Punk Rock, Parenting, and Tattoos ft. Ryan Ussher

I can go to work and do what I love, what I love and get paid good money for it. Can be at home with the kids if that's what you want to do. Or, you know, I can take some time off. You can go to work and do your thing and, you know, we'll juggle it that way. And it was sort of, we weighed it up and she weighed it up and decided that, well, you know, we're lucky enough to be able to have her with the kids rather than having to pay a daycare or, you know, ship them

off to kindy early and all that sort of stuff. Yeah, I mean, that's how it's worked out. I've tattooed, and she's been utterly, completely, and amazingly supportive of what I do since we met. And having kids, it's made the life that we've wanted to have possible, and I get to do what I love to Chats and Tats with Erin DeLaVedova. Hello, friends, lovers of tattoo art, lovers of art in general, lovers of creativity. Anybody watching

this show, I know that's the kind of person you are. Thank you for tuning in. Thank you for the support. Thank you for sharing, liking and giving me all the comments and DMs. I truly do appreciate I couldn't be here without each and every one of you. Welcome back to Chats and Tats with me, your host, Aaron DeLaVedova. Today, I am here with a very prolific tattoo artist. all the way from Sydney, Australia. He's the owner, co-owner of Lighthouse Tattoo. He's

a 17-year tattoo artist. His style would be Japanese-influenced, large-scale, big stuff, amazing stuff. This guy rips. So, with all that being said, please welcome my guest today. Oh my gosh, I hope I say this right. Your last name is fucking me up, dude. I was watching some YouTube videos and some fucker on a YouTube video said, Usur, I think. And I was like, oh, that's the way I got to Yeah, right. Lots of people think that because it's got double S. Yeah, the double S's

Usher. It's just Usher. All right. U-S-S-H-E-R. If you guys want to start looking them up right now, it's at Ryan U-S-S-H-E-R on Instagram. You can see his work live while you listen. So yeah, man, I mean, look, you're a badass tattooer and I'm honored to have you here, but it's this, uh, large scale tattooing

is, uh, it's a grind, man. It's a, it's a grind. But you know, before we get to that, I also want to tell everybody we are really doing this San Diego style because we are having craft beer on the show today. It's delicious. You're drinking something from Harlan Brewing. Our friends over at Harlan were nice enough to bring us some beautiful, I think they call it an IPA. It's It's basically a fruit juice. Do you like it? I'm OK

with that. Yeah, absolutely. I'm into weird beer. That's that's my thing. And I am drinking something from Tarantula Brewing, their Cali Day IPA, and it's delicious. So if you guys are into beer, check those guys out. They are lovers of Guru, lovers of the show, and they were kind enough to bring us all these beers. We'll get into a couple more here in a bit. But back to my point. I got a lot of questions for you, but let's just start with this large scale tattoo. What is

your, like, what's your routine? Like how many days a week are

So, uh, regularly four and then irregularly five. So it's sort of, I mean, the ideal pattern is four, four days, five days, four days, five days, four days, five days. That's heavy. That's a heavy load. That's a lot of tattooing. It is. How many I sort of, it lands between six and seven usually, but I'm there super early and that's tattoo time. That's not tattoo time. Six and a half hours is probably in the skin or, or drawing on or whatever it is, preparation, all

that sort of stuff. But yeah, that's normally the customer walks in, starts at nine, walks out around four, four 30 and early start. I like that. Yeah, I'm up early. Is the shop open at 9am? No, we don't really... I mean... You're in there at 9am. I'm in there at 7.30, 8 in the morning, because I live around an hour or so away from the shop. That's with traffic. Without traffic, it's much less. But I get up really early, try to train before work, and

then I get in there early. There's only a couple of us that do that. There's a few early birds. And I start early and finish early because I have a family and I don't really see them in the morning. So I sort of choose the afternoon to get home and be with them. Yeah. I heard training

No, I just go and sort of procrastinate my way around the gym. And, you know, sometimes when I train with a friend, it's, it's, there's a bit less procrastination, but, um, yeah, I just go and lift some weights and throw some Smart. Because when you tattoo, as long as you've been tattooing at, you know, those many days, that many hours, keeping the It's, you know, Are you together? Do you have pain? Ah, enough. Yeah, here and there, but nothing too bad. I used

to have a bit of back pain, but I don't really get that anymore. I more do it for energy. Training, if I train before work, I'm getting through the day feeling good all day. If I don't, I notice this massive, it's like I've almost got to hang over the whole day. I'm sitting there, you know, I feel really, you know. If I get in there and train before work, do anything, even if it's nothing full on, I can get through the day and feel like

Yeah. But it also gets me through the traffic, right? I think if there was no traffic and I lived down the road, I would do less of it. But half the reason is that if I wake up super early, I beat the traffic. You know, I get to work in half an hour, 40 minutes as opposed to an hour, hour and a half. And then you got some time to kill. So you do training before that. Yeah, for me like, oh gosh, 15 years ago maybe. So I've been tattooing for 33 years. So this is, we'll just call it, I'm

15 years in, about where you're at. Actually more like 17 years, about where you're at.

And I lost the ability to straighten my left arm. I had to hold my arm like on my titties. Like I was grabbing my own tits all day. It's kind of weird, but yeah. And I think it's just that muscle up behind my ear and the shoulder blade had locked up. And then I would go to the chiropractor and it would be a little better. Then I'd go to the acupuncturist and it kept coming. And then, this is God bless this moment, I found yoga. And I started, it has never, I feel

great, dude. I mean, I literally, and I do weight training now, because I'm 53 years old. You got to keep that muscle mass or that's not good for you. So I mix it with the yoga. But that yoga, man, for those tattooers out there that are cranking at this level, I would highly, I mean, fitness on some level, you ain't going to make it, man. You're going to have a health crisis. And then how much time do you lose at work when you can't get in there and

Absolutely. But yoga is definitely on the wish list. I did that actually for a little while. I did some yoga and it was amazing, but I couldn't, I just couldn't keep up the yoga and the training and the work and the, you know, it's, I feel like yoga is the thing that If you're working out five days a week, this is kind of modern team, two Well, yeah, I mean, that'd be ideal. But see, I'm generally yo-yoing between fat and not so fat. So I always feel like the

Probably, yeah. I just yo-yo. But I mean, you know, and that kind of, you know, depends on how much, well, I eat basically, and I love food. But I feel as though if I stop the training and go back to the yoga, I mean, you know, I could be wrong. If I do it correctly, I'm probably doing I'm 42. You're 42. You know, you'll do the yogi and when you need it, it doesn't help. So everything in moderation, you know, you get a couple of beers once in a while. Yeah. Once

in a while. Yeah. Yeah. But on that note, because, okay, we're talking about, I kind of, we're going through the health stuff. You're a guy who works heavy. I mean, that's hard. That's as hard as it gets for tattooers, that kind of a schedule. Yeah. I've heard about you doing fitness. You're not just not doing nothing. No. Let's get into more diet. What are you doing for that? Do you have any routines? Do you have anything at all?

Not really. Oh, look, I generally, I think my rule of thumb, I kind of go through different phases of doing and trying different things. My most recent one, I gave keto a crack. That was all right. In fact, I found that quite easy because you can eat a lot of good shit doing keto. But Then you have a party on the weekend or a dinner or something you go out to, you drop the ball, you drink some wine, you do this and that. It's sort of unsustainable, I guess, in a lot of ways for me.

