Found in a Stokey gutter outside Beyond Retro, this diary chronicles an average Monday to Sunday in London through the eyes of everyone’s favourite pseudo-intellectual synth artist/organic food enthusiast/novelty small business conceiver, often categorised as “a hipster”.
“Critics have described the loosely defined group as smug, full of contradictions and, ultimately, the dead end of Western civilisation.” - Dan Fletcher, for The Times.
The thoughts and feelings of one such dead end, below.
Monday ....
Dear leather-clad notebook,
The beard thing… I just don’t know anymore. Spotting a hipster beard on Shia Lebough and one of those One Direction termites has forced an ideological reassessment. Some days my beard feels like conformist chains, others like a comfort blanket, at any given time providing me with a feeling of manhood more complex than any a bulging bicep could provide. But what am I without it? It’s like I’ve got that stockholders syndrome or whatever, where like, my beard is my captor and I am the captive.
You’ve probably noticed how deep I can get with a good cup of gourmet coffee in my hand, a sleek apple product close by and wooden beams surrounding me. That’s how I am right now, and it’s rustic as fuck.
Tuesday ....
Dear leather-clad notebook,
Conceived groundbreaking idea for ethically and environmentally conscious pop up art space/cafe, where the creative world clashes energetically and ethically with the snack world, resulting in large mark ups and instagramming.
I’m thinking coffee house by day with thought provoking art on the walls; interactive art space by night where we’ll throw art-parties and play cutting edge music that most people won’t know how to dance to. It should sound quite unpleasant - and thereby avanteguard - and there won’t be anywhere obvious to sit or put your drink, but aspiring bloggers will write that it’s “a post-modern interpretation of a traditional display and degustation space, where the art, food and nightlife worlds stylishly collide in a cacophony of self-raising flour and soundwaves”. There will probably be disco edits too. I’m calling it Coffee Creatives Ltd. Bring it on, haters.
Wednesday ....
Dear leather-clad notebook,
London’s sold out of exposed filament lightbulbs; essentially the potato famine of the modern world. The Pop Up is off.
Thursday ....
Dear leather-clad notebook,
I first fell into hipsterism quite by accident. I was wearing my father’s old festive knit jumper because, being a wide-eyed, inexperienced 27 year old, I had accidentally shrunk all of mine in the wash. My jeans had suffered the same fate, but being slim of leg and flat of bottom, I could make do.
So there I was in my shrunken jeans and father’s oversized and garishly awful knit, thinking it was lucky I had nowhere to be that day, when I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I looked surprisingly fabulous and in the know, as if I was privy to some great fashion joke that nobody else knew about yet. I grabbed a copy of Proust from my university days and looked in my reflection again. Intellectualism, irony, eccentricism… it was all there. I’ve never looked back since.
My hipsterism may have been born from merely an aesthetic appeal but in the years since I’ve connected deeply with the ideologies behind why I look so cool.
Friday ....
Dear leather-clad notebook,
Just found out it takes five litres of water to grow one almond. Tipped all my almond milk cartons in the RECYCLING bin (I recycle). Seriously cant keep up with what’s wholesome and environmentally responsible these days, it’s healthy as long as it’s street food, right?
Gentrification of my local area continues even without the help of Coffee Creatives LTD. Torn between enjoying the seven new coffee, whole foods and artisanal bakery joints on my street and a socially conditioned awareness I should be sad that shit old grocery store was pushed out of business, because authenticity is everything right?
Sometimes when I face ideological crises I think, what would Chet Faker do? Now that’s the kind of beard another man can follow.
Saturday ....
Dear leather-clad notebook,
Just got back from a warehouse party in Hackney Wick tonight, felt inspired on the Uber home and just had to pen some notions. I went out to see my friend spin this concept piece where he mixes samples of spoken word poetry from the 70s with the sound of a door creaking, then pitch bends it into oblivion.
The music too clever to be danced to, I ended up getting quite drunk instead and bumped into the creators of the Brick Lane Cereal Killer Cafe concept. They’re like, hipster heroes, for trying to bring some excitement and diversity into the lives of the nearby office workers who have sold their soul to The Man and forgotten what it means to have an original idea. But the sellout office workers turned on them for some reason and gave the guys a really hard time for being so clever.
Their struggle against the haters inspires us all, and between that and the radical pitch-bending tonight, I just feel motivated to do something meaningful, really give something back you know? Like make a short film about my life or something.
Sunday ....
Dear leather-clad notebook,
Feeling reflective. Whilst the world judges our bowl cuts, the oft-maligned hipster community quietly struggles with its identity. It’s a tragic Catch 22: we can’t officially accept our existence as a community because everyone is striving for individuality, self-sufficiency and ideological anarchy which manifests in absolutely no practical way at all. It’s a credibility minefield - and I think we can all agree credibility is more important than charisma. Food for thought.
The most important thing is to stay ahead of the curve, so obviously liking everything before it’s cool means liking it when it’s not cool, which is confusing. The window of something being not cool (and therefore exclusively cool) is narrowing every day. The internet moves trends so fast that by 2050 this defining aspect of hipsterism may be literally impossible to maintain. We’re an endangered species essentially, only to be appreciated fully post-mortem. Which is surprisingly appealing.
Is Nihilism still hipster? Need to channel all this gracefully bleak thinking into my synth-art, “BRB".
(That’s an ironic BRB by the way, LOL)
((Also an ironic LOL, obviously I don’t use text speak, or laugh out loud.))
***
by Jordan Smith
