Tattooing Behind Bars: Anthony Prince's Story of Survival and Art

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
When I got in there, I had this tattoo right here. And they, once
you get in prison, they approach you and they're just, everybody's nosy
as fuck, man. And they're like, oh, you got tattoos. I was like, yeah,
man, I did this one myself. Lied. I don't know why, but I lied.
Cause I did draw the letters, but I didn't do the tattoo. So I was like, you
know, whatever. I tried to, you know, first day. And then,

(00:21):
uh, by the time, lunch or
dinner hits, these guys who, like
And then they got a kid, young as me, fucking with
a stencil on 5150, ready to get tattooed. They

(00:42):
want to see what I can do. You got to prove everything in there. They want to see what you
can do. I said, well, I've never used that kind of, you know, they
call it in their gun. Obviously everybody hates that, but that's what they call it.
And I said, never used one of those before. And they're like, well, let's just see what you
can do, man. Your work looks good. I'm like, uh,
you know, I'd rather not man. Hey man, let's see what you can do. Like starting to
get like. I'm like, okay, man, chill out. I

(01:05):
go to tattoo this guy. They got me gloves. It's
not like what people think. It's clean in there. People are dirty, but
a lot of times, most people are clean or OCD
in there. You have time. You think about that stuff. So
the pattern's on. I said, all right, man, you
know, it's been, you know, it's been a while since I worked out there and I've never used

(01:28):
this machine. You cool? He's like, yeah, man, I'm good. I just
want to tattoo. He's a kid. Four other guys sitting in a room, maybe
smaller than this, trying to watch me. And I'm like, I start shaking and
I don't know you're supposed to pull the skin and hold it. So I go to
like, I'm going to just like lean on him and just like draw. I
got to try to sketch it like a scratcher would. I've never tattooed

(01:49):
before ever. I go to put the line and I'm
bouncing everywhere on his chest and The
dude looks at me kind of like nudges me saying man. What the fuck are you doing? I'm
like, hey, I told you I never used this before like you
got to give me a second man like I've never used this little machine and
he's like you owe us for the that the ink and don't fuck that

(02:10):
youngster up then they left and I told the kid, I
said, hey dude, I've never tattooed before. He's got
tattoos. And I said, can you help me do this? Can you walk me through? I
can do letters, man. Just help me out. What
am I doing wrong? He said, well, everybody else kind of holds the
skin tight. I'm like, all right. So he's holding his fucking

(02:30):
skin for me. And I'm still not holding it
because I don't know you're supposed to push. I still kind of just doing
I'm feeling something in my spirit. Chats

(03:01):
Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Chats and Tats with
me, your host, Aaron Della Vadova. As maybe some
of you know this, maybe not, but man, I love a
good story of redemption. And this
is this is one we have here today. You know, life can be harsh
and I don't know. I just feel like it's too easy to judge

(03:22):
others that are Maybe not in a good spot.
It's really easy when you're not. Maybe you're in a good spot. Maybe
you're in the good spot and they're not. And then you're kind of looking down
on them. But the reality I've learned after 53 years is you get
to know somebody deep enough and you start saying
things like, well, what would I have done if I was in those

(03:42):
circumstances? Would I be where that person's at? And
the answer for me, resoundingly is, yeah, I
probably would be. So I think it's important for me and
everyone listening to realize if you're doing well, man, just realize you
probably had a lot of good circumstances or maybe not. Maybe you rose
above. Either way, it needs to be acknowledged fairly and

(04:03):
not passing judgment on others that are having a rougher
go at it. You know, so I think this story kind of bounces around with those ideas
today. And it also kind of comes towards really
good tattooing. The guy I have on today is a tattoo artist. I
don't know. I would probably call his work realism

(04:25):
with some surrealism, meaning he doesn't just always follow a
photograph. He also adds his own artistic flair to
it. And then there's a good amount of horror theme
running through his work as well. And we'll get more into that later.
So with all that being said, please welcome my guest
today, Anthony Prince, otherwise known to most

(04:51):
I appreciate you being here, all the way from Phoenix, Arizona. I should add that
he currently works at Ritual Addictions in
Phoenix, and he also owns Tilted
Crown Clothing. He's a fashion man, and
So do you. Thank you. But yeah, so

(05:12):
those are the things you do now, and you're married to Ashland,
right? Right. 10 years.
It's coming up, yeah, 10 years. 10 years with her, but
you also are a father, 21-year-old daughter. Right. Obviously,

(05:36):
Let's get into some stuff here. We had
a nice conversation on the phone, and you kind of told me a bit about your life, and
that's when I was like, dude, you gotta come on my show. This story's crazy. So
I'm gonna let you tell it, but let's, you
can start a little, or whatever, wherever you wanna start, but let's
start your story. How you

(05:57):
were born, your circumstances, what led you to here
Um, so if we were starting out in the beginning, I was born
in New York. My mom left my dad and
Right. We're just staying there kind of, uh, you know,

(06:19):
maybe there may be another ants, but at the time it was here in California.
We're in California. You know, I don't really know, to be
That was, you know, obviously, people, when
you lean on other people, it gets to be too much. Maybe like, they don't want
to say it because you're family, but it's time to move on, is what I'm thinking. I

(06:40):
don't know 100%. It's just what I'm told. So we moved
Yeah, my dad comes back into the picture for two
or three years, right? Doesn't work out. He's a heavy
drinker, man. He did He got into
close to a 16 car pile up that he created from

(07:01):
it was a I don't know man, maybe 20 mile
radius just blowing through cars. Just not caring. He
finally flips his Camaro doesn't even
Doesn't even harm himself maybe a toe, you know, everything else
was everybody else got hurt. He goes to prison now.
It's me and my mom Stepdad comes in anybody. No,

(07:24):
no, just clipped a bunch of people just kind of like race carring through people drunk
Anyways, he goes to jail. I don't really see him. No
visit, whatever. You know, normal school. A stepdad
comes in. You know, doesn't really work out
too much. I get in trouble. Go

(07:45):
to a foster care. Live
with them for a little bit. They, in
the public eye, were helping kids stay out of
trouble and off drugs. They had a boxing gym and we
trained every day and they kinda had kids that they would pull off the
street to help. But there was another side of

(08:07):
that. There was stealing, there
was robbing, there was violence. And
So to be a part of that family, it was like being a
Colt. I would say Colt, maybe a crime mob, because
they were very strict. They had rules. It wasn't a free for all like

(08:33):
You were expected to earn your... One summer I was out there with
all the other kids digging a fucking pool with shovels.
And they were getting paid for an actual pool job. They
had a company, real company, that made money that
So through foster care, they created this child labor

(08:55):
Right, yeah. And they were getting the food stamps, getting the cash
assistance. And we would get what we get. And you know one of
the funny things they used to tell me is, You
know, we were putting a roof over your head because I
wouldn't get money for the jobs I was doing. You're getting paid
by living here. Your rent is the, you know what

(09:18):
Right. Yeah. And that's how all the kids were doing
it. And there's seven, eight kids per family
member. So there was a family member with eight kids. A couple
other families who did the same thing and they were a tight-knit group. Organized
That's interesting. I've heard a lot of different ways criminal

(09:38):
organizations form themselves, but I hadn't heard that one
No, it was in public eyes, like I said, they had cops that were
letting them do anything. And
they were clean-cut. only
two of the family members had like visible
tattoos and those were more of the like gangsters but it

(10:00):
was more of a clean cut type of organized anyway
so I lived with them I ran away a couple times they'd find me they'd
beat the shit out of whoever was hiding me So no
word gets around. Don't don't you can't help don't help these
kids can't know and you know, what's funny is I quit
going to school for a little bit because I'd

(10:21):
go to school and then take off, you know And you know, I'm just like every
other kid I got in some trouble like I'm not perfect, you know what I mean? and
I actually liked some of the stuff they were doing because growing
up this was like they I They
made it look good. They made it look fun. This is
kind of like a game. Go and see how much you can steal. You can't get

(10:42):
So we're moving on. I heard they got you out digging swimming pools, which
So check this out. We would be going to
a job, right? And let's say the job requires up
to $3,000 or $4,000 worth of equipment or supplies

(11:04):
from Home Depot, right? They
would go in, purchase a cart, make this same exact cart
up, right? Walk out and buy the first one, hand
me the receipt, I would be walking right behind them with another cart of
the same exact thing. The first
cart would be returned to another Home Depot down

(11:27):
the road, they would get their money back, and we'd have the supply still.
I mean, like I said, it was organized. It wasn't just
something that just, they had been doing this. They're

(11:49):
not doing it anymore, and I won't really, I'm not gonna name names, but yeah,
eventually yeah so anyways 17 I run away I
find a girl at the time I kind of tried before you
go too far they and I've heard they've got you basically extorting
you for labor they've got you helping them

(12:11):
with little petty crime yeah but like I said and I
didn't mind some of the shit because like it became fun to me and this is
How do I say it? Like, your normal is who raises you.
And that was probably like, you figured this is kind of like normal. Right.
Yeah. Yeah. I totally get that. And you know, it's funny, I'm watching the

(12:33):
Menendez brothers documentary
right now. And it really highlights this, like these, these, I
mean, I don't know, maybe they're lying, but from what I'm gathering here,
they just figured their dad raping them. Because
he would tell them he would tell them like this isn't gay sex. This
is you like the Romans and the Spartans I'm teaching you

(12:55):
to be tough. So you bend over and this is gonna hurt and
they believed him I don't know any better, but they know in their mind something
ain't right I'm sure they did and of course I'm sure now they're grown
men that read books and it went to counseling and they realized the
Bullshit, but the point is you take a child You
tell them, you know, you're the adult learn behavior. Yeah learn behavior

(13:17):
exactly So what I was going to get at there is they've got you doing
the labor and they got you doing the petty crime, but is there drug
So that's one thing. Drugs were no. No. It was clean. Like I
said, I always say this, clean cut, that's the best I could describe it. Everybody
was always dressed well. uniform, we all
moved together, you know? Nobody was like, if

(13:39):
we went somewhere, everybody knew that we were there, you
know? And it looked good. It was, you know, militant. No
drugs, no drinking. Like I said, there was one or two other
guys who kind of did the street style, but they
were always getting in trouble. The other main ones were
always flying straight and always getting their way.

