Does 'Hipster' automatically equal Brooklyn? [now w/video!]
Comments
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I don't know how to feel about "hipsters." I mean, I really like Joanna Newsom, but don't particularly like tight pants. I like the fact that hipsters don't strike me as aggressive or violent. I don't even care about being condescended to because, well, I'm pretty smart and don't really care what people think about me.
But two things bother me.
One: Fashion, in my opinion, is a rather worthless way to waste one's attention. Something strikes me as vacuous. (but hell, I listen to baseball on the radio, play tug-o-war with my dog, and rock Guitar Hero II, so perhaps I'm not one to talk.) My point is: we all should probably spend more time focusing on more important matters...not what your friends will think of your vintage t.
Two: The drugs. These kids do too much cocaine. Talk about a waste... kids, please... it will really f*ck you up.
So I dunno. I think it's funny when gawker plays its favorite game (hate the hipster!) but hope that these kids find a way to do something good besides find the next bar, the next band, the next nabe. -
Rose wrote: [quote=alafairnadia]damn, who knew hipsters could make brooklynians feel such ire?
Wow. I thought it was just Park Slope toddlers who provoked so much resentment.
I actually feel extreme annoyance regarding the widespread proliferation of coke-snorting, hipster toddlers at the PSFC. they wear skinny jeans, platform heels, listen to the latest cutting edge indie baby rock, and only hang out at underground playgrounds. and mojito flavored apple sauce? come on! -
Subject: UK hipsters
Good points, windowdressing.
The whole Williamsburg look is based on the Shoreditch (East London) look circa 2001 and it's been like that since 2003.
The Brits are famous for inventing their own styles, which then turn into fashion. If a Guardian fashion editor saw three women wearing fishnet tights in the EC1 zip code, they would be all over the fashion supplement ten days later. In NY it takes forever for the conservative knuckleheads of the Times to realize what's happening out on the streets.
When one of my friends from London, who could qualify as a hipster, visited Brooklyn last year, she was appalled by the cocaine consumption at parties. And that says something because the UK has the highest coke use percentage of Europe.
I love NY, but to me it's not a creative hotbed like London or Tokyo, where people invent their own fashion/music/graphic design. NY does what it does best: selling itself to the rest of the world as the capital of the world without really delivering the goods. -
Sometimes people think I'm a hipster until I tell them I love musical theater and that Marie's Crisis is one of my favorite bars.
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Subject: Are you square?
filmlover44 wrote: I'm too old to be a hipster and too young to be a hippie. I've never been "hip".
Than you might be old enough to remember that Huey Lewis said "It's hip to be square." -
Tex Antoine wrote: A slight correction. Hipsters are not "from" Brooklyn. They tend to be from Ohio, or Tallahassee, or someplace else. Then they come here and adopt the "more New York than you" pose that is part of the essence of true hipsterdom. Real New Yorkers are almost never hipsters.
HERE HERE! :P
[quote=cheflady]While I have my own ideas, I'd also be interested in seeing some definitions of hipster from you guys..! other than being from Brooklyn. -
to add, fairly unoriginal of me, I'd say the minute you are calling someone a "hipster," that kinda takes you outta that bracket...no matter yer age, income, location, etc.
Perhaps AOK by you (and me)...perhaps not?
Thoughts? -
LittleRedMenace wrote: Sometimes people think I'm a hipster until I tell them I love musical theater and that Marie's Crisis is one of my favorite bars.
Sometimes people think I am the ultimate hipster because I am. -
The only thing funnier than hipsters is humor about hipsters:
This one is a close second:
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I like the second video. I really thought there would be more posts that were sort of objective observations, but there definitely seems to be a hipster/non-hipster divide out there. Can we bridge the gap?
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I don't understand what you're looking for. There are already a lot of "objective observations" here and a bunch on the blog post (http://www.dailyslope.com/2007/04/30/does-hipster-automatically-equal-brooklyn/). What is missing from the conversation?
