Why everyone’s horny for the mullet again

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We ask self-confessed mullet lovers to explain themselves.

The modern mullet is no freak accident. Its second (third? fourth?) coming has been written in the stars for months—or at least, on videos of young men showing off on TikTok. And for reasons that probably baffle those who witnessed the mullet’s first rodeo in the 80s, the hairstyle has become an unlikely symbol of hot: a pearl-necklaced, white-vested, clean boy-faced but-still-slightly-wrong’un sort of hot. The mullet was never workplace appropriate. Nor was it something your dad was particularly proud of when reflecting upon his salad days. But it does appear to be here to stay.

“In 15 years of doing this job, I’ve done the most mullets I’ve ever cut in the last 2 years or so,” says Natalie Angold, a senior barber on the frontline at London’s Ruffians. And it’s not just a Gen Z thing. “A new father came in who basically had hair down to his backside. He sat in my chair and said ‘I want the most anti-dad haircut ever’, and that just happened to be a modern mullet haircut.” 

The reasons for this rise are legion, and nebulous. But Angold thinks it may have something to do with lockdown. “It changed working culture, and office culture, and I think a lot of these guys have a ‘fuck the system’ mentality,” she says from her reception desk. “Guys are allowed to sort of circumvent the rules and dress more on their own terms. I think that’s why the mullet has just become so, so popular.” Even the style itself breaks the commandments of barbering. “It doesn’t make sense,” says Angold. “We’re told that haircuts should all connect and blend, and then there’s the mullet, where nothing connects, and it’s at different lengths. It breaks the rules.”

It sits within a longer tradition of rebelliousness that banks on its own currency of hot. James Dean didn’t have a mullet, but his style (and behaviour) did go against the grain of the pharmaceutically-induced, cookie-cutter happiness of the 1950s. The people swooned. Or look at Kurt Cobain and Nirvana’s zenith: long hair, skateboarding and oversized clothes were antithetical to late 80s Order Of Things. People swooned again. The heart eyes and empurpled emojis on TikTok and Instagram suggest something similar is happening today.

One woman, who we’ll call Mia*, was adamant on retaining her anonymity on the matter: “I love guys with mullets, but I would never, ever admit this in a public forum” she says. Perhaps it’s the roguish appeal that Mia keeps under wraps; there’s also the fact that the mullet hints at a juvenile boyishness that remains high on many ‘shouldn’t, but would’ lists. Mia is in her early 30s. “They’re funny and naughty and a little bit fuccboi. My cousins both have them and they are doctors, which I think is quite lol,” she says, only to immediately clarify her position. “Neither of them are actual fuccbois though. Both lovely men, and talented clinicians, actually.” For Mia, then, maybe it’s the allusion to the adrenaline that comes with unanswered blue ticks as opposed to the reality; she argues that boys who look a little nasty are far more preferable to boys who look and behave a lot nasty. 

Sally, a 27-year-old in London, is in agreement on the bad-but-actually-nice boy appeal. “A mullet kinda says that they’re confident, and down with the times. And probably fun. And probably a bit cheeky.” So Paul Mescal then, who, coincidentally, has a little feathery mullet all of his own. 

But for all of the mullet’s cachet, it’s still skirting a fine line for some. Success is dependent upon a set of rules. Calum, 29, wants a certain mullet: “In a really unkempt, ‘80s way, no. In a Pierre who does CrossFit and art installations, yes.” Lucy, 30, believes that it should never be a party piece, or a substitute for actual personality. “I wouldn’t write off a guy with a mullet unless it became his entire being. If you ever got it as a joke, it was never that funny. If your friends refer to you as ‘the one with the mullet’, get a hobby, and get a haircut. And if you’ve ever said ‘business in the front and party in the back’, the party’s over and you probably weren’t invited.” She pulls no punches on the matter. “I think a good example would be Kurtis Conner. He’s this YouTuber comedian and it’s like a ‘70s mullet. That’s a good one. But he’s also got charisma and a nice face, and I think that helps a lot.”

There are, of course, still detractors. Amy, a 33-year-old policy advisor in Cornwall, just can’t see the good. And she sees a lot of mullets. “It’s just not my thing at all. I notice them all the time around here—all the time—and they’re rife in nearby Falmouth where there’s an arts university. It just feels like something that won’t be cool for very long.” And a few hundred miles east in London, Nina, 32 is fan who is all too aware of a sell-by date. “I have been shamelessly influenced by TikTok: for a hot minute my entire feed was hot Aussie men with moustaches nailing stubbies and shaking their mullets around,” she says. “It shows you’ve got a light-hearted side and you’ll try something new. But I hope we’re not reaching peak mullet. I’ve seen them in Clapham. Probably means it’s over for them very, very soon.”

People keep mentioning the land down under. When researching the topic of mullets, a friend sent through an example from the world of golf: Cameron Smith, a golden, pony-haired golf who just won the Open at St. Andrews. Where was he from? “Take one guess,” came the reply. Australia, the de facto motherland of the mullet. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly why. Perhaps Australia has enough distance from the rest of the world to evolve on its own terms, like its flora and fauna. Perhaps Australia, with its blend of British partying and American frontierism, is fertile ground for something as lawless as the mullet. There’s even an annual celebration of the haircut: Mulletfest. Held every year as a pageant in Kurri Kurri, a town in New South Wales, it’s a parade of the weird wildness that has become so attractive in recent years.

It’s what drives Blaise, 33, to keep encouraging her boyfriend to get his own. “He’s refused a mullet because he didn’t want to look like a fine art dickhead. But that’s kind’ve why I like it?” she says on the phone. “It’s that crossover between big rugby player and fine art student. I do love those Australian rugby players with mullets, man.”

In this refreshing age of menswear weirdness, where men wear blouses with bows and canyon-wide flares, artistic self-expression is perhaps exactly what we want. Style is continually loosening its shackles. It’s hot to not give a fuck. “I think the reason I like mullets on guys is because it’s a little bit like the 2010s, when some guys started growing their hair and [it helped you] differentiate who had a bit about them. They were brave enough to go against the norm,” says Megan, 26. “I think they make people stand out, and signpost that you’re not… well, basic.”

This Article, written by Murray Clark, first appeared: https://www.gqmagazine.co.uk/grooming/article/mullet-hairstyle-trend-2023

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