What Paris Men’s Fashion Week Models Are Listening to Off the Runway
Geoffrey Pugen

FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Music

What Paris Men’s Fashion Week Models Are Listening to Off the Runway

From Buddhist meditation music to Skepta, we had them share their playlists.

High fashion houses have always had a fascination with the music bubbling from the underground, but recent years have seen the forms more intertwined than ever. These days, artists as wide-ranging and experimental as Arca, Fatima Al Qadiri, and Oneohtrix Point Never, all get chances to contribute new tracks and original scores to the runway shows of designers including Kenzo, Jeremy Scott, and more. Some of these soundtracks for international fashion week events have even started to receive nearly as much as much attention as the collections themselves.

Advertisement

What do the models of these shows listen to when they're not walking the catwalk though? We wanted to find out, so we recently attended the annual Paris Men's Fashion Week, and spoke to some of the people showing off the latest outfits from Yohji Yamamoto, Issey Miyake, and Y/Project. Perhaps not surprisingly, their tastes were as eclectic as the clothes, ranging from grime to house to meditation music.

Jasper, 21

Hometown: Antwerp, Belgium

Show: Y/Project

THUMP: What kind of music do you listen to?
All kinds of music. I'm always open to different genres of music, from hardcore to classical music to jazz to rap.

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
Network, a group from Antwerp.

What's your favorite album right now?
Sacred Buddha by Sina Vodjani. I meditate with it.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
On a mountain or in nature, where you can feel all the energy and feel connected with everything, where you can transcendent yourself. It's hard to do in the city because everyone is focused on individualistic things. I don't really think you can exist as an individual. I think you exist as a part of something bigger.

Bastien, 25

Hometown: Paris, France

Show: Y/Project

What kind of music do you listen to?
Old school hip-hop from the early 90s. Like Das EFX, Lords of Underground.

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
Paolo Conte, "Via Con Mi." I love to listen to that when it's summertime.

Advertisement

What's your favorite album right now?
Dead Serious by Das EFX is really good.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
Everywhere. I always have music on.

Josef, 19

Hometown: Liverpool, UK

Show: Y/Project

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
I've stopped listening to music en route because I feel like it takes you out of reality. But being honest, as fuckboy as it sounds, I really love [Kanye West's] "Saint Pablo" right now. As far as individual pieces, I've been listening to "Gazi" and "Divisions" by A. Chal. But I was raised on punk music.

What's your favorite punk album?
I can only say what's influenced me most. The one that's most relevant to my life is The Clash by The Clash.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
At home with a spliff.

O'Shea, 23

Hometown: London, UK

Show: Issey Miyake

What kind of music do you listen to?
A range of different music from hardcore metal to grime to super commercial stuff to trance.

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
"New Slang" by The Shins, "Panda" by Desiigner, "Bored To Death" by Blink-182.

What's your favorite album right now?
Raury's All We Need.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
I went to this really cool place in London called Epping with a bluebell field. If I could lie down there and listen to music, that would probably be the best place.

Finnlay, 18

Hometown: London, UK

Advertisement

Show: Issey Miyake

What kind of music do you listen to?
Grime and hip-hop.

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
Ice City Boyz and Nines from London, Lil Uzi Vert, and Travis Scott.

What's your favorite album right now?
Probably Lil Uzi Vert's album.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
Everywhere. Music is life.

Jack, 19

Hometown: London, UK

Show: Issey Miyake

What kind of music do you listen to?
Hip-hop, rock, grime, house.

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
Skepta's Konichiwa.

What's your favorite album right now?
Coloring Book by Chance The Rapper.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
Probably with my friends in the garden at a barbecue.

Jerone, 21

Hometown: Compton, California

Show: Yohji Yamamoto

What kind of music do you listen to?
Nothing but hip-hop. Tupac. That gives you a great idea.

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
Nipsey Hussle.

What's your favorite album right now?
Not album. Mixtape. Crenshaw, Nipsey Hussle's $100 mixtape.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
Anywhere I'm making money.

Robert, 30

Hometown: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Show: Yohji Yamamoto

What kind of music do you listen to?
Depends. Mostly I listen to classical or jazz if I'm working [as a writer].

What were you listening to when you were getting ready to come here?
George Gershwin.

What's your favorite album right now?
I've just started listening to Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, the Outkast album that came out like ten years ago. I had completely forgotten about it and then I found it again and it's amazing.

Where's your favorite place to listen to music?
At my desk.

All photos by Geoffrey Pugen.

Jess Carroll is on Twitter.