Rodeo Denim, Osaka

[Charlie Delta]

While reading a post on Fullcount on the excellent Denim news blog:

Tsujita (ed: of FULLCOUNT) recounts his younger days in the 80’s working in the famous vintage shop Lapine and traveling in the US with co-worker Hidehiko Yamane (of Evisu fame) to hunt for vintage denim garments. At the time vintage Levi's and the likes were already exchanging hands (American to Japanese) at hefty sums and it was difficult finding enough right pieces at the right prices to stock popular "used stores" like Lapine across Japan.

As a result in '89 Tsujita and Yamane launched the brand Rodeo backed by Lapine's owner. It offered raw denim with details that nodded homage to the vintage jeans they loved. Rodeo was famously different from existing brands like Studio D'Artisan and Denime, who pushed similar products but were supported by strong financial backing. It was known as a homebrewed label that distributed in vintage stores for likeminded individuals.

But in 1991 the ambitious duo splintered off and formed Evis (later renamed Evisu)

I got curious about this brand Rodeo.

So basicly it was what Yamane and Tsujita did before they each started their own brands.

It sounds like it was a very small, as the quote says "homebrewed" brand, and only existed for about 3 years.

That is exactly what interests me about it.

Has anyone got any more info on it?

Would like to know any- and everything...

(This was originally part of this thread but I didn't want to derail it and thought that this deserved a thread of it's own so I called Tweeds in for some mod action, thanks!)

[jpgm]

I definitely think this is worthy of it's own thread, as it could be a discussion on the Osaka 5 and not so much about each individual brand.

I recently read this on the excellent Denim news blog:

Slightly offtopic: I'd also be interested to hear more about this "Rodeo" brand.

ducky - i had heard of rodeo before i went to japan late last year, but didnt actually know anything about them as such. basically, i knew they existed and that was it.

when i was in osaka, i was strolling around and happened to walk straight past their store. naturally, i went in and checked the place out. the staff were really lovely, and pretty thrilled that a westerner knew about them and took an interest in their product.

as an aside, i found this to be the case with almost every denim store i went into in japan - skull, SDA, denime, fullcount, omnigod, dry bones, warehouse. loopwheeler were the same. i guess they wouldnt get all that many westerners in their stores.

anyway...

the guy at rodeo was telling me that they were the 'first of their kind' or something to that effect. my memory is a little hazy here, but i was of the impression that he was telling me rodeo was the oldest japanese repro company, older than SDA. maybe something was lost in translation there, quite likely.

the store had some nice vintage sweatshirts and tshirts, tricker's boots, leather belts and wallets - the usual japanese denim store fare. rodeo's jeans only came raw from memory, no one wash. i'm pretty sure they only two cuts - had a '47 cut and one other. the denim itself seemed pretty good, was of quite a regular weave, and had no modern bells or whistles. i think they have two stores in osaka.

that's about all i've got!

[jpgm]

also on rodeo - they were cheap! around 20,000Y for a pair of jeans.

they had type 1/2/3 jackets too.

[Charlie Delta]

Bumping this as it's a thread of it's own now.

Anyone?

[Skeese]

you guys mean Rodeo Uncle right? ....

http://store.shopping.yahoo.co.jp/studebaker/rodeouncle.html

[Charlie Delta]

Honestly I don't know.

Jpgm should be able to say if those are the ones he saw...

Note that for as far as I know this brand existed from '89 till '91 only,

so if those are more recent than I doubt it.

edit: this ofcourse makes no sense as Jpgm said he had been to the brands store recently...

[40ozprophet]

I LOVE that arcuate, regardless! great price point!

[jpgm]

you guys mean Rodeo Uncle right? ....

http://store.shopping.yahoo.co.jp/studebaker/rodeouncle.html

Honestly I don't know.

Jpgm should be able to say if those are the ones he saw...

Note that for as far as I know this brand existed from '89 till '91 only,

so if those are more recent than I doubt it.

yep, rodeo uncle is the one.

the lapine / rodeo site can be found at http://www.sutv.zaq.ne.jp/lapine/page038.html

mr duck - they still operate today, although i'm not sure if they have changed in any way since yamane and tsujita went their separate ways.

[jpgm]

i'm pretty sure they only two cuts - had a '47 cut and one other.

also....

looks like they mustve had limited stock at the store i went to, although there is a very slight chance that the obscene amount of denim stores i visited in osaka somehow confused me....

their lineup can be seen here: http://www.sutv.zaq.ne.jp/lapine/page015.html. they have 7 cuts.

paging edmond......

i'd be surprised if he didn't have some in his massive collection.

[rnrswitch]

They look pretty nice and pretty good prices. Their jackets are ridiculously inexpensive compared to other Japanese repro brands. I would like to see some close up pics of the denim and fit.

[OMG]

I bought a pair of the Lapine / Rodeo Uncle jeans about around 1999 in Osaka. I had no idea they had any connection to Tsujita and Yamane.(I'm a big Evisu and Fullcount fan) I'm still not convinced that this is the same "Rodeo though....I saw some old jeans in an old Evisu book and in the evisu shop with a Rodeo patch ,and they weren`t the same as the jeans I had. Or maybe the originals just evolved into the jeans/company that it is today. Anyhow, the originals I saw were much more impressive. The Rodeo Uncles I bought were nothing special. I don't have them anymore. Don't remember what I did with them.