(13:59):
It was smooth, man. Until
We'll get to that part. So
then 17, I stopped you, sorry. You run off.
Dude, I was tired of it. I would get fucking
tasered, man. Like with the cattle prongs, like the big cattle prongs. You

(14:22):
Yeah. I'm not
saying I'm a badass, right? But I did train from 12 years
old, 11 or 12 years old, and I'm talking training boxing with
them every day up until 17. And boxing
is a sport, obviously, and everything's improved, fighting's improved.
But I can defend myself, right? And when they got me, when I first

(14:44):
came to their home, I was weak, I didn't know
anything how to defend myself. Well, you take every day of running
three miles, training for two hours every
yeah like a machine well it was work it

(15:07):
was it was school first work and then boxing there
was no questions asked that's every day no matter what it
didn't matter we wake up we ran two miles we went
to school we came back immediately after school went straight to work And
then after work, we boxed to the gym, went to the gym, right? Two
hours of training and another two

(15:29):
to three mile run, doesn't matter. Every Sunday, we ran South Mountain. South
Mountain's a pretty big mountain, mountain phoenix. We'd run
the dirt road up, which is for horse trails, and
then the streets down every Sunday. Some
of their training means not just sparring, not
hitting the bag. A training session for them, we might be

(15:52):
in the intersection. Get out and fuck that dude up
right there. Could be a grown man. Get out and fuck him up.
That's training. Because why? Because it's street fighting. You
and I was the oldest of the kids so You

(16:20):
Right. So they came home with the fucking cattle prong, dude. And
I kind of laughed at it. I was like, ah, whatever. You know, these fuckers
hit me with PVC pipe before. They fucked me up plenty of times. Whatever.
It's something new, you know? Well, the first time it
came out, I laughed. They said, you're not going to laugh at me, boy. They always say boy.
I was getting mouthy with him and we were in the house I didn't think he's gonna do nothing

(16:43):
cuz he doesn't like his shit broke but he fucking hit me in the leg right
and I instantly fell and I reached up to grab him
so he wouldn't do it again but on the cattle prongs they have things on
the side if you hold on to that if they don't let
go of that trigger you're stuck You're stuck to it.
You can't let go. No. Dude, that scared the shit out

(17:03):
of me, man. So, you know, I was tired of it,
Yeah, I didn't like that thing. I didn't like that
Fucking sucked. Yeah. So I just
took off. I found somebody who didn't really care about that

(17:25):
family. They knew who they were. They didn't care. They helped me out of there. And
I found a girl that I thought I
liked and moved in with them. And that ended up being a
party scene trap house. And
a year and a half later, I was already in prison. Didn't

(17:47):
armed robberies, just doing the stuff that I
was trained to do. But the thing is, you
try to bring somebody in with you who's not, doesn't
really listen to rules. There's rules to do it
right, right? I hate saying this, I haven't been in prison, I've

(18:07):
been out of prison 10 years, and I did 11 years, and I'm
not saying this is cool, I'm not trying to advertise it, but I'm just
telling you what happened. But if you
don't, if you have somebody who's got loose ends, who doesn't really care like you do, or
doesn't pay attention to everything, then they're going to get you
caught. So I had somebody with me and they
didn't necessarily follow my rules. They got, you

(18:30):
know, I don't know what you guys would say,
sloppy. They went out on their own without me and ended up getting
caught and just said, oh yeah, this guy was with me. So they
were already on me, you know? And so
eventually, just too many times people call on you or tell on you
and You got it. You know what I mean? Look

(18:50):
at Diddy Too
So the same thing All right. So then the
gig is up and you're going good. Well, I was
Yeah. Yeah. So they want to

(19:11):
know about the family. They want me to, you know, give
them some information. I wouldn't. And they said, you know, you're looking
at 25 years. I said, all right. They
Why would you not say anything? Were
No, it's just, it's just an honor code. Yeah, it

(19:33):
is. Yeah. And plus I just wouldn't, I'd rather go
It's exactly where I would have got out and then what? Fucking somebody,
one of them would have got in trouble and then I had to be there with them and then fucking
deal with that. I don't know. So I told the
judge straight up, early retirement, just like that, man. It's in my

(19:55):
police report. He couldn't believe it. He said, man, he took
me in the chamber. He said, hey, dude. You're 17 going
to 18. We're going to charge you for it as an adult. He said, all right.
He said, man, why won't you budge? I said, I don't have anything to tell
you, man. Do what you got to do. Straight up. Didn't care. And
I really didn't, man. I really didn't. I'm not trying to be cool, but I just did

(20:18):
Well, you know, when you're living a life like that, You
know, to someone like me, prison, the idea of being in
prison would be terrifying, the lack of... It's not, it's not
even... Well, not terrifying like, I'm gonna get beat up or raped. I
mean, I'd be worried a bit about that too, but more just... You
know, I have this nice life and I'm about ready to not have it,

(20:44):
That's my point. That's my point. Like you're thinking prison's better.
I don't have to hustle every day. I don't have to fucking run the streets and
Yeah, I wanted to lay down and I didn't care what the, I honestly,
25 is a lot of time and I'm glad I didn't get it but at that time I
pretty much told him, fuck you, I don't care, do what

(21:05):
you gotta do and I stood up and said that too at
So I originally, my public
defender, because I didn't have any money, I didn't have anybody to help me, I had nobody. My
mom, I talked to her, but I
had already screwed that up because they made me go

(21:31):
Yeah, I demolished that. I made her cry, and it
was bad. And so I just went
on my own straight in, boom. The
public defender Must have felt bad for me. She
worked for me. So she got it down to 9 to 15 and
Since I was 17 just turned 18. They gave me I

(21:52):
believe it's called the presumptive which was 9 right and I
It's funny because, uh, when I
told him to take me to trial, I'd rather go to trial. Cause
like you have a chance to win. And she said, no, the witness actually
identifies you. She's here today. We'll come to find out she was

(22:12):
illegal and didn't show up that day. And I actually would have gotten, uh,
So I signed, but once you sign, that's it. He gives me
the nine years, whatever. I don't
really think about the time. I just started living, man.

(22:35):
Fast forward, we can go over other things, but I filed
a bunch of appeals. I got I did 11 years
So I got about to my six-month mark and I had all
these appeals going in from like five years before that They
let me out to two weeks earlier because they
said I got too much time. I was only supposed to get three to five years

(22:57):
for that crime Armed robbery first time right
Yeah. I got caught with a phone in there and they gave me another year and
a half and then some other shit like tattooing and tickets.

(23:18):
I only got one tattooing ticket, but it took like three to six months from
you of good time. So I ended up doing 115 of my percent
Well, yeah, exactly. And that's, that's another I
could have went back for what I don't know what it's called,
but like some kind of reimbursement. But I was so happy to get out that I

(23:40):
didn't even care or file for any of that. Wow,
I, well, I filed, it's been 10 years since I've been out and
the crimes happened in 2004, 20 years
That's just crazy to me that, I

(24:00):
don't know, like a judge can listen to a case like that where
you just told the story. Um, you're a product of
Their public defender didn't recommend? Was it brought up in court that
They knew, but without me saying anything, it doesn't mean

(24:23):
Yeah, because you were still doing the, like, I'm not a snitch. I'm not
going to talk about what happened with this family. Okay,
so that I guess changes what I was thinking, because to me... I
see what you're saying. Yeah, you would think there'd be a lot of complete forgiveness
Yeah, I got the presumptive. Presumptive, because 15 is the max, 12 is

(24:45):
like standard, and then 9 is presumptive. So
they gave me presumptive, because maybe he felt bad, I
don't know. So he kind of did but he didn't he would have
got he I probably would have got more right if they would have Unfolded the
unpacked the whole story, right, right. Yeah, but I
mean a lot of people have excuses though, too So everybody's got the same fucking story

(25:07):
Yeah, because your story would just be a story without proof, right?
You know what, you're going to go to the folks that raised you and his kids saying this
is what's going on. They're just going to be like, he's crazy. We're running a,
we're running a youth program, right? We're here to help. We're a community upstanding.
And they had your word against theirs. Yeah, and they were
shining. They had money coming in with, they actually

(25:29):
had, at the time it was a sheriff, he
had a boxing gym over, well, you're not too familiar with Arizona, but
the sheriff had a boxing gym as well, they
were cool with. So it was just like, just give me the fucking time.
Yeah, okay, this is all starting to make sense of,
okay, I get it. But, but, you

(25:50):
do have to go do this. But tattooing
starts to happen for you in prison. In
So I did. So it's funny, every time
in school I would watch people who had nice handwriting, I
would try to copy it. and do it similar.

