GQ Magazine, the elder scions of mens style has come out with a list of the 40 worst dressed cities in America. SPOILER ALERT: If you live in a city you’re probably on the list. Maybe what they’re really trying to say is that the list of 1 worst dressed countries in America is pretty much: America. But then there wouldn’t be 40 slides for you to click through! Anyways check out the list and note that Chico, CA is not on the list. Because of us OBVS.* The image above is from their #1 worst dressed city in America. Can you name it without looking?
*Probably. I guess it could be because Chico isn’t big enough to be considered a “city.” But seriously, if Provo, UT is a city then Chico is definitely a city
Wood is definitely where its at right now when it comes to the mens accessories world. Last week we added Italian wood watchmaker WeWood to our roster of braands. This week, we’re getting our wood on a little closer to home. Woodzee Sunglasses is a company based in our hometown of Chico, CA creating some amazing, high-quality hand crafted wooden sunglasses in classic styles, with the promise that with every pair sold, a tree will be planted. Check out the Woodzee Aviator Sunglasses (above in Pacific, also available in stained bamboo and bamboo) and the Woodzee Wayfarer Sunglasses (below in Sequoia) online now at TruckerDeluxe.com.
For being a tiny college town in the middle of the Northern California rice belt, Chico has brought the world some pretty awesome stuff, I mean, besides just TruckerDeluxe.com. Check this video from FOX Sports to check out two of the awesomer things to come out of Chico in recent memory, Green Bay Packers QB Aaron Rodgers and indie pop band The Make (who just so happen to be signed to Rodgers’ new label Suspended Sunrise) and get a good feel for Chico, home of TruckerDeluxe, Aaron Rodgers, Sierra Nevada Beer, and about 15,000 drunk college students. And if you’re looking to cop A-rod’s look, you can check our selection of Nixon hats and watches at TruckerDeluxe.
TruckerDeluxe.com’s homebase of Chico,CA is a small town that is thankfully blessed with an inordinate number of amazing bands. Among the best, not to mention most well known of these bands are the criminally underrated Brighten. Brighten, which features frontman Justin Richards, his brother Jimmy on drums and Alex Draper on bass, have been playing around town since long before they were old enough to drive, and as soon as they were, they took their show on the road, touring nonstop with bands like Eisley, Hawthorne Heights, The Maine, and pretty much every essential up-and-coming new-wave pop rock band of the middle 2000s. Eventually, singer Justin Richards signed on with a band called A Rocket to the Moon, who have since become themselves something of an institution in the melodic rock world, but Brighten has nevertheless always been around, churning out amazing records on their own dime and under the radar of the mainstream music world and increasingly segueing from the interminably catchy but occasionally bubble gum uptempo power-pop of their earlier years to an increasingly mature, more substantial sound. Their latest EP, the appropriately titled “I’ll Always Be Around” showcases this newfound musical patience, but also proves the band can still keep up with the bands they influenced, while occasionally incorporating a decidedly Nashville country vibe such as on “Home” which you can stream below. You can also stream their entire EP at Illalwaysbearound.com, which also features live video of the band performing some of the songs off the record. And if you don’t know, know you know.
TruckerDeluxe’s home base of Chico,CA – besides being home to one of the awesomest, most pristine city parks this side of Central Park, and more amazingly buxom college girls than you can shake your stick at (trust me, I tried) – is also home to a surpising amount of underloved, perennially undiscovered musicians, going about their music-making much to the joy of the assorted townsfolk but rarely ever making waves in the broader music world until relocating to some more urban locale, usually Portland, San Francisco or southward to Los Angeles. But when it comes to music, obscurity is oftentimes the mother of awesomeness, and if there was ever an attestation to the untapped awesomeness of the Chico music scene, it’s the new collection of low-fi, collaborative songs “Thank You Chico, Goodnight” collated by local scene stalwart Maurice Spencer, who himself is packing his bags for Portland after toiling ten years in the sweet obscurity of Chico’s music habitat. As a parting shot, Spencer asked many of the musicians who he’d played alongside over his years in Chico to pen a song about Chico, and record a scratch version to tape, which Spencer and whoever happened to be there at the time, would then add on layers of whatever instruments happened to be laying around, in a semi-spontaneous, beat happening sort of style. As haphazard as that may sound, the resulting 21 songs on “Thank You Chico, Goodnight” are an intriguing, if not infectious collection of heartfelt, sometimes humorous, other times forlorns, ode to a shared locale. And though many of the names on the disc might not be recognizable outside of Chico, there are some that, somewhat conversely, are perhaps more recognizable outside of Chico, such as former 28th Day/SF Seals frontwoman Barbara Manning or ANTI Records artist Danny Cohen whose idiosyncratic, cerebral style is on the whole a little too heavy for the college bar crowd. Also included are songs from Armed for Apocalypses Kirk Williams and Surrogate‘s Chris Keene who represent the younger guard of bands trying to place Chico into the pop culture zeitgeist as producing good shit that’s not Sierra Nevada beer or fraternity hazing scandals. However, despite the occasional small musical victories and future hope of musical victories to come, Chico will never be Brooklyn, or Austin. It’ll be Chico, an insular hub halfway between nowhere and somewhere, where urbanites in training and future farmers of America try to co-exist peacefully with the help of copious amounts of alcohol and awesome bands that no one outside of Chico will ever have a chance to care about. A special place, in both the positive and negative meanings of the word. As Spencer says in the notes to the record, “Thank You Chico, Goodnight” is ultimately “21 songs about a special place we all hate and love. I hope you like it. I think it came out pretty good.” I think so too. You can check it out for free on Bandcamp here.
