London Calling: A Countercultural History of London Since 1945

by Barry Miles

This is a major and definitive history of the counterculture by our pre-eminent chronicler of the cultural underground. London has long been a magnet for aspiring artists and writers, musicians and fashion designers seeking inspiration and success in this great city. In "London Calling", Barry Miles explores the counter culture that sprang up in the decades following the Second World War, focusing on the West End and Soho, where the presence of so many artists has established a unique atmosphere; creative, avant garde, permissive, anarchic - the throbbing heart of London. Here are the heady days of post-war Soho when suddenly everything seemed possible, the jazzbars and clubs of the fifties, the teddy boys and the Angry Young Men, Francis Bacon and the legendary Colony Club, the 1960s and the Summer of Love, the rise of punk and the early days of the YBAs. The vitality and excitement of these days and years of change - and the sheer creativity of London - leap off the page of this marvellously evocative and riveting book.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Music, London, Travel, British Literature, Biography

468 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2010

About the author

Barry Miles is an English author best known for his deep involvement in the 1960s counterculture and for chronicling the era through his prolific writing. He played a key role in shaping and documenting the London underground scene, becoming a central figure among the poets, musicians, and artists who defined the decade’s rebellious spirit. A close associate of figures such as Allen Ginsberg and Paul McCartney, Miles not only witnessed the cultural revolution firsthand but also actively participated in it through ventures like the Indica Gallery and the alternative newspaper International Times.
In the early 1960s, Miles began working at Better Books in London, a progressive bookshop that became a hub for the avant-garde. While there, he was instrumental in organizing the International Poetry Incarnation at the Royal Albert Hall in 1965, an event that marked the emergence of the British underground movement and featured prominent poets like Allen Ginsberg. The same year, Miles co-founded the Indica Bookshop and Gallery, which became a gathering place for creatives and countercultural icons. It was here that John Lennon first met Yoko Ono, at one of her art exhibitions.
Miles also played a role in launching International Times, one of the UK’s first underground newspapers, which Paul McCartney discreetly funded. Miles introduced McCartney to the people behind the project and facilitated many of his early connections with the underground scene. In 1967, he co-organized The 14 Hour Technicolor Dream, a legendary multimedia event at Alexandra Palace featuring Pink Floyd, Yoko Ono, and John Lennon, among others.
Later in the decade, Miles took on the management of Zapple Records, an experimental subsidiary of Apple Records. During this time, he produced poetry albums, including one by Richard Brautigan. However, his personal relationship with Brautigan became strained after Miles became romantically involved with Brautigan’s partner, Valerie Estes. The fallout led to communication only through legal representatives. Although Zapple closed before releasing the Brautigan album, it was eventually issued by another label in 1970.
Miles also produced a recording of Allen Ginsberg’s musical interpretation of William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience, which was released in 1970. He briefly lived with Ginsberg in New York before returning to England following the breakdown of his first marriage. He later married travel writer Rosemary Bailey and continued to live and work in London.
In addition to his memoirs In the Sixties and In the Seventies, Miles has written definitive biographies of cultural icons such as Paul McCartney (Many Years From Now), Frank Zappa, William S. Burroughs, Jack Kerouac, Charles Bukowski, and Allen Ginsberg. He is also the author of Hippie, a visual and narrative exploration of the 1960s counterculture. His writings often reflect a mix of personal experience and historical documentation, offering insight into the worlds of rock, literature, and art.
Miles is known not only for his historical accounts but also for his critical views, including pointed commentary on musicians like Rush and Frank Zappa, examining the political and commercial aspects of their work. With a career that spans over five decades, Barry Miles remains one of the most insightful chroniclers of the countercultural and musical revolutions of the 20th century.

Reviews

[Tosh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm a long term Barry Miles fan. I guess one can consider him as a cultural historian, but he also witnessed many aspects of his own field of interest. Which is American Beat/British Hippie/pop music cultural life. He was also a close associate of Paul McCartney in the mid to late 1960's, as well as a co-writer on McCartney's interesting memoir.

Miles has written biographies on American Beat Greats, as well as his own memoir of London life during the Sixties. But"London Calling" is sort of his masterpiece, and although not historically perfect (some names are wrong, or the wrong artist with the wrong piece), he captures something more important, and that is the life blood of various countercultural youth movements from post-war London to now.

It may be age or perhaps the current social life of London is not that interesting to Miles, but for sure the past is full of colorful characters and various causes in the U.K. capital. From Teddy Boys to British Beats (and how they mixed in with Burroughs/Ginsberg) to the Mods, to the Hippies, and then to the punks is really five or six books in this one volume.

But each section is really alive with details about life then, and I would think a young reader would want to check out the literature/visuals of the various underground movements that took place in the mid to late 20th Century. Also in detail it explains the importance of London as a location as well as an iconic fantasy land of sorts.

This book is by no means the ultimate history, for that you need to read at least fifty other books on the subject of London's subculture. But this is an excellent introduction to a world with great possibility and sometimes disappointment. But the adventure to go from zero to 10 is a magnificent ride.

[Ipswichblade · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very detailed history of counter culture in London but ultimately far too long

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is basically a series of mini-biographies of artists, musicians and writers who have lived in and transformed London since 1945 up until about the late 80s. A lot of this book is dedicated to the 1960s, with some first-hand accounts from the author. It contained far too much idle gossip about people I’ve never heard of before for my liking - going to lunch at such and such a restaurant or taking such and such a drug. A lot of this book I just can’t relate to because it idolizes reckless behaviour, details mundane facts about celebrities and doesn’t explain just how groundbreaking or significant these people were sufficiently.

Despite this, it’s not all bad! When I did recognize the celebrity in question it became infinitely more relatable. Some of my favourite topics covered include Yoko Ono, opposition to 60s architecture, teddy boys, BBC domination of broadcasting, foetal art, the dirty CID squad and most of the coverage of Punk. I think I got 5 chapters in before I started enjoying it at all, and it certainly does have some nice little nuggets of cultural information on London, but this book really needed an editor to trim all the fat from it.

[The Book Nazi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Only after reading this book did I find out that Barry Miles is the guy who wrote biographies of Paul Mcartney, Frank Zappa and many prominent figures. I don't live in London and don't really know most of the venues chronicled in this book but Barry is able to tell great stories about them, and make someone visualize all the good madness.

There are stories of Post war Bohemia, '50's beatniks and jazz clubs, 60's hippie pop era where the stones congregated with The Beatles and Jimi Hendrix, at the Ad Lib and Cromwellian clubs (I wonder whether these places are still in business). Miles brilliantly pinpoints these places with key events and characters, be they Drunken poets, Indie artists or Pete Townshend's Girlfriend dancing Panty-less to Pink Floyd.

I loved his, Comedic yet sublime storytelling of the swinging 60's :)

[Kimmo Sinivuori · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a must book for everyone interested in counterculture, the Beats, the Beatles, John and Yoko and post-war London. This is a must also for those who love London and its watering holes.

[Nick Reeves]

a gold soul mine find for any interested in rock n roll sub/culture.
teenage waistlines. it's only teenage waistlines. [sic] :)

[Rachel Stevenson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the first third of this book, which detailed the (drunken) exploits of the original Soho-ites (George Melly, Julian MacLaren Ross, Nina Hamnett) to the skiffle kings of Old Compton street and then the final third based on more recent history – Gilbert and George to the Ministry of Sound, but the middle third, based on Miles’ own experience running a counter-cultural book shop, organising happenings and hanging out with Paul McCartney and Jane Asher (although she’s described as “Peter Asher’s sister”) is duller, reading as it does like a memoir, rather than a history, describing in sometimes mind-numbing detail the cost of renting a W1 basement, the list of people at this or that party, the amount of LSD various tedious hippies brought with them from San Fran, and is somewhat self-indulgent, although Miles makes himself a bit part on the scene, rather than an ego-driven main character.

I suppose the takeaway is that every generation thinks that they’re the first ever to rebel, to take drugs, to stay up past midnight down Wardour Street: the same scenes repeat, played by different people in different locations with everyone maintaining that fings aint wot they used to be. More plus ça change is the appalling actions by the police and the equally appalling tabloids and the same old older generation being down on young people; nowadays it’s pronouns that cause ire rather than than hair length or loon pants.