(26:14):
So every time I had like a test or any kind of homework, it was more like an
art project because I didn't care what the answer was or anything like
that. I would 90% of the time, I would probably cheat
Both, but I like cursive, I like the way it looks, and I would do that, and
I really like, what is it, man,

(26:37):
not Celtic, what is that? Calligraphy? Calligraphy, yes. I
So what I'm hearing there is you had something
Right, yes. But no pictures, nothing like that, just letters. It's

(26:58):
It's aesthetic, it's art, it's creativity, all of it.
But you probably didn't recognize yourself as an artist. I just
Yeah, so when I got in there, I had this tattoo right here.
Once you get in prison, they approach you and they're just, everybody's nosy
as fuck, man. And they're like, oh, you got tattoos. I was like, yeah,

(27:20):
man, I did this one myself. Lied, I don't know why, but I lied.
Because I did draw the letters, but I didn't do the tattoo. So I was like, whatever.
First day. And then by
the time lunch or dinner hits, these
guys who, like, first senior or

(27:45):
And then they got a kid, young as me, fucking with
a stencil on 5150, ready to get tattooed. They
want to see what I can do. You've got to prove everything in there. They want to see what you
can do. I said, well, I've never used that kind of, you know, they
call it in their gun. Obviously everybody hates that, but that's what they called it.
And I said, never used one of those before. And they're like, well, let's just see what you
can do, man. Your work looks good. I'm like, uh,

(28:08):
you know, I'd rather not man. Hey man, let's see what you can do. Like starting to
get like. I'm like, okay, man, chill out. I
go to tattoo this guy. They got me gloves. It's
not like what people think. It's clean in there. People are dirty, but
a lot of times, most people are clean or OCD
in there. You have time. You think about that stuff. So

(28:31):
the pattern's on. I said, all right, man, you
know, it's been, you know, it's been a while since I worked out there and I've never used
this machine. You cool? He's like, yeah, man, I'm good. I just
want to tattoo. He's a kid. Four other guys sitting in a room, maybe
smaller than this, trying to watch me. And I'm like, I start shaking and
I don't know you're supposed to pull the skin and hold it. So I go to

(28:51):
like, I'm going to just like lean on him and just like draw. I
got to try to sketch it like a scratcher would. I've never tattooed
before ever. I go to put the line and I'm
bouncing everywhere on his chest and The
dude looks at me kind of like nudges me saying man. What the fuck are you doing? I'm
like, hey, I told you I never used this before like you

(29:12):
got to give me a second man like I've never used this little machine and
he's like you owe us for the that the ink and don't fuck that
youngster up then they left and I told the kid, I
said, hey dude, I've never tattooed before. He's got
tattoos, and I said, can you help me do this? Can you walk me through? I
can do letters, man. Just help me out. What

(29:33):
am I doing wrong? He said, well, everybody else kind of holds the
skin tight. I'm like, all right. So he's holding his fucking
skin for me, and I'm still not holding it
because I don't know you're supposed to push. I still kind of just doing
It came out like shit. And that night I went to my
cell with my new machine and I freaking, I

(29:57):
got to show you my leg, but I drilled lines into my leg
just to, I was, I was like a little bit intimidated. I
mean, I didn't know what to expect the next day they wanted to see this tattoo. And
I, so I tried to do like, I worked all night till six in the morning on my
I wanted to show them, like, I could do this. Next morning,

(30:18):
they see the tattoo, they're like, hey man, don't be working on anybody. You
know what I mean? I said, all right, well, whatever. You know, I don't
care. I needed some shoes,
dude, because it's just like the world in there. You need
shoes, you need soaps, you need hygiene, you need food. You
need everything. So I needed shoes. I was tired of walking

(30:40):
around in sandals. This guy says, hey, man, I heard you tattoo.
I said, yeah, I do. He said well, how much
do you charge? I said I need some food and some shoes So
he orders it right and then we get to like looking through magazines
and stuff And I start hitting everybody up
on the art. How do we make a pattern? How do you do this? How do you do that? and

(31:02):
some people show me everybody's a genius in there everybody's got the
right way and We get to the day where I'm going to work on
his leg and man, I worked probably for 11 hours
on this little ass piece and it completely fell
out and destroyed his leg. He got, he got a bad infection.
And, um, you know, a couple of weeks later, he's like,

(31:24):
Hey man, you know, I bought you the shoes. I bought you that food. I
know you, you're not good at tattooing. He said, but
do you want to learn all my legs? I said, yeah, dude, I
really do. But I need some more food. I'm
out of food and he's like, alright man. So we worked out a
deal to where it's like he bought $20, which is

(31:45):
pretty, I know it sounds funny, but 20 bucks a week in
Okay, okay, I was okay. I wasn't badass, but
Jesus Christ, what a wild ride. I gotta say

(32:08):
before you continue, like I love, I love, I get tattooers on
here all the time and my favorite stories are like their first tattoo, you
know? I think you just won the prize, man. I think you just won the
It's a great story. Yeah. And we're going to learn as
this continues where this takes you, which is beautiful. So

(32:35):
Well, maybe he'll hear this one day and I think I'll speak
for you and say, hey man, thanks. Because we got a guy here
right now that's one of the fucking raddest tattooers I've been able to sit
with, and I don't know if he'd be here without you, Mike, so thanks.
So now I'm assuming people know you can

(32:58):
Yes, and it's better than the average. Even
if you suck, people want their tattoos. They just want to be filled up.
They just want the look. They don't care, man. They want their face blasted. They
just want to look intimidating, aggressive. But
yeah, I started getting a little bit busy in there. It

(33:18):
was just like more or less like just weird skull
faces and letters. Letters was big time. And
that's what I like doing. So letters I was actually pretty good at because the
So now you've got 11 years of this routine.

(33:39):
Shit, so by the time, well, maybe I'm skipping ahead
Yeah, because I wasn't able to tattoo all the time. I had to go to the hole for
six years. And so I didn't tattoo for
assaults. I got caught with the phone. They
send you, it's called Supermax. It's isolation, 24 hours.

(34:02):
You sat isolated, no contact with
anyone, but maybe someone brings you food or whatever for six years.
I mean, my whole body is just, I don't know how the feeling I'm
having right now. Man, dude, you must be a strong minded

(34:23):
But you endured that, and what you endure calculates your strength. What
you've been through calculates your strength. So what
might seem difficult to somebody probably wouldn't seem very difficult to
I would be losing my mind after three days. And
Try six years. The initial, the intake where you go in there and

(34:44):
you see, it's dead quiet, dude. There's no souls in
there. It's death row. And it's actually,
I don't mind the time there. It's actually okay. It's
How do you fill the time you get I get a routine and
then see that let you out to work out Three days a week

(35:07):
you get out for an hour, but these fuckers are jackasses They'll
bring you out at 5 in the morning freezing cold leave you outside
in a room like this with no roof For three or
four hours because they don't want to come back and get you So
like three days a week you get an hour and then so but
two and a half years into the that little stint they started bringing

(35:28):
sellies in and and I actually had a guy that
is a close friend of mine still right now and he's
doing well too. He became my celly and
we kind of rode it out together and you know you get a routine, you wake
up, you eat, you go work out outside or inside, you
clean your whole room, you eat lunch, you

(35:49):
watch a show or two. I used to write a lot of letters and draw. So
I would draw from six at night till midnight every
And when you were drawing, is it still a lot of lettering? Or are
Yeah, people like cards. No, because I just didn't care for it at the time. I

(36:13):
Everybody likes letters. I love you cards. I mean, of course we
would try to draw something like you've seen in a magazine, but it
Damn, dude. Okay, so then you do your
six years in solitary. Now you're back into the regular population.
Now I want to tattoo again, because I was drawing that whole time,

(36:35):
so now I want to start tattooing again. Obviously, I need to
make money. Drawing cards is only five bucks a card. That
only gets you so much. You can draw as many as you can, but tattoos,
you can get up to 20 to 100 bucks or more. It just
So now you're back to tattooing, and you still got another five

(36:55):
years. So that whole five years, you're tattooing
Well, so I went one year on the yard, and
then I did the lockdown, so six, seven, eight,
nine, 10, 11. I got four years left. So I'm on
a max yard because I got the assaults. I
got two staff assaults. I got an inmate assault. You know

(37:15):
what's funny? I didn't really fight a lot in prison, only five fights. throughout
the whole time. Three of them or two of them were with cops.
Hmm. Damn, dude. But now you're getting
a lot of more time tattooing until you get
Right. Yeah. And that's all I want to do. Something in me,