We took advantage of the beautiful weather yesterday, and our proximity to the sprawling confines of Chico’s Bidwell Park to shoot some photos of our best and brightest Spring/Summer gear for postage on TruckerDeluxe.com. Thanks to Marshall from M Masters Photography for holding it down behind the lens, and to Zach, Ryan and the lovely ladies of the Chico Trucker store, Noi, Julia, Kristiana and Laura (looking fly courtesy of Lulus.com) for standing out in the sun all day and indulging us in our various half-baked ideas. A good time was had by most, and a sunburn was had by me. Photos after the jump. [click to continue…]
Like every other Americanized holiday, whatever meaning St. Patricks once had (wasn’t it something about snakes?) has long since been obscured by seemingly arbitrary traditions like wearing green and, at least around here, getting absolutely hammered before breakfast, which are obviously way more awesome than whatever it was that people did on St. Patricks Day before college kids figured out it was an awesome excuse to wear Celtics jerseys and drink enough Car Bombs to completely blot out the politcally incorrect implications of the whole thing. To that end, TruckerDeluxe has dedicated the new arrivals area of our front page to green gear, including the super dope Jelly Bean Vans Authentics and the Burton BSC Starter snapbacks in preparation for what always ends up being an epic day here in our hometown of Chico, CA. Even if you don’t live in a college town where every incidental holiday is an excuse for an all-day booze binge and St. Patricks Day is just another Thursday, adding a touch of green to your wardrobe is never a bad idea. After all, think of all the cool shit in the world – trees, money, weed – and they’re pretty much all green. Get your recommended daily dose of greens on TruckerDeluxe.com and never get pinched on St. Patrick’s Day ever again.
Yesterday the new Deftones record came up on the shuffle, and as usual, we all immediately stopped whatever it was we were doing and started getting super pumped; despite our disparate musical tastes, Deftones are a musical common denominator, a band that most of us spent the better part of our late-teen heyday listening to, and have listened to ever since. Last time the Deftones toured through Chico, bass player Chi Cheng came through the store, hung out, copped some gear, signed some record flats for Saturday Day Night Wrist, and basically was a cool ass motherfucker, which makes what happened only a few months later even more tragic. Cheng and his sister were involved in a horrible car accident, which he survived only by a stroke of luck: paramedics who happened to drive by the scene stopped and intubated him, keeping him alive long enough to make it to the hospital. Though alive, Cheng was in a deep coma, from which it was doubtful he would ever awake. A website, One Love For Chi, was established, and many fundraisers, benefit shows and charity auctions were held to help raise money for Chi’s care and treatment. The Deftones, after scrapping the album’s worth of material that they had been working on when Chi was injured, eventually forged ahead with their latest record, the insanely heavy Diamond Eyes, but have of course kept Cheng and his plight at the forefront of their efforts. And despite the long odds, Cheng has begun to show signs of recovery, including as related by his doctor “signs of improved neuro function and improved alertness at this time. Increased response to verbal stimuli. Directed movement, with purpose, seen and observed.” Cheng is also undergoing experimental and state-of-the-art treatments aimed at expediting his progress in the hopes that one day soon he’ll “wake up” so to speak. All this is only possible thanks to the generosity of his bandmates, fans, friends and those who, more than two years later, still haven’t forgot about Chi. After talking about it yesterday, we decided to move one of the Deftones poster signed by Chi from downstairs to our office upstairs, next to the window so we would be reminded to send positive vibes his way. If you’d like to send your vibes, your money, or just your support to Chi and those aiding in his recovery, check out One Love for Chi online here.
