I had planned my whole week around watching the first Cher TV show, I couldn't wait to write about the sequins. Instead, I've decided that it's time to make a statement about mustaches; the situation has gotten out of hand. Then I can talk about the sequins. Actually, the two aren't as far apart as one might suppose.

Mustaches, back in the early 1960's, were "hip" - hip in the sense that they were pretty rare. I'm not talking about old beatniks, or the Yankee styled old salt. . . I'm referrring to the occasional bartender, or rock musician who would sport one of those long, droopy David Crosby ones that started to appear with frightening regularity along with the general lengthening of hair. I'm trying to remember just how much Sgt. Pepper had to do with this; with some dismay I think all four Beatles wore mustaches on that LP cover (I can't be sure because the album is - I'm pleased to note - nowhere to be found in my house), which may mean that this record had more to do with ruining visual style as well as musical taste than we had thought. Maybe the sociological implications are heavy; perhaps it has something to do with wars, industrial revolutions, unemployment, radical politics. I seem to remember hearing that around the turn of the century men all had mustaches. All my great uncles in those sepiatoned photographs did; maybe it was just Eastern European immigrants. But what has this to do with advertising agency art directors? Doctors . . . rock musicians from Ringo to Ron Mael (who, with that absurd Charlie Chaplin mustache has helped to make Sparks one of the most, if not the most visually offensive groups in all of rock and roll; with those fake English accents ... such effete posers I have never seen) .. . policemen . . . hairdressers . . . men from all walks of life have mustaches these days, and I simply cannot understand why.

Now I realize there must be some people out there who think mustaches are sexy. Obviously - because you can't turn to a page in any flesh magazine ... no matter how subtly the pix are presented - without seeing a man, a cock and a mustache. It would seem that the two go together: you can't have a cock without a mustache. (Although Fran Lebowitz says that, unfortunately, you can have a mustache without a cock.) Despite the fact that some of my best friends have mustaches and on them it looks okay for various reasons (Donald Lyons looks distinguished, Vince Aletti looks Latino, Lester Bangs has to work and live in Birmingham) and I know for a fact that Wayne Country thinks Bob Gruen is the sexiest man in New York, I am perplexed as to why this has turned into such a mass movement. At the recent Detroit Led Zeppelin concert I counted 23 boys in the front row alone who had mustaches. You can't step foot into a New York disco without being confronted by wallto-wall mustaches, to say nothing of the Polo Lounge or Mr. Chow's in Beverly Hills. Beards I won't even discuss.

And I don't mean the thin, silly mustache like John (Pink Flamingoes, Female Trouble) Waters wears, (he's a genius, he can do anything, and on him it looks right), or mustaches worn by the hopelessly hideous who have something to hide. I'm talking about your general, run of the, mill, fairly attractive boy who shouldn't have to wear a mustache but does. And I mean the George Harrison-Duane Allman kind of mustache. I don't think the sexual aspects of the thing can be that big a plus; it usually tickles no matter where you're being kissed (although Leee Childers says it depends on the texture). It's become mass fashion in much the same way that dark nailpolish, jeans, platform shoes, long hair, fake afros, and shoulder bags have. It took a few years - but when things catch on these days, they CATCH ON. Mustache overkill.

It's much the same with sequins. Once, many years ago, Sophie Tucker wore sequins on the stage of the Palace. Aunts from Great Neck wore sequins to fancy bar mitzvahs at Leonard's or Twin Cantors. (A year ago Bette Midler wore sequins and acted like an aunt gone mad at a bar mitzvah...). But now the world's biggest male popstar wears sequins in between the exposed hairs on his chest and fifty million people tune in. And they call this progress? The Cher TV Special (first of her series) was the biggest case of sequin overkill I could imagine. Talk about the perversion of culture; I wondered what Charles Ludlam or John Vaccaro -men who really understood glitter back then in the off-off Broadway theater of the Ridiculous rwere thinking if they were watching. As I watched these four drag queens (Cher, Elton, Bette and Flip Wilson) look like chandeliers, I felt sure that the main purpose of the show was to See How Many Times Cher Can Change Her Clothes. It should have been called "The Bob Mackie Show... Starring Cher, etc."; he designed the clothes, and I'll bet anything that it's the way he wants to look himself. The only time that sequins, maribou, bugle beads, balloons, and crystals weren't dripping from everything in sight was when Flip Wilson donned his Geraldine drag. Although the show will no doubt be a big hit, and people all over America were probably thrilled with the sparkle, the result was decidedly anti-glamour. And boring. With instant communication, today's Rodney's Disco backroom joke costume is tomorrow's prime-time network visual. Obviously Cher's gig is to do that particular number, although one kind of longs to see her in a simple black dress just once in awhile. Can you just imagine her packing to go to Macon to see Gregg Allman? "Now let's see, should I pack the multi colored floral print halter bra and matching Haleloke wraparound sideslit floorlength skirt? What about the chamois jeans with the ruby red insets . . . ?" W