Rock Against Racism

English designer and typographer Roger Huddle with collaborators holding posters for ‘Rock against Racism’ and ‘RAR/Anti Nazi League Carnival’, London, UK, 27th April 1978 –  Getty

Putting into context the rise of the National Front, its increasing generation of publicity and the breakdown of the then-current labour government, it is still hard to hard to believe that a statement by Eric Clapton at a gig in August 1976 started Rock Against Racism and aided the downfall of the National Front. In September the photographer Red Saunders reacted and had published in the key rock weeklies Sounds, NME and Melody Maker the following letter:

“When we read about Eric Clapton’s Birmingham concert when he urged support for Enoch Powell, we nearly puked. Come on Eric… Own up. Half your music is black. You’re rock music’s biggest colonist… We want to organise a rank and file movement against the racist poison music… P. S. Who shot the Sheriff Eric? It sure as hell wasn’t you!”

In one way punk rock and Rock Against Racism were strange bedfellows and in another they were made for each other. Strange because of punks ambivalent political stance and nazi symbolism. Made for each other because it was the voice of youth – new, visual bright, open to ideas aggressive and sharp. It also felt something in common with reggae and the blacks in general as being underdogs.

In return RAR offered an audience and paying gigs for bands struggling to find places to play to a grassroots audience. RAR soon adopted some of punks tools be it graphics or the use of fanzines. Their very own was Temporary Hoarding. Note the tone of the editorial from the first issue:

‘We want Rebel music, street music. Music that breaks down people’s fear of one another. Crisis music. Now music. Music that knows who the real enemy is. Rock against Racism. Love Music Hate Racism.’

Ironically the National Front unsuccessfully attempted the same in its magazine ‘Bulldog’ trying to make songs like White Riot by The Clash and Feel Like A Wog as calls to action by punk bands espousing racist lyrics and calls to action but then also claimed songs by The Enid and Cockney Rebel as espousing their cause!

Anti Nazi League| Rock against Racism | Protest | Demonstration | Thames Television |1978

RAR soon began to grow in popularity and of course power. The Socialist Worker Party had been engaged in ever more bloody confrontations with the National Front with negative publicity painting them as being just as bad. And so they set up another organisation called the Anti Nazi League which broadened their support and underplayed the SWP part of it. After all, you may disagree with the SWP but you are hardly likely to disagree with being anti-Nazi are you?

The SWP connection did worry some bands like The Ruts and Menace whose beliefs were simply ‘carry no banners’. The irony of fighting against an organisation that supported a totalitarian regime on the right with another that was supported by a totalitarian regime on the left was not lost on people. Both saw music as a way for recruitment.

Syd Shelton The relationship between the Socialist Workers’ Party and RAR was very complicated. They saw RAR as a swimming pool which created this massive number of youth where they could go fishing with their little fishing line and try and recruit people.

Bernie Wilcox RAR was a front for the SWP in a lot of cases. In Manchester we looked upon it as a way to politicize people. And then once they were newly politicized and active, it was easier to move them over to the SWP. That’s how we thought. It was just a natural process. Walls Come Tumbling Down: the Music and Politics of Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone and Red Wedge, Daniel Rachal

It went further though as it became a way to purify Punk music which smacks of Stalinist purges.

Part of the ANL’s political radicalism lay in its total acceptance of punk’s rough sound, the music of bands like the UK Subs, Ian Dury or Jimmy Pursey’s Sham 69. Yet Rock Against Racism did not simply adapt itself to the existing punk sound. Rather it sought to change and develop punk music. David Renton – Socialist History

Who fuckin’ asked it to change our music? It was racism here. Next was sexism … next was…..

But like all these things, the original intention was pure… Publicity wise the largest RAR/ANL events were the huge Carnivals. The first took place on 30 April 1978. The Carnival began with a march to Victoria Park, where The Clash, Tom Robinson, Steel Pulse, X-Ray Spex and others played to an audience of at least 80,000 people. The event was well covered in the musical papers but ignored by the main media.

Other carnivals followed in Cardiff, Manchester, Edinburgh and Southampton. The second Anti-Nazi League Carnival took place in Brockwell Park, on 24 September 1978, with Sham 69 the headline band. This time with 100,000 people attending.

Whether all the people attending gigs and carnivals were seriously anti nazi or were just wanted to view the bands is not the point. The point is the perception of a huge amount of people under one cause all helped to undermine the NF’s message and rive to power.

With the potential threat of the National Front diminished the need for RAR and its carnivals and activities receded and the last carnival was held in 1981.

WHITE RIOT: documenting Rock Against Racism

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