Post #710736 by Swanky on Mon, Mar 10, 2014 9:43 AM

On 2014-03-07 16:07, ErichTroudt wrote:
It was okay.... A little history, and a lot of about the Revival...spent a little too much time on burlesque dancers...

I guess my main beef was it portrayed the comeback or revival of tiki was based solely on tiki news, tiki central, and the book. No mention of the rockabilly scene at all.

In SoCal in the early 90's rockabilly and Swing had a huge comeback, and following on its heels was the midcentury and "Tiki".

I remember in early 90's being able to get any vintage 50's stuff and tiki stuff I wanted from thrift stores, after the rockabilly revival the stuff was gone. Rockabilly people bought old houses, decorated them vintage, and made tiki bars. They searched for old 50's hotels, diners and bowling alleys...and many of found were tiki ones....

Look at many of the first events and hot rod cars shows were attached. Corpro Nason used tons of guys like Pizz and Von Franco for their early tiki prints. In 1999 Taboo: the art of Tiki book used tons of kustom kulture and greasers artists.
I remember seeing shag and his art at a Mooneyes event before he was insanely popular. Same thing years later with Tiki Diablo.
I used to carry around my early tiki revival art to the car shows for the artists to sign because I knew they'd be there.

If you wanted new tiki stuff you had to go to 8 Ball or the other crazy little stores in burbank that otherwise carried 50's stuff for the greaser clientele.

By no means am I saying that Tiki news, tiki central, and a few others mentioned in the Movie weren't a big part of the revival, its obvious they were, and like it said in the movie, they brought people together that already had an interest.... but the huge growth in interest about Tiki without a doubt was fueled by the greasers. Growth enough to justify books, New mugs, tiki companies, and strictly tiki events that happen on a regular basis.

It was just a whole mid-century revival. There was rockabilly, lounge, swing. A generation that grew up on the heels of the 50-60s started appreciating it and re-discovering it. Their parents record collections, the diners, the Tiki joints.

I always felt Tiki was a sub-sub-culture of vintage revival and it was the common connector of all the other sub-cultures. Billys were into Tiki, as were Lounge and Big Band people.

Rockabilly didn't create Tiki culture, they were all part of the same wave. I do think Rockabilly culture was the biggest group.