Miles does cover 1970s feminism and points out, for instance, that female artists aren’t given the props that male artists receive (who knew that Jann Howarth co-designed the Sergeant Pepper sleeve with Peter Blake?) and that the sexual revolution could be predatory and exploitive for women, but there are other things done by men to women that are presented in the books as japes, such as a counter cultural figure who would “lure” women to his dark basement office or mods groping Pete Townshend’s girlfriend at a happening (“She didn’t realise!”) or most disturbing, John Osbourne putting a used condom in a sandwich and serving it to Lynne Reid Banks, who had annoyed him. It seems entirely misogynistic to do this, but it’s presented by Miles as an outrageous joke.

One thing that has changed is where people live in London. In this book, quite ordinary people reside in Fitzrovia, Chelsea, or Hampstead. Except the artists who inhabit cheaper places – Spitalfields, Butler’s Wharf, London Fields. Nowadays the only places artists could afford would be Lewisham.

[Charles Poisonheart · Rating 5 out of 5]

Avrebbe dovuto intitolarsi London Underground, questo corposo e puntuale volume di Barry Miles orientato più sulle istanze sotterranee della controcultura, piuttosto che sull'immaginario comune della stessa. Se la prima parte è dedicata alla rutilante scena dei club e dei locali degli anni cinquanta e primi sessanta -dove si muovevano personaggi ed artisti come Francis Bacon o gli Angry Young Men (Colin Wilson o John Osborne)-, il fulcro centrale di London Calling offre un'ampia rassegna delle più importanti iniziative culturali degli anni sessanta. Dal reading poetico alla Royal Albert Hall, passando per le serate psichedeliche all'UFO Club, ove Pink Floyd e Soft Machine si fecero le ossa, entrando nelle redazioni delle riviste IT e Oz perennemente minacciate dalle perquisizioni della polizia inglese, sino all'esplosione (più di stile che di contenuti) del punk durante il giubileo reale. London Calling è un ricettacolo di nomi, eventi, mostre, pellicole di culto; spesso marginali e poco conosciuti al lettore medio italiano, eppure fondamentali per comprendere davvero il significato e la spinta propulsiva della controcultura inglese.

[Sheffielder · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting but art-centric and needs extending

Overall, an interesting read, full of detail, but very art-centric. Counterculture is stereotypically described in terms of jazz, protest, hippies, punks, music, fashion and art movements - but culture embraces every aspect of life and society, so a true history of counterculture should presumably do the same. The book also seems to stop quite suddenly with a basic claim that counterculture sort-of doesn't (and can't?) really exist any more. A bit like physicists claiming at the start of the 20th century that there was nothing more to be discovered, only to be confounded by the advent of quantum theory. I'm hoping he's wrong - counterculture is an inherent part of culture, and culture is far too dynamic for fresh and challenging ways of thinking and being not to appear yet again as we move into the future.

[Steve Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Detailed and fascinating history of counterculture in post-war London. The author's irritation with the post-hippy era is obvious, but the overall tone in describing all periods is warm and sympathetic. Lots of interesting facts and a smattering of salacious gossip.

[Dight · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting and informative, fascinating insight into the other side of post war London.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

An entertaining, well researched romp round Soho with its associated crowd of oddballs, many of whom could probably have benefited from a swift kick in the pants. Gor blimey Guvnor.

[T · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating to read more about underground London and all the shifts happening after ww2.

[Donald · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun read, a history of London's counterculture from the 50s onward

[Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Barry Miles was a major figure in the London counterculture in the 1960s, involved in such legendary things as the Indica bookshop, the underground newspaper International Times, and the UFO Club. But unlike some others in that scene, Miles was always interested in the general history of alternative culture: in the Sixties he read widely on the Beats who had preceded him (and he became close friends with many of them), and even after the Sixties passed he sought to keep abreast of new developments. London Calling is Miles’ massive survey of alternative cultures – whether bohemian, beatnik, hippie, punk, or gay – in that great city from 1945 to roughly the early 1990s. It interweaves biographical sketches and anecdotes with some detailed description of underground haunts with all their unusual decor and memorable staff.

The first counterculture that Miles describes, centered in Fitzrovia and Soho, is a long way away from the idealism of his own Sixties scene. Namely, we are introduced to postwar writers (of whom Julian MacLaren-Ross is probably the best-known) and painters, many of whom were alcoholics. A number of these people, like Francis Bacon, were gay and so felt the need for their own private worlds, hidden from mainstream English culture. Miles notes how in a London suffering from postwar scarcity and an English insularity, even this generation’s handful of restaurants with European cuisine and dandyish clubs, must have seemed like fairyland to them.

