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The Nike Bruin is a shoe with an enviable sub-cultural heritage. Oh, did we just use the 'h'-word? Sorry about that. But this is a release that dates back to the 1972 era when the majority of Nike's attention was on track and field and one that swiftly amassed attention in suede and leather. Ostensibly a Cortez for the court, the simplicity of this low-cut basketball offering made it a shoe with versatility and a strong companion for the Blazer (as we understand it, the later suede Blazer Low was for the Japanese market, who never took to the Bruin). It's a tough shoe to dislike, even if it's the kind of thing that would barely have raised an eyebrow in hype circles until Hiroshi and friends started to give the nod to basics like the Wimbledon and Match in 2008. Now the basic basketball and tennis pieces are big business. What's on the Nike Bruin's CV? It's one of the very few Nike shoes to not look terrible with fat laces, it spent time on the feet of Trailblazers players, Marty McFly's feet a few decades before there was an Air Mag and even the terraces, usually a 3-stripe zone, which Nike only occasionally penetrated with some performance runners — for many, the Bruin, or at least a variant of it, was their first Nike shoe.

This basketball classic even got some wear on the tennis courts via a pre-adidas Ilie Nătstase. Skaters picked up on the simplicity of this shoe too, with it being reappropriated during that boom for big jeans, XL rugby shirts and old leather and suede sportswear that led to the excellent Bruin SB a few years back. The feel and that slight toe reinforcement gave it a certain skate relevance, yet looking at the innocuous simplicity of this silhouette, you wouldn't necessarily realise the weight it carries — that's an authenticity that no amount of #hashtags and marketing loot can synthesise, so naturally we're over the moon that the inline versions dropped via Nike Sportswear and these perforated suede versions are a class act (we appreciate that, given the current weather, neither suede nor an excess of holes in your footwear are at the top of the rotation, but give it time and these extra breathable basics will make a whole lot of sense. These drop in a few weeks and you can take a closer look at the in the Crooked Tongues store now. We still think Nike need to chill on that pseudo-yellowing stuff though — it's low key here but still totally unnecessary. Please, let us tread in our own crap.