Mods v Rockers (but this time it's friendly)

IT'S bank holiday, 1959. You're on a Triumph Speed Twin bike rattling through the countryside, an Elvis song playing in your head. The open road stretches ahead as you aim for the coast with 20 likeminded friends.

At 19, you've been in work a few years and saved every penny to be able to afford a leather jacket and the machine that will deliver boundless freedom.

It's a romantic image that created the look of the Rocker and gave birth to hordes of imitators who will be following a similar route on classic bikes this bank holiday. "The lifestyle is full of passion, from the sexy, throbbing bikes to the leather jackets," says Mark Wilsmore, 43, just one of the many who will take to the road.

As part of the Rocker revival, Wilsmore is reopening the Ace Cafe, a Sixties biking Mecca, later this year. Record racing was one of its patrons' memorable activities.

Bikers dropped a coin into the jukebox and raced to a given point and back before the music ended.

The snack bar's fame ensured that, even after closure, its site on the North Circular's junction with the Harrow Road remained the place to meet.

" are youth cults and there are youth cults, but you know when Rockers have arrived, says Wilsmore, who owns five classic British bikes: a Triton 750 cc, Norton Commando 850cc, two 750cc Triumph Bonnevilles and a Triumph Thunderbird 650cc.

Period machines are the Rockers' favoured hardware, but many resort to more-reliable modern equivalents, even if the bikes are not English. The Harley Davison Electra-Glide is a favourite.

Their enthusiasm may be hard to match, but Rockers will not be alone on their rides over the bank holiday.

They will be joined by another group of two-wheeled retro rebels - the Mods.

Rob Bailey, 30, runs Mod revival organisation The New Untouchables and owns two scooters, a 1965 Vespa GS and a 1968 Lambretta SX. He has been a Mod since he was 15. "Bikes are OK if you like getting your hands dirty and you want to wear all that extra protection," he says. "But on a scooter you can dress up and feel good."

Mod style has a cleaner image than the Rocker look, because earlier bikers were from a generation who could only just afford their motorcycles, let alone state-of-the-smart suits. Pete Meaden, who discovered The Who, encapsulated the idea calling it "clean living in difficult circumstances".

Mods are also on the rise, helped by the recent popularity of scooters, such as the Vespa T5. "There are now Mods all through the country, but focused on London," says Bailey.

"Being a Mod is a frame of mind.

You always look for new music and try to keep ahead of the game."

Both cults have gone through numerous revivals, most notably at the end of the Seventies in the wake of The Who film Quadrophenia, but their relationship has not always been cosy.

In the Fifties, teenage bikers were an intimidating presence. There were stories of bike-back sexual antics and rampaging young motorcyclists. Images fuelled by films such as James Dean's Rebel Without A Cause and Marlon Brando's The Wild One, banned in mainstream British cinemas for 13 years after its mid-Fifties release.

When Mods came along in the early Sixties there was bound to be trouble.

They wore dapper clothes, listened to soul or rhythm and blues music. They shouted a desire to be up-to-date and upwardly mobile. No oily Britbikes for them.

Brighton seafront became the infamous battle ground for the two groups one mid Sixties bank holiday.

James Cooper, 62, was one of the early Rockers in the Fifties. "Many of us remembered the war and when you got on your Triumph or BSA, you felt like nothing could stop you," he says. "Everyone took notice until the Mods came along."

Each group saw themselves as the true face of the British rebel, even though, paradoxically, Rockers drew heavily on American youth images and Mods used Italian clothes and scooters. There were pitched seafront battles, captured on disturbing black-and-white TV news footage - and a national outcry about rampaging youth.

Camaraderie has now replaced animosity. "We have a lot in common with Rockers," says Bailey. "We even help one another if we break down." The soundtrack may be different, Led Zeppelin for Rockers and The Jam for Mods, but the choice remains the same: a suit and clean, Italian scooter or a leather jacket and throbbing bike.

Ace Cafe website: www.acecafe-london.com. Reopening ceremony Friday 7 September.

Ace Cafe reunion Sunday 9 September with a ride to Brighton.

Mod kit

COAT: Big, baggy parka, perhaps with a Union Jack on the back.

JACKET AND TROUSERS: Mohair suit with as many buttons as possible, shirt, tie and smart shoes.

LANGUAGE: They had and have their own terms, such as "face" (top person), "number" (unimportant person) and "mocker" (a person who draws on Rocker and Mod styles).

BIKES: Lambretta TV175 or Vespa GS. The modern Vespa T5 has less kudos but also has a much more affordable price tag than the several thousand pounds you may have to pay for its Sixties ancestor. Triumph's attempt at a scooter in the Sixties failed to take off.

Rocker kit

JACKET: Black leather, decorated in later years but if possible always from Lewis Leathers in London. A chain would be worn across the chest from the shoulder.

TROUSERS: Baggy workwear in the early years and later drainpipe jeans.

BOOTS: RAF war surplus leather or winkle pickers with Cuban heels.

GOGGLES: RAF war surplus or Mark 8 copy.

LANGUAGE: unmentionable.

HELMET: Pudding basin.

BIKES: 650cc Triumph Bonneville or Speed Twin or 500cc Tiger 100, Norton 650 SS, BSA 650cc, 750cc Triton (a Triumph engine in Norton frame).

Copyright 2001
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