My rule of thumb is generally, I generally fast daily, you know, do the 16 by 8 fast thing and not so much because I'm thinking consciously of my health, it's more just because I find it easy. And it can be beneficial, I think it is for me. Drink a few espressos, like black coffees, in the morning. Do some training. Don't eat till lunchtime. Finish eating around I agree. I prefer not to eat until

I'm done tattooing. Yeah, yeah. But the thing that's fucked me up now is the trainer's like, you need to be doing 200 grams of protein a day. And I'm like, and so I, for the first time ever, I'm not, I'm eating like eggs in the morning and things like this, because it's so hard to get 200 grams of protein a day. But when I don't eat, man, I feel so much more sharp, my energy is so much higher, coffee, maybe some almonds or something small, but then get home and just, I would love to

do it that way, but I'll never get the 200 grams of protein a day. Well, They say it's your body weight. OK, and I'm actually 190. But so let's just call it it's a little less than your body weight. So 200 is a goal, but you know, if I could get to 160, you know, that's a lot of chicken and meat, man. You got to really try for And that's the thing too, with fasting, I feel like, you know, for me, I'm so regimented in my time schedule of, you know, what time I'm awake, what time I'm here, what

time I get to work out. Well, you know, what time I set up. Everything has almost to the minute. If I added eating breakfast, I'd fuck my time up. You don't got time for that. You got a schedule to do. No time for Well, anyway, I just wanted to highlight the point that you gotta pay attention to that. I've had these shops for 21 years and I've seen too many tattooers who ignored that part because

they were young and when you're young, you're stronger. And next thing you know, they got all these problems and I'm like, you know, you gotta take care of your body for this job. This job's physical, man. Absolutely. Physical. Well, that's cool. Um, let's, uh, let's get into a little bit of you, your history. So 17 years ago, I got a black flag symbol on my right arm, about this one, you would say an inch, about an inch wide. I had 40 bucks. I was 15 years old and there was a

tattoo shop in a place called Manly. And there was a guy there who I think, I think at the time he was dying of cancer, so that was the rumor of this guy. I was already in my head, I'm going to do tattoos for a living, this is my thing, but I sort of hadn't figured out the means how or done much research. It was just, I want to do that. Anyway, we're at the front of a tattoo shop and we'd been drinking and doing dumb underage shit. And I had 40 bucks and I went into the guy and asked

him if he could do this black flag. I was wearing a black flag t-shirt. Can you do this symbol on me? I've only got 40 bucks. And yep, sit down, did it. That was it. On your arm? On my arm, yeah. Like right here on your shoulder. Classic. And that broke the seal. That, Yes, that's been covered and lasered and covered again, yeah,

A couple different rodeos with that one. Absolutely, yeah, yeah. Oh good, Oh yeah i had a fair share lazy to both arms both arms just the black you know one hit on you got a lot of Yeah i like doing that i don't no one likes that fucking hate that way worse way worse than anything it gets what

Yeah, if you've got a tattoo, like it's always when people come to me and they've got stuff that they want to do and they can't do it for whatever reason. I always think it's such a better way to go rather than just blasting over it and getting something slightly better, waiting the time out to get something kick ass. It's always worth it. 100% man. I mean, most tattooers will tell. Not everyone does it, you know, um, but it is, it, you know, getting rid, like taking your skin right

back to the way it looked before you were tattooed. Yeah. That's a And sometimes it's not even possible, but lightening a tattoo, you don't need too much. And then the tattooer can Yeah, I always say to people, as you would as well, you know, you want to get this? Well, you could do that. But if you lighten it up, you could do it 10 times better. And the possibilities just open up. It's like a book that just gets bigger One of my old bosses, when I was a young tattooer, had a,

of course the whole shop was all covered in flash. He had a section, cover-up section. It was black squares, triangles, rectangles. It was just black shapes. Yeah, right. That's correct. He was serious, too. He'd be like, I don't know what to do. Oh, that's no problem. Come on over here. We have a whole section. He'd do well. Do Yeah, yeah. That's very modern. That's very in now, I Because everyone's doing the- Totally. Do blacking out arms.

Yeah, yeah. I have a tattoo of her at the Pacific Beach location. She's got a whole blackout done. Well, she already blacked out her arm. And then one of my tattooers did finger waves on top of the black. Yeah. Dude, it looks so cool. In black? I think what- Yeah, because the blackout had been older. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we just took new black. And dude, it looks- It has a look to it. Yeah, totally. And I know there's so many people out there which blacked out stuff. I'm like,

this is the next move. Yeah, yeah. We're going to see, you know, you get used to your shit. You're like, I loved my original tattoos. Then I wanted to cover everything up. So then I got a blackout. Been a few years. I'm bored. Now it's going to be just going over those blackout sleeves. I mean, you can kind of do anything. Totally. It's just, you know, it's not probably going to have color, but it looked really cool. Yeah, yeah. It can look cool. I think, yeah. You ever done a blackout? Never.

It's funny though, cause my, my, my old boss was joking and here we are, you know, I remember when I first saw the first blackout arm and don't judge me everybody, but I was just like, that's fucking ridiculous. Like, what do you mean? A black arm? But it's so silly. And then I got more used to it. And then people started putting maybe a little shape where it cut into the hand. Then I started getting like, my mind started opening up to this avant-garde idea of

tattooing. Like, cause as an illustrator, you know, I guess part of me was just like, well, it has to be a fucking drawing. A tattoo is a drawing of something. That's just black ink. That's stupid. And then the shapes started coming in and I think it's dope. We've had a couple tattooers move here that do that work. I think it's super cool, especially if they leave a little blank skin from the bottom to the

I think there's a place for it for sure. I think for a while I was considering doing it with one or both of my arms when I started getting laser and I thought this is way too painful. I'm going to just black them out. And I thought, or I had a chat to someone and they were like, man, just do the fucking laser, get a better tattoo. And you know, I get the blackout thing. And I think now people are doing really, they're doing it really well. There's ways to

do it really well. I wouldn't be as opposed to it as I felt at one stage. I sort of wanted it and I was talked out of it. And then I went down the road of like, no, I'm so glad I didn't do that. I would never do that. And it's creeping back into my head. Not that I would or need to do it, but. There's people

There is, there is. I mean, I use the word avant-garde tattooing, but really there's just so much interesting stuff that we as more, well, I'm more of a neotrag guy, I guess, and we're gonna call you a classical guy or a traditional, maybe, aesthetic, and they're just doing shapes Splatters and you know and it's cool man it's going to be you know that's basically the splatter stuff and all this is a guy who is in australia instagram is pasty. Pst is stuff is

wild he does he does a lot of blackout kind of stuff. Or blackout, but he does splattering shapes and these sort of, you know, he does a lot of movement in these sort of almost, you know, ripples and then sort of they kind of get different shapes and he does it in this way. It's so well planned out. You look at it and go, you know, there's a lot of people who do black work and you sort of think, I

can figure out how you would do that. And there's other people you look at and you go, I can't even begin to understand how I would start to do that. Cause it's so well done. And it's that, those sorts of things that blow It's lots of people that do that. To me, it's just cool to see it. Tattooing, the art of tattooing, just breaking all the rules. I mean, that's the thing about being a tattooer. I don't know,

I think you would be included. I've heard a little bit of your history and falling in love with, Put the punk rock scene and just the rebellious nature of the art form Yeah, and that was always weird to me when I got into tattooing because I got in for the same reason I was a young punk rock kid. I'm like look at all these people over here. They don't give a fuck Yeah, break all the rules. Yeah. Yeah, then you then I became a tattooer now This is 33 years ago.

