Today I realized that I need Gnarlitude to live.
Nothing worked to shake off my lethargy and depression until I clicked on her blog.
“Uh, seriously, with my black motorcycle boots this would just be beyond fucking hot. Lanvin S/S”
“JLP is such a great photographer and really nails these motoshoots. An older friend of mine has been wearing the Harley hat below since he was a teen and that shit is vintage now, it made me smile to spot it in this shoot.”
YES! OF COURSE your friend has been wearing that “Harley hat” long before anyone else! Duh! I love you, never stop!
I don’t know what works for you, but when I’m depressed, my escape route is usually indignant rage or in this case, perverse humor. Hipsters parading their hipness isn’t always funny, but Gnarlitude raises the bar to beyond parody.
Let’s create the ultimate Hipster and get it over with. I’ll begin, and when I run out of ingredients, you can throw in the rest:
Bukowski, Iggy, The Misfits, vintage motorcycles, opiates, Max’s Kansas City, CBGB’s, Velvet Underground, leather, denim, taxidermy, skulls, spikes, swastikas, Patti Smith, Chuck Palahniak, old band t-shirts, skateboards, cigarettes, dope paraphernalia, bad poetry, Nick Cave, Converse, cowboy boots, stupid hats, Godard, Hells Angels, serial killers, Death Metal, tattoos, vintage guitars…
florals….somewhere.
Ann D., Alex W., Odin or whatever… Barney’s, writing about NYC like you live there when you actually don’t, writing in a way that makes no sense… and I quote:
‘Besides, all the good lookin old guys I’ve known for years who all still ride the best bikes in town all came around despite the crowd and were all losing their shit after spotting me back in the bar after a very long New-York-disappearance, so, that more than made up for the lack of real attraction elsewhere all week.’
Interestingly enough, the other half of her sex savages blog seems to have disappeared. But the old guys lost their shit seeing Gnars back at the bar. So there’s that.
impractical bicycles, left-leaning political affiliation without participation, Bill Hicks, roll-your-owns? Baking twee sweeties seems popular with the hipster kids nowadays, but what would i know, i live in australia.
Ahem. The Doors. Every retro-kool teenager’s favorite darkness.
Am I the only one who notices that they’re also usually white?
Never mind, here’s another few ingredients: American Apparel (proto-ingredient, in fact), Courtney Love, Daria, Ray-Ban sunglasses, checked/plaid shirts, The Virgin Suicides movie, thick-framed glasses, feather headdresses, Sassy magazine (this applies mainly to girls) and My So-Called Life.
gnarls – That quote is staggering. I am speechless.
Dru – Ah, you’re doing Gen Y hipsters. I’m not as well-versed in them, but I think you’ve just described Tavi.
Vans, ironic mustaches, buffalo plaid, vinyl record, street art
http://www.refinery29.com/img/hair-accessories-shop-2.jpg
This is the ultimate hipster accessory. I wish I could say I want it to disappear, but I love laughing at people wearing this kind of shit.
Sister- I don’t know if it’s Gen Y, I thought they just separated out into types based on….whatever. I was just thinking of the things that Jezebel writers love to have fanwanks over, but then, about Tavi….oh wait. (not that I claim to be an exception of any kind- some of the above are things I love, too).
I’m guessing the ultimate proto-ingredient of any kind of hipster (even above AA!) is the belief that personal taste outweighs all else, and elevates the liker to the level of the things he/she likes (or downgrades them, depending on perception). It’s just a theory, though.
Uk hipsters – fabulous (and lots of further reading links).
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/oct/14/hate-hipsters-blogs
They seem to be on the way to being considerated a sociological tribe too!
Bravo Hipsters!
Mr. Rogers, Garrison Keillor, Barny Fife, and that intern on 30 Rock?
..or do cigarettes and black leather absolutely have to be involved?
If so, how un-hip..
E – Oooh, I love articles that analyze hipsters, and I recently read that if you spend any time disliking hipsters, you ARE a hipster. I’ll go read your link, thanks!
