The Malcolm Todd mod cut is engineered for one specific moment: the second he opens his eyes. Todd, who went topless for a June performance on The Tonight Show and carried the same loose, unbothered energy through his inaugural Gap Inc. campaign, has made bedhead a deliberate style decision rather than a morning accident.
His barber, Yuhei Nerome, who works professionally under the name Nero, has been cutting Todd’s hair for over a year. The brief Todd gives him is straightforward. ‘It’s a short layer, textured haircut,’ Nero says. ‘So basically when he just wakes up, he looks great. It’s got a nice texture to it because it’s a little bit spikier.’ That instruction, wake-up-ready by design, is what separates the look from a standard short back and sides.
From Buzzcut to Britpop: How the Malcolm Todd Mod Cut Came Together
Todd has worked through several phases, from a close buzzcut to a shag, before settling on what Nero describes as a Britpop-style mod cut. The shift began gradually. When the two first met, Todd was still in buzzcut territory, and all Nero could do was tidy the hairline. It was only when Todd came back wanting to grow things out that the current shape took form.
Todd told NYLON that his embrace of natural growth was shaped by an appreciation for ‘cute’ British guys. ‘I don’t think my hair’s supposed to be long,’ he said. ‘I don’t feel like my hair’s obviously supposed to be completely bald.’ The Britpop reference point is apt: the cut sits somewhere between a classic Gallagher-era fringe and something a little more textured and lived-in.
To style it, Nero works a dry texture hair paste through the hair, pushing it forward to build a messy fringe, then works through the rest to add texture before letting it fall where it wants. Nero is currently developing that paste under his own haircare brand, which he plans to release in December. The finish is controlled chaos, which is exactly the point.
The Malcolm Todd Mod Cut Goes Wider
The look has taken on a life beyond Todd’s own head. Reddit threads have appeared with users asking how to replicate it, and earlier this year Todd went live on TikTok specifically to give viewers a 360-degree view of the cut. That kind of engagement is not incidental: the hairstyle is woven into the bedroom indie pop aesthetic Todd has built his audience around, groovy and relaxed, with enough texture to feel like something happened there.
The Gap campaign, directed by Tanu Muiño with creative direction from Calvin Leung, who serves as Head of Gap Brand Creative, leans into exactly that quality. Even in the campaign imagery, Todd’s hair ends up in various states of stylish disarray, the mod cut doing what Nero designed it to do.
The timing of the campaign is not coincidental. Todd’s second album, Do That Again, landed a Top 5 placement on the Billboard 200, and a 38-date North American tour launches 2 September, according to Gap Inc. A Britpop-inflected haircut that requires no intervention before the first show of the day is, on reflection, a sensible call.
