Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

Slings, arrows, and naming names

Who are Tim Mays, Sam Chammas, Chuck Patton, Paul Horn, Dave Good?

The venom is no surprise.
The venom is no surprise.

Dear Hipster: Your list of great albums sucks. You suffer from a lack of taste. Go back to making jokes about mustaches and Cap’n Crunch. — Ethan

Hipster: Nice work leaving out Paul’s Boutique, hipster. You had one job.— Dan

Dear Hipster: Surfer Rosa is clearly better than Doolittle. Preferring Doolittle is the surest sign of a weak, hipster mind; the indication of a follower, not a leader.— Anonymous

Sponsored
Sponsored

Dear Hipster: Not a bad list of hipster discs. All wrong, of course. Nonetheless, you did your best, and I don’t fault you. — Pope Clement the Hip

This comes as no surprise, and all I can say is:

Video:

___________

DJ: Besides you, are there any notable hipsters in San Diego you’re at liberty to identify? Lurking somewhere, in the vicinity of the heights, the hills, or the parks (north or south); maybe right off of 30th street, but not too far east, perhaps in La Mesa. I need some names and faces, or more to go on than the abstract profiles and characteristics that have been sketched over time in this column. — David

We laugh about it now, but back in the late twenty-aughts there was a high-level conspiracy to root out hipster subversives who had allegedly infiltrated otherwise polite society. Clandestine committees formed, issued subpoenas to trendy locals, and generally made life difficult for the hipper set. One minute, you’re innocently walking along 30th Street, headed for a bitter craft ale of some sort, looking au courant in your skinny jeans, fedora, and mustache. The next minute, boom, some wannabe plasters your picture up on a hipster-ridicule-themed blog somewhere.

It was all downhill from there. Blacklisted from lucrative bartending gigs, no longer relied upon for restaurant recommendations, and somehow there are no longer any available appointments at the local tattoo parlor.

Yup. Dark times, indeed, during the Flannel Scare. Once the Un-Ironic Activities Committee had zeroed in on a hipster, the only way to clear his reputation would be to name names. Needless to say, fingers were pointed — not by me but by people I knew at the time. It wasn’t pretty.

Ergo, you must understand my reticence to name names, even in our more enlightened times. Certain local luminaries deserve credit for blazing the trails for what became today’s hipster scene, e.g., Casbah founder Tim Mays, for giving future stars a stage; or Sam Chammas, the ingénieur behind Live Wire and the Whistle Stop, for laying the foundations for a generation of contemporary craft-beer dive bars. Chuck Patton saw the whole hipster coffee thing coming a mile away. Paul Horn has probably made more hipster jokes than any other San Diegan. The Reader’s own Dave Good is the Platonic ideal of a homegrown hipster hero in many aspects.

And yet, those aren’t the hipsters you’re looking for. Just because these pioneers laid the foundations of today’s hipster scene, for which I eternally tip my hat, the most important local hipsters are the nameless bartenders, baristas, tattoo artists, scenesters, fixed-gear bicycle aficionadi, rockers, DJs, artists, freelance alt-weekly newspaper columnists, and full-time barroom-trivia hosts — they’re the ones who keep the dream alive all day every day.

The latest copy of the Reader

Please enjoy this clickable Reader flipbook. Linked text and ads are flash-highlighted in blue for your convenience. To enhance your viewing, please open full screen mode by clicking the icon on the far right of the black flipbook toolbar.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Pie pleasure at Queenstown Public House

A taste of New Zealand brings back happy memories
The venom is no surprise.
The venom is no surprise.

Dear Hipster: Your list of great albums sucks. You suffer from a lack of taste. Go back to making jokes about mustaches and Cap’n Crunch. — Ethan

Hipster: Nice work leaving out Paul’s Boutique, hipster. You had one job.— Dan

Dear Hipster: Surfer Rosa is clearly better than Doolittle. Preferring Doolittle is the surest sign of a weak, hipster mind; the indication of a follower, not a leader.— Anonymous

Sponsored
Sponsored

Dear Hipster: Not a bad list of hipster discs. All wrong, of course. Nonetheless, you did your best, and I don’t fault you. — Pope Clement the Hip

This comes as no surprise, and all I can say is:

Video:

___________

DJ: Besides you, are there any notable hipsters in San Diego you’re at liberty to identify? Lurking somewhere, in the vicinity of the heights, the hills, or the parks (north or south); maybe right off of 30th street, but not too far east, perhaps in La Mesa. I need some names and faces, or more to go on than the abstract profiles and characteristics that have been sketched over time in this column. — David

We laugh about it now, but back in the late twenty-aughts there was a high-level conspiracy to root out hipster subversives who had allegedly infiltrated otherwise polite society. Clandestine committees formed, issued subpoenas to trendy locals, and generally made life difficult for the hipper set. One minute, you’re innocently walking along 30th Street, headed for a bitter craft ale of some sort, looking au courant in your skinny jeans, fedora, and mustache. The next minute, boom, some wannabe plasters your picture up on a hipster-ridicule-themed blog somewhere.

It was all downhill from there. Blacklisted from lucrative bartending gigs, no longer relied upon for restaurant recommendations, and somehow there are no longer any available appointments at the local tattoo parlor.

Yup. Dark times, indeed, during the Flannel Scare. Once the Un-Ironic Activities Committee had zeroed in on a hipster, the only way to clear his reputation would be to name names. Needless to say, fingers were pointed — not by me but by people I knew at the time. It wasn’t pretty.

Ergo, you must understand my reticence to name names, even in our more enlightened times. Certain local luminaries deserve credit for blazing the trails for what became today’s hipster scene, e.g., Casbah founder Tim Mays, for giving future stars a stage; or Sam Chammas, the ingénieur behind Live Wire and the Whistle Stop, for laying the foundations for a generation of contemporary craft-beer dive bars. Chuck Patton saw the whole hipster coffee thing coming a mile away. Paul Horn has probably made more hipster jokes than any other San Diegan. The Reader’s own Dave Good is the Platonic ideal of a homegrown hipster hero in many aspects.

And yet, those aren’t the hipsters you’re looking for. Just because these pioneers laid the foundations of today’s hipster scene, for which I eternally tip my hat, the most important local hipsters are the nameless bartenders, baristas, tattoo artists, scenesters, fixed-gear bicycle aficionadi, rockers, DJs, artists, freelance alt-weekly newspaper columnists, and full-time barroom-trivia hosts — they’re the ones who keep the dream alive all day every day.

Comments
Sponsored

The latest copy of the Reader

Please enjoy this clickable Reader flipbook. Linked text and ads are flash-highlighted in blue for your convenience. To enhance your viewing, please open full screen mode by clicking the icon on the far right of the black flipbook toolbar.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Live Five: Sitting On Stacy, Matte Blvck, Think X, Hendrix Celebration, Coriander

Alt-ska, dark electro-pop, tributes, and coastal rock in Solana Beach, Little Italy, Pacific Beach
Next Article

Southern California Asks: 'What Is Vinivia?' Meet the New Creator-First Livestreaming App

Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

This Week’s Reader This Week’s Reader