Those interested in history of skinhead music, there are good fairly new books about it.
SKINHEADS Rock n Rolls Damned Ones! Vol. 1
SKINHEADS Rock n Rolls Damned Ones! Vol. 2
"This book is an incredible journey through the depths of the Skinheads. As well as a lot of artwork (flyers, record sleeves...) and unseen pictures"
Its done by a skinhead, for the skinheads, covering the story - not only in England. Histories of many countries as well as many different era. But main focus is the the "golden years" of skinhead music/culture, when skins actually started their own music and international culture.
Interviews, TONS of scans of records, zines, photos, etc. put the name of book into google picture search and you'll see some samples.
Its not all worship and nostalgic joy, but the author is honest and critical. If he thinks bands music sucked, he will tell about it. He has no problem of writing about the most notorious right wing skinhead groups, but he can be very critical towards NS skins and racists. That won't be problem for him to tell story of bands he may not like too much. There are leftwing bands, Sharp movement mentioned, you got NYC latino skins interviewed, there are USA hardcore covered (including things like showing the original Madball photos of "Ball Of Destruction" 7" back cover (1989) where singers white shirt has not been airbrushed all white, but displays the Skrewdriver graphics, hah.. You got people from Poland, Hungary, and so on and on, telling their stories. Often the early 80's skins come from punk background and many of the stories of these old days are quite similar. Curious things are the old european situations. You got lots of countries that were still under communist rule. You got guys from Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, and so on. Some stories well display how in some countries, punkrock was firmly anti-communist, and transition to skins was pretty logical.
It may be also curious for some people who tend to label anyone that is not devout leftists as "nazi", when book describes the sort of ideological conflicts, that may be part of scene being "patriots" or "nationalists" and how that conflicts with part of scene being "nazis". Also, author does see RAC as part of skinhead movement, but considers later evolvement of white power music as separate phenomena that is not really skinhead scene anymore even it there is a cross-over. Which is, of course, true. Book does acknowledge some bands that have "hairies" as members, but mostly its firmly focused on all things shaven heads culture from late 70's to somewhere about mid 90's.
Language of book is very much zine-esque. I doubt there is editor or too obsessive proof reading, but I like that. It really is a skinhead book, not some art collector or skin cloth fetishist doing it, but guy who was there since mid 80's, and was in it for real. Books may not be super easy to buy, but they are out there and can be bought from the source by just dropping him email.
For finns, there is a massive massive "review" of book set at Veriyhteys blog done by Finn scene veteran, that would probably qualify as zine of its own?! Even if you'd have the books, review may be good to read. For foreign people, this gives some preview pics of books.
https://veriyhteys14.blogspot.com/2023/10/skinhead-rocknroll-damned-ones-vol-1-2.html
