Fashion Faces January 2014

The 90s was without doubt the last time when both fashion and
music united as one single unified culture, and was genuinely
fresh new inventive and exciting! ‘Brit Pop’ had taken off in
a massive way, with cool arty bands like Pulp, Blur, Elastica,
Suede, The Stone Roses, Happy Mondays and Oasis, kicking
out the jams, with a whole fresh new take on pop culture and
a brilliant visual style, still being copied and recycled today!
The real big new in the 90s though was ‘Clubculture’! With
Techno/Trance music filling the clubs all over Europe and
Ibiza becoming the center of the universe for all who were
young cool stylish and beautiful! The look that became
known as ‘Clubwear’ ruled! And spread around the globe!
Sadly the USA (other than NYC & a few ultra hip young dudes
with their radar plugged in to what was happening!)) rather
missed out in most of this! But it is this ‘look’ (like 70s punk
retro) which is being continually being re-shaped/re-modeled
and re-hashed (just like music) in an increasingly desperate
attempt to inject the current ‘emperors new clothe-ism’ of the
fashion and music industry with a less than believable illusion
of ‘Wow’!
WHY TODAY EVERYBODY IN FASHION
& MUSIC TRIES TO IMITATE THE PAST
RATHER THAN CREATE THE FUTURE!
What has to be remembered is this: It was the ‘Sound’ the
bands/music of all these periods (right up until the end of
the 90s) that inspired designers! NOT the other way round!
Young fashion design students at London’s Central St Martins
and The Royal College Of Art (still today the most prestigious
and influential fashion/design faculties in the world) would
spend their nights in the clubs posing, hanging out, dancing
and seeing bands. Indeed many of the coolest looking and
sounding bands came from art school backgrounds (and still
do). So these young design students would create ideas that
expressed the ‘look’ & the ‘attitude’! So it ALL came from ‘The
Street’ the ‘Subculture’! Not as it is today, from the artless
uniformity of Marketing & Branding, applied from ‘Above’!
What held all this together of course was The
Face Magazine! More than any other publication
then or since (although FF shows definite signs
of moving in this direction I am happy to say!)
The Face had it’s ‘Finger on the Trigger ‘of music
and fashion! It was the ‘Connector’! And global
hipsters would religiously buy their copy of the
magazine each month, knowing that what ever
was featured, was way ahead of the game, totally
‘below the radar’! And nobody else yet knew
about it!
A look at some of the collage of images that
accompany this article will illustrate how cool it
all was, and why today everybody in fashion and
music tries to imitate the past rather than create
the future! However, I like many, who ‘were there’
can sense a change! The ‘codes, signs & signals’
are all there!
It’s about to get exciting and interesting again!
And the next ‘Cultural Revolution’ is just around
the corner! So make sure you get your copy of
FFM each month! And when the train leaves the
station! You might just have a ticket to ride and
survive the ‘Style Wars’!
Life Is Beautiful If You Want It To Be!
We All Create Our Own Karma!
A Happy & Beautiful New Year to You All!
Kick Out The Jams!
Chris Garland
Chris Garland
London, January 2014.