I saw some dandies!

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Okay, I've read Hebdige so I know there are all difft subgroups and affiliations and subtly-shaded shenanigans involved in precisely which uniform a particular group of young, ostensibly with-it, men affect. However I think these guys may just be "dandies"!!

Tottenham Court Road, five guys and two women. The guys ALL have on:

* colored shirts, collars turned UP about 3/4 of the way
* oversized pinstriped suit jackets
* a potpourri of trousers; most were pinstriped though one guy had baggy jeans on
* thoroughly moussed hair

the ladies wore no uniform. they were pretty dolled up though. one had short tartan skirt?

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Sunday, 21 September 2003 12:40 (twenty-two years ago)

gareth said "estate agents"

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Sunday, 21 September 2003 12:40 (twenty-two years ago)

"I'm the dandy estate agent!"

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Sunday, 21 September 2003 12:41 (twenty-two years ago)

gareth say "relax"

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Sunday, 21 September 2003 12:41 (twenty-two years ago)

Andrew say "fuck subtle shadings"

― Andrew Thames (Andrew Thames), Sunday, 21 September 2003 12:45 (twenty-two years ago)

As in "well done for spotting those dandies!", I mean

― Andrew Thames (Andrew Thames), Sunday, 21 September 2003 13:04 (twenty-two years ago)

were the ladies good looking? as a londoner myself i notice that blokes who dress like twats (whether they be estate agent dandies or indie guys with trucker hats and neu! t-shirts) almost always have inexplicably stunning girlfriends. why is this?

― Bob Shaw (Bob Shaw), Sunday, 21 September 2003 13:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Hmm, so Tracer was in the vicinity of Soho on FRIDAY NIGHT and is questioning my assertion that this was a small Rat Pack of media sales/entry-level advertising guys (not the 'creatives'). Couldn't really be anyone else.

― suzy (suzy), Sunday, 21 September 2003 13:23 (twenty-two years ago)

i think these guys are on the cover of NME this week actually

― stevem (blueski), Sunday, 21 September 2003 13:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Has there ever been a band called The Dandies? It does sound like an NME sort of bandname

― Bob Shaw (Bob Shaw), Sunday, 21 September 2003 13:30 (twenty-two years ago)

how about The Warhols?

― stevem (blueski), Sunday, 21 September 2003 13:48 (twenty-two years ago)

hey tracer yr in england?! me too! might see you!!!
ok cool!

― duane, Sunday, 21 September 2003 13:54 (twenty-two years ago)

But don't you have to be 70 to be a dandy?

― jel -- (jel), Sunday, 21 September 2003 14:35 (twenty-two years ago)

FUCK

― Andrew Thames (Andrew Thames), Sunday, 21 September 2003 14:45 (twenty-two years ago)

there was a britpop band called the dandies. i think they were from either leeds or york, i forget

― ... (gareth), Sunday, 21 September 2003 14:46 (twenty-two years ago)

Hey wait I might make it to 70, I take my FUCK back

― Andrew Thames (Andrew Thames), Sunday, 21 September 2003 14:50 (twenty-two years ago)

you can't take a fuck back, can you?

― s1utsky (slutsky), Sunday, 21 September 2003 14:57 (twenty-two years ago)

Untill they overturn Roe v. Wade you can!

― ModJ, Sunday, 21 September 2003 15:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Re: outfits=good looking birds, it's because women like guys who can dress themselves once and a while, instead of showing up just everywhere in jeans and a t-shirt. That being said most guys who dress like that turn out to be insufferable cunts. You cannot win in this life :(

― Ally (mlescaut), Sunday, 21 September 2003 15:58 (twenty-two years ago)

sure i can!

― duane, Sunday, 21 September 2003 16:07 (twenty-two years ago)

i'm in london until wed aft. we should all get together and, uh, spot more dandies and stuff.

― mark p (Mark P), Sunday, 21 September 2003 16:15 (twenty-two years ago)

http://bitchcakes.topcities.com/katze/rocket.jpg

― Ally (mlescaut), Monday, 22 September 2003 02:22 (twenty-two years ago)

http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~dbaxo/crisp2.jpg

― jaymc (jaymc), Monday, 22 September 2003 03:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm very wary of boys who spend more time dressing then me.

― A Girl Named Sam (thatgirl), Monday, 22 September 2003 03:58 (twenty-two years ago)

well, you needn't be in that last case listed, coz he's dead now.

― Kingfish (Kingfish), Monday, 22 September 2003 06:12 (twenty-two years ago)

Recently Marilyn Mason described his own look as 'dandy' which I thought was interesting.

― colin s barrow (colin s barrow), Monday, 22 September 2003 06:14 (twenty-two years ago)

which era, tho? 1994? Aladdin Sane Redux? Nazi Dominatrix?

― Kingfish (Kingfish), Monday, 22 September 2003 06:16 (twenty-two years ago)

four months pass...

On dandies, Beaudelaire wrote "Ces Ãªtres n'ont pas d'autre Ã©tat que de cultiver l'idÃ©e du beau dans leur personne, de satisfaire leurs passions, de sentir et de penser".
translates to
"These beings do not have an other state* than to cultivate the idea of beauty in their person, to satisfy their passions, to feel and think".

