Fashion as communication

I came across an article in the entertainment section in yesterday's USA Today newspaper that featured the band Maroon 5. However, instead of focusing on the band's music, this article was all about the band's unique sense of fashion. I glanced at the article and contemplated reading it. The first thing that came to mind was all of the negatives of reading the article, such as it's seemingly unimportant topic and that it would probably be a waste of my time (which I was already running short on because I had class in 20 minutes and still had the entire sports section to cover).
Yet despite these initial insticts, I found myself being sucked into the entertainment trap as I was already halfway through the introductory paragraph and so continued to read on to the end of the article. Plus I like the band's music.
The band was in New York City rehearsing for Fashion Rocks, a publicity concert that connects fashion and music. I proved my initial thoughts wrong after I finished the article though, because it provoked a deeper thought within me. In class we had just talked about the different forms of communication and I realized; fashion is a form of communication.
Now this may seem like a simple idea to grasp, and it is. I always thought of fashion as a way of self-expression but it had never really occurred to me that what you wear communicates a message to others.
Then I went even deeper into this and thought about all non-verbal communication. I have heard things like non-verbal communication is responsible for more than half of all communication that takes place. Usually people think of speaking and language as the most basic form of communication, but there is so much more than just what people say.
When thinking about mass media and entertainment, there is so much emphasis on what people wear, especially stars and celebrities. They have their own images to maintain and they are constantly in the spotlight. What they wear is a big part of who they are.
Society has evolved and created norms (and stereotypes) that have to do with fashion, and these change throughout different time periods. Certain styles go in and out of popularity.
Music and fashion will always have a strong connection between them. The bandmates all play the same music, but all have different tastes when it comes to fashion. Lead singer Adam Levine: "People in bands, they're spending just as much time thinking about what they're going to wear as what they're going to play...People are going to think this is all very pretentious, the words that are coming out of my mouth, but fashion is some kind of self-expression."
Keep rocking fashion and rocking out mates.