On my recent visit to my grandma’s for Easter to eat rack of lamb, I unearthed this ancient photo of me from a phase when I wanted to be like Edward Furlong. I suppose nearly every sullen, semi-rebellious, double kickflipping youth had this hairdo in 1992. My stepdad used to tell me that it made me look like Veronica Lake. Whatever. My dad would tell me that I needed a haircut, that people would think he was taking his daughter fishing…to which I would reply “Dad, it’s the 90’s!” His answer to that was of course “Yeah it’s the 90’s Brandon not the 60’s…” Touche! But if only it had been the 60’s. I don’t know about you, but I’d trade a year in 1992 for a year in 1962 without thinking twice about it. I remember in one issue of Mad Magazine they had a “then and now” cartoon piece called “the 60’s and the 90’s” comically comparing the generational differences like “make love not war” vs “don’t ask don’t tell” and “Tricky Dick” vs “Slick Willy”….as well as my own personal favorite showing our progress with Martin Luther King and his “I have a dream” speech to Martin Lawrence’s “You so F#!% crazy” with a shit eating grin on his face.
Funny thing is it was meant to humorously illustrate how absurd our society has become…but all that stuff is the norm and tame by today’s standards. What was a (somewhat) edgy hairdo in 1992 doesn’t even scratch the surface of the extreme self mutilation that is commonplace today (gauges, etc.) When my prepubescent eyes first saw the issue of Thrasher featuring Steve and Art Godoy covered head to toe with tattoos sometime in 1990..I had never seen anything like it. Now half the girls and guys I know look like that, and it’s rare that I’ll meet a girl who doesn’t have a plethora of tattoos and piercings. I still prefer the classically beautiful type…but I’ve learned to see into and through these illustrations to the person and their story where there is either beauty or there isn’t. I never like tattoos because I felt they ruined your versatility, your ability to adapt and shapeshift for a given situation. But now that nearly every type of person except the Amish have them I suppose even a CIA agent like Felix Leiter(Thunderball version) could have tattoos and not have to worry about his cover being blown.
One final note, I once saw Edward Furlong at a party at Aristotle Circa’s house in Los Feliz in the fall of 2000…. a classic party that Michael Runion and I rode our bikes to all the way from West Hollywood. I could barely keep up with him on my kids dirtbike, “the stunner” purchased from the (long gone?)Sears on Santa Monica and Western.
But enough about the bad old days. Tonight I shall go out, allergies be damned and enjoy springtime in Phoenix…my favorite time to be here.