It’s officially a party (in the back) for Tami Manis, a Tennessee woman who just captured the Guinness World Record for longest female mullet.
Manis, 58, last cut the hair on the back of her head on Feb. 9, 1990. In that time, it’s grown to a staggering five feet, eight inches in length.
“A lot of people just notice it when I turn around, so most of the time it’s like they don’t realize how long my hair is until they look at the backside,” Manis said in a video posted by Guinness World Records this week.
“It was the ’80s and everybody had a rat tail,” she said, adding her mullet inspiration came after watching ‘Til Tuesday’s music video Voices Carry.
“The girl had a rat tail and I really wanted one of those,” she said.
Manis, a public health nurse from Knoxville, says she has to keep her she-mullet braided most of the time, as her hair is longer than she is tall. After a once-weekly wash, a friend will help her braid it and she keeps it plaited until the next time it’s due for cleaning.
She says she takes care of her long locks with Hask hair products, and when she’s done shampooing and conditioning it she uses paper towels to help it dry.
According to Guinness, Manis competed in the “Femullet” division of the 2022 U.S. Mullet Championships and finished in second place, coming just behind competitor Alexa Lindsey of Michigan and taking home a $300 prize.
Although the mullet, known for its business-in-the-front, party-in-the-back versatility, has been sported throughout history, it’s most often associated with the 1980s and 1990s, when it was popularized by celebrities like Billy Ray Cyrus, Patrick Swayze and a variety of hair metal bands.
Manis said she, too, had a mullet in the 1980s and felt immediate pangs of regret when she cut it off in 1989. She went back for one last trim to the back of her head in 1990 and since then she hasn’t stopped it from growing.
She told Guinness her extraordinary hairstyle is now one of her most defining traits — when she encounters someone she hasn’t seen for years, they often remember her based on her mullet alone.
“The weirdest thing I find is that people remember me from years ago,” Manis told the organization.
This is the first time the record for the longest female mullet has been awarded by Guinness.
After a long process, including filming her hair to show its length, Manis received a package on her front porch informing her of the official record.
“When I opened it, I thought, ‘this is amazing,’” she said.