I AM INDEBTED to Gordon Campbell for drawing my attention to this excellent video of Eric Clapton performing live his haunting theme to the classic 1985 BBC political thriller, Edge of Darkness. Like Gordon, I cannot help regarding it as eerily appropriate to the times.
Video courtesy of YouTube
This posting is exclusive to the Bowalley Road blogsite.
19 comments:
I have long had this on my iPod.
The Mel Gibson remake was a shocker IMHO.
" It was 5 August 1976 and Eric Clapton was drunk, angry and on stage at the Birmingham Odeon. ‘Enoch was right,’ he told the audience, ‘I think we should send them all back.’ Britain was, he complained, in danger of becoming ‘a black colony’ and a vote for controversial Tory politician Enoch Powell whom he described as a prophet was needed to ‘keep Britain white’. Although the irony was possibly lost on Clapton, the Odeon in Birmingham is on New Street, minutes from the Midland Hotel where eight years earlier Powell had made his infamous ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech. But if the coincidence was curious, the hypocrisy was breathtaking: Clapton’s career was based on appropriating black music, and he had recently had a hit with Bob Marley’s ‘I Shot the Sheriff’.
" In usual circumstances his comments would have been merely ill advised, but it was the social and political context which made Clapton’s intervention so chilling. The National Front had won 40 per cent of the votes in the spring elections in Blackburn. One month earlier an Asian teenager, Gurdip Singh Chaggar, had been murdered by a gang of white youths in Southall. ‘One down—a million to go’ was the response to the killing from John Kingsley Read of the National Front…
"Clapton not only never apologised for his outburst, but continued to praise Powell; on The South Bank Show he reiterated his support for the man and told Uncut magazine that Powell had been ‘outrageously brave’."
-- Observer, Apr 20, 2008
Well, bugger me, W Nash. That's a depressing revelation. Another boyhood hero bites the dust. (Those feet of clay can be very dusty indeed!) Sigh.
Did you not know this Chris? Even more ironical considering he made as a living from borrowing black music :-). I agree about the remake too – but then maybe Clapton and Gibson have similar points of view. :-)
His comments led to the formation of the very influential mass-based Rock Against Racism.
Rock Against Racism was founded in 1976 by Red Saunders, Roger Huddle and others connected to the British Socialist Workers’ Party.
According to Huddle, it remained just an idea until August 1976 when Eric Clapton made his comments in Birmingham.
Clapton told the crowd at his gig that England had "become overcrowded" and that they should vote for Powell to stop Britain from becoming "a black colony". He also told the audience that Britain should "get the foreigners out, get the wogs out, get the coons out", and then he repeatedly shouted the National Front slogan "Keep Britain White".
Huddle, Saunders and others wrote a letter to New Musical Express declaring their opposition to Clapton's comments, which they claimed were "all the more disgusting because he had his first hit with a cover of reggae star Bob Marley's "I Shot the Sheriff". At the end of the letter, they called for people to help form a movement called Rock Against Racism, and they report that they received hundreds of replies.
Further support for Rock Against Racism came after David Bowie made statements that expressed support for fascism and perceived admiration for Adolf Hitler in interviews with Playboy, NME and a Swedish publication. Bowie was quoted as saying: "Britain is ready for a fascist leader... I think Britain could benefit from a fascist leader. After all, fascism is really nationalism... I believe very strongly in fascism, people have always responded with greater efficiency under a regimental leadership." He was also quoted as saying: "Adolf Hitler was one of the first rock stars" and "You've got to have an extreme right front come up and sweep everything off its feet and tidy everything up."
In spring 1978, 100,000 people marched six miles from Trafalgar Square to the East End of London (a National Front hotspot) for an open-air music festival at Victoria Park in Hackney organized by RAR and the Anti-Nazi League, to counteract the growing wave of racist attacks in the UK.
The concert featured The Clash, Buzzcocks, Steel Pulse, X-Ray Spex, The Ruts, Sham 69, Generation X and the Tom Robinson Band. The Southall-based reggae band Misty In Roots led the march from back of a lorry during the carnival, although did not appear on the main stage.
A second march and concert at Brockwell Park in south London, featured Stiff Little Fingers, Aswad and Elvis Costello.
In autumn of the same year, an audience of 25,000 came to the Northern Carnival in Manchester, for a concert featuring Buzzcocks, Graham Parker and the Rumour, and Misty in Roots..
The following year New Zealander Blair Peach was murdered by police while protesting a Town Hall election rally of the nazi National Front in Southall.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4f1OF1zpIU
I go down to the local RSA to watch Hawkes Bay against Southland this evening -- and what's coming out of the jukebox as I walk in...? After fucking Midnight.
Learning something new every day, but I'm leaving it on my iPod unless Michael Kamen is proven to be a righty.
Then again, he did the music on one of Mel's movies
I took Ted Nugent off mine – mind you not sure how you got on there in the first place :-).
Yeah, I have a vague memory (from a documentary on the Blues I saw many years ago), that Clapton had forced one of the great Bluesmen (not sure if it was Muddy Waters, Howlin Wolf or BB King) to ride on a separate Tour Bus when they toured the US together.