From there we move through the “Angry Young Men” writers of the Fifties, the Beatniks and jazz fans, the CND movement against the Bomb, and of course the Sixties counterculture in its full flowering. Miles remained keenly interested in the counterculture through the Punks years, because in spite of being well into his thirties by this point and often in the United States, he worked as a music journalist and was even invited to be the manager of The Clash. His curiosity and continuing social connections lead him on to describe the New Romantics.

The book ends with the late 1980s and early 1990s. The last scene described is essentially the massive outdoor raves organized before the police pushed the dancers into clubs. Miles believes that much of what now passed for counterculture in the arts was too coopted by corporations and rich patrons like Charles Saatchi to truly serve as a free, alternative voice. Furthermore, the increasing tolerance of drug use and homosexuality made those lifestyles less alternative. Sure, one can simply conclude that as Miles entered his fifties and later years, he was simply less connected to interesting underground scenes. Nonetheless, Miles does close the book with some interesting thoughts on how earlier countercultures were marked by a delay between the activities of small, closeknit communities and later acceptance between the wider world, while in today’s internet-connected world, everything happens everywhere and simultaneously. Nothing can be called a purely London scene anymore, all culture is now global.

While some readers may feel that the descriptions of the venues are overlong, Miles does underscore how alternative culture was inseparable from its regular haunts. He gives the street addresses for all of these places, which will allow tourists to visit these legendary places themselves. Readers like myself who only know neighborhoods like Chelsea, Notting Hill, or Soho from recently, when they are excruciatingly expensive, will marvel at Miles’ detailed history of how, once, these were low-rent places where skint bohemians could live comfortably.

I got this book because I have a great interest in the London counterculture of the late 1960s, and I’ve read as many memoirs and collections of oral testimony of the era as I could, such as by Richard Neville, Jim Haynes, Jonathon Green, Mick Farren, Jeff Nuttall, and Miles himself. I didn’t expect this latest book by Miles to tell me something I didn’t already know, but in fact there was enough fresh information here for this to be a worthwhile read for anyone with a similar interest. Miles does tend to stand at a remove from all the things he’s describing, and it’s sometimes hard to tell what his own personal feelings on all of it were. However, he does mention some feuds and quarrels between members of his generation that have been left out of other books, which take a more rose-coloured look back.

[John Ferngrove · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once upon a time there were two world wars, millions died in each, and all the while the elites of all sides told their combatants that they were fighting and dying in the name of freedom. After the second war, even as some of the societies involved were gearing up for a third, even bigger war, a small number of odd and eccentric individuals in various regions and cities in the affected lands reached out to each other and decided to try and find out just how far freedom of individual expression and action could be taken within these nominally free societies while being careful to do no actual harm to other individuals around them. Despite the nominal freedom and the care to do no actual harm, media, mainstream consensus, police forces and secret services got into quite severe panics about the choices and actions of these individuals and much opprobrium and oppression was heaped upon them for their efforts. Nonetheless, more joined in and a trickle became not exactly a flood, but sufficient for certain general but fundamental concessions to be won for people of various types and persuasions, the benefits of which are enjoyed to this day by succeeding generations, not for the want of narrow minded individuals who would wish to see these advances in personal freedom redacted.

This is the charmingly narrated story of the various groups and movements who undertook these activities in one particular city - London - which for a while became a beacon of enlightenment for all who valued the advancement of general individual freedom. The storyteller is someone who himself was central to several of the groups and movements described, and who made it his journalistic business to gather as much documentary and anecdotal evidence from travellers on parallel, fascinating trajectories.

This is actually a rigorous work of social history - a history of the progress of freedom in ordinary lives of ordinary people as they discovered new ways of finding joy and fulfilment in their lives. Its value as living history will only increase as the generational distance from the names, places and events increases.

[Fiona · Rating 5 out of 5]

London Calling by BARRY MILES is a counter-cultural odyssey through London's anarchic avant garde boho scene in Soho and the West End from the 40s with various surviving members of the Bloomsbury set, through every following decade from the 50s teddy boys and Angry Young Men, Francis Bacon and the Colony Club, to the 60s and the Summer of Love, then on to the rise of punk and ending with YBAs and Leigh Bowery of the 90s. Barry Miles published the underground newspaper IT in the 60s and knew everyone, from living with Paul McCartney et al to introducing John Lennon to Yoko when she showed her first exhibition in Miles's/IT's shop in Southampton Row. Lots of transgressive history and fascinating details such as where we get the term 'plugging' from (for promoting a record) to an entire chapter on the background to the filming of Performance (one of my favourite films yet I learn a lot I didn't know before and I thought I was somewhat of an expert). Miles was at the centre of all things countercultural and subversive throughout the 60s and 70s so we also get a lot of personal, though verified, information from those times. Well written and easy to read. Absolutely love this book and can't recommend it highly enough.

