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The Lipstick Page Forums Fashion Blog
Gwen Stefani's got nothing on this one
Posted by Colleen Shirazi, Thursday, April 19, 2007 12:08 PM (Eastern)
Sorry...I'm telling ya, I will be over this Youtube phase someday. It's just so...amazing.
Check out the Blondie stage style here and tell me No Doubt didn't copy it lock, stock and barrel:
When I met you in the restaurant
You could tell I was no debutante
You asked me what's my pleasure
A movie or a measure?
I'll have a cup of tea and tell you of my dreaming
Dreaming is free
I don't want to live on charity
Pleasure's real or is it fantasy?
Reel to reel is living rarity
People stop and stare at me We just walk on by - we just keep on dreaming
Feet feet, walking a two mile
Meet meet, meet me at the turnstile
I never met him, I'll never forget him
Dream dream, even for a little while
Dream dream, filling up an idle hour
Fade away, radiate
I sit by and watch the river flow
I sit by and watch the traffic go
Imagine something of your very own
Something you can have and hold
I'd build a road in gold just to have some dreaming
Dreaming is free
"Dreaming"
Harry/Stein, 1979
Was Madonna always credited with popularizing blonde hair and dark roots?
"The Tide Is High," John Holt
recorded by Blondie, 1980
Here is the iconic Blondie...with the makeup look still done today (white shimmer shadow on inner corners of eyes, "smoky" liner, red gloss). I actually remember this dress...no one else was wearing it at the time that I knew of...it struck me as very New York (check out the Twin Towers in the beginning of the video).
"Heart of Glass"
Harry/Stein, 1978
The problem with being seminal is that people tend to remember the imitators far more readily than the original. Oh well, I gotta go now and touch up my roots. lol
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The real 1970's
Posted by Colleen Shirazi, Tuesday, April 17, 2007 10:43 PM (Eastern)
There was such a broad range of fashions in the 70's, it's hard to generalize...yet, our collective memory has distilled the decade rather than preserved it. Bell bottom jeans, tie dye, tight synthetic shirts with big open collars and gold chains, platform shoes, discos and perms...yes, these were all a great part of the 70's. But hardly all of it.
"X Offender," 1976
There is a plethora of vintage (and new) Blondie videos on Youtube, but I found this one particularly emblematic of the period. Music (and culture) had become bloated in the mid 70's...it was all about playing arenas, selling albums, drinking, drugs, playing more arenas...so what burst onto the scene was Blondie, a group that had played actual clubs (you can see by the flamboyant style), was stripped down, 1950's style, young and full of energy.
It can only enhance my experience now, but I did not know at the time that Debbie Harry and Chris Stein were lovers. Adds a romantic layer, doesn't it? As it is, it's a romantic song, in its own slightly twisted manner.
"London Calling"
The Clash, 1979
Now this is one of my favorite groups of all time, ever. Again you will note (see The real 1980's Stranglers' video) the pared down, minimal style of clothing. Punk to me was never about green hair and safety pins or other fluff. It was always about not keeping up with the Joneses...about taking this, that and the other, and making it into your own personal style.
Hmmm...
Posted by Colleen Shirazi, Monday, April 02, 2007 1:57 PM (Eastern)
Garfunkel's outfit for this concert has been on my mind for years. Thanks to Youtube, I can see it again (I didn't tape the show).
I remember watching the concert on tv...at the time, the notion of a performer wearing his own clothes was rapidly becoming unheard-of. I remember thinking, how ballsy. This was an historic event...what does he wear, but a white shirt, dark vest, and jeans that were obviously not new. Fantastic.
Oh I know that sounds next to fatuous, but we are becoming a culture of pure consumption. We don't make anything anymore; we don't produce anything tangible. I remember when you would look through a clothing catalogue and some items might be marked "imported." I also remember when a wide range of products were labeled "Made in the U.S.A."
I think...it's less a matter of returning to the past (which is impossible anyway), more a matter of being conscientious...I always look to see where a product was made. Sometimes what you see is not what you were expecting.
I went to a chain "dollar store" recently and started reading labels on various items. What I discovered, is that almost all of them...across a wide variety of items, from egg dyeing kits to cleaning products to candles to gardening gloves...had been supplied by a single distributor.
The first thought that occurred, was that the distributor came first, then the stores, rather than the other way around. The distributor created the stores in order to supply to them. This distributor was unlikely to supply to any other store, just as the store was unlikely to buy much stock from any other distributor.
What further occurred, is that the distributor probably owned the factories in China that were producing the products...that were routed through the distributor, and sold at the stores owned by...the distributor? the owner of the factories? All one and the same?
Hence, the cost to produce that dollar item was probably what, three cents?
It's ingenious, it's out-Wal-Marting Wal-Mart. I would never have noticed at all if I were not in the habit of picking up items and examining their origin.
The real 1980's
Posted by Colleen Shirazi, Thursday, March 29, 2007 9:03 PM (Eastern)
I realize I've been on a Youtube kick lately...it's temporary. It's just that I've only now comprehended that I can see stuff I've not seen in many years.
To quote Margaret Mead: "Thanks to television, for the first time the young are seeing history made before it is censored by their elders."
Youtube is (at least for now) the next logical step in that evolution; it's a library of the television that people have censored in their own memories...or have allowed other people to censor for them.
Real 1980's:
The 1980's we remember, or think that we do:
Okay, I was there. The Smiths' video made them look a lot cooler than they actually were. I'm not knocking it; it's a great video. Still, after all this time...more than twenty years...I can't play The Smiths and feel they represent the period. The Stranglers' odd little song, replete with the kind of fashion people really wore in the 80's...it's more like it.
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