STYLE News

Fashion gives live music a new stage; our favourite piece from Thomas Sabo’s Dragon Nights collection; runway songs that give us shivers.

The hearts of music lovers around the world broke a little last year as venue after venue announced they would be closing their curtains once and for all. In Toronto alone, indie artists lost seven rock haunts in the first three months of the year, including The Silver Dollar Room and The Hoxton. But thanks to fashion’s interwoven relationship with music, the clothing industry is giving fans new opportunities to connect with musicians while also providing emerging artists with a high-profile platform. Last June, after discovering that 40 per cent of London’s live-music venues had closed over the previous decade, Selfridges started its Music Matters campaign, a series of live performances held at select store locations over four months. When the Erdem x H&M collection launched in November, electronic trio Years & Years was tapped to provide the background track to the Baz Luhrmann-directed promotional video, finding the band new listeners while teasing fans about an album release. American footwear brand Vans brings music lovers together at its House of Vans locations worldwide, hosting acts like Mac DeMarco, while Complex’s November ComplexCon in Long Beach, Calif., combined performances by N*E*R*D, Gucci Mane and M.I.A. with more than 100 curated fashion vendors. And Urban Outfitters continues to drive the vinyl trend as one of the world’s largest sellers of records; it has long held the tradition of promoting indie artists through its in-store soundtracks. So the stage may look a little different today, but, in the words of Neil Young, “rock and roll can never die.”