#420 - Estevan Oriol

Interview with Estevan Oriol on The Bootleg Kev Podcast.

Full video version of the episode is available on YouTube!

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
What's up? This is a Steven Oriole check me out
on the Bootleg Cab podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Yo, Bootleg Cab podcast. The legend is here that Steven
Oriole is in the building. Ladies and gentlemen, I would
like to say I'm a fan. I've been a big
fan of your work for a very long time. We
have had mutual friends for years and years and years
and somehow I've met you like in passing at random things,
but like never really like had like the fool like hey,

(00:30):
how you doing. Yeah, but uh, it's good to finally
be able to, you know, meet you and have you
on the show man. You're a legend. So yeah, I
was so happy a few years ago when the La
Originals documentary came out because there was so much about
you and cartoons story that like I kind of knew,
like I kind of I knew you had like gotten

(00:51):
your start with like Cypersille and those guys, but I
wasn't like fully aware you kind of fell into like
the photography thing, right.

Speaker 1 (00:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
It wasn't like a like you didn't do it on purpose.
It was like they need they needed someone to take pictures.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
Right.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
I can kind of break down, like because your original
role with Cypress was something else, right.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
Yeah, I met Mugs in eighty nine and then through
the clubs and all that, I used to work at
the door and at nighttime and I did construction during
the day. And then around ninety two he was like, hey,
I got this job that I want to you know,
I think you're perfect for. And I was all psyched up,

(01:31):
you know, because I've been kicking with Cypress from eighty
nine ninety ninety one, and then you know, here comes
ninety two. I like, all right, cool, you know I'm
gonna be rolling with it. He was, but it's with
these other guys, a new group I'm starting. I was like, oh, fuck, well,
you know, I'll give it a shot. Anyways, I'll listen,
you know, hear it out and there was a house
of pain shots ever last year, and he goes, uh,

(01:54):
you know ever last I go, oh, hell yeah, because
you know, from working the doors. He used to always
come with a rhyme, synd a kid and iced tea
and all those guys. So it's you know, the job
is called road manage or tour managing, and at that
point in their career there was nothing. There was just

(02:14):
like a demo tape and the album.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
Yet it was just it was just a demo.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
I'm sure. Yeah, it was just like it was just
just getting pressed. And we're gonna go do a press
run in a van with different label reps, and we
go around to college radio and do in stores and
record stores and it's different, you know, the people different. Yeah,
people don't even know what I'm talking about.

Speaker 2 (02:39):
Like a serious bunch of guys in a van going
across the country shaking hands.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
Yeah, shame, same sharing rooms, you know, going into record
stores and and they and they play your song and
you have to like perform it there, but like maybe
ten people in the store.

Speaker 2 (02:57):
You know. The record store meet and greets are such
a just a I'm yeah, because you'd be able to
see your like the underground rap group that nobody really
knew about in your hometown.

Speaker 1 (03:05):
Yeah, and they might.

Speaker 2 (03:06):
Pop up at like a Zero Records or Tower Records,
and you'd be like, maybe there's twenty other people there
to meet them, but you get to meet them, you know,
get an album sign, get a poster sign, get one
of those black and white pictures signed.

Speaker 1 (03:15):
Yeah. Yeah, so you would be lucky if it was
the Tower records. Most of the time. It was like
a little strip mall record pop spot. Yeah, and you're like,
oh man, you know, like but you had to do it.
That was part of the That was part of the deal.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
Yeah, because if you did that, that store might give
you better real estate with where they put your album right.

Speaker 1 (03:33):
Yeah, they might put you right front center or so
when everybody walks in, you're the first record they see,
or you know, they might suggest your records. Oh you're
like this, well you check out check opinion.

Speaker 2 (03:43):
That used to be a thing. You would actually trust
the employees at the record store, yeah, to recommend shit.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
And they knew their ship too. It's crazy.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yeah, they did.

Speaker 1 (03:52):
Like you could go in there and go, you know
that song like you might get this is They're like,
oh yeah, let's jump around ye you know, and then
you're like, damn, how do they know like lyrics from
every song to where they could just direct you to
the record.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
Super lost art form being like a like a record
store employee.

Speaker 1 (04:09):
Yeah, that was that was the ship. So that's basically
what it was was taking them to the insource, taking
them to you know, radio shows, making sure they catch
their flights and they're be on time for you know, interviews,
and then it was if they have to perform, you know,
help them out with all that. So I was like, yeah, yeah,
no problem. The thing was, it was like the only

(04:32):
catching it all is there's no pay, but you do
get your travel, taking care of your hotels, and you
get this thing called per deems, which is thirty five
bucks a day for food. So if you save that up,
you get two ten a week and then you're living
you know, you're living on their yeah, but you have
all your bills back home, so it's like you still

(04:54):
have your rent and all your shit to do back home.
So luckily write it. The beginning of that jump Around
took off and we started, you know, really kicking in.
I think at the end of the summer, the band
was making like a GS show and just to play

(05:14):
jump Around and the intro is like a seven minute
DAT tape. And so for every thousand they would get,
they'd give me a hundred, So it's like three hundred,
three hundred, three hundred for the three guys, one for me.
So sometimes we do two three shows a day, so
that I'm getting you know, two hundred, three hundred bucks a.

Speaker 2 (05:32):
Day plus, right, yeah, so it was cool.

Speaker 1 (05:35):
I was like, man, this is great. I might never
have to go back to construction or working in the
door with a bunch of drunk dayheads. You know, they're
all on the guest list, so it's cool. I was like,
fuck y, I like this shit. And then we were traveling.

