Vice Style

The 90s. What can be said about them that surely somebody out there hasn't already said on tumblr? Well, a lot, actually. As someone who 'was there', all I see are pics of kids jizzing all over each other's Spice Girls limited edition lampshades, Polo Sport pogs, and LA Raiders tea towels. Also, the grunge thing has already been around longer in the 2000s than it ever was in the 90s. In fact, it didn't even exist, grunge. True story.

But anyway, as it is the decade to currently choreograph your wardrobe to, I thought I'd write about all the shit that people were big into in the 90s that that has yet to be resurrected. Apologies for the quality of some of the pics, it is just that this shit was around before the internet could handle pictures and not long enough ago to have spawned many books.

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BAGGY JEANS

NOBODY would've been seen alive at a Pearl Jam show in tight jeans, hell no. Now, nobody would be seen alive at a Pearl Jam show. Tight jeans were so played-out by the early 90s, thanks to the lame hair metallers and their kind. At first, baggy jeans were quite hard to find, so you'd have to buy, like, 40" waist jeans and wear a VERY sturdy belt. Unless, of course, you wanted them to fall down every time you attempted 'The Prodigy step' in front of her at the school disco, which you didn't.

It wasn't long before you could actually buy jeans that fitted in the waist and were still hella-baggy. Brands like Eclipse, Karl Kani, Xworx, Petro Motion—those barcode pockets were too much, Bleu Bolt, pictured, and countless other imitators spawned the dark denim, white stitching look that almost defined the raver generation's legs. They were almost always based on the carpenter-style denim, with the long pocket down one leg for a ruler and the hook on the other pocket for a hammer. Why ravers needed those features, is anyone's guess. I remember having a pair of Beano's Remoulds which were HUGE. Like embarrassingly so and had, like, fake adidas stripes running down each leg.

Now, I know what you're thinking: 'loads of people stills wear baggy jeans' and you would be right, but not the 90s-obsessed tumblr-addicted kids of today. What rappers wear has nothing to do with anything other than material greed. And I am talking about the fabric. Until he lost weight there was enough material on Fat Joe's jeans to make everyone that works for Vice Style a fresh pair. Seriously, he looks like he's rocking incontinents.  

FLEECE

Man, fleece. I actually remember when it 'came out' and everyone I had snuck into the pub with being equally impressed by this expensive, light but warm, effortlessly stylish, urban, urbane high fashion material woven into a garment made by impossibly aspirational outfit called The North Face. I know it was probably intended for making Arctic expeditions, as it is impenetrably warm, but this was really hot shit for a few years. I think the really cheap-looking fleece that almost looked like a bathrobe or faux-fur played it out. Thing with fleece was, unlike most other materials used in sportswear, it didn't look that bad if hot-rocked. I can remember being REALLY JEALOUS of people that had fleece track pants, ha ha. Nowadays you only see Eastern European people, builders, and hikers and fat grandparents rocking it. I guess it found its place in the world.

HORRIFIC VELOR KNITS

Maybe it was velor, but in truth, I have no idea what this material was called. It looks like satin fleece, but woven, like wool. It was really big for a while, but like Crocs, or something, I have no recollection of it ever being something that was ever worn by anyone but the wrong people. A lot of the time it was in really hideous colors like mustard yellow with white and navy hoops, or like acid green with red, or something equally heinous. I am really not making this up. Just look at Jerry Seinfeld rocking a one-color version. He looks retarded.

Similarly popular, mainly with skangers, drug dealers, wannabe drug dealers, were the knitted sweaters Kickers and Fila made in the mid-90s. These were usually seen worn with Ben Sherman shirts underneath, pop-off Nike, adidas or Kappa track pants, and the latest Air Max. Posting these pictures is probably the longest I've ever looked at these sort of tops, as the dudes that wore these would always start the "You looking at me, buddy?" line if you were trying to gage their garms. It always followed with a no, which was then followed with the classic "Are you calling me a liar?" retort. Fuck school.

SHINY SHIRTS

I blame that weird 90s 'isn't ugliness really clever' thing for these. I can remember my cousin getting a really garish red satin one, not dissimilar from the one above, for Xmas one year from his mum. He thought it would look cool with tartan pants too, ha ha. He exchanged it on Boxing Day for a denim jacket that he still wears, almost 15 years later. I remember going to Bangkok with the same cousin and we had some silk shirts tailor-made for nothing. I actually had mine made in silver. They sucked.

