Punk Hair FAQ

If you’ve read my old tutorial on hair whitening, then you probably realise that it’s about two years old by now. Long story short, after writing that the first time (for the LiveJournal community), I started whitening my hair again, and in the years since then, I’ve come to perfect my craft, so here’s the Update patch:

extra step in the process: If your goal is to whiten your hair, then as you are mixing the bleach, you really should use this additive called Red Gold Corrector Plus. I usually see it at Sally, cos the mom-n-pop type places around here really seem to be lacking in some things. You add this directly to the bleach before applying it to your hair. If you’ve gotten a large or medium-sized bottle of it, then you need about 12-20 drops per ounce of mixed bleach by volume — three ounces by volume of bleach powder plus three ounces by volume of developer mixes to about six ounces by volume of mixed bleach. If you’re buying Red-Gold Corrector Plus in those little snip-open packets, then one whole packet is about what you need for six ounces by volume of mixed bleach.

brand of bleach: I no longer use Kaliedecolours. It’s a great brand that I recommend to anybody who is merely interested in bleaching their hair for whatever purposes, like dying one’s hair with Special Effects of Manic Panic. What I use now is the Salon Care Quickwhite from Sally Beauty Supply. I’m pretty sure “Salon Care” is also their store brand. The problem I was running into with Kaliedecolours was that I kept having to bleach my hair a second time before toner, thus I was going through a whole tub of powder in maybe two or three months. One bucket of Quickwhite lasts me about six to nine months because I’m not only bleaching my hair half as much every time I touch up, but the tub is also a bit bigger than a Kaliedecolours for roughly similar price. Like I said, if you’re going to dye your hair pink or green or something, Kaliedecolours is probably the best that I’ve personally used. And as much as I believe in supporting Manic Panic for their principles and inherent DIY ethic, you just can’t beat the personal touch of getting your own bleaching components and doing it yourself. (Still, if you truly are lazy enough or just don’t want the hassle of mixing your own bleach, definitely stick with the MP bleach kits.)

important note: If you’re like me and have a patch of psoriasis on your scalp, I highly recommend an additive called Bio-Kur. It’s available at Sally in little packets for about 50¢ each. Still, I highly discourage bleaching your hair when your scalp is irritated (and this goes double for those of you with psoriasis that gets dry enough in the winter that your scalp cracks and bleeds). The bleach will only further inflame your scalp.

toners: Another pretty good brand of toner that I’ve been using recently is Icicle, from Clairol’s “Jazzing” line, available at most beauty supplies. There are some major “cons” with using Jazzing, though. First off, Clairol is a division of Proctor & Gamble, a corporation that has been heavily criticised for testing on animals. If you care about that, then you’ll probably want to avoid it. If you want another reason to avoid Jazzing, it’s more “liquidy” than Special Effects (a cream) or Manic Panic (available in both cream and gel), so it drips pretty heavily. It’s toxicity is as equally indeterminate as Special effects, but I didn’t see a “blindness” warning, so I prepped my eyelids with petroleum jelly and did my eyebrows a few times and experienced no serious issues. In its pros, it has got to be the best semi-permanent toner I’ve tried as, like most other Clairol products, it’s designed to actually soak into the hair’s pores rather than simply coat the hair follicle, and as an added bonus, it’s considerably less pricey than SpFX and MP. I will make a more detailed post about the pros and cons of other dyes later.

toner: In the last year, I discovered and tried out Wella’s permanent hair toners, specifically T-18 “White Lady”. This is the toner that I use most lately because, as I said, it is permanent, and unlike most “permanent” colourants, Wella products are well-known for being safe, gentle, and sometimes even beneficial without sacrificing the product’s effectiveness. Because it’s permanent, you have to mix it with a developer; the instructions in the box suggest using a 20 volume developer, but in the name of science, I tried it with the last of my 10-volume I had under the sink, and it still worked amazingly well. Like Clairol, Wella is also associated with Proctor & Gamble, though P&G just owns a controlling interest in Wella, rather than outright owning it. Still, if you care about animal testing enough to boycott P&G products, you may want to avoid Wella (as well as Tom’s of Maine, as in 2006, it was acquired by Colgate-Palmolive, a mega-corporation that has also been criticised for animal testing, but is allegedly one of the best companies for working mothers — hrmm… which is more important, women or rats, women or rats…).

I have really dark brown hair right now,
You seem like you know a lot more about this than I do, but I was wondering what color would my hair turn if I left it in there for about five minutes.
Would it turn a lighter brown, or just go orange?

