It's a bleak, rainy Monday afternoon here in the EST where, if you haven't already, I recommend subjecting yourself to the veritable existential ouroboros that is the LA Weekly list of the 20 Worst Hipster Bands. On the one hand, their astute team of crack pop culturists have pointed out something no one doesn't already know: the fact that there is a not-so-sub-culture of 20-30s out there that don't listen to mainstream music. Then again, the snide, dismissive tone of their arguments can't help but resemble the absolute worst attributes of what we've grown all too comfortable at labeling as "hipster." So, ironically, it turns out that writing off Sleigh Bells, MGMT, Bon Iver, etc. is actually more of a hipster move than listening to them in the first place… just as, ahem, writing off LA Weekly's writing off of said bands is surely even more of a hipster move… et cetera et cetera ad infinitum.
It's a problematic word (and, by extension, idea), to say the least. Still, why get rid of "hipster" altogether? What's it supposed to mean in the first place? In his fantastic book Hip: The History, John Leland shares some etymological insight into the origins of "hip":
Clarence Major, in his study Juba to Jive: A Dictionary of African-American Slang, traces the origins of hip to the Wolof verb hepi ("to see") or hipi ("to open one's eyes") and dates its usage in America to the 1700s. So from the linguistic start, hip is a term of enlightmenment, cultivated by salves from the West African nations of Senegal and coastal Gambia. The slaves also brought the Wolof dega ("to understand"), source of the colloquial dig, and jev ("to disparage of talk falsely"), the root of jive. Hip begins, then, as a subversive intelligence that outsiders developed under the eye of insiders. It was one of the tools Africans developed to negotiate an alien landscape, and one of the legacies they contributed to it. The feedback loop of white imitation, co-optation and homage began immediately.
This constant back and forth between underground, subversive movements and the eventual discovery, deconstruction and watered-down regurgitation by the mainstream is what has kept the great pop culture machine moving since its inception. A cursory look at the history of blues, punk, hip-hop and alternative rock music reveals the same pattern: "outsiders" develop new language, fashion and music, "insiders" co-opt said developments, turning "outside" elements "inside," the "outsiders" return with reactionary new "outside" works of expression and the whole cycle just repeats itself. Robert Johnson begets Eric Clapton. The Clash begets Green Day. Public Enemy begets Nelly. Nirvana begets Stone Temple Pilots. And so on.
At least, that's how it used to work. In the past decade and a half or so, there's been an alarming new trend: rather than simply co-opting elements of the underground and improving itself the way it has in the past, mainstream culture—especially in regards to music, I'd argue—keeps swallowing its own tail, poisoning the well of outside influence rather than embracing and incorporating it. In the old days, mainstream culture used to ruin cool stuff by emulating it. Nowadays, it just pulls out an old word like "hipster" (which, at least in the burgeoning jazz movement of the 1940s, used to be a good thing) to effectively write off anything that exists outside its narrow and, at this point, dated ideas of which tastes, sights and sounds are and aren't socially acceptable to whom and for what reasons.
Translation: we've killed the word "hipster." Completely. In our hands, it's died a slow, painful death—its definition stretched beyond all usability. Under the crunch of our boot heels, its usefulness has been completely pancaked. Like all words that we've allowed to mutate to the point of ineffectiveness, it's time to send hipster off to the linguistic retirement village in the sky, where it can enjoy its last remaining days with "emo," "indie," "punk" and all the other over-pillaged cultural descriptors. Don't believe we've tapped the last possible drop of sugary sweet goodness out of the word "hipster"? Consider the following:
Who and what is a hipster?
There are descending layers of hipster-ness when it comes to hipster listening habits that, like Inception, seem to get denser and more complicated the deeper you go. For argument's sake, let's say you imagine the typical hipster male in your brain. Early 20's, cheap plastic sunglasses, skinny jeans, dirty ironic t-shirt with holes under the arms, etc. What does this hipster listen to? Grimes? Salem? Grizzly Bear? Real Pitchfork-friendly stuff, right?
So now imagine that hipster dude's twin brother. He's the same age, same complexion, except that this can't stand hipster shit. It's lame, it all sounds the same, it's whiny, everybody's into it, etc. This guy can't stand that vapid style over substance poseur nonsense. He's got a ton of tattoos, buys his blue jeans at the grocery store, only listens to the real classic shit: Iggy and the Stooges, The Ramones, etc. Doesn't believe you can really understand rock 'n' roll until you've had a beer bottle smashed on your head.