Speaker 2 (05:48):
And meeting see the country to meet people, going to.

Speaker 1 (05:52):
All the the the record when they call them the
back in the day Jack the Rapper.

Speaker 2 (06:00):
All the conventions, music conventions. Yeah yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (06:03):
So now you're seeing everybody that you ever listened to
all in one place, and everybody's like going to these
little showcases. And I was like, you know, I was
like I found the.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
Junta just the fact to get paid to do that,
And like, I don't I feel like that level of
I think that people who want to get into the
music industry these days aren't impressed. Like like when I
was growing up, I worked for free at the radio
station for two years because I just wanted to be there,
you know what I mean. Like I was like, how

(06:35):
can I figure out a way to just pay my
bills through hip hop?

Speaker 1 (06:40):
This is all I want?

Speaker 2 (06:40):
That saw all I love, you know, so I would
have been happy just you know, with ten percent of
the success I've had in my life, you know.

Speaker 1 (06:47):
Yeah. Yeah, So it's.

Speaker 2 (06:49):
Like like you said, like, Yo, you can leave a
regular job, see the country, meet some of the people
you are fans of, and like do something cool and
and not have to worry about all the normal bullshit.

Speaker 1 (07:03):
So and then every night you're listening to dope music
for sure, and then every day you're in the behind
the scenes of the guys, some of the guys that
are making the hottest music out there, Cypress Funk, Dubious,
House of Pain, like our crew was fucking stead right then,
you know. So from there it went to, uh, you know,

(07:25):
we did a tour of the Beastie Boys and we
got kicked off because we're a little too rowdy for them.
And wait, wait, you.

Speaker 2 (07:31):
Guys got kicked off tour with the Beastie Boys. Yeah wow,
is there an incident?

Speaker 1 (07:35):
Like yeah, it was a little incident and we got
kicked off. And then the kar Lewis was our booking agent,
who's still doing her thing. You've heard that, you know,
on the songs. So I always used to love to
say that, you know, like who you know, who do
you guys do shows. I'd say, Karen Lewis is our

(07:56):
booking agent, you know from from The Pain and Full
And then she was like, that's kind of like a
blessing in the skies because now I can book you
guys one off shows and you guys can do your
own thing because the song is blowing up. So we
started doing our own thing. And then we went into
the Sol Assassin tour in ninety three and that was

(08:19):
a funk dubious house of pain Cypress Hill, and opening
up before them was The Hooligans.

Speaker 2 (08:26):
Which is Alchemists and Scottie Khan.

Speaker 1 (08:30):
So that whole tour was off the chain, like crazy.
Everything that could happen happened and it was one of
the best experiences of all of our lives for sure.
And then just.

Speaker 2 (08:44):
Real quick, what was it like being around Alchemists as
a kid, Because obviously for people wh don't know Scotty
Khan is, you've seen him in tons of Hawaii I point.
I mean, he's in a ton of movies. He's a
legendary actor. His dad's obviously resting peace of his dad.
He's a legend as well. But Alchemist as a kid,

(09:07):
you know, one of the most prolific, just minds, musical minds.
We've ever seen one of the goats when it comes
to production. What was that like having them on tour?
It had to be kind of like a rowdy tour.

Speaker 1 (09:20):
Yeah, it was definitely rowdy. It was off the chain.

Speaker 2 (09:22):
And they were young, right because they were fifteen. Yeah,
they were kids, So like what was that?

Speaker 1 (09:27):
He was like my little nephews, you know, like I
had to look out for them and and uh, you know,
kind of they were already doing their thing. You know,
they're already partying and hanging out with girls and stuff.
So it's always like there was no uh, you know,
you have to hide her with the kids over here,
and let's go smoke weed over here or whatever, or

(09:49):
you know, don't let no girls around them there yet
or whatever.

Speaker 2 (09:51):
They were already doing their thing.

Speaker 1 (09:52):
Yeah, it was that was way past that point. So
now its just showing them how to do it the
right way, you know, Like I kind of had to
just take Alchemists under my wing. And then he started
coming on tour with us after the Hooligans, and he
was like our he was rolling with us. He would
help Mugs with the production stuff and he'd help me

(10:15):
on the tour stuff, and we had little like side
hustles that we'd do on the road and just me
and Al you know, we asked the guys, hey, is
it cool if we do this this? And you yeah, yeah,
go ahead and get your money, do your thing. And
I mean, would I ever think like, oh, Alchemist is

(10:37):
gonna be one of the great greatest producers of all times? Right?
Probably not? You know, just saw he was a youngster,
little kid, you know, but he was He wanted to
learn so bad, and he was so on it, and
he was like on point, even like helping me. He
was like right there like hey, oh can you do this?
Can you do that? He did everything right. It wasn't

(10:59):
like nowadays there's you know, there's a new generations and
they fuck up and they're like, oh, my bad, Oh
I did I just fucked this whole thing up? Bad,
my bad? That That wasn't no accountability, Yeah, I don't
give a fuck. Yeah, but Al there was no my bad.
He was on it, you know, so you could tell

(11:22):
he was gonna do something, you know, big, But you know,
you never would know. You never know of anybody's career,
like they're going to be a Grammy nominated or whatever,
you know. But to see that, it's just such a
like proud moment, you know for us older guys that
were around him when he was a youngster. Like I mean,

(11:42):
so leg you know in uh in a good way,
in a good way because now that word is that
word Jesus.