[Colin · Rating 3 out of 5]

An entertaining enough book, packed with amusing and shocking anecdotes about the underground scene in London since the war. Unfortunately, it's also packed with endless typographical errors that become thoroughly tiresome by the end. Things are so bad that a chapter heading, printed correctly at the start of the chapter is then repeated incorrectly at the top of the next thirteen pages. Atlantic Books, you really should be ashamed of yourselves! Even the underground press made more effort to get things right than this. As for the content, well it's never less than interesting, with a large cast of 'characters'. That so many of these are thoroughly unpleasant and self-serving says rather a lot about the underground scene and means that the few with integrity shine through distinctly. C

[Simon Fellowes]

This was a really solid trawl through the late 50's, 60' & 70's aspects of inner London bohemian and creative life, particularly centring around Fitzrovia and Soho. Though seen through somewhat rose-tinted glasses, the book still manages to capture the electric atmosphere of the time, the characters, the ebullience - the can-do mentality. In hindsight we know much of what came out of the period wasn't as potent as it seemed, but it still must have been thrilling to be part of it at the time, when the scene was comparatively small, everyone making it up as they went along. The latter part of the book falls away- the author clearly no longer at the centre of the action as he once was. Still worth a read though.

[Robert Pereno · Rating 5 out of 5]

Start of Nov. 'Just getting into it and a very promising start indeed'. 'Nov 13th and have just passed the half-way mark; I can not even begin to tell you how much I am enjoying this book.'
Finished the book on Monday the 15th. I did get a bit restless during the 1960s but woke up big time during the 70s and 80s. Always fun seeing the names of friends and places you have been: The Kilt, Blitz Club, Rusty Egan, Adam Ant, Wilma and the neo-naturists, Trevor Myles of Paradise Garage...and the list goes on.
I got this copy from my local Library. I will have to buy a copy, this will be a book that stays with me for the rest of my life.

[Writerlibrarian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I finally finished this mammoth, huge non fiction. It's fun, it's interesting, it's structured in a way that you learn bits and pieces and make connections throughout reading. It's not really chronological nor is it a complete history of that period. The 50's and 60's parts are the best parts. The whole chapter about Performance is quite interesting, gave me another point of view and I wanted to pull out Keith Richards autobiography out and start reading it on the spot. Miles is a good writer, he was part of the whole scene, especially the 50's, 60's and part of the 70s. It's his point of view, an insider point of view.

[Mark Findlater · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a five star book chock full of insights from your man on the scene Barry Miles. I loved it, I learned a lot about the many intertwined histories of my home city and the culture of the nation. I'm going to dig deeper, and I whole heartedly recommend this book.

...Someone really should have edited it, and if someone did, then someone else should have. For all the wheat there is a good 25% chaff and this book could have been about 100 pages shorter without losing any of the good stuff.

[Pondering Pig Newton · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's such a fascinating subject, I can't understand why I found it tedious and boring. Perhaps I was looking for a more graphic or personal approach, or amybe I'm more American than I think I am. The Bohemians seemed a bit more like career drunks than a fresh engaging counterculture.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Weaker in the modern, post-sixties era (Billy Currie forming Ultravox after playing for Visage?) but for the late fifties, sixties and early seventies - Miles' beat - invaluable. And very, very funny.

[Tobias]

Excellent on Indica the Roundhouse and the 1960s London counter culture, very patchy on the 1970s and 1980s

[Flaviosity · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic book on the counter-culture history of London, especially the artists of Soho. Highly recommend it!

[Pauline · Rating 5 out of 5]

Especially enjoyed the early part of this book, pre war Bohemia in Soho and Fitzrovia.

[Shanti · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent read.Very informative and written with style,as Miles' books usually are.Anyone with an interest in art and the real 'movers and shakers' of our culture will love it.

[Richard Kenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great recent history of a London that's now disappeared.