still back/ swag lesson/ swag achievement!!!

It's been kind of a busy week in the world of swag and it's only Wednesday, if it doesn't feel like Wednesday to you don't worry, it feels like Monday of last week to me so you're still good. Getting right to it, I've grabbed a new hat and a new t this week and we are gonna show case them in another swag lesson combo post because of the way in which the world of swag is exploding.

Starting with the t-shirt, you've got the design right above this sentence, and it's called the "don't care bears".  I didn't post a picture of the whole shirt cus I don't actually have it yet and cus the model wearing it on the web site might scare you (it's at threadless tees type in "don't care bears" and you'll see what I mean, but don't say I didn't warn you).  As you can see, the design clearly fits the "swag animals doing swag things rule", and it gets extra points for irony.  Anyone who was ever abused with the carebears as a child (thank you gracious sister for your help in this area) probably said the phrase "I don't care" a number of times to counter their mantra of  "WE CARE, WE CARE... WE CARE".  The children that grew up with this abuse should love this shirt as I do, and if you are one of those children I give you permission to go get this shirt, even if it bites my swag a lil bit.  For more recommendations of similar swag, threadless is actually a great resource; it's not street wear but if you sift through the hipster shirts you'll get to the gold, probably at a good price too.  This means you should avoid shirts that say "geek" and have words making ironic historical jokes; instead try to stick with the awesome animals rule, it has never failed me. Some threadless suggestions:

"monkey business"

"da noize"

"electric jellyfish"

I've purposely shielded you from the models on the website but if you do go there remember not to judge them; they don't mean anything by their weirdness, they just don't know any better. Also, shout out to dbthecoolkid for puttin me up on threadless.

On to our next matter of business: the hat. Remember that Michigan hat I told you about in that previous swag lesson? The one in which I said that if you didn't get it soon, I'd have it first? Well, unless you got it before 5 o'clock today, I beat you to it.  If you forgot what the hat looks like it's here:

We've already been over the specs so I don't have to do that again and I've already made my recommendations... so yeah, not much to say here, other than that the white part of the hat feels really cool (don't hate, I don't usually feel up hats, this one is just very touchable).  Also I would love to say that this is my last snapback purchase, especially as it is not a new era, but I cannot make this promise. I've heard it from reputable sources that motivation will be dropping some new snap backs with the raging Wolverine in a new design that looks too good to pass up. So I'll try to refrain from snap backs, but in the mean time I'll defend myself with examples of swag luminaries wearing Michigan/wolverine snap backs:

1. Big Sean: the snap back king from the D is probably the most credible source out there for snapback swag, peep his choice of hat in this vid

that's right wolverines (woot woot!)

2. Chris Brown: I know what you're thinking "first he's defending snapbacks, now he's using Chris Brown to justify his cause tisk, tisk" *quizzical look you give to crazy people*... Well first of all, don't give me that look, and second of all, in this video Chris rocks the throwback Petway bball jersey to go along with a smooth hat, I'm contractually obligated to admire him for that.  Also, the song isn't terrible and his collab with big sean was pretty hot too, he's getting better (or maybe that's just the side of me that likes his hat talking, we'll never know)

    3. Bun B: That's right, I redeemed myself from the Chris Brown fiasco with a pic of Bun B himself rockin a wolverine featured snapback that I recommended earlier.  It's almost as if he read my mind or something

 but really tho, there's actually a ton of big names who have this hat including Bun, Wiz Khalifa, and Mac Miller (photo evidence can be found at the motivation blog).

But all this talk of wolverines and rappers has brought me to the fast rising wolverine rapper P.L. He's one of Ann Arbor's finest and reps the whole state of Michigan quite well with his unique flow. He's already dropped a ton of singles from his upcoming album and here's a free style on "Bill Gates" that will only serve to raise his profile (he's also done a "black and yellow" remix called "blue and yellow" so you know he's got my respect) check out his block M tattoo as well:

Anyway, that's all from me, peace swag world, happy swag trails.

I'M BACK!!!!

So I've been slacking with the blog, my apologies.  A lot has happened since my last post.  First and foremost, Michigan (woot woot!) won some more basketball games!!! The mighty Wolverines beat Illinois in the Big Ten tournament, and then smacked Tennessee in the NCAA tournament, and then beat Duke on top of that!!!!! Ok, we didn't actually beat Duke, but it was close and their mascot is the devil, so I'm claiming the moral victory here.

