The Wet Head is dead. Long live the Dry Look. Even though I now comb my hair with a washrag, circa 1976, I must have bought a can of The Dry Look at least once a month. It took a lot of hairspray to hold my baby-fine blond hair in place.
It was a relief when I finally gave up trying to make my thin locks look like Roger Daltrey's massive mane and let my growing expanse of baldness shine. Nowadays, I shave my head twice a week, whether it needs it or not.
But jump back to about 1975, and it was a different story.
Hairstyles for men have changed as much as hairstyles for women. Throughout the 60's, dudes used Vitalis or Lucky Tiger to keep their locks slicked back and looking good. But when the above commercial first appeared in the early 70's, sales of hair oil dropped precipitously overnight. A little dab'll do ya? Forget it. The wet head is dead, complete with his own grave stone to prove the point.
Gillette scored one of its biggest advertising coups ever with this campaign. That's because word had not yet gotten around to the entire nation that slicked hair was passe'. The 60's saw long, beautiful hair as a sign of rebellion. But as the turbulent decade faded in the rearview mirror, a less confrontational 70's saw longer, dryer hair as the new standard for the well-groomed guy's coiffure. And when you watched the aforementioned commercial, it was clear that the wet stuff had to go ASAP.
Dudes with thick hair required only a light spritz of The Dry Look to keep things under control. How I hated them. My fine hair demanded a veritable deluge of chemical spray to keep that middle part nicely elevated and secured.
Two BIG problems: I rode a motorcycle at the time, and a helmet was required. Ergo, my hair would look like crap when I arrived at my destination. Two, in the mid-south, rain is possible 365 days a year. Not only would the rain destroy my hour of blow-dried art, it created a runoff that tasted like, well, the aforementioned crap.
Of course, the sole purpose of the teenaged male is to attract the amorous attention of the teenaged female. So, to no great surprise, the girlfriends I attracted with my heavily-worked-but-physically-lightweight hair didn't stick around too long. My lifetime love, 24 years now and counting, was bagged when I gave up and just let my balding head shine in its natural glory.
The wet head may have died in the early 70's, but the skinhead lives on.
Comments (3)
In the 70's and 80's, we still had a few "out-of its" that slicked back their hair in high
school.....they looked like the kind of weirdo
you'd find walking around by himself at the local carnival, loathed by all good people and respected by none. The "wet head is dead" was indeed heard all over the early and mid 70's.....it had an air of importnace, and the beginning of the commercial jumped out at you with the phrase...especially startling watching late night Johnny carson in a semi-stupor state, eating hot-crossed buns
and cheese-its on the queen bed matress.
Posted by scott | July 17, 2007 1:42 AM
Posted on July 17, 2007 01:42
i loved your comment about the taste of diluted hairspray in the rain. it brought back a taste-memory i thought was long forgotten.
Posted by Terry | July 17, 2007 9:59 AM
Posted on July 17, 2007 09:59
Asa a child, we used the greasy kids stuff in our hair. Vitalis was what was used. We gave up the grease in junior highschool. In highschool, I had the long hair down to the shoulder or a shag. Never used any product to hold the dry look. Today, I have to have my hair short, but now I need to decide if I want to use greashin formula to darken the grey sides I am getting. I have a high hair line, but looks like I will not loose my hair? The wet head is dead! I will bury it in a local cemetery!
Posted by Rivers End | June 25, 2009 10:38 AM
Posted on June 25, 2009 10:38