And suddenly there was all these rules. Yeah, and all this judgment Yeah, I'm like, wait a minute. Aren't we that don't give a fuck people? Yeah, they're like no we do give a fuck of a fuck, that's shit and that's this. And I'm like, we all wear Dickies pants and car numbers and vans. I'm like, oh my God, this is, I was in the military. I'm like, this is more militant than the fucking military. How about we just let everyone do whatever the fuck they want? Hey, if that customer is stoked, I'm

stoked. You know, if they love it, that's great. I mean, now caveat, there are bad tattoos and that's not cool. And there's bad ideas that people try and that's and that's i wouldn't even say it's uncool because sometimes someone's gonna try the bad idea to kind of learn what doesn't work and then improve so you know there's room for that experimentation. Yeah to be in an industry that was supposed to be so rebellious that was so. Not

It was a little shocking to me. I think the angle for me was more that I just saw punks with tattoos. There was a moment when I was a little kid and I was with my parents somewhere and there were this group of punks drinking and just being obnoxious. They had mohawks and leather jackets. They were having a lot of fun. Totally. But they just looked naughty and I was like, I want to be in that club. I want to be the naughty guy, you know.

That was my first introduction to seeing tattoos and actually Yeah, identifying with the vibration, I would call it, you know, of the art form, the rebellious nature. Now, that's a kind of an interesting subject, because have we lost

that? The rebellious nature of it all? Yeah, I mean, it's just, I mean, where I live, like, so many people are heavily tattooed Yeah, here is, I mean, Yeah look there are certain parts of Sydney that definitely are I wouldn't say to the extent that it is here something something about specially San Diego I find you feel like you're immersed in sort of just. fringe culture, like

people are tattooed. There's, you know, 50, 60 year old dudes getting down the street with almost body suits, you know, and on skateboards and just, you know, they look like the old guys that are, not that 50 or 60 or whatever is old, but Yeah be careful. But you know people look like they they just don't want to grow up and there's you don't get much of that at So Sydney is, I mean, similar to, say, San Diego, it's split

up into a bunch of suburbs. So I live in a part of Sydney where there's not many people covered in tattoos, and I definitely stand out of the crowd. in the suburb I live in and the area. There

are people with a lot of tattoos but they're few and far between. When you get into the city and places like there's a place called Newtown and you know the inner west of Sydney where I guess most live music happens and all that stuff, that's where you see much more of the kind of fringe culture and you know people with tattoos and punks and you know people that are into I guess different subcultures of music. The Northern Beaches is like rich people, surfers,

We have a similar life. Because I, you know, here I am in San Diego, but I live in a little beach town called Carlsbad, and it's kind of the same. It's almost the same drive with traffic, 45 minutes. And I

go to and from. And then up in Carlsbad, I like it because I'm still, I still have an edge up there. I'm a little naughty. to those people. I go to my daughter's school functions and they're cool, but they're definitely

That's where I am, yeah. There's a couple of other dads who have... some pretty terrible tattoos and I hear through the grapevine that someone sort of saw me and, oh, that's the dad with all the tattoos and, you know, like I'm their immediate friend because I've got tattoos too and, you know, you're rare, you know, I'm a rarity up there and so I become the friend with all the guys with the tattoos because Yeah, not personally, but yeah, anyway, they see me as an equal,

Yeah, well, there is something about being tattooed. You're automatically, you are kind of automatically part of a club and other people that... Maybe not somebody who has a tattoo, you know, their grandmother's name on their wrist. I don't know if that's... They don't welcome you into them intimately as fa... But anywhere else, heavily tattooed people, yeah, it's kind of an auto, like, you're already Totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. And especially in areas

where it isn't a norm, you know. When you're in an area that isn't a norm, you see someone else covered in tattoos, it's immediately like, oh. There you go, mate. Wear a similar breed, Let's choose two more new beers. I went with the Tarantula Brewing, their IPA, their Cali Day IPA. Well, let's swap brands. Here, you take those and I'll take these. I'm on the Harlan Brewing now. And what am I gonna do here? Ooh, Nelson IPA's always, I always end up liking these. All right,

I'm gonna tell the audience. I'm going with the Harland Brewing, Manou Bay, Manou Bay, where's that? Nelson IPA, here we go. Let's see if I can get this on the microphone. You hear that? Everyone out there just smiled a I'm going the liquid candy hazy India pale ale from Tarantula. Wow. That sounds liquid candy. Sounds And it should be noted that Ryan used to have a show where

It can be noted. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, so you're not just a casual drinker, you like to experiment with the different beers? Yeah, look, I think COVID started all that for me. As soon as... Drinking. Well, yeah. No, that didn't start it, but... Increased it. Yeah, it increased it. Well, it became another hobby to buy the weirdest, craziest beers I could find. Well, and drink them. But then I think what happened was my My wife's family, who are also into craft beer, we

planned a trip up there. And for whatever reason, we couldn't make it up. I think there was a COVID lockdown in my area. And I'd gone and bought all these beers. And they asked me to tell them what they were like, because I sort of sent them a photo and said, this is what I'm bringing the mothership, you know, here we go. And they said, Oh, you got to tell us what they're all like. And I

think I made a video for them reviewing just being stupid. And I was like, oh, maybe I'll just do this for fun because I've got nothing else to do. It's COVID and I'm at home and I've got a whole heap of beer. And so I started reviewing the beers and I'd have my little,

at the time, I think she was four year old daughter next to me and she'd drink a kombucha and we'd sort of talk and she'd say stuff to the camera and she'd steal the show. Everyone loved her. It didn't get such a big following, but it then became, I became a slave to having to make a review every time I drank a beer. And so I stopped it because eventually I was like, I almost couldn't open

a beer without going, Oh, I've got to make a video. And it became this sort You're on video and you're about to have a new beer and I want to, I really, I'm going to do mine next. Give that a little, little swirl. And you tell me what you think about that one. I mean, it's got a Little sharp, but sweet. Kind of bitter. Telling of a couple of... Oh, there we go. It's got Mosaic, Citra and Moteca. I know nothing about any of those, but they sound cool. I have had

beers with them in there before. And, uh, it's delicious. Drink it, get hammered and go drive your car. No, don't do that. He Well, that's, you know, if you have a Tesla, let the, it'll take you home. Uh, all right. I'm going to go for my next, the Manu Bay from Harlan Brewing. The Nelson IPA. Nelson's the hops, Okay, now that's the kind I like. I knew I would like this one. Sharp, bitter, but not, I'm not the hazy guy. Yours is a little creamy looking, mine's like clear. It looks crisp. It

almost, it is. It's got a crispness to it. Quite good, quite good. And this is, yeah, it's Freestyle Nelson with Savin and Wamay. Never heard of those. Do not know. Obviously people, we are not, you know, we're not beer sommeliers. We're just doing our best We can drink them. That's yeah. That's sort of that. That's that chunks. Oh, is that supposed to happen? Probably, but everybody's some chunks of, of. Stuff just came out of the bottom

