Flaming Pablum

Disney Gets Slipped a Mickey

Initially, I wasn’t going to address it here because (a) I’d already done so somewhat laboriously on Facebook and (b) the last thing this weblog really needs is another obstreperous, vein-popping screed from me about t-shirts. As fate had it, however, the story built up steam and the next thing I knew, folks at my job were asking me to whip up a little something on it. So, I collected my thoughts, subtracted HUGE ANGRY SWATHES OF RAGE from them, and wrote what I considered to be a fairly straight account of the whole kerfuffle. So, if you really want to re-live the whole DISNEY RIPPED OFF JOY DIVISION’S UNKNOWN PLEASURES FOR A T-SHIRT saga, click right here to read my take on it for TODAY.com’s style blog, The Look. Also, let’s face it – I’m an attention whore, and want you to read everything I write. Humor me.

Depressingly, the shirt is no longer available (well, you can find it for stupid amounts of money eBay). I’m actually going to DisneyWorld (god help me) in February, and had been planning on picking one up. Oh well.

 

A Cheap Trick Indeed

Okay, here's a half-assed one, but in the interest of consistency, I feel compelled to post about it. For a start, I should point out that I don't have anything against fitness. Prior to subjecting the world to my offspring, I myself was even a member of a gym or two and even worked out on a regular basis. I'm not a big fan of gym culture, but I understand the respect the compulsion and the discipline of keeping fit (even though I'm not really doing that at the moment). I'm not knocking health clubs

That said, I cannot for the life of me figure out why the Equinox on Broadway at 19th Street is selling "vintage" Cheap Trick t-shirts (see mannequin above -- click to enlarge). I just don't see the connection. I mean, no -- it's not like I'm being protective and antsy (again) about some quasi-obscure band whose iconography is being shamelessly appropriated (like, say, Flipper or Void, etc. etc.). Cheap Trick were stadium-fillers -- for a short while -- after all (At Budokan anyone?), and their soppy 1988 ballad "The Flame" was nigh on inescapable and practically defined "mainstream" for its time. But for some reason, this still gets my dander up. It makes me want to march into Equinox and quiz the first person I see wearing one about the finer points of Cheap Trick's sprawling discography.

I know I know, it's just a silly waste of time... but t just bugs me.

Anyway, here's one of my favorite Cheap Trick tunes. This is the opening cut from the band's largely ignored 1980 album, All Shook Up. Word at the time was that the slow-building opening note was the same as the climactic final note of the Beatles' Sgt. Peppers' Lonely Hearts Club Band (y'know, if you ignore that whole "inner groove" business). Anyway,... enjoy.

Respect Flipper Redux: Don't Be Stupid, Rolling Stone

Loyal reader James Taylor just pointed out that Rolling Stone reported today on the Flipper t-shirt flap that got me so riled up last week, so I dutifully clicked on over to check it out. Under normal circumstances, I'd just laugh this type of bullshit off, but Rolling Stone, last time I checked, still billed itself as a MUSIC magazine. So you'd think, right, that THEY WOULD AT LEAST KNOW THAT FLIPPER WAS A GODDAMN BAND, and not just a rinky-dink little doddle Kurt scrawled on his t-shirt. To read their take on it, you'd never know that fact.

Shame on you, Rolling Stone.

 

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.

 

Shania Not Sheena

By some strange confluence of the fates, I'm "friends" with lauded Ramones/Talking Heads/Plasmatics producer Ed Stasium on Facebook (although -- to be fair -- I should point out that I'm evidently only one out of 3,519 "friends"). In any case, Ed put up an article today about Arturo Vega's iconic Ramones t-shirt design. If you've ever had the taxing misfortune of spending any time around me, you've doubtlessly heard me spout off venomously about the woeful misappropriation of the band t-shirt. Nothing triggers my easily-riled rage quicker than someone flying the colors of a band they're not genuinely a devoted fan of. It's a silly hang-up, I admit, but a tenacious one. Inarguably, no single band t-shirt has suffered this indignity more than the classic Ramones design.

A number of years back on the I Love Music boards, someone started a discussion thread about Shania Twain's Ramones t-shirt (see above). I believe my first entry on said thread was simply: "SHE DIES NOW!" I then went on to call her a "sparkless careerist" who made music that was "banal, inconsequential and rife with meaningless cliche" and that she was "limply trying to imply some affinity/appreciation for individuals who actually make music of quality." It got worse from there. A lot worse. Nice, right?

In any case, here's the article in question. Give a read, do.

The Revenge of the Fergie Fatwa

Disclaimer: To the more literalist readers out there, please note that the slavishly overwritten outrage expressed in the following post shouldn't be taken entirely seriously. While it's true that I believe that the Black Eyed Peas do indeed make the worst music in the world, that is only my opinion. You, of course, may beg to differ. I've upset some readers, friends and casual acquaintances in the past with my rather pointedly expressed views on the subject of music. It's not my intention to ruin your day. By the same token, if your day can be so easily ruined by something you read about music or band t-shirts on a silly weblog, perhaps it's you that needs to relax a little.

