Over a year ago, politically-minded Hip Hop fans were struck by a line of Barack Obama-endorsing shirts that incorporated the beloved 4^th & Broadway logo (Eric B & Rakim, Mobb Deep, X-Clan) and those ’85 Chicago Bulls into something socially-reactive. That was then, and everybody from Mos Def to Barack Obama himself have praised these efforts. Hoodman Clothing was the outfit behind the awakening. Started by Edwyn Huang, the New York based company has tackled many more issues, from Rupert Murdoch’s potential ownership of our minds, to the Sisters Spears both getting stylishly knocked up, to Hip Hop relationship with video games, it’s always thought-provoking, and graffiti for the mind in today’s colorful fashion world.

The Evil Collector spoke to Mr. Huang about some of the inspiration behind their new school line, the political consciousness and the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” adage of one clothier that’s not trying to do it, but rather admit its mistakes and keep on pushing product with integrity. Hoodman doesn’t make your average shirts, but it’s the brainchild of extraordinary people, see what we mean.

The Evil Collector: Hoodman puts a message in your fashion. At the height of the election hype, people are very aware – and even only for a minute, being conscious is cool. After Magic and whatnot, how has Hoodman reacted to this trend?

Edwyn Huang: I like it. It’s really exciting that people are into it. What I’ve noticed though, it’s still on the surface. People catch onto the surface characteristics and the surface messages – almost propagandistic tidbits of it, and they just roll with that. We did a little series of our blog (http://www.hoodman.tv/) “10 Symptoms of a Stupid Obama Supporter,” and you love the support. Regardless if they are well-informed, not-informed, the most important thing is to get them voting, get them believing that their voices matter because even a lot of us, we didn’t feel like our voices mattered for a long time – until Obama started doing well. Until that, we never had a candidate whose issues we got behind and stuff like that. Everyday, I keep waking up saying, “I hope nothing happens; I hope nothing happens.” When they said that Obama talking to NATO might be more political than substantive, I was worried there might be a backlash.

Getting back to your question – it’s good that people are voting, they are part of the process now, and they’re excited. The next step is whether they’re going to grapple with the nitty, gritty issues or they’re just gonna get behind the image and the propaganda.

TEC: We ran a news story on HipHopDX about Hoodman contributing not only in awareness but in dollars, to the campaign. How has the campaign embraced that?

EH: Actually, we’ve been trying to set something up official. But because they can’t accept corporate donations – that’s why the money comes all directly out of my pocket; we just use the sale of shirts on the site as a counting mechanism. They can’t be affiliated with corporate contributions and stuff like that, but we get messages from the campaign managers and things like that, saying, “Thank you very much. We really appreciate how you guys have gotten behind Barack.” Barack likes the shirts; the campaign managers emailed us on his behalf. For the most part, it’s just all love on our part. We really don’t expect anything from them; we just hope Barack does well. That’s it.

TEC: Outside of Obama, looking at your spring line, you’ve got a tribute to The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. We recently were talking about how that book inspired a lot of the Black Star album. What were you trying to say in the shirt?

EH: A lot of Hip Hop is on a very intellectual level. Rakim was very influenced by Five Percenter philosophy. There’s a deeper meaning, and a cryptic meaning that people never get into. When I heard “Thieves In The Night” [by Black Star], I could not believe that they took it to that level. It was awesome. It was Hip Hop on a socially analytical level, grappling with the issues that I think Hip Hop is supposed to be about, the issues that Hip Hop sprung out of – urban plight, black plight. That song is in my top ten.

We wanted to do the shirt because of the school season. We have all types of people working at Hoodman, but a lot of us try to avoid dominant culture. When you’re a student, whether it’s elementary, middle or high school, it’s very difficult to think for yourself and think outside of the box because a lot of the teachers being hired are very representative of dominant culture. I feel like Toni Morrison says a lot about America. I don’t know if society is totally ready for what she had to say; I don’t know if society was totally ready for what Black Star had to say. We just want to show support and identify that this happened – that she did write this book, that Black Star did do this song, and that there’s so much more to that song than just the rhyme and the beats and things like that. I don’t know if people analyze Black Star enough. It just fits into the school season. That shirt symbolizes – the teacher has the stick, they teach you what they want, you listen to what they want, and they grade you whether you were able to regurgitate what they were teaching you, and there’s very little ability to develop your own value systems.

TEC: Do you think we’ll ever get to the point, beyond just Tupac, of treating Hip Hop lyrics as literature or poetry?

EH: It’s on us. It’s on us to bring it to the forefront. It’s on the community to create music that is acceptable on that ivory tower level to gain the attention of professors and stuff like that. This is what got me into education. I hated education; the system is set up for you to fit into dominant culture. It’s not for everybody. I wrote a paper in a class [I took] called “Writing With Aristotle” on Hip Hop not being respected. It was ninth grade. I’ve had a serious problem, ever since I was a kid, on Hip Hop not being respected. I read a lot as a kid. Compared to books I read, I get so much from Hip Hop. The analysis and social observations and world commentary is equally as good in Hip Hop as it is in some of the novels you read in college. Guys like Nelson George help it out. Todd Boyd helps it out. Not to blow air, but Jake Paine. You need more people like that – at HipHopDX, all these things. You’ve got to start analyzing Hip Hop on a higher level and asking your audience to grapple with these issues like that. It’s gonna elevate the culture, but it takes the people in it to do that.

