The hipster gets a voice

Last year the Guardian reported on the prevalence of "hipster hate" blogs that mocked the haircuts and mannerisms of the more experimentally trousered denizens of New York and London. But LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy had been taking the mick out of this very same crowd for most of the preceding decade. So prescient was 2002's Losing My Edge, in fact, that it seemed to mock the hipster before the word had even taken hold as a catch-all term for white, twentysomething, pop culture fans whose identikit music and fashion tastes were worn, perversely, as a badge of nonconformity. Over a repetitive bass pattern, Murphy voiced every hipster's greatest fear – that a younger, better-looking crowd was emerging, one step further ahead of the curve than him. Many of the artists namechecked – the Normal, the Sonics, Eric B and Rakim, Gil Scott-Heron, Mantronix, Swans – are well-worn reference points for new bands now but in 2002 the passing music fan might not have been familiar with them. Which is, of course, the song's greatest irony – by skewering the hipster so succinctly, Losing My Edge became the ultimate hipster track.