Speaker 2 (11:52):
Uh So, so that tour happens, the soul assassine war happens.
How do you kind of walk me through how you
end up taking pictures?

Speaker 1 (11:58):
Well, I was all so. I bought a sixty four
I Paula in nineteen eighty nine, and I had it
as like an every day you know, was every day ride,
yeah bucket you know, kind of had like rest spots
and stuff, and had these like rusted out like mag
rims and I just put sounds in it. Spent like
eighteen hundred bucks on the car. I probably spent another

(12:21):
fifteen hundred on just the sounds. And I'll just roll
that car around and just you know, be smashing in it.
And then I had a little work truck that I
bought for two hundred bucks. Somebody told me like, hey,
I got this truck. I want to get rid of it.
It's making this weird noise. The guy didn't know shit
about cars, and oh yeah, I'll take it off your hands,

(12:42):
you know, And I took it to my homie. He
did like a major tune up on it, another two
hundred bucks and it worked perfect for ten years. Crazy,
So I use that as my work truck and then
I put the Impaula away my homeie DC Donnie Charles,
he passed away in ninety four. He helped me strip
down the Impala and put it all into the right

(13:05):
shops and then I just used my work truck for
construction every day. But he was a He was a
manager of w C in the med Circle back then,
and uh, you know that was cool et Crazy Tunes.
C's brother rest in peace. And then uh, another guy,

(13:27):
I think his name was Jim, but there was four
of them, and Donnie Charles was the manager of them.
He had a thing called Hoodrat Records and a car
club called Hoodrat Car Club. And then so he helped
me take my car apart. And so from building the
Lowrider and joining a car club in East LA and touring.

(13:51):
My pops was like, hey man, you're doing a lot
of cool shit. You should take photos. But at that
time you know, cameras are like this big.

Speaker 2 (14:01):
They're big, you know, big, clunky.

Speaker 1 (14:05):
Yeah, yet to learn shit, you know, you couldn't just
like cheat and look, you know, get it to the
perfect place where sure digital screen is like perfect photo.
Then you go, okay, it's perfect click. You know, you
just had to go with your instincts.

Speaker 2 (14:19):
You had to develop a whole role of film and
hope three or four were great, right.

Speaker 1 (14:23):
Yeah, if you got one, you were happy, because what
can you do with thirty six good pictures of one
role in the film of one ship? You know. So most
people would always say full time photographers if you get
one shot per role, like you're winning. Yeah, And so
my pops put me onto taking photos. So I would

(14:43):
do that on my spare time from tour managing. And
I never really thought of you know, I didn't really
like the camera because I thought paparazzis or tourists carry
cameras around, you know, it looks kind of weird, right,
So I would always keep it kind of like to

(15:05):
the side, and then if I saw something cool or
if the homies were there, I would be like, hey,
let me get a flick, you know, and I would shoot.
I start off shooting all my homies from my car
club and that that world, and then shooting us probably
on the the Sol Assassin tour. I started taking a
couple of flicks here and there.

Speaker 2 (15:25):
Right just for you, yeah, just for me, And then.

Speaker 1 (15:30):
The homies would see the pictures, like we'd all kind
of compare our pictures after and be like, oh yeah,
let me see what you got. Let me see what
you got. And I would always notice that my pictures
were a little bit different than theirs. I would see
theirs and be like, oh, man, like like, we're right
next to each other. How did he get that picture?

Speaker 2 (15:51):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (15:51):
Yeah, yeah. But I didn't want to say nothing. I
don't want to hurt nobody's feelings or whatever. So I
just kept doing it little by little, and then as
more people would see it, they were like, hey, this
is this is pretty good. And the lady at the
photo lab, she she dealt with all pros. She was like, hey,
can I blow some pictures up and put them in
the in the lobby of the photo lab. And I

(16:14):
had noticed that she had done that with all the
pros before, and she did it, and she sold eight
out of eleven of the photos. And she goes, you
know what, I've never sold that many photos here in
the lobby of the photo lab even of the big guys.
And I was like, okay, cool, Like I didn't know
what that meant. You know, she was telling me you're

(16:36):
onto something, you know, stick with it. So I did
a little bit, a little bit more, a little bit more,
and then I found the Because I was a tour manager,
I was the one dealing with all the magazines, the
record labels and everybody that was coming through photographers, you.

Speaker 2 (16:54):
Know, the line of defense between the gatekeeper.

Speaker 1 (16:59):
Yes, so I would set up the interviews, like the
record label would send me a fax. I don't know
if people know what that is.

Speaker 2 (17:08):
Frequently like frequently asked question FAQ or no facts? Is
a fact like a fax machine? Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay.

Speaker 1 (17:15):
So you get this like prehistoric paper.

Speaker 2 (17:18):
Yeah, we'd come through like this machine with the phone
and it was kind of like an email before an email.

Speaker 1 (17:23):
Yeah, you get a fact, yeah, the paper email.

Speaker 2 (17:26):
Yeah, that's exactly what it was.

Speaker 1 (17:27):
Yeah, and it's on a crazy ass paper, Like I
have some of the factes from back then.

Speaker 2 (17:32):
They do so crazy how they come into.

Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, with the noises and ship on the machine. So
I'd get a fax and it say four interviews an
hour an hour long, so you schedule a time with
the guys when they want to do it, So give
each person fifteen minutes. So I do the sound check,
then we do press for an hour, then we'd do dinner,
and then we do the show and then we leave.