(37:36):
maybe that sitting time, I just wanted to keep doing tattoos. I
didn't like their ideas though. But I just I knew I wanted
to tattoo. I couldn't stand most of the people in there. You know, I
just really couldn't I don't like their mentality I don't like their energy, but
I actually did well in there and I ran with like
more of the I guess you could say higher up

(37:57):
because you're it's your life, you know I really didn't care much when
I came in so I I ran, you know,
not with the lames so obviously, you know people who
got a name in there, and sometimes you'd get people who just, just like
out here, you don't like their ideas, you don't like their tattoos. I didn't do any
political shit, because I just refused to, I never would, I
don't want to, but I did, you know, hang

(38:20):
with those guys, and I
just don't like some of the stuff, skull faces, you know, a lot
of, you know the cell structure? Everybody loved
that shit, man. But I was just like, I'd just rather do some letters.
All right, well, I wanna move on, but unless there's
anything else, we've covered the prison chapter, I think,

(38:43):
right? So now you're a free man. And
I'm assuming you're like, I'm gonna go be
I wanted to. I had a little bit of a tail, probation
tail, and so I had to have a regular job.
My wife's dad is really successful. He builds

(39:03):
dealerships, luxury car lots, homes.
Well, maybe you got out. You're not married at this point, but you meet
Yeah. Well, we skipped a little bit of a chapter. I don't know
So I'm in the hole, right? And I don't
have anybody to write. Everybody who I did talk to, maybe two

(39:24):
or three people, they fell off. It's been three years. They
don't really care. It's over with. I met a guy that I was
tattooing. It was his girlfriend. And
he said, well, we broke up. Do you want a writer? I
said, yeah, I'll write her. You think she'll write me back? And the picture
I saw of her, she looked kind of stuck up, man. She really did.

(39:45):
And I was like, this, she ain't going to write me back. But whatever, I'll waste this last
stamp I have to see if she writes me back. I
wrote her and drew her a little name, you know
what I mean, and sent it out. Three weeks
go by nothing four weeks. I say man. You gave me the wrong address man.
What's up with that dude? He's I know man. She's gonna write you

(40:05):
and I don't know if he wrote her himself To say hey
write the fucker a letter a month and a half goes by
she write I get a letter from her right and I
You know, real quick, I've gotten a few letters from people
from prison who just, I should be writing all these people

(40:28):
back. Isn't that like, I didn't realize the,
I don't know, like it's, it's big. It's a form of compassion. Like
they're looking to connect and you know, and, and
I have written back. Not all of them though. I think a couple fell through the
Well, so here's the thing man a lot of times they're gonna it's

(40:49):
gonna it's just like a cat giving food It's gonna continue and then you
know, it's sometimes worse because if you cut it off, they're gonna be
they maybe turn psycho Risha Rochelle
they sent it my assistants assistant. She was
writing at one time 20 different people and you know She
got into the game. Yeah, so it's like I You know,

(41:10):
once you stop though, everybody's writing more. Why aren't you writing? Then
it's kind of like it pulls something from you and
Maybe the ones I get are just, uh, they're always the
same. It's people in there tattooing and they've seen my
work and they're just kind of like, Hey man, you know, just fishing to

(41:31):
see if, yeah, I'm going to get out soon. I'd love to meet you. Yeah.
I mean you would see the thing is you would give them such a big hope and
even if you didn't Like tell them they have
something waiting for them. They will assume so I don't know. It's kind of hard,
I'm glad I asked you because I always picture they

(41:51):
Yeah a picture of something something cool art related
And maybe say in there, hey, don't expect me to write you back, but I feel for
You could, yeah. You can even get like Vistaprint to do a bunch of postcards. Give
everybody the same one. Hey, did you see, I don't know if we should say
this one, on Jesse James, nah, I'm not even going to talk about it. Do

(42:14):
you remember when he sent a bunch of prisoners a
certain type of porno magazine because they were
Okay, so the white guys... He sent them, I'm assuming, homosexual magazines
Because they were talking shit about him on his channel. Like a bunch of
prisoners were writing hate mail to him. And so he

(42:36):
sent a bunch of those magazines to all those guys in there. Out
Yeah, yeah. I actually, I don't know if you remember Michelle
Bombshell? That's the girl he was with when
he was with Sandra Bullock and he got caught cheating
with her. I did a lot of her tattoos. So
I don't know Jesse, but there's a weird connection. That's

(43:03):
I actually tattooed Len Edmondson. Do you know who that is? He's a biker builder.
He did the biker builder off with the OCC. He's
got the best baggers. Super badass. Very cool. Did
Yeah, so this was in 2009, and

(43:23):
we just started writing letters one a week, one a month, one
a day, two a day, and then until it was just
Yeah, so do the math there. How many years are you guys writing letters before you get out, roughly?
I'm going to have her send me a picture right now. Did
you see that picture? There's a table at

(43:45):
the wedding, this size, with letters up
to here. Wow. So thousands. At
This long term, never met in person. Are
Send me the letters from the wedding. Um,
so it was about six months goes by and she

(44:09):
said, Hey, can I come see you? She was doing criminal justice
at ASU. And so she was interested in that. She still
is. We go to all the prisons, Alcatraz. We've gone to Shawshank. We,
Into everybody's stories. Well, She
was interested in just coming to see it, not really necessarily me.

(44:32):
She wanted to come and be around it. She wanted to see it. So about
six months later, she comes, visits. She liked it. We
hung out all day. And she said, hey, can I come back?
I said, yeah, I have nothing else to do. Let me
check my schedule. Yeah, so like once a month turned
into once a week. two times a weekend, it

(44:53):
just continued. And she said, well, how
do you think a relationship would work? And
I said, well, I mean, it'd probably suck for you,
but this is your life for the next nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, five
years. And she just buckled up.

(45:14):
Well, get hats off to Ashland. That's some real love
No, seriously, yeah. She didn't even know me. I
could be a piece of shit. I could be leading her on. Haven't you seen
that show? Prisoners,
they have a full show dedicated to people who are pen pals.

(45:35):
And the prisoners get out and marry them and then just blow them off. They use them for their money a
lot of times. Or whatever. Sometimes they hang out, whatever. But
9 times out of 10 they just get out and do their own thing. They
Well, she must have been going off her intuition, and her

(46:00):
Oh, man, dude. All right, so that's how you meet your wife. You
get out. You have probation. You have to get a real job.
Well, I was just going to say, let's go through that. I want to know how now you're there.
I can't do it yet, though. They won't allow me to do it. They
wanted me to actually work. I was on not

(46:22):
an STG, but a security threat group type of
thing to where they have monitoring. I
have to monitor everything. Tattooing was not what
they were going to allow me to do. So working with their dad is what I did
He designs and... What do you do? I do construction.

(46:53):
Well, during that time I was reaching out to shop after shop and
just getting the door slammed in my face. So
a lot of people are cool with prison artists, but a lot of people
don't care about them. At least when I started, now
they're accepted. Like Carl Grace. Nobody
wanted me to work there. They don't know because they look at your background They don't know

(47:16):
if I'm gonna steal from they don't know if I'm still doing drugs, which I'd or
anything I don't do drugs or any of that, but they don't know that you
know, I'm on They still watching me. So
like if they are doing something wrong, they don't want me there if my probation's coming
You know, I mean cuz I still even though I did that six months. They
It's crazy um Eventually, one

(47:39):
of my friends who passed away wrote, texted Rochelle,
said, hey, my buddy's looking for a spot to tattoo. And
at the time, she was looking for an apprentice and an artist. She
said, yeah, send him in. So when I got there, Didn't
know she was looking for or I didn't know she was looking for an artist. I
was actually going for an apprentice I was like fuck it. This is the only way I'm gonna get in So

(48:03):
I went for the apprentice job She didn't realize that
and she hired me on as an artist now I'm not saying that like
this because like she she did the wrong thing or like she
just didn't do her Background check or any of that. I kind of lied
to her. Actually. I did lie to her. I told her I had my machines I had told
her I apprenticed I told her I could tattoo she wanted to see my work

(48:23):
But all I had was drawings at the time And I said that they got stolen from
my old shop, right? So she is a good person.
She took me on. It was a trial period, right? But
I went for the apprentice spot. You know what I mean? She
gave me the job and I didn't tell her until a couple years later. So
every day that I'm there, I'm basically doing

(48:47):
free tattoos just to learn on people, because the machines out
here, I did not know how to tattoo with. I
suck, dude. I could not tattoo with these machines. It
was impossible for me. I actually built something that was
more like a prison machine, and I still couldn't do it, dude. It
wasn't working, man. It wasn't, like, have you ever used

(49:08):
one of the homemade ones? No. So you can do it just like a pencil. It
goes in like if you brush. You don't have to put pressure. It's very
Yes. When I'm using these machines, I don't know that
you have to push pressure. So all my stuff is like bouncing off.
Yes. And it wasn't sticking. So for
a solid six months, almost a year, I practice on

(49:31):
And I said, and Rochelle is probably giving you, people are telling you,
They just, They just, I
don't know man, I don't know why. I would ask them for help and they'd just
be like, oh, just keep practicing, man. Because I'm not an
apprentice. They think I'm an artist. I'm from prison, you
know what I mean? I should be good. They like my drawings. So,

(49:54):
I don't know. I would reach out to other people. I reached out to a bunch of
big names. I paid a couple big name artists to watch them tattoo.
on another person, I paid that client's... Pay
for their tattoos so you could sit there, yeah. But I would sit there for like
an hour and I just like, man, I can't do this because
I felt like I was bugging them. I'd pay them and just say, hey,

(50:15):
thank you, and I'd leave. I couldn't get it,
man. I just couldn't get it. I don't know why. It just wasn't happening. I
So that's interesting. That's very interesting. I just couldn't get it,
man. I don't know what it was. It's just interesting because of the work you do now.

