Saturday, August 27, 2011

Why did Jeff Walker (Carcass) change his hairstyle?


Question from Teo () :

What's up? I know I might sound silly but I bet that I'm not the only true fan who has had this in mind: back in the day Jeff Walker had long dreadlocks. In a matter of 2 years (from Nekroticism to Heartwork) he mysteriously unlocked the locks, and showed up with long straight hair. Fake locks or super-fast grow, huh?

from

Answer: First of all I should point out that Earache has never at any point had much of a say on how Artists dress or style their hair, we don't even hardly comment on that aspect, because we're pretty much all about the music. The dramatic change of hairstyle that Jeff Walker undertook around 1993 was purely his own (or maybe his managers) decision- I can only guess they wanted a more unified, more Heavy Metal "look" as the band were on the up, they had developed a polished metallic sound, and it was expected for the singer to 'look the part' of a Heavy Metal frontman, as Bill Steer and Michael Amott already did with their long hair.

The dreadlocked look was quite big in the crusty/punk circles of that era, and that was Jeff's trademark for many years. I was as surprised as anyone else when he appeared out of the blue one day with the dreads gone, and instead sporting long hair.

heres CARCASS in 1992


Don't fear tho- there was nothing fake or mysterious about it. The story I heard was that the dreadlocks were painstakingly unpicked - which was a long process- and with copious amounts of hair-care products brought back to life as long hair. Thats dedication for you.

Heres CARCASS in 1993:

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Who cares about this PRICK's haircut anyway?

Anonymous said...

obviously at least one person, seeing as they wrote in. Still, unpicking dreadlocks... that takes some effort.

Jason Decay said...

We tried that with Steelrider's hair back in 2002 and most of it broke off as we were combing through it; he had to grow most of it back naturally. Jeff got lucky!

Jason Decay said...

We tried that with Steelrider's hair back in 2002 and most of it broke off during the process; he had to grow most of it back naturally. Jeff got lucky!

Anonymous said...

you must do as you seem upset by it, i bet you own all Carcass stuff too

Anonymous said...

crap then and crap now

Paul Northwest said...

What an irrelevant thread!
The original post, the reply from Earache and the responses from other "fans" proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that music, finally, is dead.

Anonymous said...

He's the greatest Death Metal vocalist of all time and his hair is fucking awesome.