(17:56):
So the for the four interviews it's fifteen minutes. So
I had to, you know, be like, Okay, cool, we're done.
Next you know, I'm bringing the next interview, right. But
I would feel bad for the photographer because the interviewer
would take up ten minutes, you know, talking to these guys,
which isn't that much time if you think about it,

(18:17):
but everybody knew the deal, so it's like, you know
you're going to get this amount of time the photographer,
and I always see the photographer struggling, like where am
I going to shoot this classic picture of these four
guys at the hottest rappers in the world and we're
backstage at a concert for a four page article. And
I would see them going like, fuck man, poor guys,

(18:39):
you know. But then I was I started feeling bad
and be like, hey, if you guys need any photos
of the guys backstage or on stage during the show.
I have photos, and most of them would look at
me like, yeah, fucking sure, you look out of here,
you know, Roady or whatever the fuck you are. So
then I had these little little books with my photos

(18:59):
and I'm They're like, you take these, and I go, yeah,
that's why I'm telling you. If you want to use
my pictures, here check them out. So then they started
paying me to use my photos. Magazines yeah, and I
was like, oh, we'll give you two fifty five hundred bucks,
you know, a thousand and fifteen hundred to use the photos,

(19:21):
depending on the magazine and how big they would put
it in there. So I was like, fuck, I could
do this. This is pretty cool. This is better than
the other shit we were doing, you know, the moving
little things of weed or whatever. You know, Like, this
is cool. So I started getting a little bit more

(19:41):
serious into that, and I was taking more pictures of
my homies at the Lowrider shit, more pictures of the
touring stuff. And then I learned the language with the magazines,
and then I started learning about the videos and got
into doing videos, and it took off, you know, slowly,
because I wasn't pushing it because I had a job,

(20:02):
because you were doing the other shit. Yeah, but in
two thousand and five, those guys are tired of touring.
They're like, hey, we want to take a little break.
Is that cool? I'm like, yeah, you know, you guys
are the you're the boss, you know, like whatever you
want to do. But they were getting money from music.
But if you're not touring and you're you're not tour crew,

(20:22):
yeah yeah, you're out. So they're like you're good. Go yeah, yeah,
I'm good. You know, like what can I do? So
I just said fuck it, I'm going all in with
the photos and directing, and uh it worked out. I
never had to go back out on tour again.

Speaker 2 (20:41):
What was uh one of your early videos that kind
of that you were able to direct it because because
uh directing a video back then again, Yeah, things are
different now you can get it. I mean anybody you
can make it. You could literally shoot a video with
iPhone and it looked decent. You know, back then there
was so much more that you would put into it.

Speaker 1 (21:00):
Oh yeah, twenty thousand dollars video budget was nothing.

Speaker 2 (21:04):
That was like disrespectful video.

Speaker 1 (21:06):
Yeah. Fact, they're like disrespecting you giving you twenty grand
to shoot a video.

Speaker 2 (21:11):
So what were some of your early videos that you
were able to initially kind of be behind the lens and.

Speaker 1 (21:17):
The I mean I did videos for Mugs and Bee,
their side projects, and then I would say the one
that I did well for sen it was called Ssex ten.
It was a majority black and white video. Back then,
all the videos were shot on film. It was a
whole process. And I showed that Ssex ten video to

(21:44):
Dennis from Interscope, who works with eminem, and he was like,
I got a D twelve video for you, and I
was like, okay, cool, And so I remember getting all
excited because it was going to be fifty two thousand
dollars video budget, you know, right, and it's for eminem. Yeah,
And so I was like, let's do that, you know.

(22:07):
So I went to Detroit and shot, Uh it's called
all Ship on you. I remember that song. And because
they could never play it on the radio or well,
they could never play it on the.

Speaker 2 (22:19):
Screen or bet or any Yeah, they had a cuss word.
And back then there's no YouTube really.

Speaker 1 (22:25):
Yeah, right, so it wasn't like yeah, if you weren't
on MTV or the.

Speaker 2 (22:28):
Box or whatever it was, even the Box back. I
think by that by that time, it was BT and
MTV by that time. Manh, I think the box is done.

Speaker 1 (22:34):
So if you weren't on there, you you're asked.

Speaker 2 (22:36):
You might end up on a DVD.

Speaker 1 (22:38):
Yeah, the cussing DVDs.

Speaker 2 (22:40):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 (22:42):
So. But what I noticed was anytime there would be
a news story about eminem, they would use the footage
for my video because it was not seen right, and
it was cool. It was black and white, it had
him performing. So I would say that one probably hit
the biggest right then. And also Doctor Greenam did did

(23:03):
a pretty big And the challenge with that one was
here's a song all about weed, but you can't show
weed or show that there's anything that has to do
weed related. So I made up this like Mad Scientists.

Speaker 2 (23:23):
Remember that video as a kid.

Speaker 1 (23:24):
Right, Yeah, So it's like I made up this mad
Scientist idea. Uh. And it was based off of this
old school movie. I can't remember the the name of
the movie. There's a lot of you know, touring.

Speaker 2 (23:40):
And now it's that Mad Scientists is all over dispensary.

Speaker 1 (23:46):
Merch, weed bags, everything. So that video took off from
me and that that uh sent me into another strategy. Yeah,
and then I started. Uh, I met up with a
really good homie my name Skinhead Rob.

Speaker 2 (24:03):
Shots to Skinhead Rob. I loved him and Travis Barker
and the homie from the rantid that what was the
name of that side for the Transplants. That first Transplants
album was fucking raw.

