New Rave has long been a punchline; an aesthetic insult in the pantheon of rock ’n’ roll. The take-home image of a bearded man in tight lime-neon leggings and untucked white T-shirt, clutching an empty glowstick, is one from the Facebook memory catalogue of doom. But, a decade after it emerged, it stands as a key moment that presaged the era of fashion and music collaboration.
In the wake of groups that followed the bed-head, skinny-jeans/leather-jacket template set by the Strokes, there was a move by bands to go for something more luxe. “We wanted to be sleazy and chic,” says Tahita Bulmer, the former lead singer of New Young Pony Club. “We wanted to wear colours, look smart and be glamourous. Not look like we’d just crawled out of a heroin den.” New Young Pony Club’s main style inspiration was Halston: drapey and sexy in rich and deep colours. But they felt like they were in the minority. “When we started, there was no fun in combing music and fashion. There was no Lady Gaga. We embraced fashion and the fashion world was happy that music had embraced fashion again.”
For other bands, such as the Klaxons, their stylistic template drew from the second summer of love. That look of the 90s raver was a grab bag of styles (necromancer, native American, goth, Rastafarian), imagery (the aciiid smiley face) and shades of neon. It was reborn as New Rave with its tongue ever so slightly in its cheek. Stylist Johnny Blueeyes, who styled the band for their Glastonbury appearance in 2007, says: “They had a sense of uniqueness and futurism. This informed the silver pieces that were specially made for them for the Glastonbury performance.”
“Compared with the first wave of rave it was very tame,” says Gildas Loaëc co-founder of the record and fashion label Kitsuné Maison (the label that released songs by key New Rave bands like Klaxons and Boyz Noize). “There weren’t any white gloves or whistles. It was like a normcore rave scene.”
Still, New Rave club culture threw up some unique fashion moments. Clubber Nicolas Payne-Baader remembers the atmosphere at clubs like Trailer Trash and Boombox. “It was so full on; there was this French guy who would show up every Friday at Trailer Trash with Capri Sun packets turned into necklaces.”
Bulmer adds: “It was great time for men’s fashion. After years of wearing crap, a guy could turn up wearing 10 different types of prints and neon trainers. Stylistically everything felt possible.” Magazines including Super Super and websites such as We Know What You Did Last Night fuelled this aesthetic.
However, this marriage of hyper-alive fashion and indie rock was a difficult one. “The more bands that were associated with fashion, the more frivolous it was seen as by the music industry,” remembers Bulmer. For the second summer of love, the end was nigh.
The fashion legacy of the movement was clearly felt on the catwalk in the early shows of Henry Holland and later Jeremy Scott. On a deeper level, though, it helped make the links between fashion and music more fluid. Ushering in an age where we have Kanye West’s Yeezy Season 1 collection and no one thinks twice about Justin Bieber working with Calvin Klein.
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