(50:36):
Well, there's a light switch that goes on here somewhere.
I want to find it. So when does that light
So I didn't like doing the construction. I hated
it. I'm very thankful. I'm going to put that out there. I'm thankful for the
job and everything that they've done for me. But

(50:58):
I just didn't want to. So I went to the swap meet. I
went to the swap meet, and then Ashlyn would talk shit. She's like,
I can't believe you're there. That's embarrassing. What
are you going to do there? You're not going to make any money, blah, blah, blah. just
in my ear all day, and I would show up Wednesday, Friday,
Saturday, Sunday, I'd go down there tattooing for cheap, man, just

(51:19):
trying to get practice. I eventually go back with
Rochelle, or actually I go to one other place, Extreme Tattoo,
really high-end shop, and tons of walk-ins, I
just didn't like the walk-in style. So I went back to Rochelle, because
I remember I was able to draw whatever I wanted, it wasn't just flash. And

(51:39):
she let me stay there and I was bouncing back and forth. And
that's when I said, well, you're going to let me do something on you? And
she kind of laughed at me, right? Because she's got all realism by
high-end artists. And she's all, you
only do black and gray. You only do letters. And I said, well, what the fuck do you want
to see? And she embarrassed me, kind of. You know what I mean? In front

(52:01):
of my client. And she wasn't doing it on purpose. She just
said, I want to see that. She was just talking to me, but I got embarrassed. So
I found, obviously,
I found him. He was already
By the way, one of Prince's really good friends, now

(52:21):
a good friend, is sitting in studio with us right now, Justin. And
that's who he's referring to off to the side right now. But
so you find Justin, and what happens then? We
You're like really well I knew he wanted color a little bit of color so
I got to practice on him for that But he also always talked about Jokers

(52:42):
and stuff, and I like Jokers So it's kind of realism if we did
a realistic Joker. He wasn't ready for it So I found one
guy who wanted a Hannibal Lecter it took me four days to
tattoo that tattoo this Hannibal Lecter But it came out pretty cool, and
she's like wow I And so I was like, all right,
let's find another one, and then another one, and then another one.

(53:02):
That's interesting. So the jump from
lettering black and gray only to color realism, surrealism,
horror, whatever, all that stuff you do now happened because of
I'm looking at everybody that can't see this. I'm looking
at his phone at all the letters that him and Ashland wrote

(53:27):
There's probably... This is just one table. They have another one this
Yeah, I mean, four years of every day. Wow, dude. Sometimes two
What an interesting, I've been married for 23 years,
been with my wife 25, 26 years. Love her to
death, amazing woman. But
that's just like, that's such an interesting way

(53:51):
to bond with another soul. You know, cause it's, there's
gotta be some depth in the, you know what I mean? To write back and forth with
some, cause when you write, You have to
think about what you're going to say. When you talk, it's good too.
Intimacy, being there in person, talking, looking in their eyes, that's
got its own really powerful way to connect. But

(54:13):
writing's got another one, right? Because you've got to write what you really mean. You've
got to think about it. She has to read it, think about it, write back. So
I look at all these letters and I think about this unique bond
of intimacy that you must have with your wife. It's just
We just argue now, though. You do with letters? You

(54:34):
I'll tell you, sometimes me and my wife get in a fight. I'm like, you go upstairs. I'm
going to stay down here. We're going to text this fight out. Because texting
it out, you can't just spin off as quickly. You
have to actually be like, delete that word, change it up a
Yeah, some of those, or most of them are more, there's five, minimum

(54:58):
five pages, but there's times that she wrote, typed out
Wow, so each letter, I'm looking at all those envelopes, I'm thinking there's a page in each one.
No. My God, dude. There's, yeah, she
was, I mean, she was working full time too, so. There's no fucking book or an
art show or something in there. There's a lot in there, there's still
And what to do with that? You could do a lot of cool

(55:22):
stuff. This is me always thinking about creative
thoughts. Never mind. But there is something powerful there that I
wouldn't know how to unwind that, but I need some time to think
about that. That's different. I've never heard a story quite like that. And I'm sure
you're not the only one. I mean, there's a lot of people in love, married today,
whose relationships went like that for 20 years, maybe.

(55:44):
But I just never... I guess I never thought about it, that that
Yeah. That's interesting. Like I said, you
need something in there and that was light, so it
helped me. Actually, every day it was nice to look
I really was. Do you feel like in your marriage, Because

(56:07):
you know in a healthy marriage the idea is that we're equal and
I owe you what we agreed on and you owe me the same in
return. Do you have moments where you feel like you
I did in the beginning. I'm not saying
that I kept score, but I did feel

(56:28):
like that in the beginning because she does come from a really well-off
Not only what they've done since you've gotten out. That's
That's different than most marriages. Most marriages, you don't look at your wife like,

(56:52):
She knows she quit going to the criminal justice because
of the stuff that she saw me go through in there. Because
Yeah, she's like, I just can't believe how... And that's not for everybody, but
the system, it is what it is. If you got a little bit of money...
Here's a perfect example. I didn't have a

(57:13):
lawyer for the first round, right? Well, for the cell phone case,
they wanted to give me seven years. As soon as I got the lawyer, it
At the tail end of my sentence, 2013. I didn't know it was like

(57:33):
that. Not anymore. They don't charge you anymore and
you can have a tablet or some sort of phone
Damn, that's harsh. That's fucking harsh. Yeah,
that's a whole other, you know, makes me want to go down the corruption side
of the prison system, which I don't know if we have enough time

(57:56):
to go through that. But I mean, I think what you're saying and other stories I've
It's a business, and you got people on one end,
the lawyers that are making money. You've got this huge organization, prison
system organization, where there's massive budgets being
I didn't mean to cut you off. They have a prison, I don't know

(58:19):
what state it is, but an inmate who is doing good
and doesn't have any tickets. Tickets are like when you get in trouble. They
have a class for prisoners to tattoo. Didn't
So they have a skill when they get out. Yeah, it's pretty cool. That is
pretty cool. I mean, that's the point, right? They call prison, you're supposed

(58:40):
to reform people, rehabilitate people. Yeah,
one of the biggest things it's lacking, and I'm sure you agree, is teaching a
or cut hair, but the point is, you get out of prison and you don't have any skills, it's
pretty likely you're gonna go back to prison. Because what's

(59:01):
If you spend enough time, though, most of the people who do a lot of time, they
come out and do well. People going in and out for two or three years, I'm
not saying they can't do good, but they're more likely to go back, but anybody who sat
down for a certain amount of time, they get their head on straight. Maybe
When you have enough time, to kind of sober up,

(59:21):
not from drugs and alcohol, but just to straighten up. Yeah, to
process what happened, to get over it, to start being
like, that's behind me now. I've got to figure out what I'm going to do next. You
might not do that in two years, but you will. Most people more
And a lot of times, sorry, and a lot of times, the people spending a
lot of time have the motivation that somebody out here won't,

(59:43):
so they'll get the job and they'll be successful quicker because
they're hungry. And you know, you gotta understand, I
work for 50 cents in there for cutting hair an hour, or
doing a tattoo for 20 bucks to 100 bucks. You come out here and tattoo,
you can make 2,000 in a day. It's just like, you
know what I mean? You're more hungry to work. I still do six

(01:00:06):
really yeah i was going to get to that because you've been it's hard to
say how long you've been tattooing but what you told me earlier is you would
say six years full-time professional level tattooing
but you obviously have all this other tattooing happening and it's hard to add
all that it is it is maybe a good solid 12 years
but you're a six So, yeah, what

(01:00:28):
am I saying here? I mean, you're tattooing a lot, is what I'm saying.
Six days a week is a heavy load. I
don't even let my tattooers tattoo that. Do they come and try to do that
Yeah, yeah. I get why. I respect it. But, I

(01:00:48):
Yeah, I just, there's, I mean, I couldn't, you
know what I mean? I was having a hard time, so I just figured it'd just work more. Actually,
one artist did tell me tattoo every day, and I listened
I think that person's right. But at some point, a life
balance, if you don't get the life balance... I had that reality

(01:01:09):
checked too. Yeah, because I've, you know, I've owned this
tattoo for 21 years. I've had well
over 100 tattooers come through here. So I've seen this story
kind of happen a lot. And you get guys that are,
and girls that are just that way. And depending on
where they're at, if they're developing, I sort of let it ride. But

(01:01:29):
at some point I'll step in and be like, you've got to exercise. Do
you have a hobby? I noticed you don't spend much time with your wife
and kids. If all that breaks down, if your body breaks
down, your health breaks down, your marriage breaks down, all this work you've
It's not for nothing, but it's a lot of wasted effort. That balance is

(01:01:49):
the optimal place you want to get. And I heard you just
say, You got checked recently, what happened there?
Two years ago, if somebody would have told me that, that would
have been good because I had a pretty big scare. You
don't get up, you don't walk around, you don't drink enough water, you forget. You
work 10 hours and you maybe had a snack. no water

(01:02:11):
and every day that's bad and I would work out so like you're dehydrated.
I had some kidney damage and they're like
It's important and I didn't think it was that important at least for me.

