After a while and as more and more of my friends found themselves without jobs, I started to feel guilty flaunting the new gear I was copping on a weekly basis. I felt like flaunting the $100 t-shirt I bought that day was disrespectful to those who were in need of an extra $100 that month to keep a roof over their head or to feed their family.

These days, I’ve moved out of the City and am long past feeling the need to keep my closet fresh on a weekly basis. Also, any disposable income I find myself with these days seems to go to furniture, which has my apartment looking like a bachelor’s dream, but I’ve opted to leave the interior design posts to Kanye.

Today I felt obligated to make a rare post in the poppin tags category because it’s not often that I get to post this sort of stuff. This is the official (NBA Store version) of the Lebron James MVP t-shirt. I’ve been sitting on this for a couple of days, but it hasn’t gone into rotation until today– where it will remain the only thing you see me on game day for the next few weeks when the Cavs NBA Championship T’s become available.

In case you thought that was a typo, I did say when they become available.

WITNESS!

BRAND: Adidas
LOCATION: NBA STORE, online
PRICE: $20

Unfortunately, eBay seems to have every size except the 11.5 I need.

I’ve also pledged to stop spending money on non-essentials, after buying a new car and furnishing a new apartment.

But, um, if you’ve got the hook up on these joints in a 11.5– get at me!!! These are essential. Right?

Spotted at Hypebeast

In the interim, I wanted to show off this tee that just arrived that I actually ordered out of the Eastbay catalog. If you’re like me, you’ve been receiving the Eastbay catalog for years and it was always the prime spot for Jerseys or other fan gear, although recently they seem to be edging more to becoming a legitimate broker of streetwear brands as well.

I kept it old school and had to grab this Chicago Bears vintage jersey tee. I spotted a bunch of these in the catalog and seriously wanted to buy up the whole lot. I finally locked in on the #34 Walter Payton tee. I moved to Chicago the year after Payton retired from the NFL, but just from watching highlights as a kid, I knew that this guy was one of the best to ever do it.

To my suprise, upon opening my shipment from Eastbay, I found an unfamiliar #72 on the front and found the name Perry listed on the back. Perry? The Fridge? Well…I did always love The Fridge. Instead of being mad about Eastbay’s error, I’ve decided to embrace it (although I’m still going to track down my #34).

I’ll be back after the weekend with some fresh new NYC goods to talk about.

BRAND: Reebok Vintage Collection
LOCATION: Eastbay, online
PRICE: $30

The reason I like Burkina is because its a grimy spot. A hole in the wall on Houston Street, that somehow offers more in a place that can barely hold 15 people than other neighborhood shops that are 4 times their size.  It’s a working man’s hip-hop shop.

I also like how they’re not afraid to fly the flag as a hip-hop brand, while others use more sophisticated terms in order to not alienate potential customers. Burkina’s designs are tributes to MCs, DJs, B-Boys and Graf Writers- along with some braggadocio pieces that are inline with the flashy side of hip-hop culture we know all too well.

The tee I copped today is sure to get a lot of wear. It’s a fairly simple print, but I tend to prefer that compared to a tee that looks like a billboard. The mic design reminds me of LL Cool J’s infamous tattoo, that was a part of the historic LL vs. Canibus beef. Because of a single line, Canibus essentially personified that tattoo and Burkina is now honoring the LL Mic Tat with its own t-shirt.

Or it could always be a hand holding a flaming mic, but regardless, a hot print.

BRAND: Burkina
LOCATION: 177 E.Houston St., NYC
PRICE: $20

To it’s credit, Columbus came through with a real deal streetwear shop called Sole Classics, which is more than I can say for other Midwest cities I’m more familiar with (What up Cleveland?). I skimmed over their website before I made the trek to the store and for some reason felt like I would hate the place, as I was expecting a Soho knock-off boutique. But the store knew where they were at and even stocked an entire rack of OSU tees with a little bit of style to them, which I might have given more consideration to if not for that embarrassing loss to USC.

I came out with this piece from Rocksmith Tokyo, a brand I’ve probably run across back in NYC, but definitely hadn’t found anything that left a strong impression. The Public Enemy print had me hooked right away. It reminds me of a modern remix of an old P.E. tour tee from back in the day.

Public Enemy was essentially the group that first drew me to hip-hop, which I think is kind of cliched to say at this point, but in all honesty I’m not going to lie and say I really understood the underlying meaning of their music at eleven or twelve years old, I just knew that when they teamed up with Anthrax for “Bring the Noise” it was one of the greatest mix of sounds I had heard at that point in my life (and still is to this day).

BRAND: Rocksmith Tokyo
LOCATION: Sole Classics, 765 N High St. #B, Columbus,OH
PRICE: $34

I’m definitely glad I got out because this week took me to Dave’s Quality Meat on East 3rd in Manhattan. I had to put some emphasis on the fact that DQM resides on a “number street”, as this is kind of rare for the streetwear shop in the area, and being someone that resides in the “20′s section” of these “number streets”- I’m claiming this joint as my local shop.

