Have you ever had bad hair?
Let me rephrase that question: When was the last time you had bad hair?
Because it is one of the basic laws of Having Lived Through the 1970s, 80s, or 90s that you had bad hair at some point. Probably at many points. And that this bad hair was captured on film, and that the relevant pix still exist, out there somewhere, ready to undermine whatever modicum of cool you believe yourself to have achieved.
This is what I’m talking about:
Oh yeah. Are you feeling that, people? That’s a straight-up late Eighties suburban new wave mullet, with sensitivo facial scruff.
My own bad hair history goes deep. Here’s a little something I like to call the Deep Bowl, from the mid-Seventies:
I could go on. Seriously. We could be here all day. But what I’m asking is for your bad hair. I want you to send me a photo, hi-resolution if possible.
Why (in God’s name) would you send me a photo of your bad hair?
Three reasons:
1. In the interest of full disclosure, so as to set yourself free via confession.
2. Because I will find them anyway.
3. So you can become an official member of *Steve Almond’s Bad Hair Museum* and win valuable cash and prizes, or, okay, prizes.
*The Bad Hair Museum* will be on display here at The Rumpus. And if your photo is included, and deemed one of the Top Three Bad Hairstyles of the Museum, you will win a free copy of my new book, Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life. The Grand Prize is a mixed CD, which I will personally design and burn for you, which is guaranteed to Release Your Ass from the Ass Cage. That’s a $1.99 value.
But more important than that, you will have won the admiration and sympathy of your fellow bad hair survivors, because you were brave enough to cop to your mullet (or bad perm or inverse Mohawk or Flock of Seagulls dyed bang comb-over), rather than pretending it never happened.
So hunt through those old albums and hidden JPEGs and let’s make some follicular magic together! Send all submissions to isaac AT therumpus.net.
Yours in Drooling Fanaticism,
Steve Almond