But look, maybe I was meant to roll it first. Oh my God, look at all that stuff in there. Curls in your hair. That's fun. That's fun. It should be fun. Oh, cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Boom. I needed these Let me just show everybody my shirt here. where I tattooed Brian Redband. That is a cool shirt. It's one of his shirts. This says Death Squad. Cool. In Japanese or something. But yeah, I was out there to tattoo Brian Redband. He's a comedian. He

is part of this show called the Kill Tony Show with Tony Hinchcliffe. Oh, I've heard of Kill Tony. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah, it's a great show. Yeah. Uh, every, I think every Monday on YouTube, you can watch it live. Um, they let young comedians come out and they give them one minute to prove themselves and if they do well, they'll, they'll give them some sweet high fives. And if they don't, they'll Oh, wow. Okay. Oh yeah, I've seen it. I think actually I just roast

Oh my God. That part was hard for me. Like I just, I don't know. Yeah, yeah. This guy got shredded. One I thought he was going to cry. They know that can happen. Yeah. Oh yeah, I think that happened to him, you know, and it happened bad. And I'm like, oh man, and you know how many people are watching this show right now, like his whole family and everyone. It's pretty hardcore. But anyway, my point is, uh, yeah, three days in Austin going to comedy shows and, um, at the mothership, got to

hang out with Joe Rogan, which was sweet. Thank you, Joe, for VIPing the whole thing, but a lot of late night drinking. So, I really needed this because I'm a little shaky today. I just got back Hair of the dog. How far is the trip from here It's not bad. It's two and a half hours. Have Never, no. Actually, in the States, I've been to New York for two days on my way through to Toronto from the UK one time. Apart from that, I've only been to Isn't that the quickest place to get to from Australia?

Well, America, yeah, yeah. LA, it's, yeah, 14 hours direct So to go to the East Coast, you've got another, you know, whatever. It's a, oh yeah. Well, I would highly recommend Austin. Great tattoo scene down there, great music scene, great comedy scene. That place is There's a lot of places in the states I need to get I won't get into it, but that trip is no, I haven't been to Australia, and I internationally travel quite a bit. We always end up in Europe usually.

It's the furthest place. It's the furthest, man. I'm going next year, because once I get out to Australia, I'll hit you up. Yeah, do it. Because we're coming down. And I really want to do the Philippines. I want to do Vietnam. I want to do Cambodia. You know, once you're over there, yeah, you might as well go the whole way. Get all that shit. Get Japan. Yeah, yeah. So you're in Australia, Sydney. So how far of a flight is it for you to get Japan? I think it's 11 hours. Oh

my, my stupid head. I'm like, oh, it's probably, they probably do that in like a four hour flight. I think the clock, well, New Zealand is pretty close. That's from, and I'm talking from Sydney, New Zealand from Sydney is, I think it's two and a half, three hours. Maybe it's three and a half. That's pretty close. And then you go to like Bali, that's eight or nine. Yeah. Bali's quite nice. Bali's a bit of a, it's, I mean, it's beautiful. I've

been once, I've been to Thailand a few times. Thailand, I feel is a bit more, you can immerse yourself a bit more in the culture of the place. And you can go to places that are kind of, and you can in Bali as well. You can go to places that are a little less full on. Bali is a bit like, the places you really want to go to tend to be packed with people. And yeah, there is beautiful spots in Bali. Don't get me wrong. It's a beautiful place to go. But for us, it's like a cheaper resort holiday

place where the scenery is different. Nice. Interesting. Whereas Thailand's a bit more like you, it's a bit more about the food and the scenery and the travel and The culture, Bali's pretty westernized So in Australia, like for us, we get the craving for a little tropical getaway. For us it's Hawaii or Cabo, Costa Rica. French Polynesia is not too bad. It's almost a little longer than Hawaii. So those are our West Coast. Sure. When

Yeah. No, for most, for me personally, since having kids, we haven't done a pile of travel and the travel we have done. This is actually my youngest daughter's first overseas trip. Oh, you brought the family? Yeah. Yeah. You're here with the wife and kids? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Six weeks. You're a brave dude. Let me go back here. Eight and four. Two girls. Two I like it. Well, I travel a lot for work. They rarely get to come. And especially my wife, she rarely gets

to come. And because, you know, we've obviously got kids, you know, someone's got to be there. And I go away and I tattoo in different places and do conventions. And, you know, she pulls at least 50% of the share, if not more, being mum to the kids, you know. It's pretty cool to be able to finally take them all on a trip and do It's super cool. I was kind of joking, but yeah, I mean, I'm just saying when you travel

It's a lot. You know, it got me thinking, I'm on tangents now, Only, well, we got married during COVID-2, sort of purposely, but what is it, 2020 we were married in November? I should have said how long you've been with her. With her, nine, almost ten years. Okay, and you have an eight-year-old. So you guys got together, boom, had a baby right away. Three months she was pregnant, yep. And

Let's talk about that a little bit. So the thing is you are a very passionate artist, you know, and that lifestyle is, um, how do I say this? I don't know. A bit volatile. Like, uh, I know I've been through my struggle. I know my wife has been through struggles with married to a man that nowadays after 33 years, I'm able to, not hit it as hard as I used to. It was really challenging for us. I've been with her for 25 years. How is that for you guys?

Does she have a job? No. She's mom. She was a hairdresser when I met her. So that's her sort of trade. And then she was pregnant pretty quick. And so she did that. She's momming it up. And you're working it up. I'm working. When we met she was hairdressing when she stopped hairdressing to become mum the idea was that you know she had enough of that anyway and so it was sort of like by the time she was able to kind of go back to work if she wanted to we

kind of weighed up. I was sort of like, well, I love my job. If you need to go back to work for your, you know, just to have independence, because I know, you know, being stuck with a kid at home all day is its own battle. You know, I was absolutely supportive of that, but monetarily and financially, it was sort of like, I can go to work and do what I love, what I love and get paid good money for it, can be at home with the kids, if

that's what you want to do. Or, you know, I can take some time off, you can go to work and do your thing and, you know, we'll juggle it that way. And it was sort of, we waited up and she waited up and decided that, well, you know, we're lucky enough to be able to have her with the kids rather than having to pay a daycare or, you know, ship them off to kindy early and all that sort of stuff. We, yeah,

I mean, that's how it's worked out. I've tattooed and she's been utterly, completely and amazingly supportive of what I do since we met. And having kids as, you know, it's made the life that we've wanted to have possible. And I get to do what I love, you No, that's symbiotic and that works. Yeah. Do you guys have like a date night? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Usually like what's your routine? We don't have a