Walt Disney realized, many years ago, that it is indeed a small world after all. And that was BEFORE the internet. Now, the world feels like the inside of elevator, where like it or not, you’re gonna get real familiar with everyone else because, well, there they are. Fortunately, we not only like it, we love it. Maybe we’re just people people, but this weekend when, via our exceptional data mining skills we discovered a shout-out to TruckerDeluxe on the website of Dassel’s Petroleum, who were once upon a time the proud owners of the Kenworth Semi-Truck door that now functions as one of the doors to our dressing rooms, we were pretty pumped:
We received a picture text from a good friend of a Dassel’s Kenworth propane transport truck door that had been re-purposed to be used as a dressing room door at the TruckerDeluxe men’s clothing store in Chico, CA. This was really fun for us to find, we think TruckerDeluxe has an awesome sense of style and brilliant use of creativity & sustainability.
You hear that “You guys are a fraud! You have NOTHING to do with the Trucking industry” Facebook haters? Even people who operate trucks for a living think we have an awesome sense of style. If that’s a fraud, then baby, I don’t want to be whatever the opposite of a fraud would be. Thanks to Dassel’s for the shout out. If you live in the Hollister/Hanford area, definitely hit up Dassel’s for your propane, gasoline, diesel, oil, or lubricant needs.
The Velvet Teen are by no means new to those with a nose for infectiously melodic, introspective indie rock; they’ve been putting out delicious records and touring intermittently since 2001. [...]
As some of you probably know, TruckerDeluxe got it’s start way back in 2003 as Trucker, a retail store in a beautiful, out-of-the-way little college town in Northern California named [...]
Unlike 99% of major sporting events, both of this past weekend’s sporting spectacles, Saturday’s UFC 126 and Sunday’s Superb Owl XLV were actually badass, if you don’t count the rampant [...]
For dudes who are into sports, this weekend is one of the greatest sports weekends to come along in recent memory. Not only are the Steelers and the Packers, two [...]
The San Francisco Giants’ hard-won World Series trophy came through Chico today as part of its nationwide tour, and needless to say, dudes (and broads) were pumped. People started lining [...]
This past weekend TruckerDeluxe met up with our girlfriend Lulu’s.com at Nash’s in Chico,CA for a joint holiday party that totally put the “Extra vag” in extravaganza, with the lovely [...]
Despite being something of a solitary dot of pavement in the otherwise rural expanse of rice fields and walnut orchards that is Nothern California, Chico, CA is the birthplace to [...]
Increasingly legendary Gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello are playing in TruckerDeluxe’s hometown of Chico,CA this week and we’re already getting pretty pumped, but the show notwithstanding, any band that’s all [...]
As proud sponsors of legendary UFC fighter Wanderlei “The Axe Murderer” Silva and his WAND Fight Team, we have the honor of hosting him in TruckerDeluxe’s hometown of Chico, CA [...]
Last week TruckerDeluxe HQ in Chico,CA played host to a fundraiser for the local chapter of the Boys and Girls Club, featuring some of the best regional and local hip-hop [...]
The homie Chad Dykeman from the TruckerDeluxe retail store in Chico hooked us up with these photos, repping TruckerDeluxe on his water bottle from atop Half Dome , about 5000 [...]
Hanging out with UFC legend Wanderlei Silva today in the TruckerDeluxe retail store in Chico, CA, he told me he expects to return from his recent knee surgery “100%” and [...]
You’ve probably figured out that here at TruckerDeluxe, we’re dedicated MMA fans. So much so, that we proudly sponsor of a number MMA fighters, including, of course Wanderlai “The Axeman” [...]
Rioting these days is so passe. In my day, we only rioted when some dude got beat up by the cops or when capitalist powers tried to enslave the global [...]
Since we’re on the subject of metal, it bears mentioning that Sacramento’s finest, Deftones, came out with their new record a couple weeks back. Those dudes have definitely been through some shit: [...]
After starting out the morning so happy and carefree, Friday has officially become a day of mourning: it was announced this morning that the greatest television of ALL TIME EVER, [...]
Chico, the rural college town in which TruckerDeluxe was born and raised, is known for a couple of things: first and foremost, of course, is TruckerDeluxe. DUH! But Chico’s also [...]
Armed for Apocalypse are a band from TruckerDeluxe’s hometown, Chico, CA, but they’re no longer our local secret: they just got back from a European tour with Sepultura and Crowbar, [...]
Online news outlet The Daily Beast recently did a semi-scientific ranking of the 40 Most Stoned Cities in America. Coming in first, of course, was Eureka, CA, deep in the [...]