(01:02:33):
because I burn a lot of my
metabolism just burning in my mind, I guess, while I sit here. It's
weird. I don't know why. But anyways, I had
the kidney damage. They freaked me out, man. I
went to two other specialists just because I didn't believe them and
they said, I don't know what to tell you, man. You got pretty bad

(01:02:55):
kidney damage. I don't drink or nothing. I don't do drugs. And
so somebody told me, well, my uncle had that, they
weren't drinking water. And I was like, all right, so
I take all these tests for like six months to nine months to a year. And
they're like, no more protein for you. And I work out so I need protein.
But I'm, I'm, Man, it was bad. It was a rough year. Anyways,

(01:03:17):
it was two years ago. I took out my protein. I
started drinking water and nothing was fixing. The labs were
still bad, showing bad. I was like, all right, I don't know what's going
on. I started doing my own research. Drinking water and
doing 10,000 steps a day turned a
stage three kidney disease to completely nothing.

(01:03:39):
So I didn't have it. I just wasn't drinking water. It was
just like I was drinking every day, like alcohol. So
the doctors told me, okay, your labs are
fine, like nothing's wrong. That's irreversible. And
the only thing I did was drink water and do steps in the day. I was
sitting too much and not drinking water. But for a

(01:04:00):
full year, my body was broke down. I was,
it was, I was struggling, dude. Now I'm fine. I
do, uh, 220 grams of protein a day. I drink a
gallon of water a day, every day, no matter what. And my
labs are perfect. I don't have any kind of diseases there. They're full
of shit. They just didn't take the time to look or find out what, what I

(01:04:21):
Yeah. That's now you're getting into like our Western medicine and
how inept they are at chronic disease.
Well, I don't want to get into that because I'm not a doctor. I
don't know if it's reversible or not. The point being, our Western

(01:04:43):
doctors aren't taught to ask you about your lifestyle. That's
why my wife, she owns a wellness center up in Carlsbad. She
had her own medical issues when she was a young girl. different story
but the western doctors had nothing to offer let her down
her own research she starts figuring her own health out and

(01:05:04):
now she's just uh you know she's like a revolutionary you
know she's fighting a war for people like you like let's come
to her come to her place and the doctor's gonna sit you down and be like All
that. What are you doing every day? That's the first thing I need to know. What are you
eating? What are you smoking? What are you fucking drinking? Let's start
So when I originally, and we can get off this topic, it's

(01:05:26):
not that big a deal. But to your point, I
realized that I needed sleep, I needed water, I
needed to do my steps. I sit too much, but I still do
six days a week, but I just do that and I make sure I do everything right. But
That's interesting though. So you got checked on the life balance issue. You've

(01:05:47):
got your health back in order, still tattooing six
days a week, which still is going to be, there's still a
life balance problem there in my eyes, which is, yeah, you're getting
your water. Yeah, you're getting your exercise, but the human mind
and soul needs nature. It needs love.
So I get 30 minutes of grass in

(01:06:10):
the morning. I do my grounding. I
do that for 30 minutes. I do my steps out there barefoot and do
my workout. I don't know. I'm making excuses to

(01:06:37):
Well, take it from me, 31 year tattooer buddy, I know
I had to catch up, that's my excuse. You caught up, dude, I've seen your portfolio, you
It's time to take a couple, another day off a
week, alright? Trust me, it's gonna benefit
you much more than the working six days a week. But

(01:06:58):
No, no, I know. It's something I'm working on this year. It is. I told myself
it's going to be 10 years in February out of prison. I told myself 10 years
hard work, and then when we get there, then I'll go ahead and relax.
Damn, you're almost there. Man, this
all goes. You know, another thing I'm seeing in you and hearing in you is

(01:07:19):
tattoo artists and artists in general a lot
of times lack discipline and
it's just because they come from lifestyles where discipline wasn't really
always necessary to do okay, to pay their rent
or to feed themselves. You could kind of be undisciplined and
those things still got done. Um, and so when I got

(01:07:40):
in, I was, you know, a lot of people were of that nature and I'd been in the military.
So I came in with this like discipline, you know, I
got up at 5 30 AM. I went to the gym, I
went home and ate healthy food and I worked and I went home at night and you know, I
was disciplined. And it took me far,
quick, because I was just outpacing these people. Nowadays

(01:08:02):
it's different. Now I'm around a lot of disciplined tattooers. But
yeah, you coming in with this level
of discipline you must have, just hearing you say that,
like I said, I'm gonna work my ass off for 10 years, I'm done in February.
Here's my daily logs. I log everything. My

(01:08:24):
food, my workouts, my weight. Because
I take health serious. I know that if I'm not healthy, I can't do this
Yeah, yeah. Your body breaks down. You don't get a tattoo six days
a week anymore. Fuck, man. What
a story, dude. Thank you for sharing that. That's maybe
it is easy for you, but I think for a lot of folks out there, it might not

(01:08:46):
be. But, you know, realize like this is inspirational.
There's a lot of people need to hear a story like that, you know, and apply it to their own
lives when they think they've got it tough and when life is shitting on
them. Hearing a guy like you that spent six years in
solitary confinement. I don't know, man. Maybe you don't got it so tough.
Think about it. Perspective. Let me

(01:09:07):
ask you a little bit about Forgiveness. What
are your feelings towards the people that did these things to
I really don't even think about it. I
never got mad at them. I never went in there in the prison and
said, oh, fuck this. You don't have anger towards them

(01:09:28):
today? No. Not even then,
either. Because actually, I originally put myself in there,
if you think about it, because I ran away and did my own thing. So
I think that's a pretty responsible way to view it, but I
would say you were conditioned to become what

(01:09:56):
I was going to get to that because it's a fucking wild
ride, but would you be who
No, because before them, I really
didn't have I was like,
okay, there's so many different stories in this.
So my very first family, you

(01:10:19):
don't look at people, the kids don't look at the people in
the eyes. When you're getting talked to, you look down. So I
had tons of work with them too. I was getting
abused by them as well. So when they got
me, Was like, you know what dog when you lift the hand and
if you can tell if they've been hit before cuz they go like that Yeah, they couldn't

(01:10:41):
even do that to me and I would do that. So I was kind
of I Don't know the word man. I just really
Well, yeah, I don't know the word either PTSD or whatever
you want to call it. But yeah, you're conditioned that when you're
around adults and get ready to get beat up, or get ready to

(01:11:03):
But I wouldn't even, like this conversation would have never happened at
that age, obviously when I was younger, but I wouldn't talk in class,
I wouldn't talk to anybody, I'd be in the corner, like of the school, I'd
take the farthest, I still like to sit in the corner, but I'd take the farthest
chair away from people so I didn't have to talk, I wouldn't look at people, you
know what I mean? I just, growing up like, and being that person, I wouldn't,

(01:11:25):
How did you get, like sitting here with you today, you're looking me straight
in my eyes, you're talking fantastically, you're
articulate, you're intelligent. Did
it just evolve or did you do something special?
I'd say prison opens you

(01:11:47):
up. There's no bullshit. People are going to call you on a lie. There's
no lying. You get found out real quick. That's
a big thing. I hated being taken advantage
of too, man. When I
was working with those guys, getting taken advantage of, I hated
it. You know what I mean? I felt like I'm

(01:12:07):
a good dude and I would always, even if it was my last couple bucks,
I'd buy somebody, whoever was with me, we'd split the food.
It doesn't matter, but to be taken advantage
like that when you work really hard and you think you've earned something and
you don't get shit for it, it makes you want to stand up and be like,
dude, that's enough. And in prison, I didn't allow that. It

(01:12:31):
So your time in prison, reflecting on all this, you healed yourself,
Yeah, it gave me confidence, man. You
So that kind of leads me to another part of the story that I'm interested in,
which is, you know, I'd like to hear your thoughts around, you
know, I believe that everything

(01:12:53):
that's happened to me in my life was orchestrated
Universe. But I mean, and I say that just based on the crazy
coincidences that have occurred. The first few times I was
like, that's a crazy coincidence. And after like the hundredth time, I'm like, okay
man, this is all specifically custom designed for

(01:13:16):
me. So when you look back on all these events, do you
Yeah, I know for a fact. Like I
said, when I went in, I never once, I mean I had bad
days, but it was actually like I was happy. I
felt like I finally get to live
my life now, start living my life. Because from growing up

(01:13:43):
So that fuck up with the court system that got you to
It was. That's why I said I never got mad. I
never once got mad. I just
You're a unique dude. I mean, I understand you've
made it to where you're at now, but I can't believe there's not a phase of

(01:14:04):
I mean, I hold a lot of anger, I do, but it channeled out differently,
I held it, and a lot of the times it was like, I hated getting hit, you know? I
hated that, I did hate that, but I never got, I don't know why, I never got mad at
him. Of course if, like, I've gotten fights where I fight back
and I'm angry, but I just, I don't know, I just kind of hold it in. And
yes, I do let it out once in a while, but I work out, you know, I try to

(01:14:30):
at least that's what i think i don't know i don't got all the answers still figuring
it out man well me too me too buddy but this is um
what the show is all about you know all of us are trying to figure it
out yeah um but it's it's
rare to meet people that are actively trying to figure
it out yeah a lot of people just live um asleep You

(01:14:58):
I do, I can't. It's hard to sit still. These guys
give... They're like, dude, this guy... I
can show you my itinerary for the two weeks and it's just like, from the
time I wake up, every hour on the hour is it's itinerary.
It's completely set for me to be completely moving

(01:15:19):
Yeah, I hear you too, you're like, I lost 11 years, I gotta
But that goes back to what you're saying, you need to kind of slow down and enjoy because
otherwise it'll go by too fast. So this year, even
just starting now, I'm kind of slowing down and just
The fact you're here, I think what I'm hearing is two years ago you wouldn't have time for this

(01:15:40):
Yeah, I turned down a few people, and they were cool people, they
I saw you. I talked to you. I really thought it was an
awesome, what do
you call it? I don't even know what I was thinking about. Invitation. Awesome

(01:16:03):
I'm honored to have you here, man. You're inspiring me just hearing
your story right now. I'm going to whine a lot less after today, that's
for sure. Let me get, all right. What, what?
No, we covered the forgiveness. I think we did. I'm not sure if I answered it
I mean, I was expecting you to say
something like, I read The Power of Now, or I

(01:16:26):
went to therapy, or I'm a very religious man,
Yeah. I hate asking for help. So,
And I'm really happy to hear that you don't have that resentment. I didn't know if you were
No, I actually talk to my mom every single day now. My real mom.

(01:16:50):
My real dad died, and then my stepdad, the one
that I had issues with, he actually killed himself. You
know what's crazy is we patched things up while I was in prison.
You and the stepdad? Right. And we talked,
and he was fighting cancer. And I got out. I
said, well, I'm going to come see you, man. I want to shake your hand. And

(01:17:13):
the dude broke down and cried. You know what I mean? I
don't know how you got through, you know, he said this cancer is nothing compared
to what you might have been going through. I'm so sorry for what he
It was. And I, um, man, I
just, I thought we had a really good time. He wanted me to tattoo him. So

(01:17:34):
I, I went out there for a week. I, I did a full sleeve
on him. I did some on his back too. And this dude didn't walk around with
the shirt the whole time I was there. Everywhere we went, they had to tell
Full circle, right? Yeah. Coming around full circle and

(01:17:55):
Yeah. It was pretty crazy because he's never, like, you
know, growing up, that dude, he was a cool dude
to my mom, but he just, I don't know if he didn't like me or what,
but anything that ever, any kind of interaction was
just pure hate, it felt like. So

(01:18:18):
Wow. He was making amends. Probably.
Taking accounting of the world he had created for
himself and the effects it had had on everyone around him and probably being
like, I'm going to be going soon, so I'd like to say
But he treated me really good, man. And he treated my mom really

(01:18:43):
Wow, dude. Well, let me ask you, let's
just switch it up a little bit, but what, in your opinion,
Obviously you love tattooing as an art form. Do
So you've done a couple paintings, but you're kind of a tattooer, tattooer,

(01:19:06):
I want to paint. I just, I
don't know, man. Maybe subject matter. I think I
like the challenge. So I don't know. Maybe
My question is, what do you think makes tattoo Special
I just feel like I mean they all have their own challenges, right?
I just think that I don't know man. I

(01:19:29):
just something jaws I just really like the maybe because I like clothing
and appearance So when I see somebody with a really cool piece, it
just looks like jewelry out there, you know or a nice piece of clothing I
don't know. Maybe I'm not saying the right thing. But when I see it, it's just a appealing
and And I just, I really like doing that. Like, I really
like dressing, you know, with the shoes next to the nice shoes. Like

(01:19:51):
a badass sleeve with some really nice shoes on. It looks really good to me. So
I don't know. I just, it just pulled, it just pulled me in. But I'd
want to paint though. I know I keep thinking about painting. I'm going to pull up a painting. But
yeah, I'm just painting. That's it. I tried two times. They came out
good, but I just, I don't know. I guess maybe I didn't make the time for it.

(01:20:14):
Let's talk a little bit about technique. What kind of machines are you using
Yep. I can't use a coil. I know you're probably going to be mad about that.
No, man, I'm all rotary too. Bishop, Bishop, for
So I do have... That's

(01:20:38):
Okay, so he's a builder, and he built a cool machine that I
really liked, and then after years of using it, me and him have made
one to fit me. So I have a different motor, and it's actually smaller,
but it's my design, his build. And
so that's what I use for my color, and it's going to sound funny, but it's a 2.9. that

(01:20:59):
I pack color with. Interesting. Layers. And that's
pretty much all I use. I've bought a new machine. Every time something comes out, I'll
It's working for you, dude. I was looking at some of your work today, on your
friend Justin here, and on... Healed work, yeah. Gosh,

(01:21:21):
Is it Rochelle? Yes. And on Rochelle's legs. And then you were telling
me as I was looking at this work, There's black
He's got the black tribal. She's got other style portraits
Well, I guess what I'm getting at is your inks, right? So I use
Revolution Ink, Nico Hurtado's ink. It's

(01:21:44):
new to me. I've only been using it for a few months now. I love it.
And I have tried everything. And I kept, over the years, going back
to my... I have seven different brands. I like the yellow from this
one. I like the white. And I haven't found any, I just
think it's gonna be my ink until the end of my career. And then I found out when
you got here, you use Revolution as well. And

(01:22:04):
I'm just like, and you're telling me you're packing white, and I'm looking at
it healed too, over black tribal, and
I'm just like, how the fuck? Are you doing more
Sometimes it'll take two, but a lot of times one. He sits good
too, so that's a big thing. I

(01:22:26):
appreciate you guys taking care of me as well. For
me it works, it just goes in and I think it's because it's a lot
of muted colors and I work with muted so I guess I understand the
way to lay them next to each other. Sometimes when I use a more of
a brighter color it looks a little bit waxy and I
can't get the same appearance

(01:22:49):
I agree. Revolution Ink settles into the skin and the
skin looks like normal skin again. I've used some other brands that
it's almost like you're looking at plastic or something under skin.
I get what you mean by that. It might be brighter and a lot of people might say
that's what makes it better. I like the inks, it's
settled into the skin and it looks like natural skin with

(01:23:14):
Another thing I don't like though on some of the other brands
and not to knock them down because everybody has at least
a few colors that really work because you know they've been around they know it works
but I don't see the
red popping through a lot of his colors. Do
you know what I mean? Like when I'm putting in that white, it just looks like white.

(01:23:36):
It doesn't look like it's popping through. Like the red dotty look,
Yeah. I got to put a couple layers in when I initially put
it in, but yeah, it settles. That white is just in

(01:23:57):
Fuck yeah, that's dope. I mean, what do you think about all this talk in
You know, I see a lot of it come and go. I just think it's trying
There's a lot of countries right now. You cannot use, I don't know, every

(01:24:22):
Yeah, they're doing some studies on a lot of the
inks. I don't know enough about this. Maybe
they're just studying the really shitty ones that are coming in from China, which
gives them the right to say, we have found these bad things
in these reds and blues, so no one can use reds and blues,
but are they really looking at Niko's stuff, which is handmade here

(01:24:45):
in the States? Are they analyzing his stuff? And I don't know the answer
to that question. I
don't trust our government, to be honest. And
then I think of guys like you, and me too. I mean, I'm

(01:25:05):
Thank you. But the point is, if they do
it here, well, you're probably just going to get super good at black and
Yeah. So I'm thinking it's just kind of like the, just like
pre-workouts and stuff like that. Sometimes, you know, they'll get
banned because they have a certain green, then they find a way around it.
Just like, just like a beast mode. Um, do you, have

(01:25:28):
So for a while they couldn't get any of the ingredients, but now they got it and they're
back and they, they changed something and now it's okay to use. Yeah.
Yeah, I get you saying they're going to ban it, all the ink
manufacturers will have to go back, do it a different way, and
then boom, we get our ink back. Yeah, I'm going
Yeah, I did read into it, but I thought it was just more or less like

(01:25:51):
it'll shut down and come back, because I thought they had a petition that people were
Well, dude, thank
you so much for your story. What are you looking for over

(01:26:14):
Yeah. It's not
as... Anyways, do you have time for a little
So in school, right, I didn't get to graduate. I
had good grades, but I was actually low
in on an elective. And electives aren't that big of a deal, right?

(01:26:36):
It's like, you're getting good in math and reading and history and
So let me ask you this. Do you think that you should not be able to walk senior
That's a good question. I mean, my auto response would be

(01:26:57):
And I felt the same. So I was D
minus in a class and it was elective. I didn't really care. I always showed up
late. I always had an issue with the teacher. We didn't really see eye to
eye. You know,
they used to put your name and the grades
on the wall. I don't know if they do that anymore. They probably send a text. But

(01:27:17):
I had a D-, so I thought it was cool. You know, I was getting ready to walk senior
year. And a week later, I
got an F. You know, these are last grades. There's nothing left.
You know, this is your grade. You don't get to walk. So I said, I pulled
the paper off the thing. I said, hey, what's up with this? She's all,
you're failing. I said, well, what can I do? Can you give me some extra

(01:27:39):
credit? And she's like, I'm not going to talk to you right now about this. You
know, you don't listen to me in class. We're not going to talk right now. I said,
what the fuck? Like, OK. I
sat back down, and it was just stirring in my head. I'm like, I walk
back up, I say, hey, there's got to be something I can do. I'm doing
A's and B's in all these other classes, right? You're the only
class that I'm feeling. Isn't that kind of weird? So you talk too much,

(01:28:02):
you're always late, and you're giving me a hard time. I said, that's
just personal stuff. Give me something to make my grade
better so I can at least try. There's nothing I can do
for you. I said, fuck you. She called up the
principal and I was already out the door. I said, fuck this. Because you
know you have to go to summer school, right? If you don't graduate.

(01:28:23):
But I wanted to walk, so what does it matter? I'm not gonna go. I
start walking, security comes, picks me up. We gotta take
you to the principal's office. All right, cool. I
get down to the principal's office and he sits
me out front. He's talking to her, trying to figure out what's going on. Calls me
in, he says, hey, You know, I don't know what's going on. I don't
know your relationship. I said, last week I had a D minus. That's passing, right?

(01:28:46):
And he said, yeah. I'm at a F right now. I
didn't do nothing. Nothing happened from that day to this day. And
I guess I showed up late. So that's, like, where's it go? On conduct, maybe?
I don't know. I don't know how school does it. So that's a mark off
of my conduct. So that goes as a grade. He says, I can't
do anything. I said, you're the fucking principal. He said, dude, don't talk to me like that. I

(01:29:07):
said, look man, I just want to walk. I've worked
hard. I have A's and B's except for this class. I want
to walk. I'm not coming to summer school. So if you're telling me right now that I'm going to keep
this F, then I'm out of here. He
calls her back. I sit outside. He calls me back in. Nothing
he can do. This is her decision. She is the teacher. I

(01:29:28):
could maybe override it, but you're walking in three weeks or
whatever. You know what I mean? What are you going to do to change it? If
I kick you out of the class, that's more conduct. Just
give me a project or something that I can do to maybe bring up
my grade. He says, I'm sorry, man. Summer school
is what we have for you. I said, fuck you. I got up out of my

(01:29:49):
chair, right? And he goes to put his hand on my shoulder.
And at this time, I was just ran away from
the family. I'm still kind of like a lot
of animosity. You know, I'm living with a new girl. The family's
all into drugs and stuff. So I'm kind of like leaning into the,
not gangster, but like a rougher crowd. He

(01:30:09):
grabs me on the shoulder. I say, man, don't fucking touch me, man. He said, Prince,
what's wrong with you, man? I'm like, dude, are you
going to give me something I can bring my grade up or not? He
said, I just told you I can't. I said, well, I'm fucking out of here. I
turn around. He grabs me again. We start fighting. Right?
No, I'm definitely, I don't get to graduate. I

(01:30:32):
told him, when he came out to the cop car, I said, hey man, I don't
understand what's going on. You're such a good kid, you're good grades. I
said, dude, I'm never gonna use that fucking class ever. Why
the fuck does it matter? I'll never use that class. I
went to, not jail, prison. I went to jail as
a kid for a couple months. Got probation, got

(01:30:54):
Art. Art. I'm just gonna say it actually. That's
That's ironic. And it's also, oh man,
people gotta be more compassionate, you
It's like, man, I was late, yes. But

(01:31:15):
I'm not with you, like, dude, Art shouldn't be
the reason you don't walk. And it's funny that today you're a famous artist.
That's a good one. Hey, whatever man, it goes back to
originally what I said, like that occurred, which drove
you further towards bad behavior, which got you
to prison. Push me. In a weird way, that principle was

(01:31:37):
the key moment to saving you. That
Yeah, it would just be more like bullshit, you
You were going that way anyway. Regardless of graduating high school, you were going
Yeah, but I wanted to because when I set a goal, I actually do. I'm

(01:32:01):
super hyper fixated on whatever. It
doesn't matter what it is. I always try to accomplish the goal, and
that was a goal. I got a GED, but
that's just so crazy that I told him I would never use this in my life.
You kind of do. I do every single day. Life

(01:32:21):
loves to do that to us. I've had a few of those where I'm just
like, I know exactly what's going on and then life circumstances
change and I have to later go, I was completely wrong
You get older, you start listening more. And if you don't
listen, the universe loves to, I listen carefully now because

(01:32:44):
I've seen the times when I didn't listen, it was giving me hints.
And I look back and I could see those hints, but I didn't listen. And
then the price or the punishment got worse. Life
delivered me something that was even more. Oh yeah, because you weren't listening. Exactly.
So now I listen more. I'm like, what do you want, man? I'll do it. I just don't
want any more pain or less pain. Well

(01:33:06):
man, I just think your story is beautiful. I
think it's again a story of amazing redemption. You
know, I want to say I really respect what
you've done with your life. You could have easily not. A
lot of people in your shoes wouldn't have. You'd have every excuse in the world to
be a loser you know you can blame those people you can blame the

(01:33:26):
system you can blame that principal you can blame that teacher you're
not blaming anybody you're going out and taking control of your own
actions what's next i mean i mean i did hear sounds
like a new life balance chapter is opening up
Well, everybody keeps hitting
me about the machine, and so I actually am

(01:33:50):
going to create something. It's what I use, so
I'm not saying it's the best, but everybody, like I'm telling
you, every time I go to a show, they always want to know what it is I'm using, and
they want one. I have a
bunch of prototypes because it took like three or four years and it'd probably take a couple
more to really nail it down to the way that

(01:34:10):
it worked for other people as well. But for me, this works out perfect and
I think that we will create something. Whether it goes
big or not, I don't really care. That's my project I'll
probably be working on because so many people want one. It's
crazy. I want to try one. They're
really tiny, man. I had to make something that I was used to, like small, like

(01:34:32):
the prison machine. So I made it really tiny. But I
mean, it just buries color. It just, it
pours it in, it like shovels. It's effortless. I could do
No springs, it's... Direct drive. Yes. I
had my guy send me all the info, because I don't

(01:34:55):
know the specs, I just know what I like. So as far as
like 2.9 throw, it's got very little
grip, very little give. So some people don't like that,
Well, that's what I work with. They work with Bishop, they're all... Yeah, yeah,
But I don't use a 2, something below 3 for my color work.

(01:35:21):
Yeah, it's direct drive. It's vertical rotary. I
got Mind Games, actually. We
haven't signed yet, but we're going to work with them. And
they actually, a luxury clone, start at like $500, but
they're really nice. And it's a chess set. So each clone is
a piece to a chess set on a board. It's like a collector's type

(01:35:43):
of thing. So if somebody collects a clone in their niche, that's
A unique way of doing it. That's cool. That's really cool.
I love Clone. I love Chess. You'll have to give me some of that. Right
on, man. Well, let me ask you, where can people find
Mostly Instagram. I do the TikTok and stuff, but... Are

(01:36:04):
Oh, okay. Yeah. Can they DM you for a tattoo? Yeah.
I usually try to cut it off at three months because I do like a
two week trip wherever and then I get back to work. So three
months give or take and I keep open days sporadically just

(01:36:26):
in case when I'm back from travel if somebody wants to come in. Most
Well, your level, that's pretty common. When you do
Shows, a couple of different shows. We got Vegas in three weeks and
then possibly All Stars, I'm not sure

(01:36:49):
Very cool. Well, buddy, thank you for sharing your story. Thank
I really appreciate you as well. And everybody out there, if you're
into color realism, surrealism, horror-related themes,
it doesn't have to be, but this guy is what I would probably
call a master. Thank you. In a very short amount of

(01:37:09):
time, kind of shocking. It really is very shocking, but
I think I know why now, because that was my biggest thing I wanted to figure out about you today
is in that short of time, how did you get this good? And now I know you
just worked twice as much as everybody else. So that six
years of pro tattooing, I would call it 12 in a normal human's
life. So thank you for all your time

(01:37:30):
and everybody watching. Thanks for tuning in. Keep
those DMs and subscriptions coming, especially the
DMs and well, the subscriptions too. You guys
have been so kind and giving me a lot of motivation to keep doing the
show. I really am so grateful for that and
appreciate you for that. Thanks for tuning in and we'll see you on