Once a month? Once a month would be an average. Sometimes But you know, what's crazy is there are people with like your, how long you've been together with that age kids. They've had two in eight years. And that, I mean, Hey, look, whatever, man, if you can make it work. But for me and my wife, I mean, we average one when the kids were younger and the businesses were younger and all that. Yeah. our average was probably still once a week. And now we're probably rocking two a

week on average. I mean, for us that, I don't know. I think about that a lot because let's face it, staying in love, staying romantically interested in your partner and running businesses and having the kids. I mean, a lot of people, it doesn't work out. It's

too much and it breaks down. And I guess everybody needs their rhythm. A lot of people, maybe they don't need the date night. Maybe their thing is just, hanging at home or whatever with the kids or going to soccer games every fucking weekend and all this. And I never was that kind of, we were never those kind of parents, although we did support

our oldest in the dance career. So we'd done our share. But I just always get curious when I meet another married guy who's basically got on his plate what I've had on my plate my whole life, what the Yeah, I think one thing that worked utterly in our advantage just by luck. is that we met, she was pregnant within three months. I've only known her as either pregnant or a mum and so, pretty

much. And so we kind of experienced the honeymoon period during pregnancy and then had a kid and we sort of have, we still enjoy each other's company no matter what we're doing. It's not, you know, like a weekend comes around and I'm not craving to go out with the boys and do this and that. I'm like, you know, I look forward to hanging out with her still. And I think that it worked in

our advantage, everything happening so fast. And while there were times we were like, are we going to make it as a couple? I think we definitely did. And the fire was still there just throughout the whole period, because we kind of were still getting to know each other through the whole thing. And then once we'd sort of gotten to know each other, we had a baby and then we had to get to know each other as parents and how we're going to figure that out. It sort of kept everything super

interesting. And, you know, I don't know, I feel like that was kind of probably the glue that kept it together was sort of the interest of each other while we were both changing as people and maturing as It's kind of like, um, two soldiers in a, you

There's a deep bond created. Both people know, like, And there was so much, you know, we, we, when we got together, we were both in some kind of debt and you know, we had to basically get together and go, we've got to fucking sort this out and get into a position where we can just wipe that and make it work. And we managed to do it. And I think, you know, that definitely brought us closer and, you know, we've had our struggles, but we're still stoked to be together, you

Yeah. Cheers. Cheers to that. One of the hardest things you'll ever do in this world, falling in love, building a family, still somehow managing a career. Yeah. I call it the Navy SEAL training camp of enlightenment. Like, you know, people are like, you think I should have kids? And I go, well, it depends. Do you really want to find, develop character? Like find out what you're made of, find your flaws, you want to improve, you

want to go through all that, then yeah, you for sure should do it. And if you're looking to have a good time, which is fine, but really just experience the fruits of planet Earth and dance around, then No. Well, and also, you know, like when we, when we found out about my, My eldest daughter, everything changed. This whole trajectory of, you know, of betterment happened, you know, and it wasn't like, okay, I've got to suddenly do all this stuff now.

And I mean, it probably was subconsciously, but everything improved, you know, my bookings got my work got better, I bought into Lighthouse, all You started playing the game hard. Absolutely. Because you know, you look But I didn't even do that in a kind of tangible sense. No, it's Yeah, yeah, it just happened. When you have kids, this other part of your DNA activates, and suddenly you are just focused and doing the things you When you get up in the morning, Becoming part of a business,

And it's a great thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Best thing Wow. So you're on a little US family tour. Yep. We're doing it. It's been a while in the making. It was actually, we planned it pre-COVID and then COVID wrecked it. And we were going to do it with, it would have been our four-year-old and a two-month-old at You know, you, but you, you mentioned COVID. So, and this, I have no idea cause I wasn't there, but the media I was receiving during COVID of Australia and may,

you know, I don't trust any media to be honest. I'm like, I don't know what the fuck's real or not real anymore, but it was a little insane. They show, I saw videos of people. I think they were taking them to like camps. No, Oh, look. Not that I'm aware of camps, I I mean, you were there, you... I mean, yeah, but there were various, there were various places, like, you gotta go to this facility until you don't have it anymore. And they had, like, armed guards walking

No, no armed guards, there wasn't any of that. That's... I've heard this. from several, actually several, I won't name podcasts that I've heard this from where people are like, oh, you've seen that stuff in Australia and all these, you know, people with machine guns and walking around and make, that never happened or not. To your knowledge. To my knowledge. Right. That never happened. I think there might've been certain places that people had to isolate in when

they came back from overseas. And they were looking for, because they basically had this rule, if you came back from overseas and you're on a flight, you had to stay in a hotel for two weeks. Originally, they were footing the bill and then it got to a point where

they were like, okay, well, if you're going to come in, you need to foot the bill. And I think at one point the hotels were so full that they had to put them in some, it might have been like an army barracks style facility because the hotels were full, but it wasn't a mandatory, you know, everyone with See, I love that we talked about this. I feel like today, the only way to really get to the truth of something is to sit like this

and ask somebody. Because I mean, I swear to God, and the algorithm probably knew I was very suspicious of the entire thing. So it was feed me out like, oh, he would love seeing this video. And I was lighting up on the other end Yeah, yeah. There was a few, I mean, there was a couple of places like in Melbourne, there were a few towers of people that were, I had to isolate because they had outbreaks of COVID. There But it wasn't to the extent the media made out or at least the

media here made out or whatever. Yeah, I've heard a lot of people from the U.S. Well, I've had a lot of people in the U.S. ask similar questions. It wasn't as All right. Well, there we go. It's settled. Yeah. I always wanted to ask a real, by the way, you're not just an Australian, you're a tattooer. And I know us, you know, tattooers, we have our fingers out there in the Eddie's. We get the dirty information. If it's going down, somebody would have probably told you. That's

You talk to a lot of people. Lots of different people. Lots of walks of life. That's how you really get the truth.

You can't believe anything coming out of these films anymore, dude. It's getting wild. Uh, let's switch gears here a little bit. So, how about you give me your take, tattooing's past, present, You don't have to go deep, just, you Okay. Well, I can only really articulate my experience of what I've seen and done and experienced. That's what I want. I want your perspective. My perspective. I entered the tattoo industry, well, my first experience of the tattoo industry, I was in high school. And

so I was doing work experience in a shop. Long story short, I was at a high school that had a sort of work experience program. You had to select a place to work one day a week in your desired industry. It was meant to be, for me, I was meant to be hospitality. And I said, I'm not going to work in that. I want to be a tattooer. That's, you know, where I want to be. And I had to get my parents to write

a letter. So I went and did one day a week in a tattoo shop, a shop that let me do that somehow, I don't know. How that happened, and I was making needles and stencils and doing all this sort of stuff. Fucking with the flux. Yeah, so that was the very beginning of my introduction to any kind of tattooing situation. So then in Australia, that was massive gang culture, like I always heard that about, that I did hear, and you're confirming it,