Speaker 1 (24:17):
So he brought me in on that and I did
the press photos and that fucking album was so good.
We ended up doing the whole album packaging because we
had like a little art department.

Speaker 2 (24:28):
Great job, and.

Speaker 1 (24:31):
Ended up doing two videos for them with the bo Tribe.

Speaker 2 (24:35):
Yeah, I remember, yo, Fuck, dude, I got is that
I gotta I haven't listening to that album in probably
fifteen years.

Speaker 1 (24:41):
I gotta find it on Spotify.

Speaker 2 (24:43):
Yeah, because there was some ship on that album.

Speaker 1 (24:45):
So then Rob brought me in to that, and then
he brought me into Blink and then did you.

Speaker 2 (24:51):
Do expensive Taste stuff too with him and Paul?

Speaker 1 (24:53):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (24:54):
Yeah, there was an Expensive Taste with Skinhead Robin Paul
Wall that was Travis and Travis.

Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (24:59):
Fuck, that's a whole era of ship that I just
forgot about. Yeah, and I was a fan of that's crazy.

Speaker 1 (25:05):
Rob's been in like four or five bands, and I
did all the photos for all the bands.

Speaker 2 (25:10):
What was the band it was? Was it just the Travis.
Wasn't there a Travis Yellowl album that that was a group?

Speaker 1 (25:19):
Yeah? What was the name of that group? Fuck? I
don't know if it was a group.

Speaker 2 (25:24):
But I just it was one project. I did thee
with half of the faces. Damn, that's crazy. Shout to
Travis man, he's a real one.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (25:31):
So you were able to do some Blink stuff.

Speaker 1 (25:33):
Yeah. I did. My biggest video to date was one
called Down and I look at That was off the
self title. Yeah. Yeah, we did all the artwork for that,
did the merch and we did the video. I did
uh six videos off of that album, but one was

(25:55):
uh well, actually I did seven I think one was
Down And then I did five videos that were on
a CD ROM only.

Speaker 2 (26:05):
So it was like the deluxe album you bought.

Speaker 1 (26:07):
Right, you get the plug in the computer and you
can play it as a DVD two and then I
did not Now at the end of that that tour
that we were doing.

Speaker 2 (26:16):
That was a great album. Down's a great record.

Speaker 1 (26:18):
Yeah. So the but the cool thing was with those guys.
They were just like, do whatever the fuck you want
to do, like I wanna trust you, and like for down,
I just had this idea that I wanted to do.
I was like making a little movie, and uh, you know,
I had that little thing going on. Then I had
the performance going on, and this one girl, like you know,

(26:41):
the net bangers and stuff. They go, what does this
have to do with the song? What the songs about?
And I was like, Oh, what a bitch, you know,
like fucking bitch talking shit about me? And then uh
and I was like, well, yeah, what what does it
have to do with the song? Like this has nothing

(27:02):
to do with the song or anything. But I remember
that the reason that it was like that was because
they just said, do whatever you want. And I made
up this little story that I wanted to make. This
basically as a guy who he's on like parole or

(27:22):
probation or whatever, and the cops come to this party
and he was like fuck that, I'm not supposed to
be here. I'm out of here. He jumps the wall,
hops in his ride and takes off and gets into
a police chase.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
And so that story is happening while it's going back
and forth to performance shots.

Speaker 1 (27:38):
Yeah, it has nothing to do with the song, but
to me, he's down.

Speaker 2 (27:42):
He's down, that's all.

Speaker 1 (27:43):
I was thinking, motherfucker's down right here. So he makes
it and he gets away, which never happens never, So
I was like, I want to do that. So I
did that, and that led to a film agent name
Chris Smith. He was at this agency called Paradigm. He

(28:04):
was like, hey, you need to do movies. And I
was like, yeah, all right, cool, you know, like another
Hollywood thing, like somebody telling me you should do that,
an how about let's do this or that, so it's
just another thing. I was like, yeah, yeah, okay. But
he kept on me and finally I gave in. I
was like, all right, fuck it, so I go, what
do you want to do? And then he just started

(28:25):
introducing me to all these movie companies and I ad
met Brian Grazer through an art show that we did
at uh this Nike house in Venice Beach. It was there.
It was called the Blue House Nike about it, but
it was the original house where Jim Morrison lived on
the boardwalk. So I was like, man, this is cool,

(28:47):
Like we're doing an art show in Jim Morrison's house
and we used to listen to the Doors and our
Low Riders all the time, like our Low Writer Club.
It was the thing that was that we're known for
was when we pull into a car show, we're listening
to led Zeppelin, the Doors or Jimmy Hendricks that classic
rock just blasting out of a car that's two inches

(29:08):
off the ground going five miles an hour. It's crazy,
you know, Black Sabbath, like you put on like war
Pigs or something.

Speaker 2 (29:15):
Because you would think, like, you know, the typical low
rider club was probably bumping like Zapp and Roger and.

Speaker 1 (29:20):
Yeah like some old y you know, some Marvin game
something like that.

Speaker 2 (29:26):
Or you're placing and grew up and war Dog.

Speaker 1 (29:29):
Yeah, war Pigs were just like damn, just like everybody's
just like looking, what the fuck is that? It sounds
like evil, you know, and then you just see the
car just creeping and it's like, yeah, it's a great feeling.
But we did that that show. We met Brian Grays there.

Speaker 2 (29:49):
Probably, Like Brian Grays are a great Instagram follow if
anybody doesn't follow him.

