L.A. Dudes Still Want To Be the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air

Meet L.A.'s newest style icons:

The other day, I totally broke character and flipped on the TV without having anything in particular to watch. Of course when "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" came on, I couldn't help but watch it and revel in the hilariously young Will Smith, the hilariously dated slang...and the hilariously HILARIOUS clothing. See above for a typical example. [Fresh Prince photos: The View From Beneath Your Skin] As I watched Will and Carlton (the preppy one) jab each other about getting into college, I realized with more than a little disbelief that Will's outfits wouldn't be out of place in current Hollywood hotspots. Seriously, think about it: the neon colors, the geometric 80s shapes sprinkled all over tee shirts and jackets in seizure-inducing designs, the omnipresent windbreaker jackets...they're all over Cinespace like spots on a dalmation. Cobrasnake has the evidence:

[thanks Cobrasnake]

I had been kind of loving the whole neon-noise look (check out the headphones on the top left guy! Amazing! They totally match the tape player I had as a kid!). Too often, guys feel trapped in boring fashion ruts and feel that more creative options are emasculating or something. (Though now the pink collared shirt has become emblematic of the rich and yacht-y, which isn't too bad an association, I'd imagine...but I know at first, shirt colors other than chalk-white were considered fruity, to say the least.) That's why I like that guys are feeling brave enough to break out the eye-popping neons and crazy patterns with evident glee. I'm less impressed, though, now that I can tell they're not being creative--they're just aping their childhood idols like the always-fresh Fresh Prince.

Does this mean our boys are regressing? Is the hipster/hip-hop scene longing for juice boxes and Saturday morning cartoons? Should we expect SuperSoakers to make their appearance soon? 80s-child-worthy sneakers are already here in a major way (see these new-edition Pumas, courtesy of sneakerfreaker).

Just in case you thought the Fresh Prince has only L.A. in his clutches, think again...the Korean hip-hop band Big Bang puts Cobrasnake wannabes to shame with their fresh, fresh freshness:

thanks to this blog for photos and alerting me to the existence of Big Bang:
fashion. fandom. and the things in between.