We Need to Talk About Pete Wentz’s Hair
Pete Wentz has always been a chameleon when it comes to his hair. The Fall Out Boy bassist has displayed the occasional moment of embracing his natural texture, but on the hole, when his hair has grown longer than a couple inches he’s taken to the flat iron faster than MySpace-era scene kid. His locks have been blond, they’ve been hot pink, they’ve had little wisps of gray peaking through. He’s worn it curly, worn it straight (let’s be real, he’s mostly heated it to a point that surely can’t be healthy for those follicles), and both ways it’s looked good. Suffice it to say, Wentz’s hair has gone through quite a journey through various shapes, lengths, colors, and textures since Fall Out Boy was born in 2001, only to end up right back where he started. Recently Wentz has grown out his mane and gone back to that super-straight style Fall Out Boy fans learned to recognize him for in the mid-aughts, and it is somewhat alarming, but the nostalgia element of the look is appreciated. We should have seen it coming, though, because just last year, the musician started to inch closer and closer to those emo roots of his. In fact, he’s always been a pioneer of emo looks for men—with his guyliner, spiky hairdos, and dark nail polish. Here, a look back at Wentz’s wildest coifs since 2004.
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This is the Pete Wentz we were introduced to in the early aughts, and this is the emo-lite hair style he started with in 2004.
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By the time 2006 crept upon us, Pete Wentz was rocking what appears to be some Fantasia Barrino inspired red streaks.
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At MTV’s Latin America Awards in 2009, Wentz buzzed it off. What he lost in emo points he gained in mainstream popularity (as did the rest of Fall Out Boy by this point in time).
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Wentz left the flat iron at home for one day in 2011, and embraced his natural curly texture.
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With this hair length, beard length, and off-center smirk, Pete Wentz looked like he could have been cast as Paul Rudd‘s younger brother in 2013.
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The hair style Wentz kept up in 2013 is impressively vertical and representative of the upward mobility of his entertainment career, quite honestly.
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If you’re famous with an inclination towards radical hair change you have to go blonde at some point. In 2014, Wentz proved he was no exception to the rule.
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The short fuschia hair he kept for his musical performances in 2015 is peak Wentz.
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In late 2015, Wentz began to swing back to his emo hair style roots with the slight flat-ironed spike (and his actual roots are showing, too, but it’s a look).
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Long on the top, short on the sides, and TK was the bassist’s style of choice in 2017.
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January 2018 saw a Steve Jobs turtleneck
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And here we are in June 2018, with Pete Wentz and a Wes Anderson kind of vibe on his head. We should have seen this coming, but somehow it remains one of the more shocking elements of Wentz’s contemporary look.
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2019 was a very manbun-friendly year for Wentz, who grew his locks long but kept his natural color.
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In 2020, a year in which just about everyone experimented with their hair in quarantine, Wentz debuted what is possibly his most shocking look yet: long, blond tresses that call to mind Legolas from Lord of the Rings.
