My Take On Rock & Roll and History

Hey everyone!

I'm new on the forum. So this might be an odd first post. But anyway...

I've started working on a series of semi-educational animated films that take place in the late 1960s early 1970s. All of these films are centered around rock musicians and groups from that period. And fyi to the mods. I'm on Social Security. So there is no way for me to benefit financially from anything that I do creatively as of right now!...

Most of these films {with the exception of three} take place in Great Britain and one of the films {ie "Friends"} covers several different groups at once and runs between 1969 and 1970. During the pre-writing stage for that script...I put together a timeline of events that actually began six years earlier {ie June on 1963} and continued through the period that I'm working in and past it. Ending in 1994. I'm from the USA, And like many people from the USA,,,I had at one point been under the impression that nothing much was going on in Britain during this period. But running this timeline woke me up in a very big way! In fact I got {what they call in UK police parlance} a shocker!...

If you wonder what I mean by "shocker"...

Until completing that timeline...I was unaware of both the amount of violence that had taken place in Britain during this period and how long. Because started in 1963...I counted thirty-one years of violence that was almost non-stop with a few periods of peace inbetween. In terms of what was going on...it wasn't easy! Particularly for those who lived in some of the working-class districts of the cities {"the cities" being London and Liverpool in England and Glasgow in Scotland...some in Manchester}. For those of you who aren't aware {and even if you are}...pretty much all of Europe...including Britain...had several groups of people who were basically itenerate. That started at the fall of the Roman Empire. Some were children. Prior to the passage of anti-child labour laws ages averaged at around 8 years old to 13. And some were adults. Average age for the adults prior to the passage of anti-child labour laws fell to age 16 to age 22. These people would commonly band together and were somewhat gang-like in terms of how close they were to each other. But for the most part {with possibly a few exceptions}...they were harmless. Initially when the practice of child labour was stopped and then banned...this was still true. But starting in the mid 1950s...that changed. Teddy Boys and Teddy Girls...Mod and Rockers... and youth gangs started showing up. The Mods and Rockers had a conflict running and generally didn't go after outsiders or get them involved in it. But the Teddy Boys were nothing to chuckle at. And neither...for that matter...were the youth gangs! Youths involved in both the gangs and the subcultures ranged in age from fifteen years old to twenty-four. And both genders were involved. Covering Lambeth {in "Friends"}. Hackney {in "The Prisoner"}. And Bromley and Manor Park {in "Earth And Water"}. And all of those feature British youth gangs {called "coteries" and "collectives" in the films}. So if anyone is thinking "so what!" re the youth gangs in Britain...

The youth gangs in Britain and Europe were truly nothing to laugh at! Rowing {ie fighting} and wanton destruction and desecration {ie vandalism of property} were their main form of entertainment. Weapons of choice were switchblades {called "blades"} and iron knuckles {called "brass knuckles" in the USA} or simply "knuckles". Like the subcultures...the youth gangs were also competing with each other. But instead of the goal being numbers {example: how many Teddy Boys vs how many Mods vs how many Rockers}...the goal was to earn clout and status. And status was earned based on how many acts/offences a person could engage in over the course of a given period {usually severeal hours to several days}. And when they weren't participating in organised rows...they would seek out people to row with. And it didn't take much. Just being of age range and equal physical strength would be reason enough. And in terms of the vandalism acts...those were nothing to laugh at either. Favourite acts of wanton destruction were tossing either bricks or stones through apartment block/flat windows and setting fires. Most of this activity took place at night. While those involved with the youth subcultures seemed to be active during the day...

And that's not all...

In addition to the subcultures and the youth gangs...I also found several serial murder cases one after they other. Overlapping in one case. A few of those events:

1) 1963-1965- Manchester-- The Moors murders
1964- Clacton and Hastings-- Mods and Rockers riot
2) 1967-1987- Much Marcle and Gloucester-- Rose and Fred West murder series
3) 1973-1975- Chelsea and Knightsbridge and {possibly} Hackney and Kent-- Patrick Mckay murder spree
4) 1975-1981- Bradford/North Yorkshire-- Peter Sutcliffe murder spree/series
5) 1977-1987-- Colin Pitchfork. This case would later be known as "The Blooding" and was Britain's first murder case that was solved using DNA and related forensics

Reason for these projects...

Initially these projects were merely fun stories on rock musicians/groups. And that's still a big part of it. But the other big part of it is to {hopefully} spread some awareness about what was truly going on...