Dexter – Do hipsters still bother to be ironic about TV? I always hated that! Actually, I thought that was “post-modern” rather than hip. Like people who think it’s neat to love Gilligan’s Island.
It’s all so complicated!
I think we are past post-modern now, if I can remember it it must be over. I can also remember being pretentious and what-not when I was a teenager (I definitey remember being called out for it by some equally pretentious bloke in a pub once, oh the irony).
I don’t think I hate hipsters but I do hate arrogant, cliquey people. I’m sure it’s just coincidence that I keep meeting people who have all three attributes.
Whatever ‘group’ or ‘tribe’ it is, is ultimately cliquey and perceives value in their group above and beyond others. Your definition is brilliant for the edgy/rad hipster. Blimey this lifestyle pornography thing is bonkers.
I think you’re right, Sis. First there was TV nostalgic hip, then nerds and scientists are hip.
But true hipsters seems to exude smoldering invulnerability, whether it’s faked or not. “I’ll hurt you back first,” they or their clothing warn.
Sonic Youth, tatty fur jackets, cigarettes (own-rolled perhaps, though I think only dickheads do that), second-hand Doc Martens, bitten nails and fingerless gloves, ‘ironic’ sleeve tattoos, fluent sarcasm and total apathy…running out of ideas.
Oh, and gnarls, my dad used to listen to The Doors. He is the least hipster person I’ve ever known. He used to wear flared trousers in his youth. I wish I’d met him when he was my age, he must have been HILARIOUS.
Kiki de Montparnasse lingerie, Hedi Slimane, Ellen Von Unwerth, Ash Stymest, 70’s horror movies, underweight chicks with dirty hair and too much eye makeup, purple hair.
wants the world to stop so she can get off
Feather Headdresses, a Trust Fund, Protesting shit they unknowingly participate in on a daily basis, Glitter, Slightly dyed hair in a unnatural color so they don’t have to commit to actually being the other…
Actually, I think Tavi would technically be considering Generation Z. Generation Y ended sometime in the early 90s.
two weekends ago, i was exiting a Port-a-loo in a gas station on a Wisconsin reservation, and some guy roared out the window of his car, “HIPSTER ON THE RES!”
^hahaha!
Still more ingredients in the stew: Polaroid cameras, or photographs that look like they were taken by an instant camera anyway, headbands, oversized/’statement’ jewellery (see the repertoires of Pamela Love, Eddie Borgo, Alexis Bittar and Tom Binns for examples), Slavoj Žižek and possibly Roland Barthes, never ever admitting to being an actual fan of a sport even as a passive watcher.
I think that once the list hit Nick Cave it was done. The blinding radiance of his Caveness obscures all else.
If I may delurk with several ingredients – the belief that you are absolutely unique in what you like, even though troops of other people like exactly the same thing; the sincere belief that you have always liked headbands or motorcycle jackets or some other fashionable object even if you only started wearing them last year or possibly once wished you had one when you were twelve; the belief that only you have real reasons for what you do and everyone else is misguided.
Also, calling motorcycle things “moto”….which I personally believe dates from those razor phones’ default ring setting of [vaguely pan-european voice] ” ‘allo moto”.
Believing that somehow, somehow spending a lot of time and mental energy on getting things isn’t really materialistic as long as they are the right things….
I don’t know–the perpetual presence of left-wing stuff in hipsterdom (Zizek, protest culture) is maybe a product of the tension between people enjoying their privilege and being uncomfortable with it? I’d say that I used to be a hipster in youth (I mean, a nineties hipster) and in the end serious political activism won out over fashion, although I still do have a thing for scarves. Er, I have always been into scarves, back before everyone was wearing them.
My husband and I are 68 and he loves cowboy boots and I love him in them and we both read Mr. Bukowski, I even think we have a pair of converse sneakers in the closet. I’m so excited.
Vans… can’t forget the Vans.
don’t forget the triangle tattoos and undercuts!!
@Dru – “I’m guessing the ultimate proto-ingredient of any kind of hipster (even above AA!) is the belief that personal taste outweighs all else, and elevates the liker to the level of the things he/she likes”.
