Southall Oi! movement in the UK, while keeping true to the non heavily commercialized music. The American Hardcore scene would continue the traditional DIY (Do It Yourself) approach and the keep it simple, short, loud approach to the music.

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