REALLY CHUNKY FOOTWEAR

I mean, I guess this could've just been titled late 90s skate shoes, but I think there was more to it than that. Yes, those overly-padded DCs etc sucked and made able-bodied individuals look like they had club-foot, but some chunky kicks were actually pretty cool. Not those foam Nikes, though, hell no, they were always lame, but maybe some of the chunkier Nikes that people always dispel as ugly. And no, not Buffalos or Acupuncture either. Although, they did kind of invent the fashion sneaker, per se. Jermey Scott, believe it or not, has kinda struck a chord by recently doing an adidas Streetball. True, it looks as if a Labyrinth-era David Bowie colored it, but it was a cool shoe back then. Cons Reacts were so big too. I can barely remember seeing a pair of All Stars for years thanks to rise of Cons, the Converse b'ball offshoot and their signature players Larry and Kevin Johnson and later Dennis Rodman.

REALLY CHUNKY SHOES

I realized halfway into the last bit that chunky shoes were also pretty fucking massive back when I could get totally wasted and not want to die the next day. Kickers were the shit. Not Kick Hi, but the thick-soled Kickers boots and moccasins. A lot of clubs back then still banned people who wore sneakers, so you had to wear shoes, but these were almost as comfortable and didn't look that much like shoes, so were staple. The 90s also brought us those big clumpy goth boots that have, like, bits of metal and a doorway to hell in the heel. Shit, they really blow. And why are they almost exclusively worn with floor-length Martix-esque jackets? You know what, I don't even want to know as I will then be inside the heads of people that think Trivium is a cool band.

TIE-UP BEANIES

So, beanies became a real look thanks to the likes of Naught By Nature, Kriss Kross etc. But, even more popular than the how-does-he-keep-that-hat-that-high-on-his-head beanie, was for a brief period the tie-up woolly hat. It was basically a tube of wool that had a piece of material tying the hat near the top. I actually got this Raiders one off a vintage seller amongst a lot of 90s caps a few years back. Pretty fucking sweet, huh? The Prodigy loved 'em too, they and everyone else also loved bucket hats too, haha.

SACK-CLOTH LACE-UP COLLAR TOPS

Remember lace-up collars? Manchester United's 92-94 jersey even had one. For a while, dressing like one of Take That pretending to be one of Dexy's Midnight Runners, was actually a look. I mean, style sure was confused, kids were trying to blend urban tough bagginess with hippie aesthetics.

BAJA HOODIES

These Baja hoodies were another. I actually wore one of these, which wasn't actually mine, and a pair of combats I wore all the time, on a makeover program I appeared on in 1997. See, I was a bit scruffy—I borrowed the hoodie to up my unkemptness—and this girl I knew wanted me to look slicker. The guy who designed Princess Diana's wedding dress asked me why I refused to wear the slip-on shoes he waved at me and why I never ironed anything ever. The show was called You Can't Wear That. I ended up covered in make-up and wearing shiny purple plastic trousers and a purple velor t-shirt. I don't know why they thought this looked better than the admittedly pretty rank baja hoodie. If fashion is a form of communication, wearing one pretty much screamed MY ENTIRE PERSONALITY REVOLVES AROUND THE FACT THAT I LIKE TO SMOKE GANJA.

FLAT-FRONTED LEATHER JACKETS

I have no idea what started the trend for wearing these kind of Lovejoy jackets. Lovejoy, perhaps? Whatever, it was the perfect top coat for finishing off that retired alcoholic look. We just wanted to look older, I guess, buy booze and try and steal back all the girls our age who had runaway with 20-something drug dealers. But yeah, these were popular in black with gold zips, or dark brown with those kinda faux-acorn buttons. I had one and loved it, but ended up trading it with my uncle for an outstanding phone bill in the early 2000s. I shit you not.

MOLESKIN TROUSERS

Moleskin pants were often worn with shiny shirts. Both items were part of the same kitsch 'ugly is good taste' camp thing that bands like Pulp and brands like Diesel and Prada were channeling, as part of the ying alternative to the mainstream form follows function, combats, and cagoules yang of the 90s. I used to rock these with these Air Max Plus, more commonly know as TNs. Thing was, they were cheap and the material would drop out in chunks after several washes/wears. Haven't seen a pair in YEARS.

 

THE ORACLE

TAGGED: 90s