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  • Published: 6 May 2011
  • ISBN: 9781780570235
  • Imprint: Mainstream Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 208

The Soul Stylists

Six Decades of Modernism - From Mods to Casuals



'You never look backwards at that age. What for? This is what's happening now. You need the music to go with the lifestyle to go with the attitude. Forwards. No looking back' - Norman Jay, DJ

The Soul Stylists is about six decades of Modernism and a highly influential world of clothes and music, but one deliberately hidden away for years from the mainstream media. This book explores the enduring relationship that exists between American black music and British working-class style, tracing a Mod tradition that began in Soho just after the Second World War and continues to this day.

From Mod to Casual, from Skinhead to Northern Souler, the soul stylists are an amazing family joined together by a tradition of secrecy, exclusivity and absolute indifference towards the outside world. They pass unnoticed because soul stylists always shun the spotlight. To them, attention to detail is far more important than attention seeking. And here in this book, for the very first time, are some of their stories.

  • Published: 6 May 2011
  • ISBN: 9781780570235
  • Imprint: Mainstream Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 208

About the author

Paolo Hewitt

Paolo Hewitt grew up in care in Woking in the 1960s and 70s, an experience he chronicled in his acclaimed memoir, The Looked After Kid. He moved to London in 1980 to become a music journalist and worked for Melody Maker and NME. In the early 1990s Paolo gave up full-time journalism to write his first novel, Heaven's Promise. He has since written biographies of The Jam, The Small Faces, Oasis and Steve Marriott. He lives in London.

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Praise for The Soul Stylists

It's a great book that retraces the history of mod culture from post-war Britain right up to skinheads. It's probably too engaging for bedtime, but it's got lots of interesting details about music and fashion and social history

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