Urban Styles

Book excerpt: Urban Styles chronicles the under the radar phenomenon of Punk Hardcore music blending with Graffiti in the metropolis known as New York City. This tale is told through the eyes of band members that were adept at wielding spray cans and writers that represented New York Hardcore on the streets as well as related iconography that reinforced the connection between these two subcultures. The conventional notion of what a graffiti writer is supposed to look and be into, is challenged, as stated on this quote from the book's jacket: "When you hear the term Graffiti Artist most people think of B-Boys in Kangol hats parachute pants and break dancing. No one thinks shaved heads, Doc Martens and CBGB mosh pits! But there was and is a strong connection between the NYC graffiti scene and the NY Hardcore scene..." Lou Koller from Sick Of It All A vital component of this synthesis was, the native to NYC, inclusion of Hardcore fans within traditional Graffiti crews, sometimes at odd with one another, but always united in spreading the aesthetic of this music onto a wider visual medium. Inside the book you'll find interviews with key crew members as well as the first writers who played in bands; the ones that followed them and the modern day practitioners that are still upholding this tradition. There is also a plethora of iconic images within, culled from record/demo tape covers, flyers, t-shirts and paintings that celebrate the union of these two street cultures, most of them never seen or done specifically for the book. Underground movements, art, music, sociology, urban cultures; all of these disparate yet related topics are a piece of the puzzle. They collectively shine a spotlight on subcultures that have gone on to have a far reaching influence onto the world-at-large and it all can be traced back to this concrete jungle known as the big apple.