Teddy Boys: Post-War Britain and the First Youth Revolution

Max Décharné

Hardcover | 24.2 x 3.3 x 16.4 cm | 336 pp

Profile Books | 2024 | 9781846689789 

With their draped suits, suede creepers and immaculately greased hair, the Teddy Boys defined a new era for a generation of teenagers raised on a diet of drab clothes, Blitz playgrounds and tinned dinners.

From the Edwardian origins of their fashion to the tabloid fears of delinquency, drunkenness and disorder, the story of the Teds throws a fascinating light on a British society that was still reeling from the Second World War. In the 1950s, working-class teenagers found a way of asserting themselves in how they dressed, spoke and socialised on the street. When people saw Teds, they stepped aside.

Musician and author Max Décharné traces the rise of the Teds and the shockwave they sent through post-war Britain, from the rise of rock 'n' roll to the Notting Hill race riots. Full of fascinating insight, deftly sketching the milieu of Elvis Presley and Derek Bentley, Billy Fury and Oswald Mosley, Teddy Boys is the story of Britain's first youth counterculture.

Max Décharné was the drummer of the band Gallon Drunk, and has been the singer and songwriter of The Flaming Stars since 1994, An authority on the 1950s and 1960s counterculture.

'Enormously enjoyable' Sunday Times

'Genial and entertaining' Daily Telegraph