TRAGEDY, FOR THE middle-aged majority of us, is a pair of leather stovepipes like the ones we wore to the Santana concert in 1980. So-oo cool then. So-ooo not now. Or, the micro-micro knicker-flash mini we thought we’d give another burl because – whoa, mam-ma! – we sizzled in one just like it back in ’89.

Now, jot this down: “mustn’t”.

Regret is a particularly sad little fashion accessory on the youth-challenged. Even sadder: middle-aged bottoms in tight leather pants, knicker-flasher hemlines and other wardrobe flotsam from a hip/happening youth. Only face-lift scars express regret more succinctly.

Best not.

We can wish away until hell freezes that we were 18 again, but dress that way and, frankly, our pro-active yearning not only looks awry, it’s irritating whole Generations of Ys, Zeds and Millenials who – quite rightly – wish we would just f— off back to our own shops because this ’80s revival and youthful fashion in general is, like, about them now – OK? Not you, mum. Or dad.

We must move on. The art of leaving is a natural process of maturation and self-acceptance. It applies to fashion as much as people, places, jobs, ways of thinking, and YOUTH. We must find a new expression; shop differently, look different, to our children. It’s vital to ensure modernity. Just ask Aristotle. Or Socrates. Or Jessica down at Boost Juice.

Of course, I don’t mean old rock legends. In the rock-music business – and we all know this by instinct and osmosis, don’t we? – age is no barrier to slithering into tight leather stovepipes, or popping on a knicker-flasher. It has something to do with snake hips and the effect 30-to-50-odd years of thrashing about on stage, lungs fully inflated and every muscle tensed from toenails to follicles, can have on the figure.

In December 2013, for example, it was announced The Rolling Stones will play six concerts in Australia in 2014, including one at Hanging Rock in March. The legendary group’s fanbase, Voxfrock conservatively estimates, is 50 to 80, with a smattering of scallywags who lie that they’re 40. Most are more inclined to an arvo nap after a bit of gardening than a prance in stovepipe leathers on any ordinary day. But, that won’t stop hoards, legions and battalions of them snapping up Stones tickets quicker than Jack Flash, wriggling into those aforementioned skintights and/or knickerflashers, and plunging into the mosh pit for a once-more-in-a-lifetime tilt at youth.

Which brings me neatly about to my endpoint and moment of fashion-editorishness.

Some things have not changed since the 1980s. You need snake hips, giraffe legs and a swagger in your genes to get away with tight pants and knicker flashers at 18, let alone 40, let alone 70. If you’ve got all of those, slither and flash away.

(Go to Ticketek for ticket information)

This story appeared courtesy of Voxfrock .