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#27 2009-04-15 03:16:44
- Just Jim
- Member
- Posts: 1159
Re: On 'Cool'
What I always come back to is 'Doing The Knowledge'.
JS did it.
Chris_H did it.
G.G. did it.
Alex did it.
Jesmond did it.
StaceyBoy did it.
Hard Bop Hank did it.
Chetmiles did it.
... I've even 'ad a go too.
And so on - (In no order)
People today might just grasp 'Cool' if they've Done The Knowledge. Ditto the Ivy style. You don't just log on to the Net and become informed as all the info is spread out in the real world pretty much. You have to live & talk to people & go out. You need to travel both uptown & downtown around the world a bit too.
#28 2009-04-16 10:34:08
- SubtleCool
- Ivy, but subtle with it.
- Posts: 289
Re: On 'Cool'
I'm not sure I agree that 'cool' is ALL about image. Some people live with it so long they become it (or it becomes them).
I recall a comment Stephen Fry made (apropos Wilde's 'The Truth Of Masks') that we don't have a signature when we are born, we create one when we first have to do it. Then we use it often enough that it becomes a part of ourselves. We know there was a time before it but are not sure when.
I think this applies to what I would define as 'cool'.
But I do agree with JS that in very general terms, as a term, it is a degraded entity.
Me? Conspicuous? Lady, I'm the invisible man.
#29 2009-04-16 10:43:03
- Just Jim
- Member
- Posts: 1159
Re: On 'Cool'
I also wish we'd stop talking about 'Ivy' online - All it will do is to get 'Alan C.' & 'Reddington' 'talking' about it.
- Too many gimps spoil the broth.
#31 2009-04-16 12:06:55
- chetmiles
- Member
- Posts: 1099
Re: On 'Cool'
I do wish you'd stop picking on this new bloke. He's fresh to the game - eager, mind you, with a score of 118 since Easter Sunday - but needs tender handling.
#34 2009-04-17 04:00:20
- Alex Roest
- Member
- From: The Hague, The Netherlands
- Posts: 2165
Re: On 'Cool'
I'll give this another try alright. I think being 'cool' might be a gift and like with any other gift one has to work on their skills and work perhaps even harder to maintain those. One would have to have a certain talent for it anyway, for making it appear natural for one thing.
I can see why people would want to try and establish some common ground whilst enthusing about what it means to them, specificly. What goes against the grain with me is when people try to lay claim on such a word, however, which can obviously only be subjective i.e. it only had a specific meaning within a modern jazz context.
Furthermore, on the actual image side, I think 'cool' probably only truly works at a distance, to some degree at least. Everyone that may possess that 'cool' to the outside world will have lost face many, many times within any close relationship as the curtain falls, so to speak.
Hopefully I'll have made myself clearer this time. I love to read about that romanticised view of classic Italian cool myself too for instance. Both GG and chet are very good at that I think. That Modernist view geared towards Italy has always appealed to me, I can't deny that 
Last edited by Alex Roest (2009-04-17 04:03:01)
#35 2009-04-17 04:24:01
- chetmiles
- Member
- Posts: 1099
Re: On 'Cool'
I think some Italians are cool without really knowing it - like Dean Martin, they 'just are', both male and female. The French are often not too dissimilar IMO. My wife says that the Italian climate helps; but when we were in Venice last October it was wet and chilly. Needless to say, only tourists were in sweatshirts and shorts - the Venetians were in overcoats, scarves and gloves. If we'd gone to the far south, it might have been a very different story.
The Italians and the French, though, are stylists in all sorts of ways. I'm no great fan of, say, Fellini or Godard, but I can understand why some of their movies appealed to mods circa 1960. Also, French women are careful about matching their underwear - possibly (probably) Italian women are, too - whereas a lot of English women just don't bother and scruff around in the most appalling garbage... On the down side, a kind of generic look was much in evidence in Rome last year - very much the same stuff as where I live: Incontinence pants, Lonsdale, Surgical appliance etc.
It is a slightly romanticized view, sure. I really don't like 'Roman Holiday', Alex!
#36 2009-04-17 05:34:11
- Alex Roest
- Member
- From: The Hague, The Netherlands
- Posts: 2165
Re: On 'Cool'
Last edited by Alex Roest (2009-04-17 05:37:04)
#37 2009-04-17 06:15:10
- chetmiles
- Member
- Posts: 1099
Re: On 'Cool'
Yes: 'back in the day'. I'd say Hepburn was one of the most overrated performers in Hollywood. Seberg was sexy, though. If you didn't think much of 'La Dolce Vita', try 'Eight and a Half'. You'll soon find yourself warming to the other. Still, Marcello was a great-looking guy.
#38 2009-04-17 06:44:32
- Alex Roest
- Member
- From: The Hague, The Netherlands
- Posts: 2165
Re: On 'Cool'
Thanks for the tip, will look it up in the library ( the DVD that is ) : http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056801/
#41 2009-04-17 12:39:40
- chetmiles
- Member
- Posts: 1099
Re: On 'Cool'
Gives you a negative view of these bloody wop directors anyway...
#42 2009-04-17 12:40:43
- chetmiles
- Member
- Posts: 1099
Re: On 'Cool'
Get yourself a nice piccie of Monica Vitta instead. Circa '64.
#47 2009-04-17 14:17:31
- Get Smart
- Member
- Posts: 1106
Re: On 'Cool'
I wouldnt even mind being the last guy on the Vitti train