Speaker 1 (29:52):
He's funny, Yeah, he's hilarious and uh, you know Ron Howard,
which was cool, Like we got to meet Richie Richie
Cunningham from Happy Days and at that time, who wasn't
a fan of Richie Cunningham. If you grew up in
my era and you didn't watch Happy Days, there's something
wrong with you.

Speaker 2 (30:10):
For sure, I watched it. I didn't grow up in
your era, but I saw the reruns my dad.

Speaker 1 (30:15):
Yeah. So to be able to like work with Richie Cunningham, like,
come on, man, for sure you made it, you know.
So I got to meet those guys and they ended
up we had a documentary we were trying to put
out called Ink, and they're like, we love the documentary,

(30:36):
but we don't want to do it. We want to
do a movie. So we're like, okay, cool. So they
go for seven years, you we're gonna sign this deal
with you, a three movie deal. So for these next
seven years, we want to do three movies. With the
first one, it was like seven years of rewrites on
the script. It was like one rewrite a year for

(30:56):
seven years. So by the seven years is over, we
still didn't have a movie. They're like, hey, thank you man,
the deal's gone. That was still get paid, no, because
you don't get paid to the until you do the movie.

Speaker 2 (31:11):
I'm not hip to the film game. Like you know
in hip hop, they're giving advance right, you know.

Speaker 1 (31:16):
So he gave us like a thirty grand advanced for
seven years, you know. Yeah, yeah, divide that up and
the Yeah, the writer got paid every every time he
turned in the script. So there were seven of those
he made, you know, his money. And then at the time,
the people universally they didn't understand like Chicano culture, low

(31:38):
Ride or anything. They're like, we don't know, we don't
know how to do it, but we don't we don't
get it. So that deal went away, and Brian kept
pushing that he wanted to do the low Writer culture.
So we're like, well that's cool, you know. He was like, hey,
you know, the deal's over. You know, sorry about that, guys,
but I still want to do a movie with you guys,

(32:00):
and I'm gonna take control of it and try and
push this other direction and let's see what's see what happens.
So we ended up going from a twenty five million
dollar movie to a five million dollar movie, and uh,
Bloomhouse put it out and it's called Little Writers, and
it went to the theaters and did you know did

(32:22):
this little thing in there?

Speaker 2 (32:23):
And for people don't know Bloomhouse is known for They're
probably known for the horror movies, right right, they got
huge horror.

Speaker 1 (32:31):
Franchises, the biggest probably.

Speaker 2 (32:32):
Yeah, it's interesting. Do you feel like, you know, I
feel like the wave and hip hop is turning and
I feel like, you know, when I was growing up
outside of Cypress Hill and you know a few others,
but I grew up in Phoenix, so Chicano rap was

(32:55):
really big, right, So like Little Rob and like mster
Caponi and EMC Magic and then be Rioters and all
those guys, and it was very if you weren't like
Cypress Hill, everybody could enjoy were they just happened to
be Latino, right. But then there was that way where
it was almost like if you weren't really connected to

(33:16):
the Chicano culture, didn't understand it, you might not appreciate
the music like the people who did appreciate the music.
Right now, I feel like, man, there's this this Mexican
wave in hip hop specifically, is it is rivaling anything
we've ever seen? You know, there's a guy like that
Mexican ot who's going crazy. Uh the La in San

(33:37):
Diego scene of Mexican rappers are just killing it like
it's it feels like all of the major labels are
now trying to sign Mexican talent, which I've never seen.
I've never seen it because I'll hear people like a
lot of my homies, like there's have you heard a
group called Coyote two Brothers. They're amazing. They put a

(33:58):
record out with Shaq not too long ago, but like
everyone's trying to sign him, you know, and any of
my Mexican rapper homies everyone's trying to sign like it's crazy,
like and I feel like like your movie might have
been like before, it's time.

Speaker 1 (34:12):
We're all we've been before. It's time with everything we've
done for sure, And uh, you know even with the clothing.
We had Joker clothing back in ninety five, but me
and Big Lucky we had a store on Melros called
super Max. Then we is that way?

Speaker 2 (34:27):
Is that the same? It's Big that's not Big Lucky
works the cookies it yep. Oh, that's my guy, man,
that's my guys. He's the coolest motherfucker ben Yep, he's
such a.

Speaker 1 (34:36):
Cool dude, I'm going to meet him right now. He's
so cool. Man right after this, Yeah, shout out to him.

Speaker 2 (34:42):
Bro, he's killing it.

Speaker 1 (34:43):
Man. We're getting the you know, more movie stuff.

Speaker 2 (34:45):
Yeah, I gotta go on his podcast. We keep talking
about I gotta, I gotta make it over there man,
that guy.

Speaker 1 (34:51):
Yeah, it's gonna be. Everything's about to turn right now.
Everything's about for you know, bigger and better things. So
where were we We're.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
Talking about that? So the movie got made by Bluemouse little.