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You know what, I'm proud that New Yorkers look and dress better than many of the other places in our country. As superficial as that may sound, an element of style and "cutting edge"-ness (new word?) is a nice thing and I happen to see a good deal of that in Brooklyn and actually, in Long Island City these days.
I'll never forget getting off of a plane from Tokyo (maybe one of the hippest cities on the planet) in Detroit. Everyone, I mean everyone, was in sweatpants and Nascar themed t-shirts, or sporting some khaki, pleated Dockers and a striped Polo. I contrasted that to a recent flight back from the UK and looked at those in JFK. Noticeably different.
I'll take tattoos and black leather, denim and Onion, or "hipster/retro" band t-shirts over that whack style any day! -
Hipster doesn't equal Brooklyn, but that doesn't stop wannabes from thinking that Brooklyn equals hipster. The chicken and the egg were postmarked separately, but arrived on the same day.
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All I know is that if I see another 20-something wearing oversized women's sunglasses that match their outfit, I'm gonna puke. That must be a particular sect within hipsterdom.
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Tex Antoine wrote: A slight correction. Hipsters are not "from" Brooklyn. They tend to be from Ohio, or Tallahassee, or someplace else. Then they come here and adopt the "more New York than you" pose that is part of the essence of true hipsterdom. Real New Yorkers are almost never hipsters.
Tex, that's the best definition. EVER!
[quote=cheflady]While I have my own ideas, I'd also be interested in seeing some definitions of hipster from you guys..! other than being from Brooklyn. -
Tex Antoine wrote: Yeah, they're inclusive, as long as you walk, talk, think, and and act exactly as they do. Otherwise they're the most hateful people on the planet.
a) despite what some detractors might assume, they are one of the more racially inclusive scenes in an urban setting
^^^^^^^
would a blipster (Black Hipster) count as a token? i first heard this term about 3 months ago, and i almost fell off the bar stool. I really dont see a reason to divide such a sub-genre into a micro subgenre. ignorant but funny... -
according to that silly hipster handbook a Blipster is a "blue collar" hipster. Makes more sense.
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hipster handbook... i actually googled it and it appears it means black + indie according to brooklyn Vegan:
...There is even a new word for black fans of indie rock: “blipster,†which was added to UrbanDictionary.com last summer, defined as “a person who is black and also can be stereotyped by appearance, musical taste, and/or social scene as a hipster.†.........THE recent attention given several bands with black members — like Bloc Party, Lightspeed Champion, and the Dears — could signify change. “Return to Cookie Mountain,†the second album by the group TV on the Radio, a band in which four of the five members are black, was on the best-album lists of many critics in 2006. Around the country, other rock bands with black members are emerging....
http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2007/01/blipster_a_black_hipster_ny_times_on_indie_black.html -
[quote="Tex Antoine"]Actually they're utterly useless in terms of giving opinions because their hive mind mentality blinds them to influences that fall outside their hermetically sealed circle of "approved" records/books etc.
And the idea that hipsters help break bands into the mainstream is laughable. Hipster musical tastes tend toward the unlistenable--the Clap Your Hands Say Yeah and Yeah Yeah Yeahs of the world come to mind. They valorize musical acts that have no chance of gaining mainstream acceptance so they can safely scoff at those of us who like bands that do.
You mean like The Arcade Fire? -
Blipster, huh? We lived in the lower W. 90's in Manhattan before it became "The Upper West Side". There were two brownstones across the street full of cats and empty lots everywhere. Then the "Buppies" moved in and the neighborhood got "gentrified".
Some things change but everything stays the same. -
Nothing really changes, just the labels that the culture and media uses...
In elementary school I was a nerd (c. 1978).
In high school I was a geek (c. 1985).
In college I was a punk (c. 1988).
In grad school I was a hipster (c. 1992)
Now I'm an adultolescent (c. 2000) -
nerds are the new hipsters.
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Are you suggesting The Arcade Fire isn't unlistenable? Try again.
LimestoneKid wrote: You mean like The Arcade Fire?
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Tex Antoine wrote: Are you suggesting The Arcade Fire isn't unlistenable? Try again.
