Sound Engineers Gather to Talk About Their Ponytails

[NorseHorse]

Alright, who here has a ponytail!???

Nation's Sound Engineers Gather To Talk About Their Ponytails | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

I don't have one... at the moment...

[jacktadoussac]

You may not have loads of traction among the sound engineers here but there's some truth in the Onion article even if pony tails are also heavily linked to middle age and male pattern baldness. Occupationally speaking, I have also seen a fair number of guitar or general music store employees with that hairdo.

The Kids in the Hall did some skits in the 1990s with a character with a ponytail so it's not going away.

[marty lester]

dang, i missed it!

m.

[Kaoz]

I lol'd.

What's funny is that I'm actually on my way to work where I have to show a non-ponytailed engineer how to use a digital desk (LS9).

AND I have a ponytail.

[boojum]

Does having a Lava Lamp on my monitors suffice as an alternate?

[Bibster]

Leatherman/gerber + MagLite are compulsory as well

[Jim Williams]

No pony tails or Goat-tee's here. Those are bad fashion decisions...

Everytime I see one of those stupid pony tails I want to cut it off.

Everytime I see one of those stupid Goat-tee's I want to shave it off or at least offer a disposable shaver to the offender.

Everyone walking around like they're Vincent Price is SCARY!

[Plush]

Perhaps not as much among our cadre on the Remote Forum, but I find engineers in general to be the biggest slobs around.

Attending the AES show is always an exercise in greased hair, slob-fest viewing, and anachronistic 70's hold-over hair fashion.

Call me the anti-slob.

[Chris Lago]

Originally Posted by Plush

Perhaps not as much among our cadre on the Remote Forum, but I find engineers in general to be the biggest slobs around.

Attending the AES show is always an exercise in greased hair, slob-fest viewing, and anachronistic 70's hold-over hair fashion.

Call me the anti-slob.

I'm glad I'm not part of that gang! I take care of myself and my body.

[Foldedpath]

A ponytail is a useful accessory for balancing the weight of a full beard.

[Ragan]

I subscribe to the Onion's Twitter feed just for the headlines. Get a chuckle or two a day.

This one's classic.

Here's another favorite:

"World's Greatest Human Being Ever Puts 'Sweet Emotion' On Jukebox Just As Area Man Touches Fifth Beer To Lips"

[RobAnderson]

Awesome article - I love the Onion.

But what's with the antipathy towards ponytails and goatees here?

No ponytail for me, but I grew the goatee to make the wife happy. Plenty of goatees amongst performers in the classical world anyway.

Let's face it - many sound guys (and especially live sound guys) work mostly in the dark for 16 hours at a stretch, and you can really only wear one color on the job. At some point, you stop worrying about your hair and wardrobe...

[chris319]

When your hair is largely gone, it's time to stop tying the fringe into a ponytail. Just kiss it goodbye, guys, viz.:

http://www.youjustmademylist.com/wp-...h_ponytail.jpg

I don't understand the antipathy toward ponytails, either. The Viet Nam war ended decades ago. Richard Nixon is dead. Back in the '70s my melodramatic mother used to cry because I had long hair.

[philyesphil]

My sm7 has a ponytail, does that count?

[Jim Williams]

Facial hair is filthy. It's full of bacteria and critters running around you can't see and can never get rid of. If you saw the micro-menangery running around on your face you would think you are on some lonely planet surrounded by aliens...

Ken Camanetti of my San Diego Padres started the Goat - ee look 20 odd years ago. It's run it's course. Ken is dead now. Have some respect. Since when did looking like a nanny Goat look cool anyway?

When those in fly-away country are still sporting these outdated fashion looks, it's no different than all those girls there still wearing 1970's Farah Fawcett hair-doos in Texas. Even dumbass Washington press guys have this look, how 'square' is that? "I look just like my favorite Washington press correspondent"!

Fashion is people's excuse to look stupid and not get laughed at, for a while anyway.

A saw plenty of them at Namm yesterday.

[Bibster]

Fashion statements on Gearslutz... Has this world gone mad?

But you're right :-)

[RobAnderson]

Sorry Jim, but I will have to go with my wife's aesthetic judgements over yours...

Happy wife, happy life.



Enjoy NAMM.

[hbphotoav]

Ponytail (since 1984... and not nearly as gauche as the white-boy Afro-perm from the late '70s...) and close-cropped beard (since about the same time). Some things don't need to change. And, when the 'tail's down and falling well below my shoulders, with my wizened visage... well, shoot... I kinda like the fact that I look a bit like Gandalf...

Besides... I haven't paid for a haircut in three decades, and I'd rather spend the time I'd spend shaving, well, sleeping. Or drinking coffee. Or replying on GearSlutz.

As to the Leatherman (since 1999... Gerber before then... 4" Buck before then) and MagLight (since 1995... replaced with a 5-LED model in 2004)... guilty as charged. Everybody smirks at my gadget-laden belt... until they have need of one of the gadgets. Happens a couple of times a week.

Just as long as nobody mentions the short rolls of gaff, console and e-tape, and a half-dozen 18" strands of trick line attached by carabiners to my Swiss Army backpack... well, then.

Great FaceBook from my daughter last month... "hey Dad! Matt and I are watching you fight orcs at Minas Tirith. miss you!"

Gotta love it, letting my freak-flag fly.

As to the rest of you... you... you hairless infidels... "YOU SHALL NOT PASS...!"

[Boschen]

Lol, glad I wasn't the only one to spot that article. The Onion is a great paper.

No, I don't have a ponytail; I work in the trenches of audio design and install, navigating close construction environments rife with power tools, live wires, and heavy machinery; such places do not promote dangling hair. I like it clean and close, in the warrior tradition.

Oh, shouldn't this be in the NAMM subforum?

[chris319]

Originally Posted by Jim Williams

Facial hair is filthy. It's full of bacteria and critters running around you can't see and can never get rid of. If you saw the micro-menangery running around on your face you would think you are on some lonely planet surrounded by aliens...

How did our species survive for thousands of years before the razor was invented?

Doesn't it stand to reason that there would be a similar assortment of critters/aliens in scalp hair?

[Jim Williams]

Originally Posted by chris319

How did our species survive for thousands of years before the razor was invented?

Doesn't it stand to reason that there would be a similar assortment of critters/aliens in scalp hair?

We survived being filthy. Now we bath. We no longer look like cavemen, unless we want to. (See above for examples).

Critters not a problem here, I'm bald!

[hbphotoav]

Originally Posted by Jim Williams

Critters not a problem here, I'm bald!

...and, it seems, somewhat intolerant of deviant (by some definition) fashion sense...

Very few critters here either (at least of a deleterious type). I haven't missed a day of work since 2005 (flu, contracted via my son and an enclosed vehicle, at the end of a 1500-mile family road trip: one day out) and can't remember the previous event. Somewhere back in the mid-90s there might have been another...

Were you, by chance, acquainted with my mother, rest her soul? Y'all sound an awful lot alike...