Signs You May Have Time-Traveled Back to a 1980s Rock Club

I was in my twenties during most of the 1980s. The first six years of the decade were tumultuous for me, and what I needed most was to escape the life I had become trapped in. Staying busy with work, school, and the Air National Guard helped. So did writing; however, what really helped me escape was MTV.

I wrote a story a few months ago about how the music video channel saved my life. Introduced in 1981, MTV was nothing but music videos until sometime around 1997, when they began to cut down on music and increase other types of entertainment. At this point, the only thing I know about MTV is that they still have music awards. But in 1986, MTV was my lifeline.

MTV did more than just help me out of the life I was in. It led me to a completely new lifestyle that I had only imagined as a rock-n-roll loving teenager. I went on to work with individual musicians and bands in Phoenix and Los Angeles. I spent a short two years living a strange, wild, dangerous, and fun life in the world of “sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll.”

And that, my friends, is how I know about these 80s trends that have never been the same since. If you wake up one day and see the following things, you just might have traveled back in time to those wild and crazy days. Or, at least, you’ve come across someone who’s been there and wants to go back.

Aqua Net fogged club bathrooms

Aqua Net was the hairspray of choice for most rockers I knew of any gender. It didn’t matter if you stood in line for the women’s room or snuck into the men’s for quicker relief, the Aqua Net fog was heavy. You’d never want to take too deep a breath for fear you’d inhale too much and choke to death on the fumes.

Frederick’s of Hollywood Catalogs

Frederick’s of Hollywood is a lingerie company that has been around since 1947. The founder, German actor Frederick Mellinger, was the guy who invented push-up bras and dressed Hollywood starlets for decades. While it’s only online now, in the mid-80s, Frederick’s had stores in just about every mall in the United States. It was pretty much the only place to find the corsets, stockings, and spandex pants that rockers needed for their wardrobes.

Lots of people I knew would have the catalog mailed to their homes so they could look it over to make wish lists before heading over to the mall with their hard-earned money. Others just liked to look at photos of sexy women without having to go into an adult bookstore.

Cocaine in every bathroom

If one wasn’t subjecting their lungs to the ravages of Aqua Net fog, maybe they were dipping tiny spoons or long pinkie fingernails into vials of white powder to be sucked in like snuff in the bathroom stall. Or perhaps lining it out on small mirrors, scraping razor blades across the glass to create perfect white lines to be sucked in through rolled-up cash. Now, I’m not saying you or I were doing this. I’m just saying somebody was, and it didn’t matter if the bathroom was in a club in the ritzy parts of town or the dark industrial sections.

Animal print Spandex pants

Okay, so I had a pair of black and white tiger print spandex that I sometimes wore with a black corset and a black satin robe. This get-up paired with a pair of high heels made for a pretty hot outfit — on women much taller and more confident than I was. I’d see the band girlfriends, many of whom were exotic dancers, come into the clubs wearing animal print Spandex and know immediately that they were in a league far, far beyond mine. I’ve seen where these may be back in style. I’m not saying I don’t wear Spandex; I am saying that the tigers and leopards are best left to someone else.

Big Hesher* Hair

You know I’m not talking about Texas oil-tycoon wives’ big hair a la Dallas, but if you know what that is, you probably remember Big Heavy Metal Hair, too. Okay, well, maybe I am talking about that kind of hair; at least on the women. Men’s Big Heavy Metal Hair generally had less poof and curl and more flip and flop, though both used generous amounts of Aqua Net when styling. The higher the hair stood on the head, the better.

I was kind of a metalhead back in the day, but I was also just as eclectic then as I am now. In a time when the scene seemed to be heshers vs punks, I stood with one foot on each side of the border and sometimes moved into a different musical country altogether, like the blues or oldies. It was evident in my hair. It just wasn’t big enough.

Melting eyeliner pencil

Maybe people still do this; I don’t know. The old eyeliner pencils didn’t work so well, so it was always preferable to use liquid liner. When we didn’t have liquid eyeliner, we would heat up the eyeliner pencil with the flame from a lighter to make it go on smoother, creamier, and darker. These days I have different kinds of eyeliner — liquid, gel, and pencil, which all seem to work just fine without setting it on fire or burning my eyelids. The only thing I think was easier with the melted pencil was putting eyeliner on the ledge of my lower eyelids.

