Respect Flipper

UPDATED: Since the debacle I’m laboriously detailing below started breaking – that being Forever 21 selling t-shirts adorned with the logo of storied San Francisco band, Flipper – it seems the outlet has removed the item from their website. Stay tuned for developments.

My colleague Drew forwarded this to me yesterday, and I meant to whip something up about it, but time got away from me and now it's everywhere, so apologies if this is old news.

I first heard the band Flipper courtesy of the 1981 Alternative Tentacles compilation, Let Them Eat Jellybeans, which – as I mentioned back on this ancient post – acted as a great primer for burgeoning hardcore. The opening track on same, meanwhile, was a discordant little ditty that owed precious little to the high-velocity blitzes that marked the rest of the vinyl. “Ha Ha Ha” by Flipper was as brazenly unconventional as anything by Black Flag, the Dead Kenendys or Bad Brains, but asserted itself by being slow as molasses. The song noisily fell out of your speakers in a sloppy torpor, steeped in snide, sneerily-delivered lyrics and cacophonous guitar. Their subversive sound and aesthetic may have seemed artlessly amateurish to many, but there was no one like them. Not yet, at least.

On the strength of "Ha Ha Ha," I picked up Generic Flipper and, later, Gone Fishin' (which featured an excellent cut-and-fold album cover) and played them frequently, much to the confused consternation of my college roommates. A few years later, Flipper vocalist Will Shatter died. Flipper resumed duties without him some time after that, but that's another story.

Despite -- or, perhaps, because -- of Flipper's pointedly indelicate and unwieldy sound, the band became a sizable influence on many bands in their wake, from the Melvins to Pissed Jeans and beyond. One famous fan was --- wait for it -- Kurt Cobain, who wore the Flipper logo (a scrawl of a dead fish) on an appearance on SNL in 1992. That single sartorial act lit something of a match.

Twenty-years after that broadcast, you can suddenly buy Flipper t-shirts at ::::gulp::: Forever 21, a schlocky teen clothiers that caters to the "Glee" set. There's one on Union Square that I've frequently fantasized about burning down.

In any case, here's the paragraph wherein I froth at the mouth with a predictable amount of bloodthirsty vitriol over the brazen appropriation of the iconography of a subculture the likes of Forever 21 has no business even daring to be mentioned in the same sentence with. Blah blah blah...Rant Rant Rant!

Sad but shockingly true: You can buy Flipper t-shirts at Forever 21. If the chiseled pretty boy modeling the shirt in this picture can name a single song by the band, I'll eat my shoe.

DEPRESSING ADDENDUM: As I mentioned at the top of this post, this story is making the rounds. Seattle pi, for example, wrote an embarassing little take on it, failing to ever mention that the Flipper logo long predates Kurt Cobain's sporting of it.. .or that they're even a band. DO YOUR DAMN HOMEWORK, SEATTLE PI! This isn't about Kurt!

12.02.12 UPDATE: The plot thickens, albiet depressingly once again. Courtesy of the Facebook page of Artcore Fanzine, herewith a statement from original Flipper drummer Steve De Pace:

REALITY CHECK.... Death and Taxes has published this article WITHOUT ANY FACT CHECKING. Not to mention that they are far more concerned with Kurt Cobain being ripped of than they are about Flipper. Even our own singer Bruce Loose, jumped the gun and is shouting that we have been ripped off... People talk a lot of shit in this world and make a lot of accusations without checking facts. This design has been licensed to a company that sells the shirt to a lot of different retail outlets. The latest happens to be Forever 21. And FLIPPER is getting paid. Thank you all for your concern!!!
There have been several blogs and lots of concerned Flipper fans, who we appreciate bringing this to our attention. I myself, was informed about the license deal after shit started hitting the fan. According to the blogs, Forever 21 has a sorted reputation when it comes to licensing designs from independent artists. I was not aware of any of this, until yesterday. In this instance, the retailer has gone through proper channels and has licensed this FLIPPER shirt from a company that represents this particular design on our behalf.
Again, I would like to express our appreciation from our fans for letting us know about the shirt being for sale at Forever 21. It is on the up and up, at least this time.... I have seen many bootleg Flipper shirts over the years, but at least this time, Flipper is getting a proper piece of the pie. And if some kids happen to buy a Flipper shirt, and decide they want to know more about Flipper, seek us out and find our music, that is fine with me....

 

Below is Flipper. You won't hear them at Forever 21 ... or, evidently, in the offices of Seattle pi.

 

Comments

[James Taylor]

If it helps, I once stole a belt from Forever 21 (in reality the girl simply neglected to charge me for it). Consider that your vicarious revenge of sorts.

[Alyssa]

Alex I'm interested to know your opinion on the fact that Flipper have licensed their logo with someone who has the authority to in turn license it to Forever 21.....I think you can most likely expand on 'depressing'....

[Alex in NYC]

Well, personally speaking, I do think “depressing” kinda nails it. At the end of the day, it’s Flipper’s logo to license to whomever they see fit (although I’d hope they read the fine print on the contracts they’re signing). It’s not like Flipper exactly raked in any money in their heyday (but, then, *no one* involved in the early hardcore scene was involved for any motivations of monetary gain). Decades later, however, I suppose if the respective members of the band can profit from their art, they’re entitled to. Who am I – or anyone – to lambast them for it? By the same token, don’t the band members *themselves* feel at least a twinge of regret seeing their name/likeness/insignia utilized in this fashion? One could argue that it shouldn’t matter whether Flipper t-shirts are being sold through an “appropriate” outlet (i.e. some rock gear retailer) or via a shinier, happier, glossier affair like Forever 21 – commerce is commerce, and they’re making bank either way. It doesn’t sound like they were consulted about it, but again – perhaps they didn’t read the fine print. Or perhaps they’re not hung up about it as folks like me are.

Again, though – for me, it’s depressing, and I doubt I’m alone in feeling that way. For me, the invocation of Flipper – their sound, their image, their graphics, etc. – all have very specific associations. Yes, of course, it’s nostalgia for my own fleeting youth, but it goes *beyond* that. At the time, the music of Flipper – and the music of the Dead Kennedys and Black Flag and Bad Brains and Minor Threat and ______ (insert your own favorite hardcore bands here) – served as something pointedly *other* than the readily available, easily-accessible, mass-consumed crap of 80’s society and pop culture. That’s why we liked it. It served as the *antidote* to the glossy mainstream bullshit and “don’t worry, be happy” mandate widely on offer at the time. As such, the accompanying insignia of hardcore (i.e. Black Flag’s bars, Shawn Kerri’s “skank kid” mascot, Corrosion of Conformity’s radioactive skull, Minor Threat’s black sheep, Flipper’s scrawled dead fish, etc. etc. etc. etc.) all acted as key signifiers for the like minds. If you were strolling down the street and saw someone sporting the Black Flag bars on a pin or a t-shirt or whatever, you knew you were encountering someone who was privy to the same information and probably shared the same sensibility.

I’m aware that sounds awfully rose-tinted and high-falutin’, but that’s the way I feel about it. Others may beg to differ, saying that it’s ultimately all just about entertainment. That’s fine, but I don’t have to agree with that.

[James Taylor]

Just read in Rolling Stone controversial tee has been pulled from market...

[Alyssa]

Thanks Alex! Marsh is with you...if his t-shirts hadn't rotted off his back years ago he'd still be wearing them. I on the otherhand have a much more vapid version....bought some really cool shaped vintage PanAm glasses years ago, and now they're not cool anymore, thanks to a cheesy ass tv show....