Glam Heather asked "what is a casual?" While I'd hate to export this grimly British phenomenon to the US, I think you are owed an explanantion. Casuals emerged in the mid-80s and were characterised by a taste for sports casual clobber: think pastel shades, Pringle V-necks, Lyle & Scott sweaters, polo shirts, white Taschini tracksuit tops, white Puma State trainers, Farah slacks, lots of hair gel, wedge haircuts, crimped mullets, bum fluff, one ear ring. Bizarrely, rather unthreatening, effeminate look was sported by all the hardest kids in school. Unsuprprisingly it also took hold on the football terraces, with trips abroad to see English teams often degenerating into smash and grabs on Italian boutiques. To an extent, it was an oddly Thatcherite youth cult, which prided itself on the cost and exclusivity of the gear, and it had reactionary values to boot. At my 6th form college, these people were called 'football casuals', but being a right-minded football fan, I didn't give that label much time of day. The arrival of E at the end of the 80s is credited with the terraces getting a bit more 'loved up'. The casuals stopped trying to beat the shite out of students and, oddly, the studes made the most of this hiatus in hostilies and started, well, dressing like casuals (Oasis were culpable here). These days, I may occasionally sport an Ellesee ski jumper or a Lacoste V-neck as an ironic throwback to the casual era. At least everyone didn't dress the same back then. Someone like Damon Albarn could be seen as ironic casual, too. Indeed for a short while, it was suggested that the kids who frequented Blow Up, circa 1993, were 'modules' - a cross between mods and casuals. Actually, they were a watered down, middle class, pastiche of both. Dont you just love this stuff? PS/In common with everyone else, I too misheard the intro to 'Stars Of...' I thought it was "Make a new coat every day to suit your affairs", which made a certain amount of sense. Martin Horsfield, anthropologist +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list please mail "sinister@majordomo.net". To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to "majordomo@majordomo.net". For list archives and searching, list rules, FAQ, poor jokes etc, see http://www.majordomo.net/sinister +---+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" +---+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+