Noise from the Boys VI: Dust-bowl Blues

For many men, going bald is a source of great anxiety. I mean you would worry if any part of your body started to fall off, but hair loss rocks the confidence of many a stout fellow. As such, when you find yourself becoming decidedly less hairy than you would like, there are a myriad of treatments to choose from depending upon how much hair you are losing. From thickening shampoo for those starting to look a bit wispy to full on follicle transplants for rich and worried cue-balls. Speaking as a bald gentleman of 25 I personally have no problem with my dome - I find that taking ownership of my baldness, wearing it with pride is the best treatment. Like all of the best minority groups, we take persecution and turn it into strength, but we’ll get into that another time.

The fact is there are many balding men who are still afraid to come out of the closet and let the sun reflect proudly off the tops of their heads. So for these guys (and for a laugh) I tried out Michael diCesare's Thickening Hair Builder, £19.25 (qvcuk.com), a powder designed to cling onto your hair and cover up thinning patches. From the off I was sceptical of this product - dusting your head with powder seemed like an unusual approach, surely it would just be a mess. So when I tried it and found that the coloured powder I was sent was an uncanny match for my natural colour, I was impressed. The idea is to sprinkle the product onto areas of thin hair and comb it through to get rid of any excess. But for a full-on chrome dome like me, it ended up looking like I had coloured my head in. However, for somebody with longer hair it may very well work a treat. I did end up actually being able to see where my hairline was though, which was nice. I’m sure this stuff would last at least for an evening as it didn’t come off as readily as I’d expected when you touched it. So if you’ve got a Prince William style thinning crown, or an acceptable comb-over (if such a thing exists) then Thickening Hair Builder would probably be a decent and cost effective solution.

Just remember it is only a short-term solution, you can’t season your head with hair pepper for the rest of your life. Like any baldness treatment short of hair-plugs or voodoo magic, this is just like the story of the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dyke, valiant but only temporary. E