Great Yarmouth summer 2001

"There's only one good thing about a small town. You know that you want to get out"

(Smalltown - Songs for Drella, Lou Reed/John Cale, 1990).

I hate summer, my town is full of horrible tourists. But I dislike more the people who live here. I only found out the other day that my town is fifth on the poverty list, which is strange when you look at the people who all seem to be wearing more gold than Indiana Jones has ever seen.

It's not as if the town is that desolate when the summer tourists have gone, summer type shops and attractions lock up for the winter but we're not a town that closes down completely. We still have plenty of money being pumped around the pubs and clubs. The money is there if you look. My problem is what it's being spent on and the lack of individualism.

Last year the boys spent money on baseball-caps, tracksuit bottoms, hair-gel, and Calvin (and Hobbes) Klein 'parfume'. They also bought expensive lad shirts that get covered in sweat and beer.

This woudn't be a bad thing if everyone didn't have the same look, which can change every few years but their all wearing it.

Half of the girls in the town spend ther money on sportswear and gold jewellery, but let us not forget that they spend loads on tacky make-up.

The girls wear more make up this year and have even more earrings (soon they will have no ears left), big old frumpy sports sweaters or little flimsy strappy tops and huge common greying bra starps showing. The boyband rough and ready look is now in, it was a good look a few years ago, but not now. How grown up they look!

It's now difficult to find that special person in your life, I'm not trying to say that we should just go on looks, but we do to start with, and that's the problem, I don't see anybody that takes my eye. There's nothing that make anybody standout and say I'm the one.

All boys wear tank tops and cut off shirts proudly displaying celtic arm band tattoos. They have spikey hair, slight side burns, baggy jeans. It's a bit Beckham and a bit skate board.

We still have the 'individual' skate tribe, knitted hats (in the height of summer), hooded tops (sorry hoodies), skate pants and attitude (which is free).

Some kids who live near me were all wearing white adidas trainers and dark blue adidas tracksuit bottoms, baseball caps/bandanas, they all had the same yellow bike with shock absorbers and they all sat around looking like they were the meanest kids in the USA.

They were however Brit kids from non poor-ghetto backgrounds, with mobile phones, roll up cigs and nothing to rebel against except that they have everything but are still whining.

When these kids get older we have the fun of them with cars and doing car burn outs down the seafront because they are bored. But if you have a car you can drive miles away and get away from this shit hole. I however can't drive and because the town has a poor rail system can't get away to gigs out of the area because I can't get back or sleeep in my vehicle.

I'm not saying I'm Mr. Individual but we should take more pride in what we wear, not what everyone else is wearing. It's not about brands (which I'm against) but ther are plenty of shops that you cvan mix and match from and create something different. Yarmouth has plenty of cheap clothing shops, but sadly a new sports clothing shop is opening up and that limits what the people will wear.

All the school kids when they go back will be a right state. The boys will have every variety of STD's (or STI) on the go and all the girls will be several months pregnant, which means they will have to wear even baggier sports clothes, (DOH!).

So anyway fashion sucks, I'm going to but a load of classis clothes ala' James Dean, Marlon Brando and Paul Newman. White plain t-shirts and jeans and I'm gonna but them in bulk in different colours so that I don't have to care about what's cool, the 50's look can never be bettered because it's when cool started and so is beyond cool it's classic. Ooh I'm such a rebel and an ousider. Get her, meow!