What does music bring us ?

By Zhong Mengxia

Summer is supposed to be the time for music festivals. Here people can follow the music to swing, get minds off of life's stresses and enjoy the joy music brings. However, the sudden advent of the pandemic disrupts people’s previous tempo.Many big-scale outdoor activities have to cancel and sometimes people’s travel is limited by pandemic prevention and control unwittingly as well. With the broadcast of several variety shows related to band music recently, it reignited the passion of people for music. Also, the costumes worn by these musicians on stage aroused public attention and discussion.

Actually, music and fashion are closely connected and hard to separate long before. In the 1970s, American fashion was growing tired of hippies, at this time, punk, with its classical characters like black hair, skintight clothes and Martin boots, appeared at middle-class vacation homes, the transform just as the normcore look replaced the magnificent era of Lady Gaga. As pop music is back, Hip-hop and rap music have scared a lot of parents in a way that has never been done before, leaving over-sized T-shirts, baggy jeans and bucket hats eyeful. Now we can feel the influence of music on a piece of clothing that we can pick up at random.

If we look at the early rock singers of various countries, it's not hard to see that leather jackets, torn T-shirts, and exaggerated hairstyles were the norm. It all started with the depression of Britain in the 1960s and 1970s. At that time, British underclass youth liked to show their difference from the mainstream culture and other youth culture with their unique costumes. Terefore, various new art forms, new culture inspired Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren, who took inspiration from the rebellion of the time and made punk style clothes. Until now, this kind of clothing is still popular with bands and singers around the world.

Sometimes art and emotion make people extremely lonely. David Bowie, an American song-sing writer, drew inspiration from British mime and Japanese kabuki, put on a lot of makeup, and preened and posed exaggeratedly, which defined a new term in the hippie era: glam rock. Among these images and characters created by him, he is most impressive in his brightly colored jumpsuits, flaming red hair, and lacquered leather boots. A large number of domestic and foreign singers such as Madonna, Hong Kong singer Leslie Cheung are deeply influenced by him. Kate Moss, a international supermodel, has appeared on the cover of Vogue twice in the iconic David style. Te current designer of Celine, Hedi Slimane, who has worked for several luxury brands like Dior, Yves Saint Laurent, also admitted that his inspiration was closely related to music, and Bowie's image was an important reference.

In recent years, more and more musicians have crossed the line, joining the fashion industry and creating their own brands. Therefore, their personal musical style can be expressed in the form of clothing to attract the attention and support from the world.For example, R&B diva Rihanna took over as creative director of the PUMA at the end of 2014, bringing the brand back to the forefront of fashion after being considered outdated at the time; Tyler, the creator,an American rapper, created Golf Wang and Golf le FLEUR, and its bright colors and humorous elements used in the design are very consistent with his romantic and light music genre; after launching his own personal brand PEACEMINUSONE in 2016, Korean fashion Icon G-dragon cooperated with Nike this year to recreate Nike Air Force 1, making daisy elements a hit across Asia.

While enjoying music, we also want to see artists show more free and unrestrained personal and stage modeling, after all, styles of superstars need to be more comprehensively reflected.