* I saw a translation online that was using the word "profession" instead of my usage of the word "state", but elsewhere Baudelaire wrote "etre un homme utile m'a paru toujours quelque chose de bien hideux." so I think the word "state" is more appropriate because it can denote utilitarism while avoiding being gregarious.
np work is a four-letter word

― Sï¿½bastien Chikara (Sébastien Chikara), Thursday, 19 February 2004 22:47 (twenty-two years ago)

Tracer, were these dandies confounding the local constabulary?

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Thursday, 19 February 2004 22:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Who killed Dandy?

― El Diablo Robotico (Nicole), Thursday, 19 February 2004 22:55 (twenty-two years ago)

:-)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 19 February 2004 22:56 (twenty-two years ago)

I suppose that's a confession.

― El Diablo Robotico (Nicole), Thursday, 19 February 2004 22:57 (twenty-two years ago)

It was more a celebration of dandiness but both work.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 19 February 2004 23:00 (twenty-two years ago)

"Jim Dandy" would be a good drag-king name.

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Friday, 20 February 2004 02:00 (twenty-two years ago)

"Jim Dandy" would be a good drag-king name.

do i look like a "drag-king" to you, mr. hand?

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Stage/8543/jimdandy2.jpg

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Friday, 20 February 2004 04:55 (twenty-two years ago)

let's try this again ...

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Stage/8543/jimmag.jpg

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Friday, 20 February 2004 04:56 (twenty-two years ago)

third time's a charm!

http://www.classicrockrevisited.com/images/jim_da2.jpg

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Friday, 20 February 2004 04:58 (twenty-two years ago)

A really interesting book about dandies...

Children of the Sun
by Martin Green
Basic Books, 469 pp., $15.00

The subtitle of Martin Green's book is A Narrative of "Decadence" in England After 1918. (Thanks for the inverted commas.) It is really a curious mixture of anthropological theory and a Baedeker of the main cults or "gangs" that have succeeded one another in English literature for forty years after the national disaster in 1918. And since this is the period when Great Britain ceased to be a world power and when a wealthy, brilliant, and traditional governing class lost its will and its money, and virtually gave up control of English life (and about a third of the earth's surface), Mr. Green slips in dramatic headlines about the state of society to which literature may be linked.

― Skottie, Friday, 20 February 2004 06:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Didn't Baudelaire also say something like " A dandy always sleeps in front of a mirror"? Absolutely genius. There should be more real dandies in the world. I know from experience that Cecil Taylor is one hell of a dandy. NY Stylee, too.

― Jay Vee (Manon_70), Friday, 20 February 2004 06:56 (twenty-two years ago)

No, I think that was Pat Benatar.

― Skottie, Friday, 20 February 2004 06:58 (twenty-two years ago)

one month passes...

i just saw Wilde and am considering instigating a dandy revival. anyone care to join me? however i fear the only place to get knee breeches and the appropriate chemise is the the local goth shoppe, which i fear would severely limit my color palette. well, there's always the civil war reenactors! (though i guess that's not much better, eh).

― lolita corpus (lolitacorpus), Wednesday, 7 April 2004 20:06 (twenty-two years ago)

Have you tried a tailor, lolita? A real dandy has a better relationship with his tailor than with his best friend.

― Michael White (Hereward), Wednesday, 7 April 2004 20:54 (twenty-two years ago)

one year passes...

somebody please find and repost the picture of jim dandy on the recent black oak reunion tour

― cindy williams permafrost (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 12 May 2005 06:41 (twenty-one years ago)

also http://bensguide.gpo.gov/3-5/symbols/yankee.html

― cindy williams permafrost (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 12 May 2005 06:44 (twenty-one years ago)

i love that one of our most beloved patriotic songs works out to mean "i'm a dumb brit who dresses like a fairy"!

― cindy williams permafrost (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 12 May 2005 06:47 (twenty-one years ago)

Americans = fags.

Think about it.

― slightly more subdued (kenan), Thursday, 12 May 2005 06:57 (twenty-one years ago)

I saw a Dandy last night! And I coined a phrase which he promptly nicked. Humph!

― The Square Root Of Negative Two (kate), Thursday, 12 May 2005 11:37 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm changing my name to 'Lucy Locket'.

― zombie vermin go home (dymaxia), Thursday, 12 May 2005 11:40 (twenty-one years ago)

A 'Yankee Doodle' is a dumb Puritan, it appears.

― zombie vermin go home (dymaxia), Thursday, 12 May 2005 11:43 (twenty-one years ago)

ok ok, if no one else is going to post the jim dandy after-picture, i will:

http://www.blackoakarkansas.bigstep.com/Images/jim_tp_jammin.JPG

― cindy williams permafrost (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 12 May 2005 12:12 (twenty-one years ago)

two years pass...

warning: contains douchebag

http://www.sebastianhorsley.typepad.com/

― That one guy that hit it and quit it, Saturday, 6 October 2007 23:29 (eighteen years ago)

Favourite musician?
Marc Bolan. He had one foot in heaven, the other in Woolworth's.

That's very good. He's very quotable, which is an essential attribute for a dandy, surely.

― moley, Saturday, 6 October 2007 23:53 (eighteen years ago)

There is, after all, a certain spiritual calm that comes from having money in the bank.

Some of his quips are pilfered, but that's traditional too.

― moley, Saturday, 6 October 2007 23:59 (eighteen years ago)

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