I’m not sure music could change my life now I’m in middle age – and to be honest, I’m not sure I’d want it to. But in 1979 I was 14, an impressionable and earnest teenager, with a hunger for music, which I recognised as a gateway to all that was cool.

I preferred the music of the 60s to the abrasive and challenging new-wave styles of the time. Many of the groups I did approve of, such the Jam, I understood to be influenced by the 60s music I liked. I was suspicious of the scratchier end of punk and new wave (we didn’t call it “post-punk” then) and particularly apprehensive of the increasing preponderance of synthesisers. I also heaped scorn on disco, which was too glittery, sexy and just not serious enough for the dour 14-year-old me. Thirty-five years on, I’m embarrassed at my narrow tastes. But this conservatism was shared by many of the kids in my class, who rejected punk and disco in favour of Queen, Genesis, or even in one case, Jim Reeves.

I was just too young for punk, and no contemporary record seemed to speak to me or my generation. Then came Gangsters by the Special AKA.

London was drab and frightening in the late 70s, nowhere more so than Lewisham, where I lived. In 1977, Lewisham had been the scene of a riot when the National Front attempted to march. There were coaches full of far-right thugs parked outside my house. My adopted sisters are black, and so for my family the NF represented an existential threat. Racism was rife among my predominantly white classmates. The Lewisham march represented a political awakening for me. I was glad of any ally, and the Specials defined themselves against the far right.

The Specials – no one called them the Special AKA – had black and white members and spoke out defiantly against the NF and its racism. The name of their label, 2-Tone, and its chequered design (still associated with ska) is an assertion of black and white unity. It’s crude, yes – almost laughably simplistic, in fact. But it needed to be if it was to get through to the dimmest skinheads. I loved the 2-Tone label, and the sleeve. It looked unlike any other record, and I knew it was for me.

Oddly, I don’t remember exactly when I first heard it. I remember realising it was a record that was cool to like: it had been endorsed by John Peel, by the NME, and – most importantly – by Ray, one of my more discerning friends. Ray had become a mod, and persuaded me to do the same, which I was glad to do on the basis that it was a revival of 60s music and styles.

Gangsters didn’t instantly hit me, but it did capture my interest. I didn’t have a musical frame of reference in which to place it. It was described as being something called “ska” – but what was that? I managed to answer that question thanks to a great compilation called Intensified! that was issued in the wake of 2-Tone’s success.

But though it was based on Prince Buster’s Al Capone – as another hasty reissue confirmed – Gangsters didn’t really sound like ska at all. It still doesn’t. To me, it retains an aura of mystery that means it still holds my attention when I listen to it, unlike many of the records that I wore out in my youth. Unlike the Specials’ later hit Ghost Town, Gangsters’ message (if there was one) remained opaque. I concede, it does have a kind of skanking beat, and Prince Buster-style interjections from Neville Staple – but a strange, almost Middle Eastern melody. And then, of course, there’s Terry Hall’s deadpan vocals and appearance – on Top of the Pops he looked like Buster Keaton. Was it really ska? Everything about it seemed new, even the movements of Roddy Radiation and Neville Staple, whose jerky dancing provided a template for terrible dancing by uncles at weddings for generations to come.

In December 1979 I attended my first gig: the Specials at Lewisham Odeon. The support acts were the Selecter and Dexys Midnight Runners. The audience were frenzied, dancing continually, with frequent scuffles breaking out. For years afterwards I assumed that violence was a normal part of going to gigs. The experience was frightening, but also exciting. It illuminated a world that was violent and hard, shone a light on the grimness of late-70s London, but also provided gleeful escape.

I remember John Peel at the end of 1979 commenting that he didn’t think there’d been a better year for music. Still being devoted to 60s music, I couldn’t agree. But watching the 30 August 1979 edition of Top of the Pops (recently repeated on BBC4) you can see what he meant: there was Nick Lowe’s Cruel to be Kind, Gary Numan’s Cars, the Stranglers’ Duchess ... and Gangsters, which still sounds fresher and more exciting than anything.