Probably Muddy Waters - they toured the US on a double-bill in 1979. The claim was that, despite Clapton's great love of the Blues, he was inherently racist in his views. He apparently wasn't prepared to accept a Black man - even one that had so profoundly inspired his own musical direction - living in such close quarters with him during the tour.
Well Clapton was Muddy Waters best man and BB King turns up and jams in a friendly manner with Clapton at all the Crossroads gigs so I don't think either of those guys who are very strong personalities feel as though he's a racist at the personal level or would have put up with being treated as houseboys when on tour. If we're going to disavow the art of everyone who's morals or politics we disapprove of the list is going to be long and we only impoverish ourselves in the process. I hope you guys avert your gaze when you're walking past Picasso and Dali at the art gallery. :) I don't know much about the depth and quality of Clapton's political opinions but I suspect they are fairly stunted compared to his musical talents.The music is what he's famous for and that's what I listen to. Clapton back in the day was one of the rock worlds greatest substance abusers. If I poured a bottle of vodka down the necks of friends who share my own lefty political views I may well hear some things which neither I nor they would normally expect coming out of their mouths. Feet of clay is the correct expression and it applies to all of us.
I couldn't agree more, Grant.
After all, who amongst us here hasn't, at some point in their life, stood in front of a large group of people and shouted "Get the foreigners out, get the Wogs out, get the Coons out !!! We've become a Black Colony, Let's Keep New Zealand White !!!".
I know I have on many occasions.
Well done Marcus, LOL. That comment's worthy of some of the wittier comments on the Guardian :-).
Hi Marcus. A little hard to engage in discussion with someone who ignores the substantive parts of ones comment and goes straight into a mocking and sarcastic reconstruction of what I was trying to say. It is somewhat ironic that you pretend to be a defender and arbiter of all that is good pure and fair in the world whilst launching into cheap character assassination with no citation of sources and laced with words like: "vague memory", "not sure", "probably" and "claim". I guess GS and yourself are immune from all human failings and would never stoop to saying anything crass, untrue, hurtful or shallow about other people.. (What was that about Nicky Hager again GS?). After a lifetime of observing human nature I've come to have a more nuanced response to it. Perhaps both of you could apply yourselves to producing a list of left wing approved authors, artists, musicians and street performers so that we know who to avoid in future?
Grant, I think you take the whole thing far too seriously. Perhaps Clapton is one of your heroes? Musically, he is one of mine. But unfortunately musical talent doesn't actually give us any sense. Also I think there was probably less excuse – or is for that matter – less excuse for Clapton being a racist prick. Lots of people were racist in the 1920s and 30s and before. Nazism put paid to a lot of that, and people can change. My father changed – apart from the Japanese who he hated till the day he died. But towards the end, with dementia he rather reverted to his previous feelings about race. I think if all it takes for you to revert to racism is a bottle of vodka, then you are simply covering up your racism in public. Which in fact is all I would ask of people anyway. You can't prescribe how people think, but you can prescribe their public behaviour. If Clapton had kept his gob shut I wouldn't mind quite so much. Is that nuanced enough for you?
Hi GS. I suspect that face to face you and I and maybe even Marcus would soon find we agreed about 95% of most things and could easily forgive each other the remaining 5%. It's true that I probably do take "things" too seriously, but then, I'm not alone in that :). I have very few heroes for the simple reason that putting other people on pedestals, no matter how virtuous or talented they seem to be, nearly always ends in disappointment for the simple reason that we all have failings (the aforementioned feet of clay). It may well be that Clapton is a "racist prick". He seems to hold some of the same views as the type of people who support UKIP. However Nationalism and expressing the feeling that your country is being "reverse colonized" while drunk and angry is not synonymous with racism no matter how much some people may like to insist that it is. Thanks for sharing your story about your father's attitudes to race. I've seen similar things in older people (and drunks :)) It rather reinforces my point about the effect that extreme substance abuse has on lowering inhibitions. A bottle of Vodka and some forms of dementia lower our ability to self check and censor before speaking. Those of us who think we have purified ourselves of racism, sexism etc are almost certainly delusional. We may have intellectualized all the reasons why our various prejudices are wrong-headed and harmful, but strip away the higher mental functions and most of us would be found to have some ugly and primitive stuff going on underneath. The veneer of civilization is tissue paper thin. Cheers.
Interesting addendum.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/15/britains-most-racist-election-smethwick-50-years-on
Nah, bless ya, Grant, I have to confess I was leading you up the Garden Path a wee bit there. Just couldn't quite bring myself to resist a sarcastic little jab. Believe me, I tried to fight the urge but, in the end, resistance was futile.
As GS has pointed out, you may be taking things just a tad too seriously here.
You're certainly correct, though, in your trenchant criticism that I pretended to be "a defender and arbiter of all that is good, pure and fair in the world" when all along I was secretly well-aware that I'm not, in fact, "a defender and arbiter of all that is good, pure and fair in the world." Deceitful of me, I know. It was a filthy, disingenuous, low-down trick on my part and - to your ever-lasting credit - you caught me out and revealed my skulduggery to the World.
Grant, I put down a lot of this sort of thing to the fact that nuance is actually not available through the medium of print, particularly on the Internet. I suppose we could use emoticons all the time but basically the only one I know is :-). I'm sure that if we did sit down together, whether we agreed or not, we could be good-humoured about our disagreements, because we would catch the more subtle points associated with speech and body language.
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