Cheppies

The Cheppies are a subculture from Vexan, having emerged from cultural impact of the Tobe-Noi music genre, which had grown popular in the post-war Danpieu. The subculture is mostly found in Vexan and Corgeanotia, although other groups can be found in many other places in the north.

The Cheppies' culture is heavily associated with their music, although a broader fashion and art movement can be credited to the movement as well, with Prabaiian calligraphy and the typical Gortoric monastery art style forming the main inspiration to the Cheppies.

Tobe-Noi music

The Cheppie subculture largely came to exist around their now characteristic music genre: Tobe-Noi. This music, which translates to "New Drum", is inspired by the creative works of the Shanyan Trio, a international music trio from Prabai and Vexan. In the 90's AE, they experimented with combining various forms of both Vexan and Prabaiian folk music, leading to the now infamous song "Mother River Dance". This song, which combined Prabaiian monastary drums with Bataqois vocals, became a large hit in Vexan, selling more than 50.000 copies.

This song in turn inspired various other musicians in Vexan make use of prabaiian drums a style now known as Schoala-Veche, or "Old School", although a shift in the middle 00's arose to less vocals and a more heavy drum section, leading up to the rise of a Vexan music group in 109 named Unchiul Ching și Tobe-Bătătorii, or "Uncle Ching and the Drum-Whackers". Uncle Ching's quickly became a rising star in the scene, who after having been kicked out the city of Bataque by the constables for hundreds of noise complaints, including one by the Lord-Mayor himself, decided to let the drum be carried by the concert goers and take it through the streets of the city to a large field outside the city, where they then carried on their show. It is this very moment that the Cheppie subculture was born, as other musicians all over the nation quickly adopted these types of "Drum Walks", with the rest of the cultural elements evolving over time into it's current state.

Visual art and fashion

From it's inception, Cheppie culture has been associated with Prabai, with the monastery drums so vital to it's music having within Vexan a strong "exotic" connotation. This led to musicians even in the "Old School" days often portraying banners with Prabaiian calligraphy at their concerts. After the first Drum Walk by Uncle Ching's, cheppies would often carry their own banners, in addition to wearing variations of prabaiian clothes. Over time however, from the various types of Prabaiian clothing, a mainstream emerged based upon the popular prabaiian clothing styles of the pre-war period, as the already popular Yizhuang, or Yi Suit, became ever more popular among men and women alike, with men wearing trousers underneath, often Vexan trousers adorned with prabaiian motives and calligraphy, while women wore either Vexan or Prabaiian cut skirts. Various headdresses are worn, but the headband is by far the most the most popular one due to it's low cost and purpose to absorb sweat during the Drum Walks, which often could last for many hours. For this exact reason, often the Yi Suits lack sleeves, with cheppies often wearing large armbands.

Slang

As is with many subcultures who live somewhat socially isolated from the rest of society, the cheppies have developed several terms and words that find their origin within the subculture. A short list follows, although there are many more, with cheppies often adopting parts of local dialect and slang into their own, creating variations of the slang in the process.