[OMG]

After reading that DENIM NEWS article on Fullcount more carefully, I think that the Rodeo Uncles I had WERE from the Tsujita/Yamane company. But not the original jeans. I'm guessing that after they split up, the Lapine company continued to back the Rodeo brand with new creative directors to form the line up of jeans that are available today. The original Tsujita/Yamane jeans were just around for a few years in the late '80s early '90s like Cotton had mentioned. The reason I was confused was because I think I've seen other brands with the word 'Rodeo' in it, but I clearly remember the jeans I had were from the Lapine company, and the DENIM NEWS article clearly says the original Rodeo was backed by Lapine. But I could still be wrong...

[Charlie Delta]

That sounds logical, that the company would've just continued.

Quality wise, pics on the site jpgm linked to are very hard to base anything on though.

I'm mainly interested to find out more about what they did in the short period that Tsujita and Yamane were in control, though I imagine that will be hard to find out.

[OMG]

I think that I've seen a pair in the glass display cabinet at the evisu Osaka or Tokyo store. Not sure, my memory is a little fuzzy...

[Charlie Delta]

Yah, I can imagine the original jeans to be pretty rare now...

[salaami]

props to duck for this tantalizing bit of info. youre a quirky dude, and quirky is the new"intriguing" nice.

[edmond]

my rodeo uncle dont know where to post em evisu's the nearest i think

scoville and ykk newmax rivets!!!!!!!! yeah!

[edmond]

thanks for moving it here thanks

[selaviso]

boner alert. ed are these going in the vault?

[Graytrain]

So this is a bump from the depths. 

 

I came across a similar reference in my research to this almost ethereal brand from Yamane and Tsujita pre-Evis. As you can see, there is very little info out there on the history or details and virtually no pictures. It doesn't help that the brand continued in obscurity under Lapine as an in-house budget brand. But what I do know is the pre-Evis era Rodeo Uncles were made using the same hardware as early Evis, Scoville buttons and rivets. Other details like denim and leather patch seem to change. This pair has what looks like deer skin, thin and pliable. Others have the thicker leather patch. This denim is also pink line, unlike Ed's example with red line. It is very deep blue, reminds of Denime XX. 

 

This model, 5501, is a seemingly 66-ish detailed, 50s-ish silhouette jean. An unbelievable find. 

[Graytrain]

If you look closely, you can see the fingerprints of early Evis in these:

Similar stitching:

and hardware:

[Graytrain]

And the fit. 

[aho]

^brilliant find @Graytrain 👏

[Graytrain]

4 hours ago, aho said:

^brilliant find @Graytrain 👏

Thanks Aho! I am pretty chuffed. They fit like a glove. 

[beautiful_FrEaK]

That's really once in a lifetime find!

[Hopethisoneisnttaken]

The fit is truly perfect 

[julian-wolf]

@Graytrain Do you know whether your pair is from the original (pre-Evis) production or from one of the more modern runs? I guess the question comes down to: Do you know when they stopped using Scoville hardware? (Are there any other particular tells, that you’re aware of?)

[Graytrain]

There is very little info out there as to what pre-Evis examples actually were. The best I could find was the above example from Ed, with a lot of interpolation on what I know of early Evis details and construction, paired with looking at as many examples of Rodeo Uncle jeans as I could. The early designs are incredibly fluid. Same model number 5501, but everything from denim, hardware, construction details change.

 

Early Evis (that I have several examples of from the first runs where they did partial runs of stitched arcs prior to full adoption of painted gulls) all have red line denim with a wide selvedge, scovil hardware, diagonal mounted rear belt loop, left side installed care tag, with very odd stitching details like overlapped stitching (almost like they ran out of thread and restarted) with a very dark orange/almost brown thread. The details of fabric, thread and minor construction changed very rapidly even while still "Evis". Selvedge got narrower, thread became a more standard yellow and orange, odd sewing behaviors disappeared, but scovil hardware continued until a later era (present in post-Bull patch Evis). 

My above pair of Rodeo Uncle have the exact same details of construction, thread and hardware, look like a pair of early Evis, save for the denim. It is a pink line denim with a narrow selvedge. 

 

From all of the other Rodeo Uncle examples I have seen, denim changed first (somewhere there was my pink line and a red line) along with a transition to using YKK rivets alongside Scovil hardware (mine are all scovil), construction details diverged away from Evis-like details (offset beltloop, different thread and sewing techniques, pocket shape and placement), then a change of hardware to "Standard Style" shop branded hardware, along with patch changes (that I am less clear on). 

Based on this information, I think it is logical to suggest that those examples which have scovil hardware and Evis-like construction where made from the "shop" that became Evis, and the transition away from Evis "fingerprints" likely signals the pre/post boundary. Now, I do not know if between mine and Ed's, which is earlier. Its clear to me that the thread used on Ed's pair is the identical brownish thread in mine and early Evis. You can interpret the all scovil hardware vs the some YKK as being an indicator of Ed's being a transition pair (because Evis is all scovil and YKK as the company name didnt come about until '94? I think, so after this era which was ~'88-'90).

The ONLY detail that seems to be a clear indicator that I have been able to pick up on, which I even hesitate to say, is the stamp font used on the patch. 

Every example I have seen BUT my pair, including modern examples, use a "curly-er" font. See Ed's below and another example below:

Eds:

 

Whereas my pair has a very plain font:

 

I have not seen this font used on any other pair, (nor a deer skin patch). This might be the best determining detail. 

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to nerd out @julian-wolf. I hope that answered your question. 

[aho]

Lovely detective work @Graytrain; Maybe we could ask Tsujita-san or Yamane-san, I wonder if they'd remember all the details! 

[Graytrain]

7 minutes ago, aho said:

Lovely detective work @Graytrain; Maybe we could ask Tsujita-san or Yamane-san, I wonder if they'd remember all the details! 

This would be my dream. I would love to be able to write down a detailed history of what happened and when, with the fingerprints of that history that can be seen in the details.