The Arcade Fire are completely unlistenable.
[quote=LimestoneKid]You mean like The Arcade Fire?
It's a shame when a crap band like that comes to represent music in Canada when there are so many better bands. (And I'm not referring to Avril Lavigne when I say that.) -
Brooklyn isn't the only spot in America where there are large pockets of hipsters. Other popular cities are: Boston(Mission Hill),Providence,Portland,Chicago,Seattle,Asheville, and Baltimore(yikes?).
I don't like to consider myself a hipster, like most I know, but I know I am immediately labeled one upon sight. I'm white, tattooed and live in Bushwick. I'm also a bit overweight, hate cool haircuts, think fashionable clothing is stupid, and just barely scraping by on my rent. I don't have rich parents to fall back on, which is the basic assumption people have about people in my predicament. I am guilty of being a music dork though, but save most of my scoffing, if any, for those who listen to Arcade Fire or TV on the Radio. I'm also not from NYC, I'm from New Hampshire, and slightly pride myself on it.
I don't care about being labeled as a hipster. In all reality, what can I do about it? Educate every person I meet about the difference between me and what I consider a hipster? I don't think so. That's an incredible waste of time. -
themfa wrote: THE recent attention given several bands with black members — like Bloc Party, Lightspeed Champion, and the Dears — could signify change. “Return to Cookie Mountain,†the second album by the group TV on the Radio, a band in which four of the five members are black, was on the best-album lists of many critics in 2006. Around the country, other rock bands with black members are emerging....
Wow, I didn't know rock music had reached black culture yet, much less that black people were actually playing it. That's great to hear. -
doctorj wrote: [quote=themfa]THE recent attention given several bands with black members — like Bloc Party, Lightspeed Champion, and the Dears — could signify change. “Return to Cookie Mountain,†the second album by the group TV on the Radio, a band in which four of the five members are black, was on the best-album lists of many critics in 2006. Around the country, other rock bands with black members are emerging....
Wow, I didn't know rock music had reached black culture yet, much less that black people were actually playing it. That's great to hear.
Big ups to sarcasm. We need more of it. There apparently isn't enough on this message board. -
doctorj wrote: [quote=themfa]THE recent attention given several bands with black members — like Bloc Party, Lightspeed Champion, and the Dears — could signify change. “Return to Cookie Mountain,†the second album by the group TV on the Radio, a band in which four of the five members are black, was on the best-album lists of many critics in 2006. Around the country, other rock bands with black members are emerging....
Wow, I didn't know rock music had reached black culture yet, much less that black people were actually playing it. That's great to hear.
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Santa wrote:
how about having a woody guthrie quote put on my track bike!?
p.s. quoting Woody Guthrie is a pretty hipsterish thing to do.
oh noes! i'm hipster! -
LeeHo wrote: You know what, I'm proud that New Yorkers look and dress better than many of the other places in our country. As superficial as that may sound, an element of style and "cutting edge"-ness (new word?) is a nice thing and I happen to see a good deal of that in Brooklyn and actually, in Long Island City these days.
Yeah, I agree. The odd thing I've found about Park Slope, and why I'm not surprised to see such a negative reaction to the word "hipster" here, is that this neighborhood has the cutting-edge equivalent of historic downtown St. Charles. :P
I'll never forget getting off of a plane from Tokyo (maybe one of the hippest cities on the planet) in Detroit. Everyone, I mean everyone, was in sweatpants and Nascar themed t-shirts, or sporting some khaki, pleated Dockers and a striped Polo. I contrasted that to a recent flight back from the UK and looked at those in JFK. Noticeably different.
I'll take tattoos and black leather, denim and Onion, or "hipster/retro" band t-shirts over that whack style any day!
http://www.mainstreetstcharles.com/index.htm
As much as you criticize "hipsters" for all wearing the same thing, I see plenty of people donning the "Park Slope" uniform. There are lots and lots of people out there who choose these little subsets to reside in for whatever reason, be it comfort, fear of your innate self, etc.
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