Black folks don't always go whole hipster. These young men, seen on 14th Street in Washington, have taken the kaffiyeh (usually white) and the nerd glasses (usually nerdy) and paired them with the hats of their favorite sports teams--creating a remix that is all their own.
The repurposing of secondhand clothes and back-in-the-day trends is a hipster trademark. Streetpeeper.com catches a vendor in East London's trendy, grime-y Brick Lane wearing full-on throwback mode--from the fanny pack to those colorful Nikes. The ethnic-looking beads keep it black, though!
White rapper Asher Roth has said "The world's gone mad when blacks wear plaid." [11] Looks like this guy is in on the joke.
Ninjasonik, New York City-based musicians and performance artists, take care to call themselves "a band, not a rapper." The band's enthusiastic claims to blipsterhood are manifest in its underground hit: "Tight Pants." [12]
"Art Rappers" Das Racist, based in Brooklyn, drop an album of playful mashup hipster hits on June 12th. Their single, "Pizza Hut / Taco Bell," [13] channels both street style and suburban ennui—the perfect blipster anthem.
Ouch! A commenter on the website hipsterrunoff.com [14] expressed confusion at this retro 90s look: "I can't tell if they are alt black or if they really just came back from a waterpark." Good question.
The legendary George Clinton of Parliament Funkadelic gives today's blipsters a run for their money. Here, he performs "Atomic Dog" at the B.B. King Blues Club & Grill in October 2008.
Read about "The Rise of The Black Hipster" [15] at The Root.
Links:
[1] http://www.theroot.com/print/11853
[2] http://www.theroot.com/printmail/11853
[3] http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite
[4] http://www.facebook.com/share.php
[5] http://www.digg.com/submit?url=http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite&title=Black+Hipsters+Unite%21&media=news&topic=arts_culturetarget=
[6] http://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=%7C+%40TheRoot247:+Black+Hipsters+Unite%21+http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite
[7] http://www.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=postto&t=Black Hipsters Unite!&u=http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite
[8] http://www.stumbleupon.com/submit?url=http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite&title=Black Hipsters Unite!
[9] http://www.google.com/bookmarks/mark?op=edit&bkmk=http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite&title=Black Hipsters Unite!
[10] http://twitter.com/share?text=| @TheRoot247: Black Hipsters Unite!&url=http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite&counturl=http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/black-hipsters-unite
[11] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wTJeMUXyH0
[12] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syKm6BNCxms
[13] http://www.myspace.com/dasracist
[14] http://www.hipsterrunoff.com/2008/04/an-open-email-from-an-african-american-hro-reader.html
[15] http://theroot.com/views/rise-black-hipster
[16] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/asher-roth
[17] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/brick-lane
[18] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/das-racist
[19] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/lupe-fiasco
[20] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/marc-jacobs
[21] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/pharell-williams
[22] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/black-hipsters
[23] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/fashion
[24] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/hip-hop
[25] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/hipsters
[26] http://www.theroot.com/category/views-tags/kanye-west
[27] http://www.theroot.com/taxonomy/term/49
[28] http://www.theroot.com/taxonomy/term/50
Comments