ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the relationship between the first wave of skinheads and the primary music style of Jamaica, now commonly referred to as reggae, which had gained an increased prominence at the dancehalls, youth clubs and discotheques during the late 1960s. Driven by the pioneering investigative Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, academic research into the nascent skinhead subculture has concentrated on its class origins and political direction. In consideration of skinheads’ penchant for violent confrontation with authority, cultural clashes with their counterculture adversaries, the hippies, and their prominence within the expansion of soccer hooliganism at the end of the 1960s, the importance that music played in the day-to-day cultural experiences of the early skinhead has been bypassed by historians. The reverence given to the ‘Spirit of 69’ is only promoted by those writing from privileged internal positions within the subculture. Consideration is given to the two largest independent musical distributors of reggae, Trojan and Pama, both of whom saw the skinhead movement as a business opportunity to expand their fledgling operations within the British music industry. Establishing a number of subsidiary companies targeting the skinhead community, they both sought to meet the increased demand for their product, utilising both the Jamaican and emerging British reggae producers. In meeting this demand, they saturated the market, leading to their ultimate demise. This chapter seeks to redress a neglected aspect within our understanding of the development of reggae within the UK together with its dependence on the first-wave skinhead subculture.