There was a time, yeah. I mean, not anymore as well. I mean, to the most extent. It's not really happening anymore. But yeah, when I started or when I even got into the industry, that was huge. That was all it was. So while there were people making art and that were good at it and people who wanted to be good at it. I think it was more of a kind of like, you do pretty good drawings, be the tattoo artist. And, you know, the gang, the gangs were just sort of laundering money. And that

was the front. But my experience at the time, it was just this taboo, intimidating place to be. And I was drawn to the idea of that a bit. It was sort of like naughty. So, yeah, that was pre social media, pre all that sort of stuff. I then went traveling, came back to it. And when I came back to it, it was still, you know, no social media, no anything. I think it might have been MySpace, perhaps. And then, yeah, I eventually got a spot in a shop as a counter hand, still pre social

media, pre all that sort of stuff. So it was magazines. That was the only sort of way you could get any kind of inspiration. And then during my career, or right at the start of it, that's when That was the tipping point. That changed everything. Even in Australia, it was like this immediate acceptance of And you know, hey, fuck yeah. I mean, I Well, totally. And, you know, there was a boom and Totally. And I feel pretty stoked to have lived through... All three phases. Yeah, all

Yeah. Coming into the light. Yeah, yeah. I think you're, I mean, I agree with everything you're saying. I feel I went through these same phases and Absolutely. I feel, you know, and I didn't get a huge grasp

Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot more. Totally. I got enough to sort of appreciate it and to feel lucky to have been part of it prior to transitioning to a point where I think people come in and specialize off the bat in some sort of style because you know, you've got access to everything on the internet and Instagram and you can look at one thing and specialize in that because it's all

you're going to practice and all you're going to learn. I feel happy that I entered the industry and had to try to be good at everything and wasn't, you know, when I started tattooing, there was Japanese was sort of, it was a thing. There wasn't an idea in my head that that's where I wanted to go. It was just, you know, that's part of tattooing. I want to do whatever I think is good. And whatever I thought was good was whatever I saw in the magazines that were like, wow, this guy's doing insane

realism. Imagine doing that. I'm going to have a crack at it. Oh, I fucked that up. And, you know, move on to the next thing. But the whole way through that was an exciting thing. It was exciting to get a magazine and go, I wonder what I'm going to see, not just open Instagram and go, I know exactly what I'm going to see. You know, I can just look for it. And that felt I don't know, man. I love your face right now. It's the face I'm making, too. Yeah, I don't know.

We're all making the whole the future of the world. Well, yeah, it's getting so weird, man. Yeah, yeah. Good. I think I think it's going to be all right. But I'm not going to speak for you, but I'm just going to mention, you know, there's a lot of Up to you. AI is obviously going to start playing. The introduction of an iPad, Procreate, all that Yeah, but just to interject, I love my iPad. You draw on That's all I draw on. What's the difference between drawing on an iPad and drawing on

paper? I mean, I know there's some nuances. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're still doing what we used to do. Absolutely. It just made it quicker, more efficient. Look, when I say the iPad introduction, I don't really mean that the iPad changed everything. You know, for you and I, you're drawing something, I draw the way I used to draw on paper. I have a pencil sketcher, I refine it and I do a final outline and that's sort of the drawing. Same.

When I paint, I still draw on the iPad. I would draw on paper. The iPad's far more convenient. I've got a tiny house. It's easier for me to sit on the couch and draw than it is to pull all my papers out and reference and all this sort of stuff. So, you know, I did the same thing when I do a painting. Pencil sketch, final sketch, print it out, light box, pencil sketch, and then brush, you know, and that goes that way. Tattooing obviously

makes stencils make the tattoo. But things like realism, the way that Procreate changed the game for realism, I mean I guess Photoshop would have done the same thing but I feel like having an iPad and everything at your fingertips and dragging and dropping and doing all this sort of stuff, there was a change. There was a change in the way people

did realism and it got crazy good. Agreed. Into the future, maybe we're going to start doing six fingered, you know, skeletons because everyone's using AI for reference. I don't know. But there's definitely going to be some form of AI interjection, I think, into the industry. There already is. Well, yeah. Already. But beyond, I think, maybe beyond just the Yeah. I don't know. Good synopsis. I couldn't agree more. Yeah, I love it. And again, it's all good, man. I really don't think AI can fuck

Oh, well, look, you know, like it's not it. I get, I get that there is a, you know, you could use it to your advantage in ways. And look, I've, I've used, I've typed in shit and I've come out with some stuff. Like I did some typing on, what is that thing? Discord, the mid journey. The mid journey. Yeah. Yeah. So I typed in some like, you know, explanations of like scenes with reapers and like medieval carved out of marble and

all this sort of stuff. And the shit it came out with was mind-blowingly good. In a lot of ways. I would and could. The fact that that is available pisses me off, but it also blows my mind. So, yeah. I don't know. There's the laziness that shit is going to create is going to piss me off, Hey man, I don't have a strong opinion here. That's why I talk about it to people, especially other tattooers, because I'm I'm just watching and absorbing and having emotions, and

I don't know what to do with it all. You know, I have contemplated it a lot, and not just in the context of tattooing, the world, of course, but, you know, for tattooing, it's

gonna change everything. It already has to some degree. You know, the artist's ability to sit down and, you know, it's not just futuristic drawings either, you know, because somebody the other day was like, Oh aaron not everyone's gonna be tattooing like crazy three or sixteen eyed face portrait looking surreal video game looking tattoos and i was like oh yeah i pulled out this little program i got a traditional panther yeah dope as fuck Then I hit another button, add angles, like

a cubist version. And I was like, oh, I mean, by the end of this three minutes, I had like 19 rad tattooable designs. Three minutes. I'm like, you know, well, Aaron, see, I haven't seen that. Oh, it does it. But I haven't, I haven't been, you just got to enter. Um, uh, one of your keywords has to be like traditional tattoo aesthetic. And then boom, everything goes from like a video game looking drawing to like old school sailor Jerry. But like with a little different, I

can't haven't quite seen it like that before. You know, and these things are only getting better at light speed. So, you know, the need for an illustrator, You still need a tattooer. You still need someone who can compose on a human body. And then, of course, you still need a technician. You've got to know how that fucking machine works. You've got to know how to put ink. You've got to be efficient. You've got to treat your client. There's all this human shit that

still has to happen. And that will still be a gateway. If you can't figure that out, bye-bye. We go, they stay. I believe the creative illustration part of tattooing is going to become non-necessary. Now, But just remove that from the Yeah. Suddenly you've got all this time to do Yeah, that. And I don't know what that means. I don't know. I don't have a, I honestly, I'm not personal about this. It just

is what it is. This stuff's happening. I'm not going to have, sit here and, you know, but, uh, it's happening and It's definitely interesting. But I think, you know, if you're going to drink the Kool-Aid and go as far as, you know, allowing something to illustrate what you're doing and what you're going to apply to someone's skin in all the other, you know, if you're still the front of house guy who says hello to the customer and you're still applying the stuff, I think you're going to get

shittier at tattooing. Because I think there's part of the drawing process that's applied to the tattooing process. You've got that muscle memory, you know, like when you, When I draw something, I've kind of roughed it up a few times and then I finalize the drawing when I tattoo it, it feels like I'm redrawing the same thing that I've drawn over and over again. It doesn't feel like I'm figuring

it out as I go. If I went out there and pulled one of your flash pieces off the wall that I'd never seen before and made a stencil and put it on the skin, I'd feel like I was figuring it There's a ton of guys out there though that are girls, guys. that are so good at just looking whatever's on their iPad, and it happens on skin. They're just map followers. I'm not so good at that either, to be honest. Like fuck, when I tattoo, I hardly But then you would lose the stylistic nature of your

Now you're getting more close to where I agree with you. A factor here, let's call it the human soul? Totally. I Absolutely, well yeah, you gotta make a mistake here and there that you gotta fix on You know, how many times during a tattoo were you, you know, the concept is there, you already created it, and you're going around the elbow and you're like, that ain't working anymore. Yeah, yeah. Like we gotta, and on the fly you just start, adjusting all the time.

