Liverpool v Spurs: a unity of opposites, not a Culture War
On Thursday evening Liverpool and Tottenham met at Anfield. Liverpool won 4-1 (on aggregate). As a lifelong Spurs fan I would have preferred another result.
However there is more that unites Liverpool and Tottenham fans than divides and that is worth remembering as north v south culture wars continue.
50 plus years ago both Liverpool and Tottenham were major industrial areas and home to distinct and competing musical cultures: the Merseybeat and the Tottenham Sound. Neither are any more due to the activities of the same individual: Margaret Thatcher.
I wouldn’t presume to pronounce on 1960s Liverpool but Tottenham I can do, since I was there (my late father was the head librarian at Tottenham Library- now flats of course)
In the 1960s- and this will be impossible to believe for anyone who has moved to the area since Mrs Thatcher appeared- Tottenham and the wider Lea Valley was a major industrial area. A stronghold politically of the Communist Party and culturally home to large numbers of working-class mods.
There was a Tottenham Sound that was a serious rival to the Beatles and Merseyside led by the Tottenham band the Dave Clark Five.
The Dave Clark Five were the most successful 1960s band aside from the Beatles.
Their local home was the Tottenham Royal on Tottenham High Rd
The Royal was demolished in 2004 but it stood over the road from Tottenham police station.
Opened in 1910 as a skating rink by the 1950s it was a major venue for dancing and concerts attended by many thousands of people, more indeed than modern regulations would allow I suspect.
The Dave Clark Five had a residency there in January and February 1964 just as their record Glad All Over hit the top of the charts.
A quick google will find you various memoirs and pictures of the Tottenham Royal and a marvellous Pathe News video of the Dave Clark Five [buttoned down collars, ties, suits and carefully constructed hair-dos] playing at the venue in early 1964.
It as a world we have lost and not all for the worst either. However the working class mods of places like Tottenham were not just about fashion and speed, they were also a potent industrial and political force in the Britain of 50 years ago. Many of them were apprentices learning skilled jobs across industry in a time of economic boom and a rapidly changing society.
Both Liverpool and Tottenham still have lively and widely renowned music cultures (as well as football teams) albeit very different to the Beatles and the Dave Clark Five. The industry and employment situations are rather less happy
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