Before Pittsburgh area malls got a Hot Topic, East Carson St. was THE destination for all the…read more"Spirit of '77" punks who'd sprung up across Allegheny County in the 90s and early 2000s. With two great thrift stores (buying used clothes = more beer/show/ciggie money) and the mighty boutiques called SWANK Gear and Slacker, the South Side was a Clash City Rocker's dream.
Slacker was always the larger of the two stores, and I'd hit it up last in my shopping rotation. I bought my staples at the thrift store, my Young Ones shirt and awesome zipper skirt at SWANK, and hit up slacker for bags, pins, and accessories. The owner and employees were always really cool, loved to chat, stocked tons of flyers advertising shows near the front door, and didn't mind if you browsed. I remember buying tons of pins and belts and makeup and magazines and all that other stuff that a young lady buys when their college is giving her stupid amounts of money for purportedly being a good student, albeit one whose Mohawk put her perpetually in danger of being evicted from the Honors College.
Time marched on, and SWANK Gear closed, despite my best efforts to save it - which included: doing their ads, promoting it at punk brawls and bashes and gallery crawls of all kinds, buying up everything Kris, the owner recommended for me to wear. Although it had a much better clothing selection than Slacker - which is not a slam at Slacker, since SWANK Gear, in its day, was also head and shoulders above Zipperhead in Philly and Trash and Vaudeville in NYC - I think its location doomed it. As Kris pointed out, it was on a side street, tucked away from foot traffic, and Port Authority cuts combined with alarming headlines about the city's decline warned younger kids away from the South Side and pointed them toward the malls. Also, in a move that was unbeknownst to me - but which would become obvious five years later - developers were targeting the South Side for Williamsburg-style Californication, and would ultimately strip it of its small businesses, to replace them with artisinal foodie restaurants and national chains.
Slacker has stood the test of time, defiantly resisting developer efforts to replace it with a Bank of America and restaurants serving locally-sourced free-range chicken breasts in duck confit with walnut-aoli ravioli, artichokes, and organic baby carrots in demi-glace. Or whatever those menus say. I'm a pizza-and-salad kind of gal. For that, for its great location, and for its awesome staff, I give it five stars, even though my punk days are nothing more but a handful of memories, photographs, and stories that begin with "Back in the day..." The next time you're tempted to hit up Hot Topic, skip it and go to the South Side instead. Check out the thrift stores for your threads and Slacker for your accessories.
Oddly enough, while cleaning my apartment, I just found my Velvet Underground "Peel Slowly and See" pin, which I bought at Slacker more than 12 years ago. It is never leaving the lapel of my favorite black military jacket. Love ya, Slacker...and Andy and Lou!