And that will still be there. And hey, look, it's not the end. It's just, I do think many, many, many more people will have access to this industry because of when you remove the illustration part, the floodgates fucking open.

Totally. Well, that's going back to, you know, the tattoo schools. You know, as soon as you can go and pay to do a course and get taught the tools of the trade, you don't need to be an artist anymore. You just have to be able to copy something from a picture. Yeah. The rest is knowing the trade, I guess. But yeah, the floodgates will open, I think. And, you know, I'll

just get more pissed off. No but you know it's a frustrating thing to watch you know people just come in and go there's my ticket i'm just gonna do it yeah and you go fuck it i put so much into Yeah yeah i hear you man and uh you know we'll see how the scales go here because. As i mean it's hot as fire right now everybody is so accepting of anything made digitally and it's very magical it's very news very novel and i don't know how many years this takes but

i do get the sneaky suspicion. Ten years twenty years handmade crafts are gonna be like ten x in value where they are today like they'll be these. That'll be the thing you actually pay real money for. I could see a shop in the future where you advertise, like, there is no computers in here. There is no, we actually, everything, we have paper, we're making, and then suddenly you've got these super fans that are going to

get that stuff. They want that. authentic human interaction experience, like from one soul to their soul. So there could be a tip, a tipping point to it all. But I do think we're not near that right now. We're going through this static celebration. It's all new, right? And even this, you Hypothetical. Who fucking knows. I'll tell you one thing, I think, by the way, I'm lapping you, so let's get it together. You're an Australian, this is embarrassing for your country. You

guys are known to be fucking hardcore as fuck. Boom. I need to rinse that. Look at that fucking thing. I I'm going to the Mexican lager from Harlan Brewing. I'm a big fan of Mexican beer in general. In fact, I'm leaving for Mexico on Monday. Driving the entire length of Baja in a truck with my neighbor pulling a boat. Wow. Everybody Have you know any people down there? Pull some strings. I don't want to die. I'm kidding. I love hijacking and busing. Years Yeah, yeah, so I did the west coast,

well, most of the west coast of Mexico surfing. That's where all the surfing is. Yeah, and then came up, got the ferry across the Baja, then came up Have you been to Todos Santos? No, I don't think I have. It's a very famous monster fucking break. Oh really? Oh man, when it goes off, it's big. What are you going to go with there? It's hard choices, man. Don't fuck it up. The blondie. You're going with the, yeah, we're all, we're all, we're

Funny story though. So I'm in the Coast Guard on the East side of the Baja and I decide I've heard of this surf break. But we couldn't bring surfboards on this little ship I was on, so we brought boogie boards. Because the captain wouldn't let us bring fucking surfboards. So we hitchhike, we get two days off, I'm like, we're going to

Toto Santos. So we hitchhike, me and this buddy, hitchhike, and then get a bus, and then the bus doesn't tell us where the stop is, and then when we finally figure out we're way past Toto Santos, he just like pulls over and he's like, get the fuck off the bus, we're in the middle of the desert, I'm like, Then we hitch, another guy picks us up, brings us back to Todos Santos. Then we get to Todos Santos and they're like, no, it's two miles up there is where the break is.

So we walk that. I mean, this is a whole thing. Yeah. Finally get there. Yeah. I have no idea. We don't have iPhones. We don't know what the swell is. Nothing. I come around the top of the beach there. I'm not kidding. You do triple overhead. It's. fucking massive. I'm just like, oh my God, what are we gonna do with this? There's like, you know, Volkswagen vans, a few, I'm sure these dudes are just, these guys are

gnarly. No one's even out. Yeah. And of course we, we walk up with two boogie boards in our fins and they're from no car and the whole beach is like, What the fuck are these guys doing here? And we went out. We were on boogie boards, right? Yeah. We went out. Yeah, that's all right. And then, you know, some beaches, how when they crash and they come in and then they do a second crash on the beach. That second crash on the sand was like head high. So anyway, we get out there. I see a

set coming and I'm terrified. I never kicked my little feet so hard in my life. I barely crashed that last wave. And now we're out out and I'm, you know, I'm safe kind of, but I'm like, we got to go back in there somehow. So anyway, my buddy, Bob. Another set comes through medium. He's like, I'm just taking a dude. Boom, Bob's gone. So now I'm out there all alone. I'm looking at it and watching, watching. There's Bob way on the little man on the beach is waving like he's in somehow. I'm

like, Oh man, my turn. So I ended up grabbing one, made it down the phase, big fucking crap. I must've been on that beach for 20 minutes trying to time that landing. Got in okay, didn't break my neck. So we went out, we both caught one wave, got to the beach, grabbed our little boogie boards and walked past all the pro surfers Yeah, that's terrifying, man. I've been out a few times when

the waves have been way too big for me. And that point where you paddle out and there's a set in front of you breaking just so it's going to break from me to you away, or it's going to land and you're like, I'm fucked. I'm fucked. Completely fucked. And then you spend the next hour like in the washing machine trying to paddle through all the whitewash and all the

It's scary. Yeah, it's very scary. Well, yeah, so you spend some time down in Baja and Baja is beautiful and awesome and it really, you know, knock on wood, it is indeed, the people down there are the most friendly people I've ever met and I'm really looking forward to this trip. It'll be fun. I've never seen, I've always gone to this place on the Baja or whatever. We're going to drive the whole distance, so it'll be fun to see it. Yeah. The whole

Have you been to Sayulita? You would have been there, right? Just north of, Oh yeah, Sayulita. Sayulita. Oh yeah, totally been there twice. Okay. That's beautiful. Yeah. We went there and this is 20 years ago on our trip down. And I remember saying to my mates, I went, I am going to move here one day. I swear to you, I'm, this is where I'm going to end up and live. I haven't been since. You meet a lot of guys you could tell made that decision there. Yeah, absolutely. Man,

that place is amazing. I mean, again, I saw it Last time I was there was probably five years ago. It's still quaint Yeah. It was pretty busy when I was there. Yeah. When, when we were there, there was a few, like it was a bit touristy, but it was almost like it had maybe not just been discovered, but it was not, we weren't sort of like, we weren't the only, you know, well Australians or Americans there, It's a little different now. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. That's cool that you've done that

much time in Baja. I love, I love that place and it's cool to live so close to it here in San Diego. Most San Diegans, you talk to them about Baja nowadays and they were just like, they feel like you're going to like a war zone. Like, yeah, you would, you Kind of like, yeah, I'm going down there. Yeah. Well, Is it that sketchy? Again, I don't think so. I mean, you know, the news, we hear about everything now, instantly. I mean, you know, to be fair, there were

Oh, from Australia. Yes. So everyone's on high alert right now. Yeah. There were a couple of tattooers actually. There was one girl who's guested with us who was, I think they were quite close friends with her. And, um, she instantly put the