Thanks, keep reading and enjoy...
- The Management

Back in the balmy, carefree days of 2008 (yeah, right), I typed up an angry little screed about the fact that Fergie -- she of the irrefutably vile Black Eye Peas -- was depicted sporting a vintage Sisters of Mercy t-shirt in an ad for iTunes. Being that she was and remains partly responsible for inarguably some of the WORST MUSIC HUMAN EARS HAVE EVER BEEN SUBJECTED TO, I felt that she was doing a woeful disservice to the incalculably superior Sisters by wearing a garment emblazoned with their signature iconography. More to the point, I rather aggressively doubted --- and remain entirely skeptical -- that Fergie could hum a `choon by the Sisters if her very life depended on it (and wouldn't it be splendid if it did?) I found it unfathomable that someone who'd versed themselves in the icy majesty and black-hearted sturm und drang of the Sisters could go on to make music..... like this.

In the ensuing years, Fergie's only become more of an inescapable figure of pop culture. It'd be charitable of me to suggest that the music of the Black Eyed Peas has improved in the interim, although that's very clearly not the case. Evidently not satisfied with blighting the world with her shrill sonic pestilence, Fergie (or, perhaps, her stylist) has seen fit once again to rile those easily-riled among us by wearing a Black Flag t-shirt. I mean, .... seriously?

Now, it's been long-documented that I have a feverish disdain for folks who wear band t-shirts while not actually being fans -- let alone passingly familiar -- with the bands in question. Apart from maybe people leaning their seat backs into my lap during flights, it's quite possibly my biggest, planet-engulfing pet peeve (and I'm not the only one bothered by it). It seems to have died down more recently (the last egregious example I can think of was in 2009 when "Hills" dingbat Audrina Partridge was photographed wearing an Exploited t-shirt ... that just about made me want to gargle with sulfuric acid), but it does still happen. And when it does, I am more than prepared to get all bent out of shape about it. Obviously, to anyone even remotely familiar with Black Flag, theirs was a music that served as the very antidote to the slickly vacuous pop of their day. I cannot possibly imagine a band with less in common with the Black Eyed Peas than Black Flag. It's almost hard to believe they come from the same planet as each other.

Now, by my count, Fergie must be somewhere in her mid-thirties. While I'd stake my life on the notion that Audrina Partridge hasn't the foggiest fuckin' clue about who the Exploited are or what they actually sound like, I must begrudgingly admit that maybe -- just maybe -- Fergie does know and care about bands like Black Flag and the Sisters of Mercy. I honestly doubt it, but it'd be presumptuous, elitist and probably even a little misogynist of me to assert that it was an impossibility.

That said, I still think she should KNOCK IT THE HELL OFF!

Entirely trivial side note: Prior to joining the insipid ranks of the B.E.P., Fergie warbled melismatically for a breathily overwrought trio named Wild Orchid in the 1990s. While theirs was precisely the type of syrupy slop that would send me scrambling to change the station, I couldn't help noticing that their video for "At Night I Pray" was shot in Central Park. Watch it with the sound off and you might enjoy it.

Terry's Tees

Honestly, I really don’t know anything about Terry Richardson other than that he seems to have accrued a rather convincing reputation as something of a perv. That may not be the case – for all I know he could be a totally stand-up guy. The photography of his that I have seen all seems to occupy a disarming middle-ground between the pioneering transgression of Richard Kern and the thinly-veiled, DIY rec room soft-porn of American Apparel advertising. He’s also something of a hipster deity, I gather. But, y’know, again – I’ve never met the guy.

I stumbled upon his website today, however, at work (it was linked off to from a story about ::gasp:: Jennifer Aniston’s new romance) and was struck by something. Terry may be many things – sleazy shutterbug, maddeningly ubiquitous scenemaker, facial-hair-criminal, etc. – but at the very least, it turns out that he’s a fan of old school hardcore and has excellent taste in t-shirts (that's one of his shots above). So… y’know…he can't be all that bad. Check out his gallery of T-shirts of the Week here.

Rude, Reckless and Right Down the Block

Check this out. Rude and Reckless: Punk/Post-Punk Graphics, 1976-82 is the first New York exhibition surveying the extraordinary diversity of Punk and Post-Punk graphic design. It'll be happening July 21st through August 19th at the Steven Kasher Gallery at 521 West 23rd street. More info here.

 

Just Another Day at the Office

In a moment of candor she invariably now regrets, a colleague of mine sheepishly admitted this afternoon that she owns and wears a Misfits t-shirt. Why is this significant? Well, not only is she not a fan of the band, she couldn’t even get their name right (she referred to them, I believe, as The Misshapes). Being that she knows full well that this is the just the type of thing that sends me off into an irrational, planet-engulfing rage, I initially figured she was just yankin’ my chain. And then she provided photographic evidence. :::sigh::::

Just so she and everyone else is clear, THIS is The Misfits. Pay attention. There’ll be a quiz later.

Hey Marc Jacobs....

Just fucking STOP IT!

I wrote a whole big, angry, frothy-mouthed, pedantic rant about this, but figured I'd be better off going with the abridged version above.