
Some thoughts from Gary: “The annexation of the most vibrant motorcycle sub-culture in decades didn’t take long…For marketing departments, desperate to find any growth in Northern hemisphere biking, it’s an easy sell. It’s all smart haircuts and expensive denim, an appreciation of art, architecture and photography, a willingness and the means to travel. The holy-bleeding-grail of target audience if you’re trying to shift ‘lifestyle’ products. And the bike manufacturers didn’t have to lift a finger for the scene to become so large they could no longer ignore its potential. What was an exciting niche is now a cliché. Inevitably. But – another question that only time has the answer to – is it a bad thing for ‘the scene’?…”

On that note, it might be worth re-reading my ‘Instafamous/Instabroke’ essay, or my very similar thoughts on the Industry poking fingers into the Custom scene, called ‘Awake, Leviathan’.

I read both Inmans and your treatise on the current alt custom scene. Bloody good and very insightful . I used to build bikes in the mid seventies. Hard tail Z 1b, lowered cb750 etc I should of kept standard for the £. I feel the present scene is so ubiquitous that too many bikes are being fucked up. However it’s your bike so do what you want. Some amazing engineering going on, but l like the old bikes best. Rant over