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Karma chameleons: Rock 'n' roll's greatest gender-benders

Rock 'n' roll didn't invent gender bending, but it dressed it to the nines.

Rock 'n' roll didn't invent gender bending, but it dressed it to the nines.

From makeup-clad pioneers like Little Richard to drag queen RuPaul, rock and pop history is draped with dudes who looked like ladies and ladies who looked like gents.

As we prep for Culture Club's concert Friday night at Verizon Theatre, here's a look some of rock's greatest gender-benders.

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David Bowie

At the dawn of the '70s, Bowie evolved from a folk-singing hippie into the most famous androgynous rock star on earth. Rolling Stone described him as "almost disconcertingly reminiscent of Lauren Bacall" in 1971, and a year later, Bowie upped the stakes with Ziggy Stardust, the sexiest unisex space alien ever to strap on a guitar. After Ziggy, rock fashion was never the same.

Top gender-bending years: '70-'73

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Best look: Golden-tressed and long-dressed on the cover of The Man Who Sold The World.

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New York Dolls

An important link between glam-rock and punk, the New York Dolls looked like teen street thugs who'd stolen their mothers' high heels and scarves. Pouty lead singer David Johansen was a dead ringer for Mick Jagger's kid sister, but the entire band was made up of sartorial switch-hitters.

Top gender-bending years: '71-'75

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Best look: The big-haired, full-drag display captured on The New York Dolls LP cover.

Grace Jones

The Jamaican model-turned-singer was a standard-issue disco singer in the late '70s before Jean-Paul Goude designed a series of gender-bending LP covers that turned her into a new wave legend.

Top gender-bending years: '80 to '85

Best look: The flattop 'do and broad-shouldered Armani jacket on the cover of Nightclubbing.

Annie Lennox

Lennox has changed her look as often as her music, but for a brief shining period in the '80s, she helped turn menswear into a timeless trend in women's fashion. Sporting close-cropped hair and mens' dark suits, pants and ties, Lennox was every bit as striking as Eurythmics' synth-pop songs. Her ultimate gender-bending role came in the video to "Who's That Girl?": Dressed as both a man and woman, Lennox made out with herself.

Top gender-bending years: '82 to '85

Best look: The banker's suit and orange-red buzz-cut in the video to "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)."

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Boy George

George O'Dowd wasn't the first braid-haired, gender-bending leader of a British new wave band -- that honor goes to Dead Or Alive's Pete Burns. But the Culture Club singer took the look to new heights.

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Today, the 55-year-old Boy sports facial hair, but he's still rarely seen without his trusty eye shadow.

Top gender-bending years: '81 to '86

Best look: The Day-Glo Asian schoolgirl get-up in the video to "Karma Chameleon."

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Dee Snider

The Twisted Sister front man added a much-needed dose of femininity to the hopelessly macho world of heavy metal. Looking like a cross between Bernadette Peters and Count Dracula in clown makeup, Snider put the drag into Twisted Sister's sturm und drang.

Top gender-bending years: '84 to '87

Best look: Wearing lipstick, rouge and high-heel leather boots in the "We're Not Gonna Take It" video.

Marilyn Manson

No matter if he's dressed like a goth prince in his namesake band or all dolled up to play Christina Superstar in the film Party Monster, Marilyn Manson is rock's reigning king of gender-benders. His androgo-meter has been tilting toward masculine lately, but he'll probably never walk onstage without lipstick.

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Top gender-bending years: '94 to present

Best look: The flame-haired alien on the cover of Mechanical Animals

  • Culture Club and opening act Groves perform at 8 p.m. Friday at Verizon Theatre, 1001 Performance Place, Grand Prairie. $55-$250. verizontheatre.com

Thor Christensen is a Dallas writer and critic.