Speaker 1 (35:05):
Right, and then I got my footage back from the
Ink documentary and we met a guy named Sebastian Ortega.
He came here to work with these He came here
from Argentina to work with these other Argentinas. And his
thing was, I'll work with you, but I want to
meet Stellan a cartoon. So I went to meet him

(35:27):
and he was like, I want to do I want
to do the Ink documentary. What's up with that? And
I go, that's funny you ask, because I just got
the footage back. It had been ten years locked up
you know, a shelf. So I just got the footage
back and he goes, can we do it? I go, well,
you know it sounds good, you know, but what are

(35:49):
we talking about here? He goes, well, let me fly
you to Argentina and show you my facility and see
what you think. And he's like, you know, I'm the
perfect guy to do this with. And I'm like looking
at him, like, okay, he's covered in tattoos from the

(36:11):
neck down. He's wearing Chucks Dicky's T shirt from Argentina,
from Argentina, and he goes, check this out. He shows
me on his phone he has two low writers. He's
the only guy in Argentina with with a lowrider and
he has two of them. So I'm looking at it.
He's going, yeah, I'm the you know, I'm probably the
perfect guy to do this with them. Yeah, I think

(36:32):
you are. You know. In my head, I'm thinking like
out of.

Speaker 2 (36:35):
Everybody, obviously understand the culture.

Speaker 1 (36:37):
Yeah you get it. Yeah, And he goes, you know,
I got into this business because of watching you guys.
And I was like, oh man, that's cool. You know
you guys inspired me. Shoots me a first class ticket
fly down to Argentina, picks me up. He goes, We're
gonna go to my facility, and I'm thinking, like, you know,

(36:58):
Our office was crazy. We had like twenty Low Riders
in there. There was three warehouses down to.

Speaker 2 (37:03):
Downtown in the Young Club.

Speaker 1 (37:05):
It was like, you know, we had our offices in
there at Tattoo.

Speaker 2 (37:08):
Is this this was in skid rowdy.

Speaker 1 (37:11):
Yeah, say studios. We called it solo assassine Studios. And
then so I get there and I see this huge studio,
like a film production studio, not like a studio, like
this is.

Speaker 2 (37:27):
Like shoot everything in there, like some ship you drive
by in Burbank.

Speaker 1 (37:32):
Yeah, Burbank or Paramount or Sonya. I was like, what
the fuck? And he goes, what do you think, man,
And as we're walking through that, mister Taka, do you
want to coffee? Mister take did you need to? You know,
like they're just like loving him, and he's he's the
main guy there, the owner of it all. And I
was like, man. And then he takes me to his

(37:52):
pad and out in the country in Argentina where he
has his lolos and we go cruising the Lowriders. I
was like, man, this is fucking said fuck, like, this
is a no brainer. We're doing this ship. So he
has like the number one show in in Argentina on
Netflix and we do like a little cut and show

(38:13):
them and they like it. And then he's they gave
us more money because he put in a pretty good
chunk and they liked it so much. They're like, they
showed Netflix. I guess it's like Latino Netflix.

Speaker 2 (38:30):
Yeah, I mean if you go, depending on where you
are in the world, if you turn Netflix on, sh
it's different.

Speaker 1 (38:35):
Yeah, way different. So this is like Argentina Netflix. They
showed it to the main headquarters over here and they're like,
let's go. So they gave us the rest of the
money to finish it, and then it was we changed
the name to.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
La Originals, which came out fire.

Speaker 1 (38:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (38:51):
So such a great fucking you guys killed that ship, dude.

Speaker 1 (38:55):
Yeah, I was proud of that one. And then then
the pandemic came. We were supposed to go to south
By Southwest Film Festival. We're the headliners, the main pick there.
A week before they canceled it for the pandemic and
the COVID you know, so everybody's like, hey, Holmes, what
did I do? We had like thirty homies going with us,

(39:15):
what do I do? You know? I got my fucking
plane ticket, the hotel, Airbnb, like, how am I gonna
get that going, homie?

Speaker 2 (39:22):
I don't know, like go out there and hang out.

Speaker 1 (39:24):
What do I look like? You know, like fights were
canceled everything, so, you know, the airlines, everybody gave their.

Speaker 2 (39:32):
Everybody everybody was getting refunds during that time. But it
was kind of you know, scary, like yeah, for sure,
it was unknown.

Speaker 1 (39:38):
We never yeah, there's that pandemic, then you don't know
if you canna get your money back, and just looked
like luckily that that week, everybody is locked down, They're
in home and they.

Speaker 2 (39:50):
Just I remember I was, I was supposed to south
By that year. Yeah, I was like, well, I guess
that ain't happening.

Speaker 1 (39:56):
Yeah, everybody turned the channel on and there.

Speaker 2 (40:00):
Everybody was just at home watching fucking the news, fucking
scared to go to the grocery store. I remember I was.
I had to go to seven eleven. I put gloves
on and ship. I was like, oh man, I don't know,
maybe you really need this.

Speaker 1 (40:14):
Shit was crazy.

Speaker 2 (40:15):
It's crazy, and it's funny like now that we like
look back and like realize, like we probably overreacted, you know, like.

Speaker 1 (40:22):
Oh yeah, well was fucking we didn't know.

Speaker 2 (40:24):
We didn't know. We didn't know. It was the first
time it ever happened. Yeah, was safe and sorry. Hey,
I want to ask you, you know, for people who
don't know, when you land in LA and you go
to the airport, in the gift shops, one of the
most ripped off. I know that in the gift shops.

Speaker 1 (40:43):
The LA is officially yours.

Speaker 2 (40:46):
Yeah, but in general, your iconic image of those tattooed hands,
it's probably the most pirated, ripped off and hip hopcal.

Speaker 1 (41:00):
Ever, and it's the most tattooed.

Speaker 2 (41:02):
And it's the most tattooed. But when I tell you, man,
I see that ship everywhere. Yeah, and it it's crazy, right,
So it's like for you, it's like, uh, the double
edged sword. Can you tell me the story behind that
specific photo.

