We’ve already established, over the last few days, that hairstyles and attitudes are indeed connected. We’ve also established that although hairstyle decisions are no longer the equivalent of a political statement, people continue to take them as seriously as if they were. In the sixties the long hair of young band like The Beatles and The Stones was a line boldly drawn between the old guard and a swinging, liberated new generation. Those rockers and the fans who emulated them braved society’s disapproval and possible physical harm in the name of self-expression. However, it never occurred to any of them to write songs about it. One famous icon who frequently mentioned his hair in his songs was Bob Marley. For him and other Rastafarians, dreadlocks have a religious significance -which I don’t fully grasp, Rastafarianism being a complicated faith – and a loud fuck-you to an oppressive, racist post-colonial society. I’m sure that in Jamaica and Rasta communities outside of it, dreads continue to be much more significant than just a personal grooming decision. In today’s America dreadlocks have been thoroughly co-opted by ‘rebellious’ white people with nothing better to declare than their bratty veganism and love of marijuana. For us today hair is no more and no less than a signal of who somebody thinks they are, a cover to judge a book by, as it were. It’s the hair that gives us an instant glimpse into someone’s self-image, a quick way of deducing if a stranger is a kindred spirit or to be well avoided. Hair is about social status and aspiration, or the lack of those things, a signifier of tribe. That’s the hair identity Lady Gaga likes to sing about. You may have noticed that all the hair songs we’ve heard so far have been very serious-minded, even Morrissey’s campy contribution. It takes Timbuk 3, in what should by all rights have been their second greatest hit, to point out that all this hair-identity struggling can be patently ridiculous and worthy of a little satire. Because for everyone who finds just the perfect quiff to rocket themselves to iconicity, there’s a horde more who just look stupid.
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