Punk Hair FAQ

March 26, 2006

Problems with wax:

Filed under: dreads, info — Ruadhán McElroy @ 12:25 am

If you go to a website designed to sell you dreadlock products and specifically “dread wax,” you’ll be told that you absolutely NEED their “dread wax” to make nice-looking dreads. On the other hand, if you REALLY start doing research on dreads, you’ll see mixed reports on how effective wax is to creating and maintaining nice-looking and healthy dreads.

Fact is, waxing newly-forming dreads is nothing more than one particular method. It’s not necessary. Some people will say wax is absolutely necessary and nothing but helpful, others will claim it will cause nothing but problems. Others will insist it’s neiter particularly harmful nor helpful, just unnecessary.

Here are some common problems I’ve seen reported with using wax in dreads:

  • Blow-drying wax can pretty much “turn your hair into a candle from the inside-out” (as somebody in a forum put it) and it can just end up making your hair harder than it should be. You want your dreads tight — not rock-hard.
  • It may not give desired results and can just end up making your hair look like crap.
  • too much wax (either aplied all at once or built-up over time) can cause breakage. No matter what you read on the sites for wax manufacturers, too much wax can cause breakage
  • wax has also been known to casuse rot cause too much was applied to the outside of the hair, it wasn’t washed out properly and since this couldn’t let the inside knots dry properly after washing it, life-forms (OK, mostly mildew) started forming.
  • wax doesn’t create knots, it just holds down loose hair, which can be a good thing at the begining stages, just keep in mind that it’s not necessary, even at the begining stages.

    Also, don’t take my word on it, I don’t have dreads yet, I’m still learning a lot of shit but this is the conclusion I’ve come to from reading other sites, considering my own knowledge of hair styling products and looking at photos and drawing my own conclusions. Experiment with wax if you feel like it, just keep in mind that no matter how nifty the company is, their main interest is selling you a product. Maybe they’ll use good reasons (like company ethics) to try and sell you that product or maybe they’ll just try to make you think that you NEED this product for whatever reason and through whatever means they can aquire; it’s also possible that they’ll do both.

    I like the company ethics that Knotty Boy claims on their site, so I link to them and suggest use of their products (though if you have hardcore evidence [ie: not hear-say] that they don’t adhere to these ethics like they say they do, by all means, tell me so that I can remove their link and stop supporting them in other ways), this does not mean that I feel using their products is necessary for creating dreadlocks, just that a) I like their company ethics and b) I think that their products offer one way to create dreads. If you use their products, you could end up with great results but over-using their waxes may prevent knots from forming or could cause build-up to the point that your hair is breaking off cos it’s too hard and heavy. If you don’t use their products, your resulting dreads could end up looking just fine or they could end up looking like crap.

    I can’t speak from expierence on this at the moment, so if somebody has some advice to offer on the topic of dreads, I’ll be more than happy to publish it.

    • Quick Dreadlock How-To (backcombing)

    Filed under: dreads, how-to — Ruadhán McElroy @ 12:11 am

    This is basically what I’ve figured out from reading lot of other on-line tutorials:

    You need:

    • a head of hair, a minimum of three or four inches long
    • a super-finetoothed comb (like a lice comb or a flea comb for your pet)
    • a residue-free shampoo (either specially formulated for dreadlock-care, or a tea tree oil shampoo works fine enough and in some cases may be cheaper)
      Optional:
    • a natural beeswax
    • snagless elastics for sectioning off hair
    • a patient friend

    1. Wash hair, then towel-and-air-dry or blow-dry
    2. If you want, section off your dry hair, when it’s all sectioned off, you can start backcombing it.
    3. Backcombing for dreads is a little different than backcombing for “Siouxsie Sioux hair” — you don’t want it “fluffy,” you want it as tight as possible. Sectioned-off or not, you may want a friend to help you with this cos you’re going to be sitting there and ratting your hair for a while, so you might as well bride a friend with oral sex or a bowl of candy or something to cut the time roughly in half. Start about an inch from the scalp, push the comb through and comb TOWARD the scalp. Keep doing that until you’ve reached the ends and do it with all sections.
    4. After back-combing your dreads, you may want to palm-roll them (rub ‘em between your palms) to tighten shit up and help make more knots.
    5. Many people with dreads advise against using wax. This is because wax is unnecessary and is pretty much only used to make the locks shiny. The ancient Egyptians used wax in their hair, but pretty much just to create a pleasing smell, detract bugs and stuff. If you want to go ahead and use wax, anyway, use it very sparingly, DO NOT blow-dry set it, and keep images like this in mind. Now look at Ani DiFranco or Zack de la Rocha’s hair. You don’t want to be wax-dependent, cos it won’t look great. If you’re going to use it, use it sparingly and don’t think that it’s going to do anything more than make your locks shiny and maybe provide a pleasing odor.

    The upkeep involves washing your hair every few days to weekly (using only a residue-free shampoo and no conditioners), scalp massages (rub your scalp in circular motions with your fingertips, concentrating on the roots to tighten hair and form knots).

    You can also dread up your Mohawk and the end results could end up looking pretty sweet.

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