The internet hasn’t produced a lot of content that is truly worth of being enshrined in museums, but this photo is certainly among the bare handful of things worthy of permanent protection.
A full decade ago, to the day, a paparazzi photographer snapped this since-immortalised photo of then-it boy Pete Wentz, inadvertently capturing what appears to be a burgeoning Bruno Mars in the background standing in pure, unfiltered, starstruck awe.
https://twitter.com/dracomallfoys/status/990496385664417792
A remarkable photo; incredibly detailed and multi-layered; one that truly proves just how fucking long ago 2008 truly was.
There it is, mercifully timestamped for all to see and mark the occasion: Bruno, eliciting a soft, tacit “wow” at 2008’s Pete Wentz, member of Fall Out Boy, on the verge of releasing the chart-topping Folie à Deux, and two years removed from a nude photo scandal.
Sure, technically it was yesterday here in Australia, but thanks to time differences it’s having its official 10th anniversary right now so we’re claiming it.
Bruno, for his part, was building a career as an acclaimed producer, and was a full two years out from stepping out from behind the mixing desk to release his first solo album Doo-Wops & Hooligans.
Though Mars himself has asserted that he was not starstruck at Wentz, rather put out because the photographer had shoved him out of the way to get the shot, the photographic evidence says otherwise.
It’s a masterwork. A complete triumph. A more accurate measurement of time than the Gregorian calendar.
In the years that have since past the internet has seen innumerable fads and passing interests come and go, but one thing remains as solid now as it was 10 years ago when it was taken:
Get you a man who looks at you the way Bruno Mars looks at Pete Wentz.
It’s a beautiful day, folks. Celebrate accordingly.
