Wendy Brandes Jewelry Blog

Never Is the Next New Thing

The Red-Legged Musical Men of My Youth

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I’ve been writing about bloggers wearing red tights and red pants since February:

The photo that started it all. Click for original post.

The trend has become so noticeable that the New York Times wrote about it last week.

But this whole time, I’ve had a vague feeling that I was missing some important red-pants history. While scrolling through my iPod this weekend, it finally hit me. How could I have forgotten Loverboy‘s 1981 Get Lucky album cover?

Loverboy’s Working for the Weekend video was on all the time in the early days of MTV. In the video, lead singer Mike Reno wore the tight red pants he wore on the album cover plus a matching jacket.

In 1979, Rod Stewart wore skin-tight red Lycra pants to perform Da Ya Think I’m Sexy (yes! we did!) at a Unicef benefit concert. That must have been why I incorrectly remembered Rod as wearing those pants in the official Da Ya Think I’m Sexy video, but it turns out he wore skin-tight black pants while a band member wore red. I’m consoled by the fact that Rod wore a leopard-print … blouse? Leopard is my favorite color after red.

Rod's sex-ay ass in Da Ya Think I'm Sexy. Click for video.

My close personal friend David Lee Roth and the rest of Van Halen were very into red clothes.

Van Halen’s video for Hot for Teacher was a huge scandal. Everyone was worried it was going to corrupt the children. I still love the song and the video. Sing along with me: “I don’t feel tardy!” And check out the red suits.

Here’s a contest: I’ll do an interview for this blog with the first red-legged lady (or gentleman) who perfectly recreates the Loverboy Get Lucky album-cover pose. Get your cameras out!

UPDATED TO ADD: Not a Loverboy pose, but I had to share this red-legged photo of gorgeous blogger Stef of Diversions. I like that she wore red shoes with the tights.

Click for her original post.

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. I’d have to get lucky to fit into leather pants, but I’ll try! I sing “workin for the weekend” or “look out weekend” every Friday at work so it’s about time I paid my respects via outfit post!!

  3. Wow, that Loverboy video is quite a time capsule — the headband, the bandanna, the red leather pants, and that classic 80’s white guy dance. Priceless! If I had some red leather pants I would definitely try to recreate that cover.

  13. WOW! Gorgeous jewels and Rod Stewart’s scrumptious tuckus before I’ve finished my first cup of coffee! It’s going to be a great day. Thank you thank you thank you! Off to sing, “Do ya think I’m sexy,” loudly with a raspy voice and annoy my coworkers.

  15. Thanks for including my photo 🙂 I’ll have to grow some long arm hairs to faithfully recreate that one 😉

  17. I do hate red pants (or as we call them in the UK trousers). I’m not entirely sure why.
    My mate has a good excuse – all the girls that said no to him in high school wore red pants lol – strange but true.

    …I may be contradicting myself here but I did love Eddy Murphy’s red suit in Delirious.

    – Dress So Fresh