Zack Novak being a boss. No, this picture doesn't have anything to do with anything, I just like it

          
But anyway, that's probably not what you came here for so we'll talk about some developments in the world of swag.  The first of which is that Big Shan dropped a new mix tape.  I know what you're thinking - "Sir Swag Don't Stop, don't you mean ya boy from the D, Big Sean, just dropped a new mix tape?"- and your confusion would be understandable.  But no, avid reader, I meant Big Shan, another pretty dope rapper from the D.  Don't worry, Big Shan isn't tryna jack Big Sean's swag; they're cool with each other and have worked and performed together.  The mix tape is called "The Fresh Prince of Detroit" and has some great tracks, including my favorite "I love U", to go along with it's great name (although c'mon Shan, everyone knows that I'm the real Fresh Prince of Detroit).  The cover for the mix tape is pretty swag, especially the maize high top, and you can download it here.

Sir Shanimal himself             

The next bit of swag news is that motivation had their spring drop which included 3 new snap backs and a ton of new crew neck sweaters and hoodies.  Now normally I'm not a big snap back fan, so I was hoping for a new motivation fitted or something like that, but the snap back that they put out was just too good to pass up and, if I had time, would certainly be the feature item in the next swag lesson.

  As you can see, the hat is pure swag (there's also two other color-ways of the hat if you are a hater and don't like maize and blue for some unknown, but clearly sinister, reason).  I shouldn't have to explain why this hat is swag, but I will anyway.  The two tone hat is a pretty swag thing all on its lonesome, but the fact that it has the most awesome animal on the face of the planet (the wolverine of course) only helps this hat.  We've already discussed what an awesome animal can do for your swag, and now we see the classic University of Michigan Wolverine with a motivation twist on his little sailor hat thingy (which also makes this hat cool, awesome animal +awesome hat on animal= extra awesome hat).  So yeah, even though this is a snap back, this hat is swag. In fact, the whole snap back genre is kinda (not really but sorta) growin on me.  I don't have any real reasons for this other than that the University of Michigan seems to get a lot of love in the snap back game.  So in an ode to snap back swag I'll make some recommendations of the University of Michigan variety:

This one's a mitchell and ness that's over at motivation for only 25 bucks!!! I've been told that there are about 20 left so there's no rush to grab this, but if you don't get there fast I'll probably have it before you, so get a move on!

Yea so my photo shop skills suck, but imagine you only see the maize and blue hat with the block M in the picture, cus that's all that's important here anyway. This is a vintage hat at burn rubber, that has the burn rubber logo on the side for extra swag, I'm not sure if they still have it in store as I haven't been there in months, but if you're in Royal Oak you should check for me.  They also had a reasonably swag lions hat that released with these other vintage snap backs but that may also be long gone.

  Again, I have no idea if these are in stores still, and you should feel free to look at me with a heavy dose of skepticism now that I've posted two Tisa snap backs from Revive in Birmingham.  I'm not a big fan of revive (although they can come up clutch with their custom fitteds) and I usually can't stand Tisa, but even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every once in a while.  Here Tisa and Revive (two blind squirrels) have combined to find two acorns!!! So even though these hats will be hideously overpriced, the Michigan logo makes them worth it... Also it would be really cool if a hat company would make a fitted with a blind squirrel finding an acorn, cus that would also apply to the "awesome animal doing something that said animal could not do under normal, non-hatworthy circumstances" rule.

Remember how I didn't know if those last two hats were in stock or not? Well I know that this one is no longer in stock over at Motivation but I decided to post it anyway as it is the original hat that piqued my snapback interest.  This hat was a special anniversary hat done by Motivation in collaboration with Mishka (hence the Motivation Wolverine on the left opposite the Mishka Death Adder on the right) and only came out in limited quantities.  The design was pretty popular and this hat has actually been sold out for a while but you may be able to find one on the interwebs somehow (if you could find two and would give me the second one we could definitely be bffs). 

Anyway, this has been a Michigan update/ new music gift/ swag lesson; you just got three posts for the price of one, congrats!!!