TEC: Speaking of them, Talib Kweli and Mos Def endorsed Hoodman at Magic. Tell me about some of the endorsements you’re getting, without necessarily getting models or spokespeople…

EH: It’s pretty cool. I hang out with some of these guys. At Magic, what happened was, Mos Def was performing, and he was walking up to the stage. I think he has a partnership with another clothing brand (Triple Five Soul), but what happened was, I said to him, “Yo Mos, check it out, it’s a Bluest Eye tee.” It got his attention. That’s his [book]. He looked at it, he smiled, he liked it and took the shirt, saying “That’s love.” Later on, my man Steve was holding up an Obama t-shirt, and [Mos Def] just gripped it out of the crowd. As soon as he saw the shirt, he gripped it. Later on, Steve just asked him for a pic with it, and it ended up on OkayPlayer. The message, to us, is what’s important. Each season, the styles change. There’s no consistent style, no market we’re catering to. The one thing that’s stayed the same is we pick up issues that other people don’t want to touch. We touch them before other people want to deal with them. We were a year ahead on Obama. A lot of people come out now with t-shirts…and you know what? The support is good. Any support is good. But…the most critical thing to me is this: whether he wins or loses, I really hope that people don’t give up on change. Don’t give up on educating themselves and having their voices heard. People should be careful about people coming in with the Obama movement and profiting on it without really knowing the issues.

The artists thing is dope. They don’t know us. I’ll admit now, Hoodman is a bad name. We really struggle with it. A lot of people don’t want to give us a chance; they don’t want to bring us into the store. We’ve had owners flat-out tell us, “A cool kid that shops in a boutique isn’t gonna want to wear a shirt by a brand called Hoodman.” It just shows you how people aren’t willing to look past a label or a category or an image. The name Hoodman came from jacking Bergdorf Goodman, ‘cause we’re a reaction to larger fashion houses, fashion with no meaning – we’re taking it back and we’re flipping it on you. People didn’t get it. On my part, that was a bad choice. That’s my fault. But it’s really disheartening to see that people love the shirts, love the messages, and the store owner is gonna say that the only reason he’s not bringing it in is ‘cause it’s called Hoodman. It’s kind of silly. The artists, the musicians, the activists, the magazine writers such as yourself… we get a lot of love from the press because people that see these shirts, they rep it and rock it and see it for what it is.

TEC: I’m gonna put you on the spot. If this election gets hot in the fall, and Obama’s in it, with all your views, what happens if Urban Outfitters calls you up and wants the shirt in stores? What do you say?

EH: If it’s an Obama shirt, something like that, I don’t mind putting that in a bigger store. I feel like our messages are so subversive, so out to lunch, no matter where you put it, it’s not gonna be sell-out. I would be fine with it, because the goal of the Obama shirt is to get support out there. Same with Murdopoly [a play on Rupert Murdoch]. I would love it! The goal is to get people to react and change the culture.

The “Babies Are The New Chihuahuas” shirt is one that I would probably not. Some people may misunderstand that shit. That would be a dangerous shirt to have out at an Urban Outfitters where there’s a lot of people on at urban sprawl/suburban shopping malls buying in.

TEC: I’m glad you brought that up. “Babies Are the New Chihuahuas” shirt, which is a rip at pop culture or dominant culture. We talked politics, how important is humor to you?

EH: One of my professors is Jennifer Henton, over at Hofstra. She’s like my Yoda. Any time I do something that’s questionable, [I’ll get her counsel]. One of the things we talk a lot on is humor. She doesn’t agree with my use of humor sometimes. She feels like for people telling jokes, even if you’re alright and you have thick skin, you have to understand that not everybody has thick skin. Not everybody’s ready for the joke. She’s been trying to get me to stop telling as many jokes and taking myself more seriously – and the issues. Present the issues without the humor, and see if they can stand alone. I don’t agree with her. I might not be representing her opinion either, as well as I should; Perhaps she’ll want to respond…

My thing with humor is, you have to use have to use humor sometimes, because society – the people around you, sometimes they’re not really ready for how you really feel. I use humor as a poking stick. When you’re cooking a turkey, you’ll stick your hand in there to see if it’s really ready. That’s what humor is to me. You see who’s on your side, who’s laughing, who’s not, and you see how people feel about this issue before you jump full in. I use humor a lot to gauge the environment. You can hide behind the humor in a way.

TEC: Do you plan on going beyond t-shirts, sweatshirts and hoodies? Or, maybe collaborations?

EH: One of the brands I’ve always liked, for a long time is Stall & Dean. It’s because Stall & Dean owns the licensing on the Negro Leagues [baseball], they own the licensing on the minor league. That’s the type of shit I really like. If anybody comes over to my place, all my outerwear is Stall & Dean. It’s a little bit subversive to bring back this art; they have a lot of the Jim Crow art and stuff like that. If somebody made that art now, it would be [considered] racist. But they’re preserving a lot of the art and culture from Negro Leagues, from Rucker Park; I love what they do. I would love to work with them.

TEC: What does the rest of 2008 look like for Hoodman?

EH: Right now we’re putting out the school season. We want to see how that works. For the company, a lot of people are like “Get into jeans!” I’m not a company that can do that. I can’t put out jeans or write a book on a shoe. For the most, people are asking us to expand the line. We’re gonna get into jackets, more sweaters and winter types of things – hats. T-shirts are the best item for us to make to get our messages across. We’re always gonna be a t-shirt company, that’s what we are. We’re not gonna clothe you from head-to-toe.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 9th, 2008 at 12:45 am and is filed under Fashion, Features. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.