I’m assuming you mean “bleach” here.

Honestly, I have no idea what it might end up looking like. No idea at all. I’ve never left bleach on my hair that long and I’ve been dying my hair since I was about thirteen (when I would use a rinse of concentrated grape juice to tint my naturally auburn hair — and got a perm so I could look like Marc Bolan), and have not seen my natural hair-colour since I was fifteen or sixteen 9when I started dying it black). And, as it is now, I never leave bleach on for “only five minutes”. It takes maybe ten minutes to cover my head with bleach, and as I’m finishing up, the parts I got first have already tinted from dark auburn to a sort of golden-yellowy colour.

But, going on logic rather than memory, depending on the strength of bleach and developer you use, it won’t get very light, but it will probably always have some orangy tint to it, cos that just seems to be the nature of bleach.

I just approved a comment about Dreadlocks removal.

I have to say, this is an unusual question for me because most people I know who have dreadlocks understand that dreads are less a fashion and more of a commitment.

The easiest way to remove dreads is to shave your head. I’ve also heard that some people have had moderate to impressive success with simply cutting the hair until each dread is about two or three inches long and then just spending a day with a fine-toothed comb and a LOT of de-tangler or just plain ol’ conditioner. Also, according to the Internet, mydreadlocks.com says that growing the hair out for a month or two *before* cutting your hair and abstaining from rolling, etc, so that the hair at the root is as loose as possible is probably the best way to go if you’re going to cut your hair.

If you feel like spending more than the cost of five bottles of Suave conditioner Knotty Boy makes a dread removal kit that costs $25, or you can buy two kits for $45: [link]
A few satisfied customers are quoted on the Knotty Boy product page, but just keep in mind that such pages are designed to sell you something. If you buy it, keep in mind that results will vary.

I’ve also seem some people recommend Take Down for dreadlock removal.

Now the reason I stated at the beginning of this article that dreads are a *commitment* is because, well, frankly they are. Dreadlocks, be they on white people or black people or any of the Asian persuasions, are something that takes a long time to do and can be a real pain-in-the-ass to take out — and even Knotty Boy’s satisfied customers state that they’ve had to cut a few inches of hair off the ends after removal. Even Whoopi Goldberg has had it suggested to her that if she’d take down her dreads, she’d get more and better parts, but she’s also committed to having dreads, so she pretty much says that if they really don’t want her character to have the same hair, then they could get her a wig, and she’s worn wigs in many of her more famous parts (like Ghost and The Colour Purple and Corina, Corina).

Before you do dreads, you should ask yourself if it’s really reasonable for you to have this hair style for at least a year — it’ll take about that long for them to really “settle in” is what I hear from most people. Also, I suggest that you “plan ahead” for their possible removal in the future — consider your dread removal options and consider what kind of conditioners would be best for your hair. Some people say that the extra oils in cheap conditioners are best while others swear by Mane n’ Tail or anything with placenta in it.

The basic technique for removing dreads is simple:

1) select your conditioners and a day where you’ll have at least the same abount of time it took you to do the dreads in the first place. This is a time-consuming process. If you forget how long it took you, figure in a minimum of eight to ten hours. It’s possible that you’ll even need a whole weekend.

2) bribe a friend to help you, if possible. this may help to cut your time in half.

3) pour a bunch of conditioner into a bowl and grab your comb. Don’t be seduced by those “detangler” combs, get a regular fine-toothed comb, prefereably one that promises to be unbreakable — but since you’ll probably break it anyway, get a minimum of two. They’re cheap, so quitcherbitchen.

4) scoop up a handful of conditioner and work from ends to scalp. spread the conditioner pretty thick at first and adjust how much you need per inch of length as it suits you.

5) comb out the dreads carefully and slowly in one-inch sections at a time per dread. It’s best to comb slowly, you’ll break less hair that way.

also: don’t be tempted to saturate your hair in water first. wet hair breaks more easily than dry hair. if you really want to start with wet hair, use a spray bottle and mist your hair.

Also consider *why* you need to remove your dreads. This can and should affect which method you use. Somebody who waits tables may want to keep their hair longer than somebody who works telephone tech support (many people think buzz-cuts on either women *or* men look “threatening”). I also know a girl who accidentally got a corn-based oil in her dreads and couldn’t wash it all out — now since most oils are fats, fats *will* rot and grow mould over time. Obviously, cutting off as much hair as she could get away with was the best option in her case.

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:

I’m naming these two by brand name specifically because they’ve both been around forever and they’re both what a lot of people know best.

Manic Panic Pros: