Sex, Drugs and Retro clothes

Sky scraper platforms, lace-less doc Martens and the understated Stan smith, all footwear of the musical icon, these fashion statements have adorned the foot of many a rock legend and triggered the trends in fashion decades over. Pioneering the direction of fashion year after year, music is a key inspiration of many a fashionista’s look. Whether it be the ironic motif t-shirt of the indie teen, or the tight skinny jean painted to the legs of students, infiltrating cities across the country, there’s no escaping the influence music has to our wardrobes.

Since the 50’s, Rock n’ Roll and all that goes in-between has been a lure, enticing its followers by its rebellious image, even from Elvis Presley and his ‘Blue Suede shoes’ music has given the youth culture a way to vicariously live on the wild side and express their own sense of musical tastes and attitudes, through what they choose to wear.
Music, rock especially, has that effortless cool that everyone attempts to encapsulate, whether it be the band trying to emulate guitar solos that could only be matched to Hendrix or the street wise stylist imitating the flamboyant frills and tight jeans glorified by Mick Jagger. We all have a desire to become our idols, through fashion and styling, we are able to look like them and in turn have a bite in to the cake of fame.
Even when rockers were uniformed in their styling, they were still setting trends and causing a stir upon their fervent followers. In the 60’s Beatle mania and all that went with it took a grip on Britain and transformed the way we styled ourselves. Male teens were donning the iconic mop top and strutting the streets with their crisp Pierre Cardin suits, while mini skirt cladded girls were throwing themselves on stages at their concerts, the bands signature was written not only in our autograph books but in the pages of history.
With their rocker rivals, ‘The Rolling Stones’, a culture war set apart the mod’s from the rockers. The rockers adapting the more individual style that allowed each band member to express their own individual personality, often teaming leather pants with feminine shirts. A controversial statement at the time, coinciding with their more evocative lyrics and riffs, their rocker audience latched on to this bad boy image. Looking rough around the edges has become a staple in the sex, drugs and rock n’ roll diet.
Of course, any dedicated follower of music and fashion would be perfectly aware that even today the Beatles, and that decade, still have their stamp firmly imprinted on the way we choose to dress. With the new en vogue style being everything that is retro and vintage, it has never been cooler to look like our idols.
Lucy Conroy, owns a vintage clothes and home-ware shop in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, she knows only too well the influences and importance of music to fashion, and sells a large variety of styles of clothes from several different decades and eras.
“We have clothes here dating further than the 40’s, I don’t know much about how music influenced the style then, but the style of dress was very lady like and floaty, they went to dances and balls so I suppose the music they danced to influenced that style of dress, it was so elegant and ladylike. There’s definitely a change looking at the styles from the late 50’s early 60’s, everything’s a lot more quirky. Obviously rock n’ roll was in full swing. ”
Dressed head to toe in vintage attire this girl is a walking advertisement for not only her quaint boutique but also her other sideline, music. Adopting the same name as her shop, ‘Lucy and The Caterpillar’, her band produces modern folk music compared to the likes of ‘Regina Spectare’. Wearing 50’s day dresses and fashioning a white pixie crop her music has a definite influence to the innocent image she flaunts.
“I don’t think I’ve gone a day dressed in anything but vintage, not since I can remember any way... It’s all about the image, it wouldn’t look right if you saw me dressed like this on stage and I came out with some death metal roars.”
Fashion definitely gives bands their authenticity. The threads that our idols wear prove to us their status and in turn dictate some aspects of the style of the era. Take the 70’s we’ve all seen the bell bottoms and extreme platforms, made popular by glam rockers, and ABBA of course. Glam rock in all of its glory had a highly stylised and eccentric approach to fashion, drawing from the unconventional outfits glorified by ‘Ziggy Stardust’ and ‘Gary Glitter’.
A glaringly obvious link of music to fashion later on in this era is, of course, punk rock, the anti-establishment trademark, ironically, has become a fashion in itself. In 1976 Punk rock exploded, we were thrashing the streets of mainstream London, dressing in anything but clothing. Bin liners would be wrapped round safety pin studded bodies, the Doc Marten found itself on the foot of the most unlikely of owners. The music of the punk rocker being almost-three minute war-cries identifying everything wrong with society, an idea that was latched on to by Vivienne Westwood, known for her original fashion designs.
Causing a stir definitely leads the way when it comes to music; it’s this that makes us remember them. The 80’s wouldn’t be the 80’s without ‘Boy George’s gender bending looks, or ‘Duran Duran’ with their rolled sleeves and frosted hair. Even though most of us wouldn’t like to admit it we have all, at some point, taken some fashion pointers from those in the industry. No matter what era we hail from.
The more underground the music the more diverse the fashion, take the New Romantics, where boys were wearing make-up and girls double breasted suits, echo’s of Fade To Grey pouring from the Ritz on the streets of London, this image reinforcing the themes that came from eerie whines of the genre. This look is still evident today, with the staple of the party season wardrobe being the oversized blazer, and lace being the only thing to be seen in.
‘Modeliste’ are a band from Luddenden Foot, also in West Yorkshire. They are a three piece, whose trademark sound mixes funky riffs with rock-styled vocals. They know only too well how much the music they play influences their dress sense.
Ben Adey, the bands lead vocalist, recalls their influences, “We try to look as individual as possible, we’re not into wearing all the same thing, we don’t like to just stand there and not move, when we play we are really animated and rock it out like wild bears, ‘Queen’ influenced us a lot, they didn’t take themselves too seriously and wore some crazy stuff at times, this is how we like to dress.”
Clearly rockers at heart ‘Modeliste’ each have their own persona on stage in their gigs. “We enjoy the occasional dabble with make-up, eye-shadow usually, we dress a bit out there. There are bands out there now who have amazing style. ‘MGMT’, ‘Hot Chip’ and of course ‘The Kings of Leon’ are our favourites.”
Wearing a tight T-shirt and even tighter pants Ben has the archetypal look of the modern day rocker, especially when teamed with ‘Ray Ban’s and winkle pickers. His influences are apparent, on and off stage, “We don’t copy off anybody’s style really, but we do wear stuff that matches the music we play, it comes with the territory, we’ve got to look good. Our music is really energetic and our clothes represent that.”
“We wear a lot of clothes influenced by the 60’s, the retro look is pretty cool but we like to combine it with modern classics as well, red skinnies have crept in to one or two of our wardrobes. I know it’s been done before, but it takes a confident man to wear them and look OK’ in them...trust me.”
Admittedly we all want to look different; drawing from figures in the music industry adds a quirk to the way we look, take grunge. I bet the bands of the grunge era didn’t premeditate that the week-old jeans and tatty oversized jumpers they threw on would become a fashion trend. The mellow moans of ‘Nirvana’ made it cool to look unkempt.
When we look back on all of the trends that have gone before, there’s always a soundtrack to go with them in our minds. Today, we see this more than ever, as retro is as popular as ever we see people not only dressing like their modern day icons but their icons’ icons. You only have to flick the pages of Vogue to see the key trends that have been spurred by our rocker muse’s. As each genre becomes more commercial the more we see its influence infiltrating high street clothes stores.
Traipsing the streets of any big city, it’s easy to see music’s influences in all of its glory. Subcultures have developed and become so ingrained in our lives that we could probably take a stab at the type of music a certain individual may be into just by looking at their outfit.
We have developed names for these groups, have you noticed most fashion trends are named after the genre that influenced them? Take ‘Emo’, ‘Nu Rave’ and even ‘Hippy chic’, we have all bought into music’s’ influence, whether we realise it or not. This will happen as long as music is fashionable, and I don’t think that’s going to change, not for a long time anyway.