It’s been a little quiet of late around here. Beyond our usual laziness, the other reason is that we’ve been writing a little book for Donkey Products. Germany finest purveyors of novelty product shaped hilarity. Most famed for their royal family tea bags. Found in just about every shop worth visiting here in Berlin.
The book is called The Hipster Encyclopedia. It’s short, simple, nicely illustrated as usual by the Hipstery’s designer and Mayor of Pirna – Romibello. We’re writing it together with Paul Hawkins. The latest recruit into the shambolic Hipstery family. Here are few sample entries from the latest draft:
American Apparel
There’s a funny Woody Allen short story about Lacoste, where a shirt salesman falls upon hard times and prays for divine guidance. “Put an alligator over the pocket,” God tells him. Boom. Hundreds of millions of dollars fall directly upon his head. Dov Charney, founder of American Apparel, did the same, appealing to God on how to sell clothing to Hipsters. To which God answered, “Take the crocodile off.”
“That’s it?” Dov said? “Yeah, pretty much. Or make it neon. That’ll work.”
Berlin
Berlin appeals to the frugal hipster because it’s the one of the poorest capital cities in Europe, which means they don’t need to get those pesky job-shaped things. Plus, it’s suffered. It still wears the scars of its history on its every Strasse. It’s like Romeo and Juliet, only in city form; cruelly separated for so long and reunited very recently only to discover that Romeo has a gambling problem and can’t find work, while Juliet is actually a French bi-sexual freak-folk musician and anti-capitalism demonstrator.
David Bowie
The androgynous, bisexual, taboo-breaking fashion icon is perhaps the closest thing that hipsters have in this empty mainstream universe to that of a spiritual deity. He lived in London, Berlin, New York, and probably a cupboard, wrote music that a lot of people won’t know about, wore makeup, and defied classification by weaving in out-and-out of genres and genders with all the subtlety of a hippo in an ostrich contest.
His song Changes is the unofficial Hipster anthem, and probably will remain so until they realise that it is not about scarves or haircuts.
Hipster History
While all Hipsters like to believe they are unique and individual snowflakes, they know deep down that they did not evolve separately and distinctly to other counter-culture groups. Indeed, they prefer to see themselves as a miraculous, modern blend of everything that was ever hip or cool or good about anything, ever. Possessing the poetry of the beatniks, the ethics of the hippies, the money of the yuppies, the nihilism of the grungers, the sensitivity to the E-minor chord of the emos, and the politics of the punks, it’s safe to assume that most hipsters imagine themselves like giant, tattooed versions of the ultimate robot thing at the end of every episode of Power Rangers.
That’s all for now folks, the book will be out at the end of year. Along with another that we are close to finishing and will probably self-publish, tentatively titled “how to take over the world”.