Ripped jeans worn over fishnet stockings

Now, when I say “ripped jeans” here, I mean as in, our jeans wore out and ripped, at which point we extended the tears and used scissors to create a few more. There was none of this going to the mall or online to buy pre-ripped jeans for $19.99 or $1,995 (yes, you read that right. That’s at Dolce & Gabbana today).

I stocked up on inexpensive fishnets at Halloween, just like I did black nail polish and lipstick, because these things weren’t available the rest of the year at most stores. I did purchase a quality pair of fishnets with a back seam at Frederick’s of Hollywood once, but I don’t think I ever wore that pair under my jeans. They were meant to pair with high heels and miniskirts.

Artfully cut off-the-shoulder concert t-shirts

This is something else that can be bought with the work already done if you’re going for the 80s look. However, to be honest, shirts that come from the factory with the retro cutting just don’t have the same appeal. There’s something special about a shirt you took hours to cut up, tie, and braid in your own unique way.

Some of my favorites to wear were simply done Flash Dance style by cutting off the neckline so one shoulder would slip off, revealing just enough of my chest for my dragon tattoo to peek out. I had friends who had the art of cutting and tying down to a science. Their shirts looked every bit as professional as the new-fangled factory-made kind, and were certainly more unique.

Second-hand wedding dresses cut short and shredded worn with combat boots and fishnets

Yes, fishnets again. Fishnets were a key fashion element for some of us. Wedding dresses and prom dresses converted with a pair of scissors and an eye for just the right cuts made great fashion. Angled rag-style bottoms left unhemmed and sleeves cut to provocatively slip off the shoulders paired perfectly with the fishnets and combat boots. Add a black leather studded belt, a choker, a few un-matched dangly earrings, a large stack of bangle bracelets on at least one arm, and maybe a pentacle necklace, and the outfit was complete.

I wore the combat boots I was issued in the Air Force until I lost them somehow. I was wearing this particular outfit one evening when my friend and I were stopped by some tourists and asked if they could take our picture. We obliged, of course, then went on our way. We were walking from the east side of Phoenix to the west side to see some band at our favorite club, drinking Cokes from Burger King to which we had added a good pour of Captain Morgan. Shush! It was a long walk!

Long t-shirts worn as dresses over Spandex leggings with low-slung belts

This outfit worn in whatever color combination the wearer liked, but usually mostly black, looked great with high-heeled sandals, high-heeled boots, or combat boots. I was of the combat boot camp, but I’m sure you guessed that. I wore heels back then, but if I could skip the foot pain, I would. I didn’t have to wait until I was old to suffer, it started when I was young.

When I wore my mini-dress length t-shirts with leggings, I would wear my studded belt slung low at an angle and toss a long loose button-up satin blouse over it all. Of course, the blouse was never buttoned. A long necklace, unmatched dangling earrings in every piercing, and at least one stack of those bangle bracelets topped off the outfit.

I was wearing this ensemble with black leggings and a white t-shirt the time my boyfriend slid his knife blade across my hand, drawing blood. So. Much. Blood. My t-shirt was almost the crimson color of my overshirt before it was all over. That’s a story for another time.

I was also wearing this outfit (with black leggings and a black t-shirt) when my belt was taken from me at a concert because they didn’t want me taking it off and beating someone up with it in a mosh. The show was Alice Cooper and Megadeth at the Veteran’s Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix. They did give me the belt back after the show, so that’s good. Right?

Okay, I admit it. I still sometimes wear clothing combinations quite similar to that last one, especially now that I’ve lost weight, but without the combat boots. Only because I don’t have any.

*When I came on the scene back in the day, I had no idea what “Hesher” meant. I heard it being used to refer to the gorgeous thin tall blonde buxom young women in spandex who accompanied many of the male band members or frequented the clubs in groups, as in “those Hesher chicks.” Wiktionary describes it as “A diehard enthusiast of heavy metal music” “Derived from Hessian: so called due to long hair and warlike personality akin to that of the Hessian mercenaries.”

***

This story first appeared on Medium