Nick Jackson Of Twelve Bar

I’m particularly interested in how sound and music play out in visual arts and product design. I wondered if you could speak about how your interest in music has influenced the garments 12 Bar puts out.

Nick: I think that is one of those things where you have to look at the different products we produce to answer the question properly. The beauty of the graphic, and this is why the graphic tee will always be an integral part of what we do, is it allows you to directly represent your musical and other influences. For example, for Fall ‘08, we’ve done one design based on the color ways from the Midnight Marauders print. Obviously with that there is a direct correlation, and people can visualize it and get it straight away.

As far as the collection as a whole, I think the influence is a little more abstract. What I mean by that is its not so much, "oh, we’re going to make a coat that this guy wore in this video", or something like that, which occasionally will happen. But, it’s more about the style we have, and the people in the company have. I think it’s largely born out of the style that emanated from each particular music genre. To give an example, we’ve done a chino pant for fall. It’s one of those things, that, growing up in London in the late 80s and early 90s with all the music people were listening to. Whether the jazz funk scene or American hip-hop or roots stuff, like Maceo Parker and Roy Ayers, you just developed a certain style and swagger. There were things that you wore that were almost just part of that time. Getting back to my point, we’ve made a chino pant that just makes sense to us, because in that era of time it’s what us and everybody around us were wearing. It almost went hand in hand with the music. People would wear argyle burlington socks, air Jordan's or timberland loafers, and they would wear puffa jackets. That was just the style of what we were into at the time, and what we were into really was born out of the music we were listening to, simple as that.

So you would say that music culture was your primary influence, rather than say the casual scene?

Nick: God, I’ve not heard the word casual in a long time. I think for us it was about the attitude and the style of the music we were into. What was interesting about growing up in London, and being fortunate enough to travel, particularly to the US a lot, was that London absorbed influences from the continent, particularly Paris, but also from New York and LA as well. Because the lines of communication were less dynamic back then, we could almost cherry-pick stuff. The whole New York hip-hop style, which was ridiculously baggy and very Polo influenced, Northface, really driven by that colder climate and that rugged look. In London, you would have looked ridiculous if you replicated that completely. So we would pull a few elements. Then we would pull a few elements from Paris as well. I think that it was really very music driven.

I remember going to Paris for 10 days in 1993, one of my friends was living out there, when people like MC Solaar were really big, and Menelik and Sony MC. That whole Talkin’ Loud, Urban Species sound was huge in London and Paris. I remember going there, and for the first time seeing people wear old school Nikes again and break dancing. Wearing Lacoste fisherman's hats and headbands, kind of like the whole Jimmy Conners tennis thing. In Paris, it was a nod back to New York breakin’ with a little European flavor. I came back to London rocking a pair of old school canvas Nikes, just one color with the swoosh, that cost about 20 quid. I came back, and people in England were like, "Damn, where did you get those, I’ve never seen them before." Sure enough, they were in every Footlocker a few months later in London. It was just absorbing different elements, and that was what was so interesting about growing up in London in that period. The style was very much a reflection of the music.

I’m 30 now, but that’s kind of why I knew about Bape and Futura. I didn’t know about Futura from being fascinated by Graffiti, I knew about him because of Mo’ Wax. Then I discovered Subway Art, that had been sitting on my parents coffee table for years because they thought it was cool. While I don’t want to come across as corny like, "Oh yeah, music, we make a double breasted pea coat because Charlie Parker wore one." It’s more about the style and attitude and how it influenced us in what we wore. I think in its simplest form it’s funny. I own Supreme clothes from 1995, and not because I was a skater. I was very interested in skate culture though, because I lived in Australia in the 80s, while the whole brigade thing was massive. That’s why I was always interested in Supreme. It was a skate brand, but it was very clean, fresh. Back then, a lot of the clothes had racial stereotypes.

Oh, absolutely.

Nick: That’s what I loved about Supreme. It wasn’t white or black or Asian or Indian or whatever. It was just very fresh, with a Polo aesthetic but very contemporary. It happened to be a skate brand. I think again, part of the London thing, was being able to pull a little bit of this and that. I wasn’t a skater, but I would pull elements of the culture I could associate with. I was never a rapper, or a DJ, I didn’t grow up in New York, but I would pull a few elements of that we liked. Similarly there was the whole underground rave that evolved into drum and bass, we could pull some stuff from that as well. I think all that is what helped guide the whole 12 Bar flavor. What’s been more interesting is that as the companies grown, there are eight of us full time now, we are literally all different ethnicities and from all walks of life. One of us grew up in Tokyo, one in New York, one in Honolulu, and everyone has there own flavor to bring to the table and make it even more rounded.