I've mentioned them before, but as I seem to be on a bit of a trip back down memory lane to the grating eighties (see The Loveless, below) The Stray Cats naturally sprang to mind.Or, more specifically, Brian Setzer. See, in the early eighties, before the Internet or even VHS players, your tastes as a youngster were influenced by what you could find in magazines and album covers and hear on the radio or in clubs.
Brian was the first guy I'd ever seen on Harleys like this (before I'd discovered American bike mags)... and I liked the pared-back fiftiesness of them. Harley caps, engineer boots (even the appalling Johnsons double-buckle versions they're wearing on the album cover), cut-off bowling shirts... I fell for it all. I remember reading in NME how he'd ridden his old Panhead from London to Paris to hang with the French HA, and I lapped it up.
So thanks Brian. I hate to admit it, but you were a cool cat back in the very early days before the mullet and the orchestra... and you introduced me to some nice bikes before anyone else.
(Thanks to Danny Franssen for the top photo, which he scanned from an old French mag).
2 comments:
Well my baby and me went out late Saturday night
I had my hair piled high and my baby just looks so right
Well, pick you up at ten got to have you home by two,
Mama don't know what I've got in store for you
Well that's alright 'cause we're looking as cool as can be
ACE !!!!!!!!!!!
'Bob Job' (not Bobber). First time I heard the phrase was in something written about Setzer's bike. He was tellin' how the rear fender was fashioned from some early '50s Cadillac tail fender. Cool, I thought.
No body seems to use the 'Bob Job' phrase much. You see 'Bobbers' on the covers of many Tesco mags now! WTF's that all about? Internet tellin' everyone what's 'cool' these days?
I personally stole clippings of Lee Marvin's and the Beetles sickles outta rare library books on film making from the '60s to get my fix of eye candy in those long-gone days.
Yeah, they've taken a lotta flak, from me too, about all kindsa sh*t, but it's gotta be said, The Cat's is an' was, Cool.
Post a Comment