DQM was just an all around cool store. I was feeling the vibe the minute I walked in and heard “Receipt” from Lil Wayne’s Carter II disc- just because that’s a track that never got much commercial push, so I don’t really expect to hear it much if I’m not controlling the playlist. What also stood out from the jump was how well-rounded the store was with good varieties of tees, hoodies, kicks, etc.

I was feeling the tee selection from DQM so much, I had to double up this week. One reason for the double feature is because of the color variations at the store that I’ve been searching for week after week. I finally found a solid design on a navy tee and complemented it with a dark brown piece that actually looked better in white with a gold print, but I wanted to go with the one I’d wear.

Another reason I’m posting 2 joints this week is because I’ll be on the road next week watching QP wreck the stage at the Ohio Hip-Hop Awards in Cleveland- and due to my familiarity with the area, I’m already aware of the difficulty in finding a local streetwear brand to report on. I’ve got some ideas, so I won’t rule anything out, but don’t be jockin’ me if I’m MIA.

BRAND: Dave’s Quality Meat
LOCATION: 7 East 3rd St., NYC
PRICE: $28/each

This misstep left me without much direction today. I started to do some wandering around the LES, thinking I may run into a diamond in the rough, but that’s easier said than done when most of these shops are pretty hard to spot when you know exactly where they’re at.

I ended up near Reed Space on Orchard St. for the 2nd week in a row and found the Reed Annex, located right next to the actual Reed Space store, but something I missed last week. The annex is like the TJMaxx or Marshall’s version of the real store, where they’ve got their overstocks, stuff from last season and whatever else you usually expect from a discount gear store.

The selection at the annex was very similar to the counter-part with a good variety of brands and styles, while lagging in color options and seemed to carry an overabundance of white tees.

As previously mentioned, I’m not a huge fan of white tees. The whole white on white thing when pairing with a white undershirt just doesn’t look right to me and I guess I’ve never been ambitious enough to consider wearing an undershirt that isn’t white.

So check out this WHITE tee I found from UndrCrwn at Reed Annex. This tee was literally the first thing that caught me eye when I walked in the store because of the textures used on the print. It reminds of a Nike tee, which is obviously intentional when looking at the letter positioning and the star in the middle actually has that raised, rubbery feeling like a basketball.

It’s a slick design, but still something I’m expecting to occupy a hanger for a while. This was definitely a forced buy to come back with something, but I’m not expecting to be running around with a new found love for white tees.

I am glad I found the Reed Annex and definitely recommend anyone planning on heading that way to hit up both locations and probably even hit the annex first, especially if you’re poppin’ tags on a budget.

BRAND: UndrCrwn
LOCATION: Reed Annex, 151 Orchard St.,NYC
PRICE: $15

Fortunately I made it back to NYC and made a good score today at Reed Space on the Lower East Side. I was excited to make my first appearance at the spot since the store is known to carry a variety of unique brands, some NYC based and other imports from around the world.

I wasn’t disappointed by the diversity of gear at Reed Space, as their brand selection and variation of t-shirt designs was better than about 90% of the spots I’ve visited in the City. They also give good background information on all their brands, which is appreciated by consumers like myself who want to know the background on the gear they’re not familiar with.

My biggest complaint here, which seems to be increasing in frequency, was the lack of colors available throughout the store. Is this recession causing designers to only be capable of printing on black, white or gray tees? Did the navy t-shirt producers fall victim to downsizing? I counted 2 navy t-shirts in the entire store. As you’ve probably noticed, I like my t-shirts dark. I don’t really do the white or gray thing (unless we’re talking a dark heather gray).

No worries, I still came through with some heat. This one is from 10.deep, a brand that I had previously heard of, but never really knew much about. I should have guessed by the tough look that this brand is straight out of NYC. You gotta love a brand that features a pair of brass knuckles in their logo. I’m really feeling how the design requires people to think about it’s meaning and really love the colors the shade of green that makes the shirt more than just a black & white piece.

Upon further research, there’s a couple of more spots in NYC that carry 10.deep, so don’t be surprised if we see some additional entries from them around these parts.

BRAND: 10.deep
LOCATION: Reed Space, 151 Orchard St.,NYC
PRICE: $36

After my disappointing trip to BBC, I decided it was imperative that I hit up a t-shirt vendor who had some original prints I stumbled upon in the middle of a farmer’s market that was taking place in Union Square. Come to think of it; what was a farmer’s market doing in the middle of NYC?

The artist actually had some more hip-hop oriented designs in his stash and I probably would’ve had one to show had he been more receptive to my bargaining. I’m really feeling this Jimi Hendrix design, so I’m not too mad at him. In reality, Hendrix is a pioneer of hip-hop so this addition definitely fits the closet.

I’m tapped out for this week, but next week I’ll be poppin tags somewhere between Raleigh, NC and Myrtle Beach, so we’ll have to see what North and South Cak have to offer.

BRAND: N/A
LOCATION: Union Square, NYC
PRICE: $20