Sights & Sounds: Bricolage Fashion & Canadian Indie

By Victoria Nergaard

In Canada, the independent music scene is arguably the fastest growing arts scene in the country, even rivaling the pop culture darling USA. However, because the Canadian music scene is still quite young, there seems to be an attitude that artists are welcome to dress how they want, sound how they want, be as ridiculous as they want. For up and coming Canadian artists, there is the opportunity to be ironic and not take themselves too seriously in the way they dress and present themselves for their audience. Because of this, MERDE has interviewed three musical acts from Alberta, asking what defines their sound and personal style, and how these two elements interact and influence their performance. To be a musician is truly an intersection of sight and sound. While music is obviously pretty important to musicians, creating a strong personal brand and aesthetic to go with your music and a cohesive image to go with it is becoming increasingly important in the millennial Online media world. As new acts rise to fame, good music coupled with a clear brand is the recipe for success. Ultimately, it’s this intersection that makes the style of a musician so interesting: their style of dress is a very visual reflection of how they want to sound, how they want their audience to see them.

GLAM GARAGE: Calgary, Alberta

Rachel Mazer & Delphi Wheatley WEAR: White jumpsuit, gold round glasses, black patent boots with white toes, black overall dress, black and white Hawaiian shirt, black converse.

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR SOUND?

RM: The guitar’s pretty lush and reverb-y, but we have a hard time pinpointing our sound. I think I just write what feels true. I feel like the artists that inspire me don’t really sound like my music, like Frank Ocean, but everyone in the world is inspired by Frank Ocean. In terms of my writing I love Lana Del Rey, she is story telling and creates such strong images.

DW: Definitely a lot of storytelling. Japanese Breakfast, Alvvays and David Bowie are all influences. We’re finding our sound.

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR STYLE?

RM: I wear what I always wear, so like grunge, 70s, sporty, menswear and minimalist, that would describe and encompass everything. Basically minimalist with a statement piece, like something that pops, a cool retro looking jacket or cool shoes.

DW: I would say minimalist menswear with gold accents, that’s me. And we always have hoops!

RM: Yes hoops are always a must, I wear silver and Delphi wears gold. If I’m not wearing hoops, I’m dead!

J BLISETTE: Lethbridge, Alberta

Jackson Tieffenbach WEARS Suede fringe jacket, Power Buddies graphic tee, grey wool dress pants, western-inspired shoes, pink bandana, western belt buckle.

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR SOUND?

JT: For a while I was doing “tropical glam cowboy goth”, those were all the phrases I would throw out. The music is garage rock, it’s psych rock, I hate describing my own music so much. It really depends on who’s asking, we’re a punk band for a lot of people but not for a hard-core dude. We’re kind of also a 60s throwback group.

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE

YOUR STYLE?

JT: I would also go with “tropical glam cowboy goth”. A lot of it, as a dude in his mid-twenties, is desperately trying not to look like a guy who skateboards. Everything I wear needs to actively communicate that I don’t skate, but that’s kind of defining myself backwards. A lot of it is vintage 60s and 70s stuff. In the past few years I’ve also been trying to dress like an actual grown man. Like these pants are decidedly masculine. There’s this tendency amongst dudes who are interested in fashion to paint their nails, wear lipstick, and go really feminine (which I used to) but for me it’s a real balance of feeling masculine and still being fashionable without doing streetwear and skater stuff. A lot of my stuff is vintage, like pleated pants, and cowboy boots. I’m actually almost done with the cowboy stuff too because I feel like we’ve really reached peak cowboy. Part of looking masculine for me is also trying hard not to look like a child.

KHILLA KILLS: Calgary, Alberta

Katie Hillson & Kylah Folen WEAR Purple bodysuit, skirts and chokers by Champagne Charlemagne, leopard print bodysuit by Melody Mangler, fetish-wear

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR SOUND?

KH: We are synth-wave, it’s definitely influenced by 80s music.

KF: I would say it was definitely heavily inspired by when we went to a Melted Mirror [a synth-punk band from Calgary, Alberta] show in Calgary, and we decided we really wanted to do something with synths.

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR STYLE?

KF: We really try to be creative about it. Also, it’s about trying to find somebody local help us build something that we came up with on our own instead of picking from a regular store. The experience of working with a local designer has been really cool. Hopefully we’ll do more of that as we come up with more fun outfits.

KH: I’m really inspired by the 80s again, and Debby Harry. We both really like fetish-inspired stuff, like the boots, the chokers, definitely very New Wave.