What is a lifestyle brand?

Sometimes I'll get pretty into a band, or a t-shirt company, or any other sort of business, and I find out that they are not what I think they are. They are in fact 'a lifestyle brand.'

According to wikipedia:

A lifestyle brand embodies the values and aspirations of a group or culture.
A successful lifestyle brand speaks to the core identity of its customers. Individuals each have their own sense of self, based on their background (e.g. ethnicity, social class, subculture, nationality, etc.). A lifestyle brand provides a powerful supplement to this core identity, by allowing the individual to publicly associate themselves with the brand.

Alternative lifestyle brands are the present and the future of the arts & entertainment industry. Bands will no longer be bands; they will be lifestyle brands. Designers are lifestyle brands. Films must exists as lifestyle brands. Blogs and Websites are lifestyle brands. Humans will be lifestyle brands.

In order to be a lifestyle brand, you must do any combination of the following:

Make Music
Make T-Shirts
Make totebags
Have an e-commerce website
Have 'inventory' of something cool within your apartment
Participate in yardsales/own a vehicle from which you sell your goods from
You have hired your best friend as a 'designer'
Have placed an ordered in bulk quantities from American Apparel
Have a myspace page with 500+ friends
Have exchanged emails with another 'lifestyle brand' about collaborating to make a cross-brander product
Have a logo
Have a website with over 100 images
Have an internship program
Have executed a 'guerilla' and or 'viral' marketing campaign
Have been blurbed in an alternative magazine or blog
Other crap that I'm sure people will cmmnt about

The best part about being a 'lifestyle brand' is that you are really easy to blurb about in alternative magazines that people may or may not read/take seriously. You supply writers with multiple 'talking points' that they can reference in blurb-style mentions. For example, HEARTSREVOLUTION.

Part of being a lifestyle brand means you don't have to know what the hell you are talking about. Here is an interview with some people who work in an ice cream truck.

Lifestyle brands are the only way to reach alternative markets. If you are a band or a business, and your audience is not willing to let you steer their identity, then you should not exist. We should all strive to be lifestyle brands, and take over the psyches of your friends, family, and any one who ever encounters you. When other people see you, they should say, "I wish that person made a t-shirt that I could wear so that other people would know that I associate with him/her."

For example, these kids love the Ed Banger Lifestyle Brand.

Should bands stop being 'bands' and start being 'lifestyle brands'?
Do you know any one with a startup lifestyle brand that deserves to be blurbed about on HRO?
When will HRO officially be a lifestyle brand?

XX BONUS LIFESTYLE BRAND COVERAGE XX
A few of my favourite lifestyle brands: