Art on the Edge of Rebellion with Spike Moore

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Have you ever found yourself mesmerized by the intricate dance of a tattoo needle, or wondered about the stories etched in ink on someone's skin? Spike Moore, a maestro of tattooing and a shop owner with a wealth of knowledge, joins us to unravel the rich tapestry behind the art form that's become a symbol of identity for many. Step into Spike's world where Japanese back pieces win awards and where 'adult tattoos' are a testament to an individual's lifetime journey, each design resonating with an unspoken narrative that lasts beyond the buzz of the tattoo gun.

In a culture where tattoos once screamed rebellion, we trace the evolution from underground badges of honor to mainstream expressions of the self. Through the tales of Midwest ink enthusiasts from the 80s and 90s, to my own rite of passage within the buzzing walls of a local tattoo shop, we reminisce about the days when being a 'shop rat' meant more than just hanging around. Spike and I dissect the delicate balance of customer service, where the dance between an artist's vision and a client's dream can either harmonize in beauty or clash in disappointment, and the ever-present challenge of cultural appropriation within the inked lines.

Lean in as we close our session on a note of inspiration, discussing the power of mentorship and the profound effect of paying it forward. Spike, with gracious acknowledgment of those who've paved his path, speaks to the soul of the tattoo community—its collective effort to uplift and evolve. From the significance of supporting fellow artists to the sustainable practices that will shape the future of tattooing, we share a commitment to not just bear witness to change but to actively participate in it. Join us, not just for a conversation about tattoos, but for an exploration of a subculture that continues to redefine itself with every generation.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Good afternoon, good afternoon.
Good afternoon, we're on BZPodcast.
I'm excited, are you?

Speaker 2 (00:12):
excited AB.
I am very excited.
We're out here in Temecula,california, 78 degrees at
Captain Tattoo.
It's our first field trip forthe podcast.
It's very exciting.
I got one of my buddies, spikeMoore, tattooer for over 20
years, shop owner and also ownsa supply company.

(00:33):
He's currently the owner andtattooing at Captain Tattoo in
Temecula and he's the CEO of hissupply company Barely yeah,
with that great intro, is thereanything else you'd like to
throw in there?

Speaker 1 (00:52):
No, no, I'm good.
I think that's enough.

Speaker 3 (00:56):
The rest will speak for itself, I'm sure, oh yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
So how are you doing today, man?

Speaker 3 (01:02):
Good Good, just getting back from a convention.
As usual, it's conventionseason, so yeah, how was it in
Arizona this time?
No, this one was El.

Speaker 2 (01:10):
Centro, El Centro, okay yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:12):
Imperial Valley Good tacos Right on.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
How's that Nice Mexican people?
It's 100 degrees all the time.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
It was good.
Yeah, it's a small show, butit's quality, quality over
quantity, would you say eachconvention has a different vibe.
Absolutely, yeah, okay, muchlike each tattoo shop has its
own vibe.
Yeah, some are cool some arenot cool, some are you know
business, some are homie.
Hangs like remember music yeah,no one made money in music.

(01:40):
Everyone went there to dococaine and hang out and fucking
wait for NoFX to play.

Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yeah, I went to one music.
That was my first conventionand I remember the game, the
rapper, he was mad dogging me.

Speaker 1 (01:51):
He was mad dogging me , yeah yeah, I was like you look
like something popular, I don'tknow.
Yeah, yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
I'm with Spooky.
You know, yeah, yeah, yeah, andyou know Spooky look crazy.
So you know I'm in good company, I'm around my brothers and
stuff he's dogging.
I'm like, yeah, he doesn't know.
I have people jumping out ofbooths ready to defend me and
shit.
Anyways, Did you win any awardsout?

Speaker 1 (02:16):
there, I won one, yes .

Speaker 3 (02:18):
Okay, what category was that Large color Nice?

Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah, we were talking about it a little bit earlier.
That was a big back piece.
Oh yeah, back piece.
Yeah, yeah, japanese, yes,correct, yeah, what would you
say?
What's your strong point?
What's your art that you fuckwith the most?

Speaker 3 (02:40):
Well, I mean honestly , when people ask what.

Speaker 2 (02:42):
I do, I tell them my tattoo yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:44):
You know I'm a jack of all trades, master of none.
But if I had to say, my focuswould be on tattoos that look
like tattoos, so like Americantraditional, Japanese
traditional, anything that'sjust kind of bold, strong, you
know, colorful usually.
I mean I do black and gray too,but I'm more known for color.

(03:04):
I see you rolling out the backpieces lately yeah, try and try
to build a legacy, you know, Imean at some point in time.
You know, all these littletattoos are cool and they pay
the bills, but they don't.
You know, they don't cement youas like a who's who tattoo or
whatever.
You know, just trying to dostuff that's a bigger working
more collectors, try to attractmore collectors.

(03:26):
You know, if people don't seeyou doing it, they don't know
you can do it.
It's like your portfolio.
So I'm just trying to build abigger portfolio of bigger
pieces, now that I'm at thatpoint where, like, I kind of
understand how to design them,how to tattoo them, how to
shepherd people through theexperience, because, I mean,
you're scabby and itchy andbroke for a year.
You know that experience,because I mean, you're scabby

(03:46):
and itchy and broke for a year.
Oh yeah, you know that's a backpiece.
You know that's, that'sliterally what it is like.

Speaker 2 (03:49):
Every month you're going to be healing a session,
maybe two, you know if you'reambitious, and if you're super
ambitious, three you know.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
Because once you get the outline on, you can bounce
around a lot.
You can start on the rightshoulder, you can work to the
freaking butt cheek on the leftside.
You know you can bounce around.
So I mean you can do threesessions in a month.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
It's doable um, so what made japanese your niche
like?
Why did you choose that to beyour style?

Speaker 3 (04:14):
um, I chose that, an american traditional, just
because they're classic, they'rethe the oldest, they're the
least trendy, they're the onesthat in 20, 30 years you're
still stoked on your tattoo.
You know when it comes up toyou in the gym and like oh man,
I remember when those were cool.
You know like no one says thatabout those styles because they
predate electricity, theypredate all tattooing.

(04:38):
Basically, they are the roots,the foundation of tattooing so
it's a heritage, it all camethrough there.
Um, and you know, honestly, atthis point in my career I'm
trying to give people adulttattoos, not trendy not oh cool,
you know, but like that'sprobably going to end up being
considered a trendy tattoo, Iwant something that kind of
lasts the rest of their life,because that's how long your

(04:59):
tattoo stuck with you.
So it's super important to makesure that you give people adult
tattoos, you know I mean, andfor some people that is a hello
kitty tattoo.
Some people are just going to behello kitty lovers their whole
fucking life.
You know like, uh, you know,good autumn, I hope life works
out well for you.
But uh, you know, uh, for themost part I just try to do stuff

(05:21):
that's timeless.
You know, uh, we still look atold italian art, you know, as
being the pinnacle, or, you know, being the foundation of
everything.
You know why can't you havesomething in tattooing that's
kind of looked at the same?
You know, so kind, of therenaissance of the tattoo.
Yeah, I mean the roots of theart form.
You know it's a sacred art form.

(05:42):
I know it's been whored outnowadays and it's here and it's
there and it's on freakingshampoo and bed sheets and
shower curtains and fucking hairgel and whatever.
But like you know that that'llbe gone as soon as there's no
more money left in tattooingwhen the well dries up and the
rest of us, uh, that aretattooing for the right reasons,
are still here and all the kidsleave on to the next trend.

(06:04):
You know, oh, I'm gonna go tosmoke shop, or you know,
whatever the next thing is.
You know, oh, ai, I supportthis.
Ai, I told it everything I knowabout art or whatever.
Uh, you know, we'll still behere doing it.
You know, because those of uswho love it love it for the
right reasons it's kind of likeskateboarding right like the og
skate yeah, before p-rod madeeverything p-rod and everybody

(06:25):
tried to tray, flip like him andwear nikes like him and yeah,
and everybody lost style becausethey were all just trying to
imitate one dude's style yeahyeah, basically yeah or punk
rock or surfing or any of thosethings that have kind of become
super fucking popular.
They're at the olympics now.
Real people don't give a shitabout that, dude, I.

Speaker 2 (06:44):
I think a lot of your interests as far as hip hop and
the style of hip hop, historyand then tattooing are all
tailored to that core heritage,to the value of what it is that
you really like, and that's onething that I just kind of put
together right now.
Like he likes backpack hip hop,you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (07:05):
Core, where they're spitting bars and stuff like
that Because I was trying tofigure, a way to bring hip-hop
into this Well, the lyricalcontent is the important part,
the beat is the second part.
I know there was a point therein the late 90s, early 2000s
where the producers got morepopular than the rappers.
Mm-hmm, you know, you know, djkevin, that's all you needed.

(07:28):
In the beginning of the songyou could spit garbage, you
could be like.
This is why I'm hot for 20minutes afterwards and people
were like yeah, that jam is fire.
Like no, it's not, the beat iscool.

Speaker 2 (07:35):
You know, the lyrics are dog shit, like my kid could
write that, speaking to the coreof what it is that he's
interested in.
You know what I mean.
Um, he's always core value withthe things he goes hard.
You know what I mean.
So is that what's interested in?
You know what I mean.
He's always core value with thethings he goes hard.
You know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
So was that what got you into?
It?
Was the history of tattooing,no, or did you just want to make
money?
Outlaw shit?

Speaker 2 (07:54):
Okay, I'm from the Midwest.

Speaker 3 (07:56):
So people didn't have tattoos.

Speaker 2 (07:59):
Now they show Minnesota.
Right yeah, minnesota.

Speaker 3 (08:01):
Wisconsin is where I was born and raised, so you know
, the first person I ever metthat had a tattoo was this
crazy-ass old lesbian lady namedVera, and she kind of looked
more like a dude than a chick.
It was funny.
But like she's the only personI ever knew that had a tattoo,
for the first probably 15 yearsof my life 20 years of my life

(08:21):
I'd never met anybody else witha tattoo.

Speaker 1 (08:28):
She was the only person I ever saw with a tattoo,
so it's like a social prior ora little bit people.
Yeah, it's the bible yeah, it'sthe bible belt for a reason.

Speaker 3 (08:34):
So, um, yeah, no, I mean, it was kind of the if you
wanted to stick a middle fingerup to the world that was the way
to do it get a tattoo, yeahthat was the way to drop out and
be like I don't give a shitabout anything anyone.
Like fuck you, fuck the world.
Like you know, I'm a punkrocker for real.
Like get a tattoo, you know outhere in california people have
always had tattoos, you know.
I mean, that attitude wasprobably prevalent in like the

(08:55):
40s and 50s out here.
You know it was probably thesame.
People kind of hid theirtattoos if they had them.
Only a certain group of peopleor class of people had them.
You know, if you got one youwere one of those like fuck the
world people.

Speaker 2 (09:07):
Uh you know.
But that changed pretty quicklyout here, way faster than the
midwest midwest is always 20, 30years behind.

Speaker 3 (09:13):
I mean, it's a little faster now.
Instagram, tiktok, all thesethings kind of making it obvious
as to what the new thing is,but back you know, 90s, 80s, 90s
that was not the case.
We were far behind you know.

Speaker 1 (09:25):
So what came first?
Were you getting a tattoo orgetting involved in tattooing?
Getting a tattoo, getting atattoo, that's what, that's what
.

Speaker 3 (09:30):
That's what yeah, so I grew up looking at trans world
and thrasher and, like you know, seeing the punk rock, you know
.
And then mtv came out, you know,and like there was everybody
that was cool had a tattoo,that's right you know, all the
cool rockers, all the cool likeskaters, all the people that
kind of like, had their ownthing going on, had their own
style.
They were tattooed, you know,maybe not heavily, you know, I

(09:52):
mean there was only.
I mean it was like a couple ofguitarists and bands back then
that even had full sleeves.
You know like it was somethingto have a sleeve.
When we'd see somebody with asleeve in the midwest it was
like whoa Cross the street,don't look him in the eye, like
he might be a bad motherfucker,right?
You know like, don't fuck withthat guy.

(10:12):
He's somebody Like he's a realone.
You know, like, nowadays, whatdoes your sleeve mean?
Grandmas come up and ask oh,where'd you get that done, my
son?

Speaker 1 (10:22):
oh, my god, it's, it's not the coach you are but,
where does that transition foryou now, now that you're
creating the legacy?
Was it starting the shop?
So what?

Speaker 3 (10:32):
happened is I.
I got my first tattoo at a shopuh, it was a satellite shop of
don nolan, who I later found outsome super famous, super
influential tattooer.
At the time I had no fuckingclue.
I was clueless.
I was just like tattoos arecool, when I turn 18 I want to
get one.
Come to find out.
I waited until I was 20 to getmy first tattoo, but you know I
was busy doing other shit, I waspoor and you know I was in

(10:54):
between getting kicked out of myhouse and back in and you know,
life was kind of weird at thattime in my life so I didn't get
one right away, uh.
But when I was 20 I went got myfirst tattoo and I just thought
man, this is the coolest fuckingexperience ever.
Like this is, this is wow, likedude.

Speaker 1 (11:08):
This is everything I wanted it to be the shop's scary
, it's dangerous.

Speaker 3 (11:11):
The art is cool.
Uh, the people are cooler, youknow, like they were gods they
were wizards you walk into atattoo shop in the 90s in the
midwest, dude, like you, you'dsay the wrong thing.
They might chase your ass outof there with a gun, knife,
baseball bat or fists like orfist Like you know.
It was a real thing, it was areal place.
Like things were heavy backthen.
There weren't shops.
I had to drive 50 miles to finda shop.

Speaker 2 (11:34):
If you could fucking believe that you can't walk 50
feet without hitting one.
Now, they're like herpes.
You're not going to California.
Yeah, they're like herpes.

Speaker 3 (11:41):
They're popping, you know, but it's a completely
different world I grew up in,you know tattoo wise, so I got a
tattoo two weeks, three weekslater, a month later, and I went
back for another one yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, once I got over
the like.
Okay, you know, because I wasscared of needles going into it,
like I think a lot of peopleare you know right, yeah it's a
huge phobia you know, uh, once Igot over, like oh they're.

(12:04):
You know it sucks, but it's notthat bad Like you can deal with
it.
There's worse things in life.
I was hooked man.
I was hanging out in the shopall the time.
You know, I got three tattoosin my first year.

Speaker 2 (12:20):
You know which back then was kind of a big deal.
Yeah, banned them right out.

Speaker 3 (12:23):
Yeah, most people kind of get one and you know it
was garbage, but I didn't reallythink about it, I just kind of
kept hanging out.
I went to a different shop.
There was a friend of mine saidhey man, this guy tattooed me.
He's in our town, in Red Wing.
Oh okay, crazy cool.
I didn't even know there was ashop there.
You know, you didn't haveInstagram.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
You didn't advertise yeah Shops, kind of just popped
up.

Speaker 3 (12:45):
Yeah, it was word of mouth.

Speaker 1 (12:47):
Yeah, speak easy type .

Speaker 3 (12:49):
Yeah, real underground, real word of mouth.

Speaker 1 (12:51):
You weren't on the front newspaper like hey new
tattoo.

Speaker 3 (12:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
Just opened up.
Yeah, right yeah.

Speaker 3 (12:56):
You kind of kept it on the low.
So when I found out about thatone I went there.
I got his pricing.
I liked his attitude.
He was a little less scary thanthe shop I'd gone to before.
The guy tattooed me His namewas Crazy Dwayne, yeah.

Speaker 1 (13:10):
Kind of find out years later.

Speaker 3 (13:11):
Oh yeah, very out of the park Tattooers don't get
nicknames for no reason.
That's right they fit.
You know like what was thatshit?
Cat Williams said If someonecalls you a, crackhead.
You're, yeah, crazy away forsure, but yeah, so I started
hanging out with this guy, Kevin, and I mean we just became shop
rats, we, you know people don'treally realize anymore, but
there used to be.
there used to be a couple ofdifferent groups of people.

(13:33):
There was like groupies, andthen there was hangarounds and
like I was just a hangaround,you know, I just hung out like,
oh man, you need McDonald's,I'll go get lunch.
Cool my tattoo, you know.
Maybe you know who knows likejust try to work your way in,
you know any way you could.
Oh, I'll go run that errand.
Oh, I'll stay at the shop realquick while you go run an errand
.

Speaker 1 (13:51):
Yeah, you know so who gave you that chance then?
Who gave you the chance kevin?
That was yeah, yeah, so solater he pulled you later.

Speaker 3 (13:58):
He was like hey, if you know anybody that wants to
be a tattooer I really need thehelp and at first, honestly, I
didn't even think of myself.
I thought of somebody else.
I thought of other people.

Speaker 2 (14:07):
And after a while I was just like, why not?

Speaker 3 (14:09):
me Like I draw, I paint, I mean I've been, I've
been drawn on the wall since Iwas old enough to hold a crayon,
you know like.
So I was like fuck it, you know.
And I said, hey, man, I'd liketo.
He's well, you know, we'll see.
Because at the time I worked ata strip club, so I'd get off at
four in the morning and I haveto be to work at 10.
Yeah, for my apprenticeship I'dusually roll it around noon,

(14:31):
much to his chagrin.
It was tough.
I mean, in the first little bitit really kind of, you know,
worked it up to the point whereI could get it.
I became a piercer so I couldmake money because by this,
point I already had collegebills.
I lived on my own, I had a carnote, I had bills like real
bills.
So I needed a way to make moneywhile learning how to tattoo,
because back then it wasn't twoweeks in and you're doing

(14:54):
freaking sleeves already.

Speaker 2 (14:55):
Yeah, no way.
I had to wait two years beforeI was allowed to tattoo.

Speaker 3 (14:59):
So I paid my dues.
I scrubbed tubes, I madeneedles, I made ink and this,
that everything, this, thateverything real traditional
apprenticeship.

Speaker 1 (15:06):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely yeah.

Speaker 3 (15:08):
So you know I wasn't allowed to do shit forever.
You know, I wasn't even allowedto touch machines for the first
like year.
It was crazy, uh, you know, andit just slowly worked, you know
, and uh, well, I mean I.
What attracted me to it reallywas just the, the punk rock, the
outlaw the, so just screw you.
Counterculture attitude thattattooing used to have.

Speaker 1 (15:28):
Now today, has that changed at all?
Oh, absolutely, Now that youown your shop.

Speaker 3 (15:32):
Well, no, no, no.
That's still what I love aboutit.

Speaker 1 (15:34):
The culture has changed, the culture has almost
changed.

Speaker 3 (15:36):
The culture is totally, you know, we're used to
soccer moms and you know allthis soft.
You can't play Slayers, rainand Blood all day anymore.

Speaker 2 (15:47):
You all this soft you can't play slayers.

Speaker 1 (15:48):
Rain and blood all day anymore.

Speaker 3 (15:49):
You know you can't have a motorcycle in pieces in
the front lobby and cocaine andhookers hanging, you know.

Speaker 1 (15:52):
Yeah, it looked down a little bit, yeah that doesn't
fly anymore.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
You know, uh, nobody's really looking for that
kind of a tattoo shop anymore.
So, uh, you know, I still likethe some of the ethos from that.

Speaker 2 (16:04):
Obviously they weren't exactly the friendliest,
I mean customer service isimportant, no matter what you do
.
At the end of the day, what?
People don't understand yourjob is to serve the customer.

Speaker 3 (16:12):
as a tattooer, I think people get this twisted
quite a bit nowadays.
You know they're like well theydon't want to take my advice
and it's like was your adviceany good?
You know like, who are you?
You know what?
What pedigree do you have to begiving a customer advice?
You know, a lot of times thesekids don't know what the fuck
they're talking about.
You know at the end of the day.
Honestly, I look at us andwe're like an art server.

(16:34):
Some people bring you food.
Oh, I'm your server.
Today, I'm your host.
You know I'm going to the soupdu jour.
Is this, you know?
Whatever At the end, of the day.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
I I've always struggled with your opinion upon
that.
For us, I've always struggledwith that.
There is a huge service aspectto our job.

Speaker 3 (16:51):
Without the customer, who are we?

Speaker 2 (16:53):
Right, and without the thing that you need, we have
no job.
You know what I mean.
So he's 100% right.
As much as you know, I hatethat opinion of our job, but
he's 100% right.
You know, without that need,which is just just a tattoo, it
could be a butterfly, it couldbe, because, whatever the fuck
it is that day.
But you're right, we are hereto give you a service.

Speaker 3 (17:14):
Yeah, you know at the end of the day, that's what it
is.
I mean, there's a lot of stuffbetween a and b.
You know, I'm not saying it'sthe straightest of paths or
roads, but uh, at the end of theday, your job is to give
somebody a tattoo.

Speaker 2 (17:27):
You know if they want a bad tattoo that's on them.

Speaker 3 (17:30):
You know, I mean, I used to fight with that.
I used to struggle with this,that trying to talk people into
out of things Like, at the endof the day, you know what, if
they're determined to get a badtattoo, guess what?
It's your job to do a badtattoo or it's your job to tell
them to kick rocks and guesswhat?
They're going to go down thestreet, especially nowadays.
Back in the day you could getaway with telling people to
screw themselves and you know,go good educated, go 50 miles,

(17:52):
find the other shop that's 50miles away from us.
Have them tell you it's afucking dumb idea and then maybe
you'll come back, not anymore.
Now they go 50 feet down thestreet.
Joey freaking, been tattooingtwo weeks.
Guy does their tattoo, does iteven worse than you can do it?

Speaker 2 (18:10):
because even if they, want a bad tattoo, you can
technically do it good.

Speaker 3 (18:12):
You can do the lines clean, you can do the shading
clean, or the lack thereof,it'll heal in a week.
You know it'll do all thethings a good tattoo is supposed
to do.
It'll still just be a badtattoo, you know.
Maybe from a technical asspoint uh maybe they want it
facing backwards.
Maybe they want it in a placewhere in 20 years it's going to
look like crap from aging.

Speaker 2 (18:31):
And that's a game, right there he's giving you guys
.
That was game right there he'sgiving you If you're just
starting, that was game Rewindthat you could do a shitty
tattoo very well and it'll lookbadass.

Speaker 1 (18:43):
But anyways, keep going, I'm sorry, but I do see
the difference now, because inone of our first episodes we
brought that up Brandon did.
Brandon said he usually pushesthose ones away or he talks
about something totallydifferent, right, whereas you're
more.
So okay, we'll give it to you.
Yeah, but this is my opinion onit.

Speaker 3 (19:00):
Yeah, yeah, and you know, I was told, you know,
forewarned is forearmed.
I had a civics teacher preachthat in seventh grade and it
stuck with me.
Hated him, didn't like his classat all, he was kind of a douche
, but that stuck with me.
You know, if you tell somebody,hey, this is a bad idea, it's
going to age terribly, it'sgoing to fall out, whatever you

(19:21):
know, you tell them once, tellthem maybe twice Sometimes.
You know they don't catch itthe first time.
It kind of goes over their head.
They're nervous, they're notpaying attention.

Speaker 2 (19:29):
You know they're bullhead in the head.

Speaker 3 (19:30):
They got the wheel, they're driving the bus right
off the cliff Like, hey, you'regoing off the cliff.
Hey, going off the cliff.
All right, I told you, I warnedyou.
I mean, that's what I'm here todo.
I mean, I hate to say it, it'snot about that, I don't want it
to be about that.
You know, I'd tattoo for freeif I won the lottery.

(19:52):
For sure, absolutely.
I mean, I'd only tattoo whenI'd want to tattoo, but I'd
still tattoo.

Speaker 2 (20:01):
I would never give it up as far as tattooing what you
want to tattoo too.
I remember being in a shop witha lot of artists and I was
tripping on one dude, mike.
He just kept doing gangstershit.
Everything was dope as fuck andI was like bro, who the fuck
are you getting these peoplefrom?
Like, where are they comingfrom?
He's like no, like I justchanged the, the idea, I just

(20:23):
changed the design and thattailored what kind of tattoos
people were, you know, bringingin, you know, like, so, when
people were reaching out for him, it was all within this
specific genre, if you just givethem what the fuck they want.
Yes, sometimes it is that youknow.
But if you just give them whatthey want, then you are limiting
yourself.
I did it for years, for years,just kind of, you know, just

(20:45):
being a walk-in artist and notnecessarily being invested in
the art like I should be orrefining it and putting my own
stamp on it right.

Speaker 1 (20:53):
What would you show people is what they ask for
right, the only thing you can do, what you show them so I've
noticed that here, because I seea lot of that as American,
traditional, neo-traditional.
So so people come in here andthey, they want what's on the
walls, right?

Speaker 3 (21:05):
sometimes I mean still people come in here and
they want what's on the wallsright.
Sometimes I mean still peoplecome in for other stuff.

Speaker 1 (21:09):
We do it, we just don't promote.

Speaker 3 (21:10):
You know we don't what people don't understand is
like my.
Instagram is not real busy andit's because I do everything,
you know.
I mean, maybe I do a black andgray piece.
Is it as awesome as TommyMontoya's?
No, but you know.

Speaker 2 (21:21):
Does that speak?
Speak to longevity withintattooing.
You have almost double myexperience and sometimes I'm
like man, like how am I going todo this for another, like how
do you keep that longevity, howdo you stay relevant?

Speaker 3 (21:34):
well, that's it you got to do, whatever the new
trend is, as much as you mighthate it, as much as you know
it's trendy and you don't wantto give your clients trendy
stuff work.
Hot told me a long time agothat aaron k him aside once and
said hey man, it's a young man'sgame.
You know, get it while you can.
You know younger kids are more.
You know I mean, look at it now.

(21:54):
Instagram when Instagram cameout, the young kids were into it
.
Tiktok came out, the young kidswere into it.
The people my age and tattooingare like, oh, I don't need that
crap.
Now they're all oh, thealgorithm and this, and that
they're all trying to figure itout.
you know like because theyrealize if you don't stay with
what's popular.

Speaker 1 (22:12):
That's your free advertisement right there.
Yeah, there's a lot of pros,but there is a lot of.
You got to learn how to use itWell, that's life.
Yin and yang there's always twosides to every coin there has
to be.
You know, there's no one-sidedcoin in life how do you, how do
you promote so outside oftattooing?
Uh, you got your family life,uh how do you have more like it?

Speaker 3 (22:33):
well, how does that?

Speaker 1 (22:35):
how do you promote the longevity in that direction?

Speaker 3 (22:37):
so longevity honestly boils down to just be willing
to tattoo.
You know, a lot of people Iknow are like, oh, I don't do
the pinterest tattoos and it'slike, okay, well, there goes
half your business Right now.
Let's be honest, that's abouthalf of what people want, you
know.
Let's say what's the average.
About 30% of Americans have onetattoo.
20-ish to 50-ish or so havemultiple, you know.

(23:02):
So look at it that way.
Then go, how many percent ofthose people have like some
little trendy thing?
You know they'd show it on yourphone.
Oh, look at this, I got thislittle idea I want to do.
You know, I mean, granted, doesit fulfill the art side of your
life?
Like, oh, I want to desire tobuild a legacy, and I'll say, no
, it doesn't, but it fills yourcoffers, you know.

(23:22):
And those people can turn intogood clients.
I've had plenty of people getlike a little.
I mean, I've turned Friday the13th clients into leg sleeves.
It's totally doable.
You have to be willing to takethe time and the investment and
show people like look man, I cando this little $20 banger for
you, but here's what I could do,here's what you could have,

(23:44):
here's who you could be.
I feel like I've met a lot ofpeople who have awesome tattoos.
I've been like, oh man, thattattoo is really cool.
Who did it?
And they're kind of upset.
They're like, oh so, and sodown the street did it.

Speaker 1 (23:55):
Whatever you know, I mean not to bring up any names
or whatever, but I've met a lotof people who have awesome
tattoos and they fucking hatethem really it's not what they
wanted.

Speaker 3 (24:03):
Yeah, the artist took it, said okay, you want a wolf?
Okay, cool, well, I'm gonna domy style wolf.
I'm not gonna listen toanything you have to say,
because all I do is me.
You know, and, and I feel likethere's a lot of that in
tattooing, there's a lot of thisentitled art ego.
I mean they kind of 100.
I've never met an artist thatdidn't have a fucking ego.
I mean, that's that's.

Speaker 2 (24:24):
It's based on that there's got to be a line, too,
where it becomes positive inlike some interest interest line
, as we can call it like forsure.

Speaker 3 (24:35):
You know, now I'm interested because, I put this
much into it right well, andyou're always free to turn it
down and send it down the streetor to one of your other guys,
which, when you're an owner, isgreat when you're not an owner,
you're just working for a dude,you know you're.
You either want to make themoney or you don't you know,
you're either willing to say,hey look, I'll compromise what I
normally like to do, you know,to make the money or I won't.

(24:56):
You know, I've worked in shopsthat do both.
I've worked in shops wherepeople just take whatever walks
through the door.
Man, they can't do lettering tosave their soul.
But don't do that name on you,because yeah you know, and then
I've worked at shops where like,hey, we got a guy that
specializes in lettering.
You're going to get a reallyawesome tattoo out of this guy.
When you want a realisticflower, I'm the dude that does
those.
You'll come back and hopefullyyou know everybody shares with

(25:18):
each other.
I've worked in that kind ofenvironment as well, too and I
mean both are successfulenvironments.
There's nothing against eitherone.
I mean as an artist who caresabout the end result more so
than anything, because at theend of the day, the tattoo is
the thing it's not me, it's notmy ego, it's not my trophies,
it's not my shop, it's notanything.
It's is the tattoo good, that's, that's it, you know bottom

(25:41):
line.
That's the most important partso somebody who cares about that
?
you know, I like to be in a shopwhere people kind of share with
each other.
Hey, we got an anime guy.
Hey, we got somebody that'sblack and gray.
Hey, we got somebody doesrealism.
Hell, you wanted it.
You want a skull, an eagle anda sword.
Fuck yeah, dude, all day I gotyou.

Speaker 2 (25:55):
You know, like I'm your guy is there anything in
your current shop today that youfeel like you're trying to add
that you don't have right now asfar as a style?

Speaker 3 (26:04):
not really.
No, I think we're pretty wellversed in covering everything.
I mean there might be some kindof like new thing on the
horizon.
I don't know about that.

Speaker 2 (26:14):
We like a trash polka or steven does trash polka does
he?
Yeah, yeah, we got gang gets todo realism.

Speaker 3 (26:20):
She does the best realism I saw huge glitch
realism.

Speaker 2 (26:26):
I heard the other day , I read something about Glitch
Realism.
It's realism and it's thatglitch where it creates a weird
hue with your eyes.

Speaker 3 (26:35):
Yeah, okay, new to me .

Speaker 2 (26:36):
Right.

Speaker 3 (26:37):
Cool, I'm down for it .
I'm sure we got somebody thatcan figure it out.

Speaker 2 (26:41):
I'm not trying to do that shit.
It sucks to look at when youput those colors in there in
that fashion.

Speaker 3 (26:46):
So here's my thing Realism, all that stuff, pop
culture.

Speaker 2 (26:49):
I don't like it.

Speaker 3 (26:50):
I get why people do it, but to me like, oh, I want
to, I want grandma on my arm.
Like, get a T-shirt withgrandma on it, wear it every day
.

Speaker 2 (26:57):
If you love grandma that much.

Speaker 3 (26:59):
The last thing your girl wants to see when she's
getting you naked is grandmastaring back at her naked is
grandma staring back at her.
Last thing she wants to see isyour kids looking at her
especially if someone else, yeahyou know, the last thing you
want to see when you're pullinga girl skirt up is her grandma,
grandpa, dad or anybody elsestaring at you like what are you
doing with that boner sonny?
yeah like don't do it, it's tome.

(27:21):
I mean, I get why people do it,I totally get it.
You know, I have people in mylife I love enough that given
the right circumstance maybe Iwould take the plunge.
But, to me.
That's just not what a tattoois.
You know, iron man.
You know I got Iron mantattooed on me.
Cool.
What are you going to do whenDisney reboots that shit in 20
years?
It just doesn't.
Oh, you got the old Iron manRight.

Speaker 1 (27:44):
It's such a personal.

Speaker 2 (27:48):
I got an iron man on me.
You know that I was like man.

Speaker 1 (27:52):
Okay, I was more into a nickname I had that was kind
of like a nickname I had, goodgood, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (28:02):
A timeless piece of art, yeah, yeah, so what?

Speaker 3 (28:04):
are going to do when you find out Iron man has a
fucking kiddie porn dungeon?

Speaker 2 (28:08):
Oh shit, he's been to the island.

Speaker 3 (28:11):
Yeah, you know what I'm saying though, like
everybody says oh, my kids aresafe.
Well, you know, hitler'sparents probably thought he was
a real nice guy too, until hewasn't.
You know what I mean.
Like Jeffrey Dahlberg, oh, he'sour great little baby.
You know, I could get his nametattooed on me or his face.
And then what?

Speaker 1 (28:28):
Then what you know like.
So what do?

Speaker 2 (28:29):
you say you must think you're a parent of the
century.
You don't like portraits at all.
Are you learning something?

Speaker 3 (28:34):
right now, huh Are you learning something about him
.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's new tome.
I'm okay with people doing ityeah, exactly, that's spike's
daughter.

Speaker 2 (28:43):
She's been chilling in that episode super quiet.

Speaker 1 (28:47):
We got a little route .
We'll keep you down, sorry.

Speaker 3 (28:48):
Sorry, we'll keep you down, my bad so, uh, you know,
I just, I I get why people dothem.
I think that it's amazing thatpeople can do them to the
quality they can do them.
It's fucking unreal.
It looks like a photo, you know.
Uh, I just don't agree with thereason for getting it.
I think it's better served asas a poster.
Like Iron man, get that t-shirt, dude.
They make a million differentt-shirts, iron man.

(29:09):
They got that special editionNikes in that same color,
everything.
You know what I mean.
But, like, don't put it in yourskin.
It's not something you shouldcarry to the grave with you.
I think things need to be moreimportant than that, or maybe
they don't you know, or maybethey don't.

Speaker 2 (29:26):
So how do you feel about cultural tattoos then?
Like, with that said, if youare not within the culture,
should you be getting the tattooright?
That's a.
That's a.
That's a rough one, right?
So you can't celebrate othercultures because if you do
japanese, isn't that human onhuman culture a caucasian dude.
So what isn't that?

Speaker 3 (29:43):
the same fucking thing, you know no because
you're not a japanese dudeyou're not giving it to them for
the same reason, maybe you'renot putting the signature in
there you know it's obviously anamerican japanese tattoo.
It's not a japanese, I'm nottrying to be horyoshi 3,
horyoshi 2.
I'm just copying what they,what they did.
You know, I'm paying homage toit, I'm paying honor to it as a

(30:05):
tradition, as a cultural thing.
You tattooed in Hawaii.

Speaker 2 (30:09):
I'm going to push this a little bit more.
You tattooed in Hawaii.

Speaker 3 (30:12):
I have a Polynesian tattoo, okay.

Speaker 2 (30:14):
You come in somebody's on vacation and they
come into your shop and they'relike hey brother.

Speaker 3 (30:18):
Yeah, you give them the white version.
You give them the Howie versionWith the turtle.
You give them the shit thatsays you're from a certain part
of the island, you're uh, uh,your amakua is a certain thing.
You don't give them none ofthat.
You give them.
You give them the sticker.
You give them the sticker theyput on the back of their car to
say I went to hawaii once, I hada vacation, I party is there

(30:38):
beef for people who do thetattoos, polynesian tattoos is
there like a hatred from thepolynesian side?
of things to people they used togive us.
When I worked there, the localbrattas that I worked with would
always like give me the whitedudes that were on vacation.

Speaker 2 (30:52):
Mm-hmm, yeah, like, hold on this one, you own guns,
yeah, oh this holly boy he wantsto get.

Speaker 1 (31:02):
You've given us a lot of instances where you were
able to put the ego aside is whyyou mentioned earlier uh, if
you want to be an artist andbang out tattoos you gotta put
the ego aside, was there?

Speaker 3 (31:12):
ever times where you couldn't put that ego aside all
the time, yeah, at the beginningof my career, oh, yeah, yeah, I
wanted to change everything.
I wanted to do my own version.
I wanted to change the game Iwanted to make tattoos that
looked more like my paintings,because I feel like I've always
been a painter who tattoos, nota tattooer who paints.
Yeah, um, but yeah, you know,yeah, definitely, it took 20

(31:33):
years to get over it.
It took 20 years plus to figureout.
Like you know, hey, this isn'tabout you, this is about your
clients.
You know, like it's the samething as like bringing back to
tribal tattoos the coming, someof the oldest origins.
It was a rite of passage, it wassomething that you endured with
a person A lot of times incultures.
The tattooer and the tattooeewould fast for days, they would

(31:57):
not leave a hut, they would sitthere and meditate and think
about the process that was aboutto happen.
Now it's like hey, man, I got ahundred bucks, I want to party,
I want to look cool, I want tocool the gym tomorrow.
You know it's a totallydifferent thing.
But if you go back and you wantto honor those older kind of
reasons for getting tattooed,you know yeah, you start
thinking about it in a differentlight, in a more serious light.

(32:18):
You know and you learn to putyour ego aside because it's not
about you it's about their riteof passage, it's about their
coming into manhood or womanhoodor whatever they're trying to
memorialize, or maybe they justwant a little fucking cool gym
tomorrow.

Speaker 1 (32:32):
I love the way you said that, because if you are
willing to, that's probably oneof the best things.
If you are willing to put thetime in to get to know your
artist and and to build that itdoes become, uh a lifelong
relationship.

Speaker 3 (32:48):
I'm friends with a lot of my clients, still to this
day.
Yeah, absolutely yeah.
Yeah, it's sacred.
People don't understand thatperson is going to take that
with you your bad day, yourfight with your girl, your fight
with your man, your daughter,whatever, none of that matters,
dude.

Speaker 2 (33:05):
What matters?

Speaker 3 (33:06):
is execute the tattoo .
But also, the execution of thetattoo is only half of the game.
Like people get it twisted,they put on their headphones and
they ignore them and they justdo their thing, because that's
how I get in the zone.
It's like, bro, you're ignoringthe person, you're ignoring
their experience, you'reignoring their suffering.
You're ignoring half of whatthe experience is.

(33:26):
You know your job is toentertain them.
You know I mean it's.
They could have went to thebeach today.
Instead, they could have wentto the concert, they could have
went and saw the new Iron man orwhatever.
The hot new movie is Not tobring that up, but you know they
could have did something else.
Instead they chose you fortheir day's entertainment.
You know partially.

Speaker 1 (33:47):
Oh yeah, you know.

Speaker 3 (33:48):
So you better have some jokes.
You better ask them somequestions.
You know, act like you care.
Act like you care about thepeople who are paying your bills
.
You know, at the end of the day, you see all these kids and
they're tagging Bishop andKingpin and Taxol and Bounty and
Starbucks and all thesecompanies.
They want to sponsor them.
You know who your sponsors areyour fucking clients, the people

(34:09):
that pay your actual bills.
Bishop don't pay your bills.
I don't care how sponsored youare by them, they ain't paying
for shit.
Dude, they might give you awholesale discount.
Yeah, trust me, I get wholesale.
They don't give their sponsorartists wholesale.
They pretend to give themwholesale.

Speaker 1 (34:24):
That's got to come from experience too.

Speaker 3 (34:26):
They, they pretend to give them wholesale.
That's that.
Guy comes from experience too.
It's they put in the hoe, inwholesale.
Yeah, they be hoeing thesepeople out.

Speaker 2 (34:31):
You do your advertising for me.

Speaker 3 (34:32):
You do this, you do that.
You use our products.

Speaker 2 (34:34):
Don't use anybody else's stuff being a supplier um
with your supply company.
I know you have artists thatyou work with.
How do you help them?
How to, as a supply company?
How do you help a tattoo artist?

Speaker 3 (34:46):
so basically right now we're super small.
We don't really do sponsorships.
What we have are kind of likepartnerships.
So we ask that those people,kind of like you know, promote
us in certain situations usuallyconventions.
For that we give them free, wegive them in caps, we give them
all the basic stuff they need totattoo with at that show.
We send them a box.
All you got to do is throw yourbox in your suitcase.
You're ready to go, you gotyour, all your disposables, all

(35:10):
your prevention, you know allthat stuff.
All you really need are yourgloves, ink and your needles and
your machines, or mushing ifyou're a dildo user.

Speaker 2 (35:20):
So uh, right, yeah, so I do have a few profile
questions.

Speaker 1 (35:24):
I do have a few profile questions.

Speaker 2 (35:26):
I do have a few profile questions that I'm going
to do with all the tattooartists and owners.
So coils or wand.

Speaker 3 (35:34):
I mean both.
A warrior understands allweapons of war.
An artist understands all thetools of art.
Now, does that mean that youshould or shouldn't?
I mean it's personal preference, I mean whatever gets the job
done.
At the end of the day, thequality of the tattoo is what
matters.
Now, if you want to take itdeeper, like I do, and you want

(35:55):
to support tattooing, then youwant to buy stuff made by
tattooers.
Right Too short said.
Spend your money in the ghetto.

Speaker 2 (36:01):
Right, keep your money in the ghetto.
That's how the ghetto grows up.

Speaker 3 (36:04):
That's how you become , that's how you move on.
You know you don't move on bygiving McDonald's your money.
You know you go to the localburger joint the guy who's
struggling and you spend yourmoney there.
So you know, when you buy allthese you know Chinese things
you're supporting China.
You know I, I got nothingagainst the Chinese people, the
Chinese government, I could dowithout.

(36:24):
I don't agree with how they runtheir things and unfortunately
over there they're intrinsicallylinked.
There's no separating the two,as much as you want to say hey,
my money is not going to supportcommunism, it absolutely is.
It's supporting all the thingsthey do, the Uyghurs, all these,
it's a whole.
It's another howl hour podcastabout all that crap.
But you really are spendingyour money on that.

(36:45):
You know you're spending yourmoney on stuff that doesn't last
.
It ends up in a landfill.
You know, if you, if you've gotanything with a lithium battery
in it, you're supporting, uh,people in the congo being slave
labored for pennies on thedollar by china.
It's terrible.
It's horrible when you look atit.
You know, when you really digdeep, you won't like what you
find.
No, that's right.
You know, when you look at acoil machine made by a tattooer.

(37:07):
You know you might not like thetattooer, you know.

Speaker 1 (37:11):
But at the end of the day.

Speaker 3 (37:12):
That's as bad as it can be.
Well, I don't like him, I don'tlike his politics.
Yeah, you know.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
Cartridge or on bar.

Speaker 3 (37:19):
Both, I mean.
Once again, you should befamiliar with all the tools you
should.
You should be familiar with all, all the tools numbing cream or
no numbing cream?
I mean, there's a time and aplace for it.
Um, you know, if you're gettingyour first tattoo on your bicep
, get the fuck out of here,absolutely not.

(37:39):
You know, if you're a collectorand you're covered and your
butt cheeks are coming up andthey're just too sensitive and
you can't sit still, or the backof your knee, or you know, your
stomach, or, like your innercrotch area on your pay, or
something you're trying to fityou know, then, sure, why not?
I don't think it's terrible.
I mean, I get.

(38:00):
People are totally against it.
You should experience it, nomatter what.
You know I've never used it.
Will I ever?

Speaker 2 (38:07):
I don't know I don't think so.

Speaker 3 (38:08):
I think I'm gonna try and tough it out.

Speaker 2 (38:11):
I always call you and I'm like hey, man, how's your
shop doing?
I I temperature check is what Icall it.
I try and call around othershops and see how everybody's
doing, to see what the industryis doing, to try and tell where
it's going to go, what's going,how it's going to shift.
I call upon my friends me andSpike talk often when is the

(38:37):
industry at in your mindset,right?

Speaker 3 (38:38):
now for today, and where do you think that it's
headed?
I think the future is kind ofuncertain to a certain extent.
The extreme popularity can'tlast forever.
Uh like anything, everythinggoes up.
What goes up must come downwhat goes down must go up at
some point in time.
I mean, it's the yin yang thing.
There's a lot of taoism and allthese other principles.
You can apply to things whenyou look at life long term, when

(39:00):
you play the long game.
But I think the extremepopularity of it isn't done yet,
but I think we're close to theprecipice.
I think we're about to have arecession of tattooing
popularity Maybe not necessarilyfinancially which we kind of
are in one right now.
I've been through a couplebefore.
I went through 9-11 and Itattooed through the 08 housing
crisis as well, One of which waspretty bad.

(39:21):
The other one, yeah I was luckyenough to be in a place where
it didn't hit the economy didn'tchange there the economy
actually got better because ofthe war.
Unfortunately, in 08 I was by abarracks and there was just kids
coming and going.
Uh, right now it's tough.
I mean everybody's gettinggimmicky.
I mean I saw tommy montoyatalking about it on the story
today, about how everybody lostsight of what the the reason for
the season.
You know.

(39:42):
Uh, you know we joked around inhis next post about free menudo
for every tattoo we're kind ofthere you know, we're kind of in
a point where kids are freakingout, old-timers are freaking
out, everybody's freaking out.
You know like uh, we've neverhad more tattooers.
And I mean, I know thestatistics and I've seen the
thing where they say the demandstill isn't being met.
I mean, we're here, we're openseven days a week because we're

(40:07):
here, like, come get a tattoo.
There's no lack of tattooerstrying to tattoo right now, so
I'm not sure I agree with that.
Maybe we don't meet the demandof the super trendy client who
wants, like, the trendiest,newest thing.
We don't do magic ink and shit.
You know we don't fuck withthat.

Speaker 2 (40:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (40:25):
Blonde and dark.

Speaker 2 (40:26):
Yeah, we put real tattoo ink in people and why
don't you do tiny tattoos inthese types of we do?

Speaker 3 (40:32):
I don't yeah.
We got artists here that do ityeah.

Speaker 2 (40:35):
And the reason that people hate on these tattoos and
why it's taboo within theculture is because they don't
heal well.
If done right they do and it'sstill a risky yeah, Ben Gurion's
stuff looks great, it's like afinger.

Speaker 3 (40:48):
He does a little Jesus portrait there's still
like there's still like maybe alittle bit, yeah, but you can
still tell it's Jesus.
It'll look like a blob.

Speaker 2 (40:55):
Yeah, and his work is fire, yeah exactly.

Speaker 3 (40:57):
Well, I mean the top, the top, top, top.
It's like Nico.
Not everybody does realism well, but Nico to it.
You know, I mean in 20 years asunburned it out and you know
his area.

Speaker 1 (41:15):
Will it look good?
Probably not, but that's on theclient as much as it is on the
artist at that point but onceagain, in my opinion you
shouldn't even get that anyways.

Speaker 3 (41:21):
Like, why are you doing that?
Like, get a poster, get a, geta painting, make him paint that
shit, he can paint it.
He can paint it just as nice,and you know what you can give
the painting to your kid, it'llbe worth something.

Speaker 2 (41:30):
I did have a question .
You know I've watched you foryears with this journey.
You watch me for years withthis journey.
At what point do you feel likeyou've solidified yourself
within the game?
And what does that look like asfor a tattooer?
Because for me, like it justseems like we just work until we
can't work anymore.
You know what I mean?

(41:53):
Like that's kind of it.
Yeah, like so, at what point dowe make it and this is a
question for my, you know, forme in my career, you know, at
what point do you considersomebody has made it within this
industry?

Speaker 3 (41:59):
it depends on what your definition of made it is
made it like.
You have a total respect fromyour peers and everywhere you go
, people love you and when youpost something on instagram,
people from europe are liking itand all these like who's, who,
tattooers like it.
You know, that's some people'sversion of making it.
Oh, I got 20 000 followers andeverybody loves me.
Um, is it love from yourclients?

(42:21):
Uh, is it being able to be goodenough and busy enough and
charge enough so that you canspend more time with your family
because you don't have to workas hard?
Is it having a fuck ton ofmoney in the bank?
You know, like oliver peck,fuck off money style, where you
can kind of just do whatever youwant to do?
Like everybody's version ofsuccess and making it is
different.
I think you have to define yourown.

(42:42):
Uh, it depends on where youwant to put all your eggs.
Do you want to put all youreggs in the basket of, like, my
friends and my family and timeand home?
Do you want to put all youreggs in like being famous,
blowing up, getting all theprops from your constituents?
Is it a little bit of all ofthose things?
You know it's, you define yourown version of success.

(43:03):
I think you've made it onceyou've put a decade and two
decades in, you're kind ofyou're in.
You're a tattooer.
You can put on a good tattoo bythen.
You should know how to treat aclient.
You know, you've kind of madeit from there.
You're free to control your owndestiny.
You're not stuck at the whimsof walk-ins necessarily so much
like you know the chain's goingto come off, uh at 10 years.

(43:27):
They come off a little bit moreat 20 and I think you're truly
like you it.
They call it escape velocity.
You can't be canceled.
Air quotes at 30 years I thinkat 30 years is really the
Japanese.
Look at 30 years for anapprenticeship.
You're fully out of yourapprenticeship at 30 years.

Speaker 2 (43:44):
So you study under.

Speaker 3 (43:45):
Horiyoshi 3.

Speaker 2 (43:47):
And the first 10 years you copy him verbatim.

Speaker 3 (43:49):
You're supposed to just make your shit try to look
like his as much as possible.
The next 10 years you spendkind of free to change the
backgrounds.
Or maybe you do your claws andscales a little differently,
maybe you do the beards and thehorns a little differently and
you start kind of developingyour own thing.
And you do that for 10 years.
And then, once you do that,then you're free for the next 10

(44:18):
years to like really get, getpast all that, do really do your
own thing and really create.
And then when you hit that 10year mark at 30 you know then
you're at, you're at, you'redone, you're, you've made it,
you know there's a lot ofdifferent versions of making it,
though I think we all kind ofdefine our own, you know success
is what you make it.
Happiness is what you make it.
Some people are happy withtheir nose to the grindstone all
day.
You know they can't sit still.
They just want to be drawingtat and they want to be in the
shop all day some people don'twant to be at the shop at all.

(44:39):
They fucking hate it.
They'd rather work four hours aday and say books closed and do
one tat a day and you're kindof accepting of all forms of
life and tattooing which?

Speaker 2 (44:49):
Which forms are you not acceptable of?

Speaker 3 (44:53):
Just the ones where you don't give a shit about it.
You know the selfish kids, thekids that are in it just for
themselves, just for the props,just for the money, just for the
cool guy they go to the bar.
Yeah, I tattoo.
It's like dude.
You can tell it's writtenacross your fucking forehead and
we hate that shit.

Speaker 2 (45:08):
I don't like that.

Speaker 3 (45:13):
I just I think you're , it's like Too Short used to
say he always called the game ofspit and lyrics.
He always compared it to a hoeon the street.
You know, here, take my bitch.
He used to sing.
You know, like tattooing, Ikind of treat the same way, like
she's a good, she's a greatlady.
She'll treat you real well.
You gotta treat her well too,though.
It's a two way street.
You can't just take, take, take.
You've got to give somethingback you know, that's what the

(45:33):
old-timers teach you if you wantto keep this thing really
moving forward, you got to givesomething back to tattooing.
You can't just take and that'sanything, you know.
You try to plant a garden.
You can't just take, take, take.
You got to go in there.
You got a water, you got a weed, you got to nurture, you got to
make sure things are growingright.
You know life is that way.
You know it's not justtattooing.
I mean, you can apply this toanything you're doing.

(45:54):
You can be a surfer, a skater,you can be a person who works a
nine to five.
You get what you give.
You know, like, if you want to,you want to make things happen,
you have to nurture thosethings.
You have to be a constantgardener.
You have to put something intoit.
You can't just be a taker.
You know people who try to take, take, take, take, take end up
at freaking starbucks outsidegoing hey man, you got any spare

(46:16):
change?
because they don't give nothingback to society sometimes that's
you know not their fault.
They're mentally ill ordisabled or you know any number
of reasons but the ones that areselfish and just want to
fucking do drugs all day and notdo anything just not take care
of their kids?

Speaker 2 (46:30):
their family, their community yeah, they're just
being selfish.
You know, speaking of from asociety aspect too, I see that
you've kind of always taken apart in, in injecting yourself
in the community that you'reworking within.
I remember when you weretattooing at empire redlands you
were on the art associationassociation over there.

(46:51):
I know you're dealing with alot of community-based
businesses out here in Temeculaas well as far as doing
fundraisers and stuff like that.
Is that more from the heart oris that marketing?
Why that route?

Speaker 3 (47:08):
Okay.
So as someone who grew up withnothing dirt poor welfare I had
a job at 10, first job, firsttaxpaying job at 10 years old.
I just feel like once you getto a point where you have I mean
I have abundance in my life.
Let's be honest.
I mean, you know I'm in debtand this and that and the other
from a financial standpoint, butfrom a life standpoint I have

(47:29):
abundance.
I have lots of things to give.
You know, if you just hoardwater, it goes stale.
If you keep it from flowing,it's of no use to anyone.
It's much like knowledge.
If you just hoard it and youdon't give it to anyone, what
good is it?
Is it valuable?
It's not valuable unless yougive it, unless you let it flow.

(47:50):
So it's really a firm.
You give it unless you let itflow.
So, um, it's really a from aheart to think.
You know what like you'd besurprised how awesome it feels
to give someone something to tobe.
You know, I've been on thereceiving end of that.
I've had to take charity before.
You know when we were, you knowwhen I was super young, growing
up, we were a charity case, youknow, and I understood what it

(48:11):
was for those people to givesomething to us in our time of
need and I feel, like now that Ihave the opportunity, the
shoe's on the other foot.
I think you know if you wantsomething from a community, you
need to be a benefit to thatcommunity A hundred percent.
You know you get what you give,it's just like tattooing.
If you give the time and theeffort and the respect respect
it deserves, you will getsomething out of it.

(48:31):
Community is much the same manif you just keep bugging the
community.
Hey guys, come in, come in.
We're slow hey, give me yourmoney give us your money, give
us your money at a certain pointin time, you know people are
going to burn out.
They're going to think, oh,these people are just greedy,
what do they do for us?
You know you need to be abenefit to your community.
It's important that.
That's how life works, that'show communities work, that's how

(48:52):
the world works, that'shumanity has always relied on us
being kind to each other.
Now, if it's kind to each otherfor whatever reasons I mean,
I'm not going to get into allthat Obviously, people are kind
only to certain people, forcertain reasons or whatever.
You know everybody's got theirtheir flags in their yard and
their their things to back.
But at the end of the day, noneof that, really matters.
You know, like what matters iswhat you do for people.

(49:14):
You know the Romans are rightyou die twice.
You die when you physically dieand you die when someone stops
talking about you.
If you do enough shit, you canbe talked about for a long, long
time.
You know, honestly, it's easierto kill a million people when
you get talked about foreverthan it is to help a million
people and get talked aboutforever.
If it bleeds, it leads right.
That's the news.
But you know, I feel like froma karmic standpoint it's better

(49:35):
to just be good.
You know, if you can, why notgive?
You know, if you got anabundance of peaches on your
tree, keeping them all toyourself, what good does that do
?
You can only eat so goddamnmany peaches.

Speaker 2 (49:56):
Even if you preserve them, you can only eat so much
shit before it goes bad.
Why don't you share?
If you have the, if you have aopportunity to impact and
influence the community aroundyou, you definitely should.
As tattooers, we do charge andit is.
You know this is not somethingthat's cheap and you know that
that is a form of us giving backis is, you know, inserting
ourselves into the community andoffering things where you guys
can come down and have theseexperiences.
That's where he's talking aboutexperience, rather over over

(50:17):
the, the design of the thing youknow he's offering something
other than a tattoo you canbring a whole.

Speaker 3 (50:22):
In addition, yeah, in addition to which?

Speaker 2 (50:25):
lasts forever.

Speaker 3 (50:26):
You know, name something that can do that, you
know look at what tattooers havedone you, you know I mean.
Almost every shop does a toydrive now.

Speaker 2 (50:33):
Can you imagine if all the tattoo shops didn't do
that.
Right.

Speaker 3 (50:36):
You know, and look, it started with one or two shops
doing it, you know, and now,look, everybody does it.
You know, there's that suicideprevention one that everybody
kind of jumps in on.
Now there's a sex traffickingone that that's real popular you
know there's a lot of causestattooers get behind and we we
have a huge platform.

(50:58):
I mean, I've always explained totattooers they don't really
understand it necessarilyanymore because they're not
being trained by people whoactually have any real pedigree.
But at the end of the day,we're the kings of the losers.
As a dropout kid, you don'tneed a high school diploma, you
don't need shit.
Like how many things can you doin that?
Like if that's your life?
If you're kind of like I don'tlike to wake up early, I swear a

(51:20):
lot, I don't have a high schooleducation.
How can you be successful inAmerica?
You can be a comedian.
You can be an actor.
You can be an actor, you know.
You can be a sports star, Imean, granted, you should be
more like Kobe, the slacker dudewho's just talented and kind of
gets by on talent, but I meanyou know there's a realm there.
You can be a rock star,musician, rapper, you know.

Speaker 2 (51:42):
Let me cut you off real quick.
Let me cut you off real quick,since you're talking about
bringing people on and what itis that you could be.
Um, what about?

Speaker 3 (51:52):
your apprentices.

Speaker 2 (51:53):
You feel me and I say you know that sounds horrible.
I say apprentices because youknow everybody's like well, you
got two.
No, he had two or two differenttimes.
Clarify that for the assholesout there um, I don't care, fuck
them right.
Assholes always stink it's ait's a big deal to bring
somebody on right.
Um, what has it changed in youby apprenticing people?

(52:13):
What does it do for the shopowner?

Speaker 3 (52:16):
okay, let me get back to that in just a second hold.
That thought um so yeah, youknow, I mean no matter what
realm you take as kind of adropout.
You can be a biker gang dude.
You know.
There's a lot of ways to makeit in the world.
You know as a dropout kind ofjust you know outside of normal
society, not nine to five, notsuit and tie, not going to
church on sundays, no matterwhat church it is or whatever.

(52:38):
Um, but the coolest one all ofthem is tattooing, and here's
why you might be mick jagger,but when you want to look cool,
guess whose chair you got to sitin mine.
Guess what?
You got to shut up and you gotto pay me.
Right, you know like, uh,you're some social media jake
paul, guess what?
Shut up, pay me.
Like, sit in my chair, do whatI tell you and pay me.
You know, that's why we're thecoolest of all the all, the all

(53:02):
those groups of slackers dropsout drop cultural influence yeah
, oh, you might be johnny dev,but guess what?
you still got to pay me.
That's right, you know, at theend of the day, uh, you know.
So that, why to me?
Why it's so important that thatyou know we give?
A shit about what we do,because it is an important role
that we play.
You know like it's kind of thecoolest thing, like we are the

(53:24):
rock stars to rock stars.
You know there's a story ofJohnny Depp and Jonathan Shaw
walking down, uh, hollywoodBoulevard and somebody comes
over oh my God, oh my God, oh myGod.
And Johnny Depp kind of likestarted shying away, like I
don't want to talk to this dude.

Speaker 2 (53:37):
And they came over and they were like oh, my God,
you're Jonathan Shaw Dude.

Speaker 3 (53:40):
I've seen your tattoos.
You're fucking awesome.
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blahand wanted to talk.
It's a funny ass story.
I've actually heard itpersonally from the man's mouth
himself.

Speaker 1 (53:51):
That's cool.

Speaker 3 (53:56):
You know, and that's what tattooing can be.
That's how powerful and cooltattooing really can be.
You know, if it was ancienttimes and we were in any other
culture, there would be kingsand rulers, and then there's
witch doctors and tattooers.
We're kind of like the nextdown in the rung of hierarchy.
That's how popular we would be.
I had a kaputa in Hawaii.

(54:17):
Tell me about that.
So there was kahunas andkaputas and they had two
different kind of roles.
Kaputa is the medicine man.
They do the hexes, they do theremove hexes, they do the.
Oh, you don't feel good here,drink this, blah, blah, blah.
And he remove hexes, they dothe.
Oh, you don't feel good here,drink this, blah, blah, blah.
And he explained to me that outof their society there's a lot
of rules.
If you step on the shadow of anelite which is a ruler, you

(54:37):
could be put to death for that.
You could be seen as trying tosteal their soul or something to
that effect yeah, don't quoteme on that.
I'm only as versed as a whiteperson.
How late could be in?
The kind he explained to heexplained to me that, like him
and and a tattooer, the only twopeople that could spill the
blood of a King and liveeveryone else would be murdered.

Speaker 1 (54:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (55:00):
Yeah, so you know when you think about that and
you really think about that andyou apply that to yourself now
as a tattooer, that should hithard.
That should hit home.
Oh yeah, onto the apprenticething.
It changes a lot.
I mean, to teach someoneanything, you learn more.
You learn while teaching,because now you have to figure
out what you learn and how youdo it.

(55:21):
Obviously, there's multipleways to do it, so you can't
teach all the ways.
You can only teach your way,because that's the way you know,
right.
So you have to understand that.
Hey, you're going to need tosearch to other people as well
to get some information, becausethere's more than one way to
skin a cat.
There's a lot of ways to tattoo.
Some people hang their needlesout super far, some people don't
.
Blah, blah, blah.
No need to get into it nowbecause this isn't an

(55:43):
apprenticeship, uh.
But uh, you learn a lot, you,you, you have to rethink things
you have to figure out.
It's easy to do it.
It's hard to explain how andwhy to do it.
That's what you learn.
You learn how to put that intowords and into action, not only
for yourself, but for someoneelse.

(56:03):
Um, you also have to learn howpeople learn.
Are they visual learners?
Do they learn best by reading?
Do they learn a little bit ofboth?
Do you have to be stern withthem?
Do you have to threaten them to?
get them motivated, or maybe youjust got to gently handle them
with kid gloves and be like hey,you know.
So you have to figure out A howto be a good educator, how to

(56:35):
discern the information you havedown into a format that's
palatable, and you also have tolearn how to teach different
people, because different peoplelearn differently.
It's the mistake that schoolhas made the entire time is they
try to just here's the hammer,here's the nail, it's pretty
hard huh, it's the hardest thingyou'll ever do as a person.
Pretty fucking hard.
Yeah, as they're trying to.

(56:55):
Well, because then you knowtheir legacy and your legacy are
intertwined, you know, I mean,it's like having a child, it's
the same as having.
They're cool then.
Good, good on you.
Oh, you did good.
If they're a piece of shit, ohman, they must be a bad dad or a
bad mom yeah yeah, exactly, youknow, um, and tattooing does

(57:16):
keep a ledger.
You know the people who matter,the people who who really give a
shit.
You know they pay attention tothese kind of things.
They may not say nothing theymay lay back in the cut.
Watch you just fuck up andteach 20 people and you know
whore out tattooing and you knowbut, but, but but people like
me you know, we pay attention,we watch, we see we see what
your apprentices are doing.
We see the fucking.
Two years later they've got aprivate studio and they're doing

(57:39):
$20 tattoos all week and $60 anhour.
And you know, we see all thatshit.
You know, I'm just not tryingto be part of that.
It took me 22 years before Ieven said yes to anybody.
The first person I took on is alady named suzy.
She was already tattooing.
I mean, she was already likepretty damn good.
I was blown away at the stuffshe was able to do with zero

(58:00):
help, zero training just whatyou can see on youtube and an
amazon tattoo machines.
She had all the talent, uh.
And the other person I'vedecided to take on is a kid
named tanner and he was alreadya tattooer, he just wasn't doing
it.

Speaker 2 (58:14):
You know I mean you, you know that the attitude, the
background, yeah, the drive theambition you know, he had a
young, fresh guy, yeah, he hadall of it.

Speaker 3 (58:22):
He just wasn't actually tattooing every day yet
he was already there I mean I,I saw a mirror.
When I saw him I was like, oh,that's me yeah, he be talking
that shit too, you know likethat was me.
I was that kid.
I just needed somebody to giveme the opportunity, hold my hand
and teach me, you know.
So yeah, and I feel like we'reat a point now where all the

(58:43):
people who are worth a shit as atattooer don't want to work for
somebody.
You know, everybody wants to bethe boss now, everybody, you
know.
Uh, everybody wants to be theboss.
Now, everybody's fucking rickross on the boss.
Like you know, nobody dudeswith 20 years don't want to work
for nobody and when they do,they shit and bitch and complain
and they moan and they don'twant to do pinterest tattoos.
And I feel like a lot of ownershave kind of given up on trying

(59:04):
to find good tattooers andassemble a good team, and I
agree decided to make a goodteam.
Find people who want to do it.
Find them.
Teach them the right reasons.
Like my, apprentices know howto make needles.
They made needles.
They know how to make clipcords.
They know how to put machinestogether from scratch.
I mean, they don't know how tocut the frames, but I mean, how
far do we really want to go?
I eventually teach them that ifthey want to learn, we can sit

(59:27):
down with a hacksaw and afreaking drill press and you
know we can.
We can make this happen.
You know they're going to learnhow to make ink.
They're going to learneverything.

Speaker 2 (59:35):
They're going to learn how to tattoo off an
acetate.

Speaker 3 (59:37):
They're going to learn how to carve an acetate,
you know.
They're going to know who cliffraven was.
They're going to know who gregirons was.
They're going to know who edhardy is, and not just because
of the clothing and the fuckingthis and that.
They know who sailor jerry is,and not just because he makes
rum air quotes.
Uh, you know, uh, it's a bigdeal to teach someone.
It's super important, it, it?

(59:58):
It takes away a lot of yourtime to be a tattooer which I
don't think people understandman yeah, my goodness it's
adding a whole nother job intoyour already non-existent of
time.

Speaker 2 (01:00:12):
You know, I'm lucky, I I have a wife.

Speaker 3 (01:00:14):
That that is.
I mean.
None of this happens withouther.
You know, I mean I, I can.
I get all the accolades.
Everybody in tattooing is likeoh, spike and captain and
working class man, none of ithappens without my wife.
You know that that's our ace ofthe whole as businesses is.
I have a partner in it who isextremely knowledgeable in a lot

(01:00:37):
of things that most tattooersaren't.
You know, some tattooers mighthave the ability but they don't
have the time because you've gotto be a tattooer full time.
You know, I get to have herhelp with putting together
events, help her help with allthe business side of things
making sure we're legal, legitT's are crossed, i's are dotted,
you know.
Uh, she keeps me in line, I'mthe balloon, she's the string.

(01:01:00):
You know, she kind of keeps mein check and holds me
accountable.
Uh, you know, and I don't thinka lot of shops have that, a lot
of owners don't have that.
You know it's a huge advantageto have.
I enjoy her and she doesn't getenough credit for the hard work
she does behind the scenes.
You know she's kind of thewizard of Oz.
Don't look behind the curtain,you know.
I mean I wish people would,because they'd see how hard she

(01:01:23):
works.
In addition, you know I can'ttake credit for any of this
outright because I didn't do anyof it.
I can take credit for mytattoos, sure, because I do them
.
You know she helps.
I got questions.
I show her.
Hey, what do you think?
You know, because she looks atit from a client's perspective.
You know I don't always see thata lot of tattooers don't always
see that it's hard, you get,you get caught up and you, just

(01:01:43):
you get caught doing.
You you know I just want tomake it tratty and this and that
you know she'll be like why'dyou?
Do the hair like that.
Oh crap, I don't know.
You know women look at thingsthat way, so you know it's nice
to have her around.
She's definitely our ace in thehole.

Speaker 2 (01:01:57):
Nothing happens without her, so yeah, shout out
to Vandy, I still want thatinterview.
I still want that interview.

Speaker 1 (01:02:02):
So we're gonna we're gonna round this up.
We, uh, we appreciate you.
Yeah, you taking, take the timeout of your day.
You're a busy man.

Speaker 3 (01:02:09):
We'll have to do a second one.
Is that all right?
I feel like there's a lot moreto dig.
Yeah, that's what I meanthere's a lot more to dig.

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
Honestly, I hate cutting you off right now, but
I'm going to throw a couplequotes at you.
Yeah, yeah, and just give alittle bit of feedback, sure,
and then we'll get someshout-outs from you.

(01:02:34):
Uh, get your instagram.
So we, uh, we put that on theon the show, yep, and then, uh,
so.
So here's our, here's our firstquote, because I saw a van gogh
book sitting there.
Oh yeah, if you hear a voicewithin you say you cannot paint,
then by all means paint, andthat voice will be silenced yeah
, um, not too many people know,a few people do, but I'm in the
process of writing a book ofpoetry.

Speaker 3 (01:02:55):
It's something I've always wanted to do is publish a
book.
Uh, one of the things I put inthere is there's nothing I can't
do, only things I haven't putmy mind to.
That's one of my, one of mywritings and I feel it's very
true.
I feel like people limitthemselves, uh too often, oh, I
can't, I can't, I can't.
You know, like the joke, be aMexican, yeah, be an American,

(01:03:17):
you know.
Like, be a can-do person, man,you can do anything.
I mean, obviously you can't beNeo and you can't just like go
wow, fly off into the fuckingsky, but you can figure out how
to make a jet pack.
You know motherfuckers have tomake a jet pack.
You know my voters have.
Oh yeah, there's nothing youcan't do, only things you
haven't put your mind in yourreal, true, honest effort to.
And I mean that doesn't meanyou're going to succeed.
But once again, what's yourdefinition of success?

Speaker 1 (01:03:39):
you have to find that as well I feel like that segues
.
We brought up some italian uhartists, uh leonardo da vinci,
yeah uh, painting is poetry thatis seen rather than felt, and
poetry is poetry that is seenrather than felt, and poetry is
painting that is felt ratherthan seen.

Speaker 3 (01:03:56):
Yeah, picture's worth a thousand words, isn't it?

Speaker 1 (01:03:59):
So they say Any last minute shout outs oh.

Speaker 3 (01:04:04):
I just shout out to the crew here at Captain Tattoo
Obviously we couldn't do itwithout them.
It's not a me thing, it's a wething.
The wife, I mean all the, allthe credit.
None of this happens withouther.

Speaker 2 (01:04:18):
I know she likes to you know, try to downplay it
sometimes and upplay it at othertimes, but honestly without her
nothing nothing good happens inmy life.

Speaker 3 (01:04:25):
None of this happens.
You know, it would not be thesame business, uh, neither would
the supply company without her.
Uh, you know she's a, she's agreat partner in life and in
business.
And, uh, I don't know, I meanjust everyone that ever gave me
a chance.
You know, uh, shout out to tokevin for fucking saying, hey,
I'll teach you how to tattoo,I'll teach you what I know.

(01:04:46):
Shout out to slick.
Rest in peace.
Who?
Who continued that?
Uh, jamie mack, who took me onand and gave me a lot of
motivation and quite a bit ofknowledge, and and fire, uh, and
, and everybody else.
Jim took me in after that,warcott, everybody, everybody
along my journey, that's just.

(01:05:07):
You know, showed me something,helped me, opened a door for me.
You know, I hope to pay thatback, uh, to the next generation
of people.
You know, like it was given tome, it's my job now to turn
around and give it to otherpeople, help them, help them
come up.
You know, absolutely, again, weappreciate you.

Speaker 1 (01:05:24):
Spike, that's uh at.
Spike more yes on instagram yepand at working class tattoo
supply.
And the shop page is at captainunderscore tat t-a-t number two
correct.
Again, thanks for coming on.

Speaker 3 (01:05:41):
Thank you, we'll have to do another one.
Yes, sir, let's continue this.
Thank you, spike bye.

(01:06:02):
Thank you.