Then here comes their twin sister. She thinks both of her brothers are idiots for buying into this fake, constructed, mass delusion calling itself counter-culture. She recognizes it's all bullshit, there's no such thing as real indie, DIY culture. She listens to Lady Gaga and Ke$ha and Rihanna because, unlike the Conor Obersts and the Justin Vernons of the world, those artists are the only ones brave enough to actually admit that its all industry and profit and that commercialism is the only semblance of what used to be artistic expression our fallow waste of a generation has inherited.
Okay, so now explain to me how the first character is more of a "hipster" than these other two, according to whatever vague consensus of a definition we're all adhering to. Take your time.
Does enjoying hipster stuff automatically make you a hipster?
When we use the word hipster as a negative signifier, we're attempting to draw attention to (at least, I think this is what we're doing) a perceived lack of inherent realness—a postured, reactionary sum of tastes, attitudes and appearances that only exist as a sort of protest against something else. I can't stand these idiots who buy their clothes at the mall, so I'm going to buy my clothes at the thrift store. I hate morons who listen to Nickelback, so I'm going to listen to Joy Division. Stuff like that. We're collectively engaged in the awkward balancing act of simultaneously rolling our eyes at pretension and reaction-ism while actually agreeing that, yeah, those douchebags who shop at the mall and go to Nickelback concerts are pretty abhorrent. So why is being a hipster still bad if being an opposite-of-hipster is worse?
What if someone, for argument's sake, really does like The Decemberists. What if the only reason someone listens to The Decemberists is because they really like the aesthetics of verbose, literate folk rock music. What if this person really likes wearing old punk rock t-shirts because… they really like old punk rock bands? What if this person wears really big glasses with thick frames because they like going to concerts and don't want their brand new pair of thin, wiry glasses to get smashed with one stray elbow to the face? What if they just (somehow) really like squeezing themselves into a pair of really tight jeans every morning? I suppose it's possible, right?
We like to say, "there's no accounting for taste"… but in reality, that's all we do with each other's interests, isn't it? We compile and categorize and calculate ideas about each other based on the clothes we wear, the bands we listen to, the movies we do or don't like, etc. So is it possible to listen to a so-called "hipster" band or wear a typically "hipster" outfit from a genuine, sincere place? Shouldn't it be? I'm not saying that recognizing postured, pretentious attitudes isn't useful and maybe even vital… I'm saying that just because postured and pretentious people like to listen to a style or music or wear a type of clothing or drinking a brand of beer, it doesn't mean that everyone who genuinely likes those things deserves to be presumably postured or pretentious. Listening to X, Y and Z shouldn't make you a "hipster"… it should just make you Jenny. Or Dave. Or Leslie. Every eagle is a bird, not every bird is an eagle. Etc.
Isn't acting all reactionary and dismissing things is, like, kind of the most hipster thing you can possibly do?
The word "hipster," as we've allowed it to evolve, has gotten really good at pointing and poking at the surface things without allowing itself to go much deeper. It writes off effete Brooklyn bands and Instagram photos and flip-flops and PBR and all sorts of other clichéd attributes while ignoring the sub-textual, eye-roll-worthy attitudes and motives behind all that stuff. When we go hipster trolling, we're not annoyed that people out there aren't shaving or spending more than $1 on a can of beer. We're annoyed that people out there are full of shit. They're vapid and dopey and insular and conceited and ostentatious and passive and boastful. They relish feeling better or more attuned than the rest of us. Right? I mean, isn't that what this is really about?
The solution isn't writing these people off as "hipsters" and calling it a proverbial day. The solution is recognizing the distressing lake of sincerity in our everyday culture, strangled to death by years of irony and surface and presentation. The solution is recognizing that we're all full of shit, one way or another, but it's our own unique brand of shit, it's not anyone else's. The solution isn't making a list of the 20 worst this or that… or even a list of the 20 best this or that. The solution is engagement. The solution is communication. The solution is brutal, ugly, diluted honesty even when it's unpopular. The solution, dare I say it, might involve finally allowing ourselves to not give a damn about what anyone else says, does, wears, thinks or listens to. It's going to be tough, I know, but with a little elbow grease and fewer outdated signifiers in our vocabulary, I think we can just maybe get through this thing together.
Unless, of course, you think getting through things together is totally lame, in which case you're more than entitled to do exactly the opposite…
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