Title *redacted* for security reasons

So, a quick one today on a subject dear to my heart, and one I find myself infinately qualified to talk about...

Yes, you've got it...

Fashion.

What? stop laughing at the back... I'll have you know that I'm very fashionable, perhaps not in the sense of 'current' or 'accepted' fashion, but I'm a dapper Dandy when you get me down to my nitty-gritties, (as more than a few people have).

My specific gripe (today) is the bastardisation of things that are inherently cool by big business, purely to make money out of the ill-educated herd. You've all seen the Christian Audigier clothes branded with the 'Ed Hardy' and 'Von Dutch' logos right? Generally worn by the sort of people you would actively cross the road to avoid, I think I might have labelled them as  Gits in a previous post a description I wholeheartedly stand by.

If there wasn't the danger of the person turing out to be a confirmed multiple stabbist, I would go up to people wearing an Ed Hardy T-shirt and ask probing questions like:

Who is Ed Hardy? (He's a retired tattoo artist from California, Taught by Sailor Jerry)

What was his first name? (Don)

Why are you wearing a shirt with a person's name on that you don't know? (Because I'm a member of the herd and a guy on Jersey Shore told me to)

If they could answer any of those questions I would give them a shiny five pound note. The likelyhood is of course that they will look at me askance and drool slightly out of the corner of their mouths.

Thinking about it, Von Dutch is even worse, the guy was a genius, Kenny Howard (Von Dutch's real name) was a Bike-Builder and painter from the '50's, he's acknowledged as one of the fathers of Kustom Kulture, along with people like Big Daddy Roth and he finally joined that hallowed rank of people who have drank themselves to death - And a more typical Rock-and-Roll exit would be difficult to orchestrate (Unless it involved a Hot-Rod, painted like a flaming devil's phallus, being driven off the rim of a volcano, into the lava, playing Little Richard songs, but exploding before it hit in a quiff shaped explosion that smelled of brylcreme)

There are people out there of course, who wear Von Dutch gear completely non-ironically, but they are the people who drive restored Chevy Stepsides and attend Rock 'n' Roll weekenders all over the country. These people are great, you should buy these people beer and/or ice-cream whenever you see them. (I am not one of these people before you ask, my involvement in this scene is restricted to respecting the work done by Betty Page, but most of them are pretty Gorram cool)

The reason this particular subject came to mind is that Steampunk has been identified as the next mainstream style 'trend' - OK, it's going to be watered down, as these things tend to be. I don't think we're going to see people wandering around in brown leather top hats with goggles permanently attached to them, or Dorothy Perkins selling Victorian style ray-guns in their accessories department. But I do sense a definate increase in things with cogs on them (because when you get down to it, that's what people who've heard about Steampunk, but don't know about Steampunk, think Steampunk is).

I'm not afraid to admit that like things a bit Steampunked-up, I'm a dyed in the wool anachronist when it comes down to it. But the first time I see someone on TOWIE wearing a brown leatherette corset, adorned with an ammunition bandolier and a scattering of diamante cogs, I will go to my hand-made, Ugandan Teak carcased, purple velvet lined, gun cupboard, take out my brass trimmed Fortune & Sanderson Discomnervulator 5000 and go on the rampage.

I truly will - And no-one without a handlebar moustache, impressive decolletage or pith-helmet, worn unironically, will survive.