Post #807525 by WhiteDevilPress on Sun, Jan 22, 2023 10:34 AM

As someone who was regularly redacted & eventually scrubbed from the original version of this website, I'll toss out a few opinions which, at least in the old days, would automatically have been regarded as unpopular.

98% of everything that Revivalists like Sven & Swanky say is true, and the leftover 2% isn't untrue, just the exceptions that prove the rule. Without the original truth, we have no way to discern what is patently false: but what is true and false in popular culture depends largely on context.

Yes, Rat Fink and monsters aren't Tiki, but I have seen home Tiki bars that tastefully incorporated elements of it into the real thing, and it works. Fezzes, surf music and Elvis movies aren't as originally Tiki as exotica, authentic craft cocktails and Polynesian carvings, but they are historically & aesthetically adjacent. Their significance lies in the expansion of cultural awareness & enjoyment that are out there to be discovered by the newbie.

Having assembled & curated my former home (incorporating The Deep South Pacific Room) near Athens, Georgia which was Tikified inside & out, I subsequently disassembled my collection and sold the house after about a decade. This was due to several factors, but one primary reason was that when you're immersed in the exotic 24/7, it ceases to be exotic. I think that's why Tiki events and new bar visits inspire us so much: they're exotic because unfamiliar and new to our experience.

Jimmy Buffett shouldn't be blamed for the bad taste & behavior of Parrotheads any more than Jesus should be blamed for Christian hypocrites. It was Hukilau attendees & neophytes who were drunkenly talking over Robert Drasnin's music that opened my eyes to the fact that it's people who make the Tiki experience either enjoyable or otherwise. Those who lack a knowledge of the authentic and a discernment of quality are the folks who need to stow the "Tiki is whatever..." ignorance and maybe read a book or two. Only by tasting an original recipe cocktail can most of us learn to identify a cheap imitation, and for that we need research and documentation.

I have had less-than-enjoyable exchanges with the Tiki elite (at least in their own minds), and they can be just as tedious as dilettantes. I think the difference between good Tiki and the fake is the difference between good personalities and fake: context and character make a world of difference. Where people are concerned, the most enjoyable ones are inevitably those who don't take themselves too seriously. Those who are least inclined toward political correctness, arrogance and extreme behaviors are far likelier to be enjoyable drinking & dining companions, the very essence of mahalo.

Tiki old and new is a vast umbrella, and can accommodate a wide variety of tastes & influences. But there is a core gospel to be adhered to, and it has been elucidated to us by the Revivalist work of Sven Kirsten, as well as by those who preceded him in the original iteration of the 1950s & 1960s. Recipes, trends and times change, and Tiki is tough enough to change with them, but only if its (imitative) origins aren't adulterated and Shanghaid by those who only want to distort it in order to make a buck.

[ Edited by WhiteDevilPress on 2023-01-22 10:35:54 ]