Did I ever mention that I divide the world into haircuts and hairstyles? Everybody needs a haircut at some point. It's just sensible management. However, hairstyles are the mark of a mind with too little to occupy it. Hairstyles are a desperate attempt to catch up with ephemerality, of a need to comply with the arbitrary whims of a soi-disant élite. I know that, like all matters of appearance, they consist of a complex social code (I've read my Barthes on movie hairstyles), but I just can't help thinking that anyone that bothered about their appearance has too much time on their hands.
I should probably confess to my hair history. I had a pudding bowl cut, thanks to my mother, as did all my siblings regardless of gender or wishes. After that, I grew my jet black hair nearly down to my waist, which at least distracted from my face and went well with the skinny frame, black DMs, black jeans, black shirt and black biker jacket. Yes, I was a student. After a while, however, the black became brown and the locks became sparse. I decided that the Francis Rossi look wasn't for me, and chopped it all off for a short-back-and-sides, which is sensible but just doesn't work when moshing.
Anyone else want to confess to particularly egregious choices?
21 comments:
I demand photographic evidence of the long hair phase. A private email with attached photo will do (I know you are allergic to the public gaze) but ocular proof there must be. I have always, except for a short spell of opulence, cut my own hair - and it shows. However, I would suggest that blokes cutting their own hair are responsible for many evils, not the least of them, the mullet.
I too have cut my own hair, hence today's remedial trip to the barber before sis's wedding.
There is no photograph of me with long hair, though one or two readers knew me well in those days - I'm hoping they don't have any either. No shadow, no pictures…
Very clever. Utter rubbish of course but very clever none the less. All hair cuts (excepting perhaps the cave man type hacking) are by their very nature, a hairstyle. IMHO.
Excellent - I knew I'd get a response out of this one. For what it's worth, Barthes also said that you can't be outside fashion, just on a different node in the network. I am (mostly) joking, though I do wonder what some of my colleagues and students are thinking of with some choices.
Zoot - You cut your own hair! Amazing, it looks so good. I always assumed you went to some sort of specialist rock god hairdresser, and sat in the queue between Charlie Watts and Rod Stewart.
What is this about there being no photographic proof of your lovely long locks? I don't like to argue with you often as you are invariably right, but I am afraid that on this occasion you are definitely wrong- I have the evidence!
Hmmm... a rock god hairdresser Neal - not me. Although I do owe a lot to Rod Stewart. I inhabited an evolutionary dead end until 'Maggie Mae' came out as a single and I found that a hairstyle I had had for ages suddenly subliminally signalled 'source of viable genetic material' to several lovely but not too bright persons whose acquaintance I made. Thank god for Rod, as it were. Unfortunately, as you can probably tell, this is the only hairstyle I've ever had, and it now probably signals 'old and in the way' but I don't care because my eyesight is too poor to see it clearly.
3 Last thoughts on hair.
1. Cough up that photo Vole.
2. Yes you can. Cough it up.
3. If you cut your hair yourself and dispose of it down the loo it never all disappears with just one flush. Unless warnings are given this can cause partners some anguish when they use the bathroom after you and find obvious signs of advanced colonic werewolfism floating on the water. Luckily going grey makes 'em kind of transparent - wow! old age has just got so much going for it!
I wonder if you plotted a graph with price of haircut on the x axis and attractiveness to the opposite sex on the y axis what sort of line we would see.
I imagine it would be a straight almost horizontal line up to about £8 then quite a steep incline up to about £50-100 (the variation due to differences in prices for men and women) before a sort of levelling off occurs where anymore money spent has little effect on attractiveness.
As such a graph hasn't to my knowledge been plotted I am reduced to anectotal evidence. I have never heard a woman say "have you met X? He is so hot. He cuts his own hair."
I think when you like someone very much and you want to ask them out then not having hair that looks like a dog recovering from being crudely shaved in preperation for an operation is one of those little courtesies that will make the conversation flow that bit easier and make a happy outcome more likely.
Think about all the women you find attractive. How much do you think their hair style costs? Why do you want them to look good for you while you can go around looking like a heroin addict?
You are a very handsome man vole. Compliment that face with a hair-style. You know you want to.
But isn't cutting your own hair and dressing like Michael Foot part of a structural reaction - nowadays - to the botox, silicon and steroid-pumped and designerwear-draped bodies that are offered for worship on the pages of celeb magazines? There is a kind of bohemian chic which veers close to studied heroin chic at one extreme and smelling of wee at the other, but I still find that kind of apparent (and, again, often studied) disdain for appearances attractive. I don't smoke any more, but I tend to like smokers for similar reasons (strangely, I only like older smohers; I just want to tell the young ones off). I also find a bad tooth in a handsome face a fascinating detail. Love me, love my faults (this might be as bad as it gets). I must admit it's mainly just me though. When I get ponced up for something my girlfriend beams at me and I sometimes get shocked compliments from people who have never seen me in a suit, etc. But I always feel really uncomfortable dressed up. My girlfriend, however, won't even go to bed in uncoordinated pyjamas. I should point out that I don't wear trainers or any sportswear either, ever, and I haven't been 'in fashion' in the non-retro sense since my last pair of crushed velvet flares, so what do I know? We are a dying, tatty breed, unable to attract the mates we would probably disappoint in the end, and maybe that's the point. Not you though Vole, you honed piece of machinery you x.
