Burning up – The Dark Side of the Summer of ’76

The Bunker

Podmasters

News, Politics, Society & Culture, Government

4.6 • 984 Ratings

🗓️ 12 June 2025

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Legendarily hot, dry and hedonistic, the Summer of ’76 burnt itself into our cultural memory as a kind of Ultimate Summer. But the record temperatures, the soul and disco classics and the sense of youth breaking free took place against a backdrop of economic collapse, political failure and barely suppressed rage. These were the Dark 70s of the Southall Riots, the Ripper and the Black Panther, police queerbashing and simmering hatreds. John L. Williams, author of Heatwave: The Summer of 1976 – Britain At Boiling Point, talks to Andrew Harrison about four months of tension that birthed punk rock, Thatcherism and a more cynical Britain. • Buy Heatwave: The Summer of 1976 through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll help fund The Bunker by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org’s fees help support independent bookshops too. • Support us on Patreon for early episodes and more. • We are sponsored by Indeed. Go to Indeed.com/bunker to get your £100 sponsored credit. Written and presented by Group Editor Andrew Harrison. Audio production by Sara Farolfi. Produced by Liam Tait. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Managing Editor Jacob Jarvis. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production www.podmasters.co.uk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Enjoying our podcast, but maybe not the adverts, sign up to support us on Patreon and you'll get every episode ad-free.
0:06.9	Follow the link in the show notes to find out how.
0:12.1	Amazon offers employees up to £8,000 for education and training.
0:16.5	Like Juliet, she's now a trained technician.
0:20.2	And to her, the sound of machinery in need of repair
0:23.6	reminds her of how far she's come. In two years she's landed her dream job, providing her with valuable skills.
0:33.6	That's up to £8,000 for education and training at Amazon.
0:38.3	Eligibility conditions apply.
0:46.0	Hello, welcome back to the bunker, your daily deep dive into politics, culture, history and the big themes that shape our world.
0:52.8	I'm Andrew Harrison.
0:55.8	Today, pull up a sunlanger, pour yourself a nice cold corona lime aid, or maybe a crested cream soda. Turn up Elton
1:01.5	and Kiki doing Don't Go Breaking My Heart and get yourself ready for a race riot in Southall.
1:06.8	The long hot summer of 1976 is etched into the British memory like no other.
1:12.2	Even if you weren't there, it looms large as a kind of ultimate summer.
1:16.0	Temperatures hit 35 degrees centigrade.
1:18.6	City parks were parched brown.
1:20.2	A drought sent the British population to standpipes amid the original few water scorcher summer.
1:26.9	But we learn in a fantastic and richly entertaining new book,
1:30.7	Heatwave, the summer of 1976, Britain at Boiling Point, there was a dark side to these three
1:36.7	idyllic months as well. Britain was sinking into an economic morass with unemployment rising
1:41.8	and industrial unrest. The National Front staged provocations in
1:45.7	immigrant areas. There were civil disturbances from Bristol-St. Paul's to Moss Side to South
	...

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