You always distill ideas beautifully.
Russ Meyer and images influenced by his work, defending exploitation and misogyny as “art”, real bones of dead things as accessories, vintage knock-offs from ModCloth, and most important hipster ingredient is an extremely misplaced/mistaken sense of superiority and self-importance.
Hipsters like this are why I quit smoking. At least in this town, if I’m standing outside the bar, it’s usually with the trucker-cap-and-fake-glasses crew. Someone needs to clue in Gnar to the fact that motorcycles are now the big nerd trend – I see more of my dweeby computer programmer ilk walking around in neon Teflon Power Rangers gear than brawny dudes in leathers, and I live in a biker town. They let their ratty ponytails and geekbeards hang out the helmet and everything.
Twinky DIY seems to be big. “Look, I sewed a felt bird shape to my t-shirt!”
I view Nick Cave as more redemptive, as in, “Ugh, a hipster, but at least they like The Birthday Party.”
this was on postsecret this week:
this needs to be made into a banner for a lot of people (including, at one time, myself)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v482/claudelemonde/overdose.jpg is the image if it can’t post
Jello colored mohawks.
Question: How many hipsters does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Answer: It’s a really obscure number. You’ve probably never heard of it.
Everything in this song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9g9BJ33KJRI
“The biggest difference between trying to pick up a ‘hipster girl’ and J-Woww is most hipster girls will value commonality much more than your average girl. They have had a life of feeling disillusioned and outcast from others and want to feel like they have a friend in this dark, cold universe. If you feel there is a strong chance her favorite movie is Harold and Maude, just like yours, bring it up ASAP.”
Ironic Fair Isle sweaters.
Everything mentioned in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xzocvh60xBU&feature=related
& fugly glasses, crotch-bustingly tight jeans, cultural appropriation, the complete inability to do anything in a non-ironic way, scornfully judging the earnest/enthusiastic, and looking like you’re a hairstyle with a person attached.
HelOnWheels- thanks! I’m blushing a little from reading that, too.
Siobhan- “looking like you’re a hairstyle with a person attached.”
You just made me snort my late-night coffee out my nose from laughing.
bukowski hated himself
Really crappy beer. I can’t get over how bad it is.
dudes in brown pants.
chiks with mullets
overly tight pants
lack of visible hygiene
dressing like it’s still the 80’s
I also forgot – pretending to have read boooks you have never really read.
i don’t even think these people realize that the sex pistols actually suck
Wes Anderson films, vegan barbecue, double knuckle rings, Jeffrey Campbell Lita boots, jizz nailpolish. I’m not sure to call Tavi a hipster, but I would count her as an ingredient. So lets add her to the list.
Oh, Erika, that reminds me. I am guilty of buying t-shirts of bands I had never heard before–back in an emo wannabe phase.
We need to have a dress like a hipster photo shoot. That would be funny.
the hipster thing is quite regional and also subjective. What one person may think is such, another may not.
honestly i feel like everyone thinks that everyone but themselves and their own group of friends are “hipsters”, and that they’re the only ones who are genuinely into things for the right reasons. that sentence sounded atrocious but you probably get what i mean.
ooh this is my first comment even though i’ve been lurking and loling forever.
What Katie Wore – have you seen this website? I’m addicted to the horror of it all. Typical East Londoners with wacky haircuts.
Toms footwear
American Spirit cigarettes (used to be parliament)
Finger tattoos with “funny” things like a mustache or shhhh
‘Alex’ Wang
Sofia Coppola films
Lookbook
Drinking PBR
Deep Vs
Chest tattoos
Fixed gear bikes
Eating disorders
Mustache wax
The super thick super sideswept bang
…to name a few
-Hipsters liked the Chilean miners better when they were underground.
PS I like Erika’s suggestion.
I am greatly greatly greatly upset by the fact people at Jezebel enjoy the show Daria.
I’d add onto the list a brand new newly-constructed loft/condo in a neighbourhood once home to a large immigrant population.
annemarie – HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA, unforgettable! Thank you! xo