Final practical points.
If you have unruly, curly or sticky-out hair, it's much easier to cut it yourself. If you have silken locks, cocking things up is much easier. And never attempt to self-style when drunk. I recommend wearing a large conical bucket-collar such as vets supply for dogs at such times.
I bought a set of hair clippers about 4 months ago from the cheap homeware bargains type shop over the road for the princely sum of £8. I've been cutting my own hair ever since, and the results are actually better than when I was previously spending £9 a time at the local barbers. Best £8 I've ever spent.
I've already offered to cut the Vole's hair for free, as I can't do a worse job than he does himself - I'm just waiting for him to come round. Of course, if he was off out on a date then perhaps visiting a reputable hairdresser would be a safer option. But in the meantime, a grade 2 all over is just the kind of image change he needs I reckon if he's to escape looking like a young Michael Foot. It'll go well with those cherry red Doc Martens he's got too.
Zoot Horn: You had me at "part of a structural reaction"
I agree with what you say but I also think that a hair-style (vs hair-cut) should not be a matter of fashion. As Quentin Crisp said "fashion is for people who don't have any style". Fashion as an industry is potentially a fun smorgasbord of clothing ideas but unfortunately the transition from catwalk to populace is poisoned by the curse of trend.
If fashion were music then trend would be Lily Allen. Everyone can see that Lily Allen is a terrible decision but that does not mean all music is bad. I suppose, to take the idea further, Dr Martens would be Belle and Sebastian - inoffensive but not exactly breaking new ground. (yes I can bring any conversation round to insulting Belle and Sebastian)
Einstein said "long hair reduces the need for barbers". All this proves of course is that Einstein had split ends.
I love that Q. Crisp quote Ben - what a courageous and razor sharp personage he was eh? I'm adding it to my store.
Could I present something for consideration: in matters of appearance and style we should take the advice of our friends more often, rather than sticking to 'principles'?
That said, a grade 2 is fine for you Dan, with your grecian profile and proportions, but us people with massive conks and other collateral ugly-stick damage need some balance if we are to avoid being mobbed by crows - might suit vole however...
I love that these comments are becoming the 'perfect argument' in that we all started from different viewpoints but that we are moving toward a consensus of opinion. That consensus of opinion of course being our deciding exactly how the vole's hair should look. A decision which is now being made in his absence. Perhaps rightly so.
This is a far happier outcome than if we had had to partition bits of his head in a manner similar to the jurisdiction of Antartica where the vole got to cut the back of his head himself, Dan shaved the crown with his clippers and I insisted he pay thirty pounds for a senior stylist to cut his fringe.
This process could all end in a rather wonderful 'makeover' night at chez vole. A bit like in an American teen movie with the vole in the part of the geeky bookworm who becomes a cheerleader, finds true love with the hunky quarterback but realises in the nick of time that she musn't neglect her studies and that the nerdy girl she used to work in the school library with is the best friend she will ever have. This would make myself, Zoot, Dan and Neal the bitchy cheerleaders or 'plastics'. All we need now is a young lady to take on the role of the handsome quarterback with excellent career prospects who knows how to get down with the homies? Any takers?
I love being a cheerleader
You thought you'd stamped on
Wol-ver-hamp-ton
but we're just getting
STAR-TED
1-2-3-4
gonna put you on the floor
2-4-6-8
then say "are yow allroit mate?"
Gooooooooo Wolvo!
okay... as long as it doesn't mutate into a teen slasher movie...
Cheerleader movies are all slasher movies now.
Thanks for all the effort you're putting in to this one, everybody.
Apparently photographic evidence exists - but it's pre-digital, so you won't see it.
I have now had a professional cut my hair. I look like action man (from the forehead up). It's shorter than it's been since 1989.
Have you never heard of scanners?
x
You've all genuinely made me laugh enormously. Neat hair is fine - ostentation styles are out, at least for me. Ben, has anybody said to you 'you're otherwise unattractive, but I'd like to take your barnet to bed?'. I suppose a mullet might distract from my unpleasant opinions though…
Scanners? What? That film where everyone's head blows up?
Well you would say that wouldn't you.
But it doesn't wash I'm afraid, or at least that is what your hair says when you're not listening...
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