But hey, to be fair, they were killed by drug addicts. Okay. They weren't killed by the cartel. Right. They were just. It could happen here. You could be camping on a beach in California somewhere, some tweakers show up, they want the rims off your car, and something goes bad, that's what

happened. They just wanted some way to make money, to go buy drugs. And I did hear, I think it's pretty established, that they fought back, I think, too, and these guys had guns, and I think it was two guys and a girl, and they killed those guys, man, which is, Sad as fuck and I don't think that is what Baha is, I think there's random, it's like lightning striking, I mean look we hear about shootings here in America and I think even coming

over here it was like, you know you have it in the back of your head that this happens, you know. People own guns here in Australia. They don't. I mean, they own them, but it's not like you can't buy a gun in a shop ever. I didn't know that. You've got to be fully licensed. They've got to be locked in a safe that's in some part of your house that is inaccessible to

anyone but you. And I mean, I don't know if it's that far, but you will only own a gun if it's for hunting purposes and You know, if you're part of a, I think, rifle club or something, but you don't... So that's a good lie, because then normal people can't Yeah, well, yeah, sort of. But it's not like we don't have, you know, people walking around shooting massive people ever. It happened, it has happened, but

it's massively rare. There's gun violence in gangs and, you know, biker war, you know, turf violence and all that sort of stuff. But random people killing random Well, what can I say to this? There's a part of me that was drilled into me as a young American male by my father. And I mean, hey, look, our right to bear arms. It's in our constitution. And they are very clear to tell you why. Yeah. You know, hey, look, if we don't all have guns at some point. the government can

just tell us what to do. So we all need guns. I own guns. My family owns a lot of guns. I only have a couple of guns. Just, you know, I'm not a, not crazy about it, but that law still makes sense to me. I think I do support it, but it's challenging to hear you say that because, you know, I guess there's probably stats on this, but there's a lot more gun violence in America than there is

Well, and they used to be in Australia. I mean, I don't know if there was as much as America, but I know that there was a point where guns were basically taken off everyone, because it used to be similar. The laws used to be similar. And they were taken off everyone and mass incinerations of these guns and all this stuff. And then since then, the gun violence kind of went down, down, down, down, down. And then now it's rare. But do you worry a little that that might be like a setup for

what they got planned next? I'm going down the rabbit hole, everybody. I'm going Alex Jones on this episode. Hey, look, I'm down for anything that makes place a I think here it's massively, it's so part of, you know, this country that, and it has been obviously forever. It would be hard to turn that around and for everyone It's my right. Oh, they're going to fight for that right. Cool, man, cool. Well, look, this has been fun. I've been told the attention span of most people nowadays is a

little bit on the shorter side. I could do this for another three hours, personally. Sure. But let's wrap it up. Cool. I do want to know a couple more things. Okay. Maybe there's something, maybe there's nothing. What's next for you? I don't know. I mean, you got your shit together. I can feel the vibe. What's Oh man, don't ask me that, I don't know. Can you plan personally? Yeah. It's the Australian dream, you know? Buy a nice house and settle down, no. I mean that's part of it, it's hard.

Sydney is a, as I'm sure and as I've heard it is here, it's an expensive place and it's forever getting more and more expensive and the idea of I don't know you can't I mean look tattooing I love tattooing I want to tattoo till I die it's the idea of ever retiring from doing tattoos scares the shit out of me but in terms of you know where I want to take my life and my family and all that sort of stuff who at the end of the day that's kind of what it's about For me? I

don't know, I don't know, I don't know. It's sort of hard to say what the ten year plan is because it's unwritten. At the moment it's in the air. Life is expensive, life is hard, things are The plan is to keep grinding. Keep grinding, keep pushing. Keep pushing your own personal art. Yeah. Keep pushing the shops. Absolutely. Keep growing your brand. Yeah, look that's, yeah. You prosper, the people that are with you in your shops, they prosper. Totally. And with enough luck, everyone's

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, you know, on an artistic level, yeah. I mean, pushing is number one. And the shops, I mean, we've got a great crew of guys and girls, all of which do incredible work. You know, the idea of our shops as a whole is to kind of, you know, make all of us better. And we have this idea to bring people on and help them, have them help us and inspire each other to create something better than it was. And, you know, that's forever the goal artistically with

Lighthouse. We're kind of, you know, that's what we're about. We want to make people, we all want to be better, you It's beautiful i mean that mantra that statement man everybody carry that to work everyday what a great world to be you know let's all get together and inspire each other and help each other well that's that's the grass you know that's the grass roots of the

You know that's what we hope for it'll happen. Yeah, I mean it does and it is and you know people do get better they come on and we all kind of get together and we you know help each other out and everyone's open and we all want to share and everyone's you know asking advice to each other and how does this look and we

all do it and it's It's a good collective. And I feel like that, if we can keep pushing that, everyone's going to get better and I think the only thing you got to add to that is you, you need a very Of course. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And hopefully, you know, a new AI manager will start creating all the designs for us and Oh my God. You're joking a little, but an AI Probably not. Imagine walking in and you open your computer screen and there's a little beautiful human that isn't real, that

has got all the books sorted out for everybody. It's got all the accounting done. It's just all happening. And you just talk to it and it just handles it. Imagine that. Five years, dude. It's coming. It's coming. And it's going to bring a lot of benefits. I don't want to get into the dark side on this episode. It's been too full of light to do that. Very cool. Where can people find you? Just throw out some handles. Is it Insta, websites?

Yeah, look, Instagram is the most updated and regular thing to find me. It's at Ryan Usher, R-Y-A-N-U-S-S-H-E-R. That's the most regularly updated platform that I use. Website, ushertattoos.com, but I mean, that's, you know, I feel like websites are almost obsolete these days. I mean, but you use them, but I never Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I have a contact form of a website. People click my link If somebody wants to get tattooed by you, I mean, can The wait time is, it's pretty long at

the moment. I think it's 2026, maybe almost About two years, around, about. But there are, openings here and there, especially for like, you know, I don't just do large scale tattoos. So, so smaller stuff I can generally fit in somewhere in between it all. And, and obviously there are cancellations and all that sort of stuff too. So it isn't necessarily always Yeah. Big projects. Maybe they, you know, you got to get them going. Yeah. Yeah. I get that. I get that. Well,

good for you, man. You're busy. You're killing it. Your work's beautiful. Much respect to you and what you've created at Lighthouse. I appreciate it. And of course, thank you so much for making time for I really appreciate that. It's been unreal. Cheers, man. Cheers, man. I said man, but I should have said mate. Mate, yeah. Cheers, It's like a... I I do. Yeah, well, we feel the other way because we see you all on movies, you know, so

it's, you know, you grow up. It's not true. You guys are cooler. Oh, I realize awesome awesome alright everybody hey look thanks for tuning in by the way i don't know if anyone noticed all this fantastic beer we've been drinking today has been drank out of a sullen art collective pint glass if you guys love art like the art that this man does the art i do and you want to see it on your favorite apparel,

t-shirts, hoodies, hats, check them out, sullenclothing.com. Ryan and Jeremy, huge supporters of the tattoo industry, and I say that a lot, but you guys need to realize, like, these guys actually give a shit about this industry. They care deeply. They're great human beings. Please check them out, and keep the likes, subscriptions, love coming, and