Concert Fashion: Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, Chappell Roan, Cowboy Hats, Battle Jackets, & More

If you’ve ever dressed as a musician to see them in concert, dutifully sewn metal band patches onto a "battle jacket," or decorated a cowboy hat to wear to a show, you’ll feel personally seen by this episode. This week, we discuss modern trends in concert fashion and how the threads we choose to brandish can display our fandom. Through the lens of pop and metal culture, we converse about early displays of fan merchandise and debate which fan base may have originated the cowboy hat decorating trend. Most importantly, we ask the age-old question: Are you a poser for wearing a band t-shirt to a gig? We shall see…Links:Pinterest BoardCarrie Brownstein, “Concert Outfits: A Brief History” (NPR)Lauren Alex O’Hagan, “'My Musical Armor': Exploring Metalhead Identity through the Battle Jacket” (Taylor & Francis Online)Madeleine Schulz, “Did the arena tour kill festival fashion?” (Vogue Business)Find us:⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠TikTok⁠YouTubeTimestamps:Intro 00:00Did the arena tour kill festival fashion? 00:17Fan-Artist-Fan Connection 01:48Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour 02:44Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts Tour 05:17Carrie Brownstein’s “Concert Outfits: A Brief History” 06:02Early Concert Fashion and Fan Merchandise During Beatlemania 08:52Madonna Lookalike Contest 11:13Chappell Roan’s Concert Themes 12:15Battle Jackets in Metal Culture 13:13Cowboy Hats 16:23Band T-Shirts 21:42Are you a poser for wearing a band t-shirt to a gig? 23:39Rave Culture 26:14What artist do you own the most merch for? 27:17Outro 28:35 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityvertigo.substack.com