Ian Stuart Donaldson - Career

Career

Ian Stuart Donaldson attended Baines School in Poulton, where he met Sean McKay, Phil Walmsley, and John Grinton. After, they formed the cover band Tumbling Dice, who played songs by The Rolling Stones. They formed Skrewdriver in 1975.

Skrewdriver had temporarily flirted with a rocker/biker look, but eventually they adopted a skinhead look. The original version of the band gained a reputation for attracting violence at their concerts, but they did not openly promote any far right political views.

After the original Skrewdriver lineup parted ways in 1979, Donaldson formed a new lineup and began to write songs for a white power skinhead audience. The new version of Skrewdriver openly promoted far right groups such as the National Front. raising funds for them (and affiliated organisations) through the White Noise Records label. As a result, Skrewdriver became known for its involvement in the white nationalist movement and its associated music genre, Rock Against Communism. Donaldson, along with Nicky Crane, founded Blood and Honour, a neo-Nazi network that distributes white power music and organises concerts.

Donaldson also became leader of two other bands, The Klansmen (a rockabilly band) and White Diamond (a hard rock/heavy metal band), and he released several solo albums. Along with Skrewdriver guitarist Stigger, he recorded the albums Patriotic Ballads volumes 1 and 2, which included covers of traditional folk songs such as "The Green Fields of France". Donaldson's voice also appeared in the song "The Invisible Empire" (whose title refers to the Ku Klux Klan) on the 1989 album See you in Valhalla by neo-Nazi rock band No Remorse.

Donaldson was one of the principal organisers of a white power concert near Waterloo station in London in 1992. Anti-Fascist Action organized a protest, which resulted in physical confrontations.

On 10 July 1993, Stuart and Skrewdriver played their final concert in Waiblingen, Germany. The programme, Second anniversary of the Kreuzritter für Deutschland, was organized by freelance writer and white nationalist book author Andreas J. Voigt, who leads the semi-secret society Deutschherrenklub.

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