Film Noir Buff Style Forum / "We always wore it dead straight..."

Taylor McIntyre · 2013-03-24 01:53:37

"We always wore it dead straight because we considered ourselves to be really hip already".

In reply to me saying that JS just raised his eyebrows. He had commented on the conservatism of the Ivy items I was putting in the Vintage Room in the early days of doing Smoking Cat Vintage with him. One Brooks Sack he even called 'a Preacher's jacket' so square was it in its Ivy perfection.

But it was true - We'd always worn our Ivy really deadpan and straight, despite being a loose gang of ne're-do-wells of various sorts. We were Hip, so our clothes didn't have to be. If anything the disconnect between how we looked and how we were was a great part of all the fun as we made our way through London.

It was a Bill Evans kind of deal.

Ring any bells with anybody else ?

4F Hepcat · 2013-03-24 04:28:12

It's that quality of the cool: the archetypal trickster garbed in understatement.

Acton_Baby · 2013-03-24 05:01:32

'Straight no chaser' but I also wouldn't mind a whiskey as well....

A recent altercation on a First Great Western train can confirm that 'straight' is the way to go.
A gentleman and his brood (clad in matching Berghaus and supermarket jeans) boarded the train and decided to make the 'Quiet Carriage' their own personal playground, when I challenged their behaviour the patriarch decided to blow his stack and demand my removal from the train and that the Transport Police be called at the next station.
The Police arrived, seeing the gentleman red faced, ranting and raving in his weekend warrior garb instantly decided to side with me (the calm chap in tweed, flannels and a knitted tie).
The upshot of this, I get an apology from the cops and he gets a fined for travelling 1st class without a valid ticket (they didn't even ask to see my ticket but could have done me for the same ;-) ).

Kingston1an · 2013-03-24 05:13:23

Nice one Acton_Baby!

Was he a Ramblers Association type? They do not usually make a fuss. They are meek and mild and very reserved in an English way. The mention of Berghaus is confusing though I know it has gone way beyond ramblers now.

Yuca · 2013-03-24 05:26:00

Acton_Baby · 2013-03-24 05:44:13

^ Deffo not rambler types (they are usually good company and have flasks of proper tea on offer), the chap had an air of entitlement, which would suggest 'upper class but financially challenged'.
He seemed to really annoy the officers in attendance by constantly demanding that something should be done about my "blatant lack of respect for *his* family" but somehow oblivious to his own 'lack of respect' of everyone else in the carriage.

The sight of other travellers telling the Police that 'he' was the 'aggressor' and I had been perfectly reasonable was priceless, as this seemed to push him over the edge and this prompted the train-manager to do a ticket check.

I got directions to the new cab rank at Paddington and he got a £200 'on the spot' fine (which he needed to split over three credit cards, I lingered to see the fallout by doing my laces).

These little victories are worth celebrating

Armchaired · 2013-03-24 05:50:33

Kingston1an · 2013-03-24 05:54:32

Sense of entitlement and travelling first class on a second class ticket? Sounds like a politician.

Andrew Mitchell en famille? Did he refer to anybody as a 'pleb' ?

Acton_Baby · 2013-03-24 05:54:53

^ We were heading into Paddington, which was where the train terminated unfortunately, as his expulsion at some 'out of the way' station would have been a cherry on the top of an already tasty cake

Acton_Baby · 2013-03-24 05:58:05

4F Hepcat · 2013-03-24 09:18:00

One of the great things living on the continent, there is no chance of meeting arrogant in-bred chinless wonders unless I go skiing, which of course I don't.

Kingston1an · 2013-03-24 09:46:29

Not much skiing in the Netherlands, though the Dutch do ski.

You are missing out, but its your choice of course. Winter holidays are usually better than Summer holidays IMO.

4F Hepcat · 2013-03-24 10:15:56

Highly likely Kingy, but I have no desire for the geographic discomfort and displacement of mobilising the family in winter. I have an open fire and access to the best jazz collection and exotic booze in the Hague, that's enough to see me through the bleak mid-winter.

Taylor McIntyre · 2013-03-24 12:56:08

Some nice emails on this topic...

So why is 'Dead Straight' Ivy dead Hip in the UK and dead Square in the US ?

Search me, Guv. It just is & always has been (Apart from that 'Boom Years' moment when it was also Hip along with all the usual things that it is in the US)...

I think that when it comes to the Hip stakes and Ivy it all boils down to subversion on both sides of the pond - At last a common bond !

Not that Ivy is just about Hip... Which also means that Ivy is also not just about being Square.

More to say on this but I'm just back from the bookshop where I help out and a bit tired -

Feel free to kick the topic around a bit and I'll join in again later...

Shalom - Pesach at sundown tomorrow.

Jim.

Taylor McIntyre · 2013-03-25 02:22:53

The usual iGent / Trad (They're all the same) interpretation of Ivy dressers who weren't 'born to it' is that it's all about aspiration - That was always the favourite motivation offered for why Black Jazz musicians picked up on Ivy, not that it was just a fashion.

I'd offer that the online obsession with aspiration is purely because all those iGents / Trads (They're all the same) are so eaten up with aspiration themselves that they can't see beyond their own preoccupations.

The favourite phrase is that people were 'trying to look like...' or that they were 'aping...' - Not a word of it, in my opinion. Not in the US or UK if we are talking about the subversion of Ivy clothes..

Nor in the world of subverted Ivy clothing is anybody 'trying to look' Hip - The clothes and their Hip connection are so coded that only fellow Hip Ivyists would spot that that was what's going on. Rather, those who are Hip already may choose to express that through the codified language of Ivy clothes. If they are both Hip and into Ivy.

http://www.garmsville.com/2011/05/miles-davis-ivy-style-33-nku.html

I'm with Jason.

Sammy Ambrose · 2013-03-25 03:33:51

Taylor McIntyre · 2013-03-25 04:03:11

Taylor McIntyre · 2013-03-25 04:03:48

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsH_xec7rjg

I value you as a foil.

x

Sammy Ambrose · 2013-03-25 04:30:47

Last edited by Sammy Ambrose (2013-03-25 04:31:34)

4F Hepcat · 2013-03-25 05:13:56

Sammy Ambrose · 2013-03-25 05:26:54

Yuca · 2013-03-25 05:34:30

Sammy Ambrose · 2013-03-25 05:50:39

4F Hepcat · 2013-03-25 08:42:50

A couple I've read have mentioned his style, not in any great depth, but its back in the 90s when I last read his autobiography and biographies. In fact I read his auto on holiday back Menorca back in 1997, so I will have to take Yuca's word for it.

An interesting what if: if Clifford Brown had not died in that car crash, would he have been bigger and better than Miles? With Max Roach he was way, way ahead IMO of Miles in the early to mid-50s.

Sammy Ambrose · 2013-03-25 09:14:35

#1 2013-03-24 01:53:37

"We always wore it dead straight..."

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