Speaker 1 (41:18):
Yeah. I was in downtown and I was doing a
little photo shoot that I was doing for my clothes,
and I was shooting a woman, you know, game member,
and she was throwing up her neighborhood and I was like, hey,
can you throw up something you know, more universal, so
that like, you know, we didn't want to be branded
to just one neighborhood. And the picture come out, Yeah,

(41:41):
it says the name of the brand. But the photo,
you know, she's throwing up her hood. It could be
any hood, you know, but with that letter, you know.
So I was like, let's let's do something more universal,
you know, let's let's throw up to LA. And she
did it, and I was like, usually back then, I
didn't really know anything about photography. That's nineteen ninety four,

(42:04):
you know. I'm telling you. I got my camera like
a year before probably, so I'm just shooting like from Afar,
you know, like maybe ten feet so you could see
the whole building and everything. And I wasn't really into
shooting details. But for this one time, like two shots,
I went in and I just shot the fingers, you know,

(42:26):
just the hands. And I didn't really put it out
there like that for a little while, maybe a couple
of years, because I was more into the whole environment,
like the whole photo. So when people would ask me

(42:47):
for I would do an interview or whatever, they would say,
can you send us ten of your best photos that
you like the most, And I I was noticing that
I was shooting just wide full frame shots like a
girl with a house or a guy with a house
with a low rin.

Speaker 2 (43:02):
Yeah, a lot of your photos are like storytelling for real.

Speaker 1 (43:04):
Yeah, so I wanted to change it up, and I
wanted to show some detail shots, like just the rim
or just the fingers or just the face, you know.
And I started sending that around and seeing the reaction
that it was getting, I was like, fuck, I'm gonna
send it again, you know. And I just kept sending
that on everyone. I would change maybe the other nine

(43:27):
photos out of the ten they wanted. I would change
those other ones, but I always send the Ellie fingers
and people would always print that one, you know. They'd say, like,
send ten and we'll pick four or five or whatever.

Speaker 2 (43:40):
That would be the one that always want to print.

Speaker 1 (43:41):
Yeah, either was the main part of the story with
my you know Ellie photographer. You know, boom, there's that photo.
Then the interview or they wanted for the cover or whatever,
and uh, I noticed that shit was just the one.
So I just kept putting it out there here and
there for thirty years, been putting it out there.

Speaker 2 (44:02):
You kind of said it's like a gift in a curse, right,
because it is such an iconic photo. But it's also,
like you said, I mean, like if you walk through
Santi alley. Yeah, you're gonna probably see your ship, oh
for sure, everywhere. Then it's everywhere you see your ship.
You're like, that's my ship.

Speaker 1 (44:19):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (44:20):
But you also if you go to Lax, there's the
official ship, right, you know.

Speaker 1 (44:23):
So that's what I'm trying to do, is get the
official ship out there enough to where people don't have
to buy the bootlet ship. Right, scumbags down there, you know, yeah,
fake shit, no disrespect to the name boutlet, but no,
it's all good, you know, the bog shit. Yeah, yeah,
those guys. You know, it's like that's my that's my ship.

(44:43):
You know, like I've been promoting that that photo that
I took for thirty years, and you just fucking go
and make a shirt of it, you know, and cash
in on my hard work. You know. It's a fuck
up feelings.

Speaker 2 (44:55):
It sucks too, because I do feel like that's kind
of the plight of photographers is some how, you know,
you've obviously been able to break through and be one
of the goats, but like somehow photographers man, and even
videographers and graphic designers. I feel like those three, but
photographers more over than anybody somehow, always man just don't

(45:16):
get the appreciation because I feel like people who don't know,
they don't really understand, like the work right the like
like you said you were you were on tour with people,
and you guys might have been standing right next to
each other and you would see their photos and you'd
be like, how the fuck did you get that? And
I got mine and we were standing in interest from
each other. This is not like you know, there's just

(45:38):
so much that goes into it, and like, you know,
no one thinks about the photographer when they print printed
a picture. I mean that happened with Cameron. Cameron was
selling merch of the picture of him on the phone
wearing all pink and didn't credit the photographer, and the
photographer suited him in one. Yeah you know, and it's
like you got to understand, like that's art or art,

(46:00):
you're the artist.

Speaker 1 (46:01):
Yeah, it's like you're taking one of their songs to
get paid. Oh they get hot, Yeah, it's gonna get hot. Motherfuck.
You can't use my song, don't use my photo. Yeah, yeah,
that simple. But everything's just so twisted now, it's like
so crazy, like that whole thing, you know, But.

Speaker 2 (46:19):
I mean, I'm sure that that photo has been such
a blessing for you.

Speaker 1 (46:22):
Yes, well yeah, because every time they use it without asking.

Speaker 2 (46:26):
It's ceasing. You must have a great fucking lawyer.

Speaker 1 (46:30):
Yeah, the season assist doesn't. Isn't that great because you're
just telling people to stop doing what you've already been doing. Laws.
The better one is like at the end of they
made all that money and then you're like, hey.

Speaker 2 (46:43):
Did any of the big because I always see like Fashion,
Novachine some of these like uh bigger companies that are
like manufacturing in China. Did they ever steal your ship?

Speaker 1 (46:54):
Yeah? They got to pay too, so they don't get
so you sue them. They get they got to cut
it check, you know, so.

Speaker 2 (47:01):
Who who took who? Who was one of the bigger brands.

Speaker 1 (47:04):
They don't let me say it.

Speaker 2 (47:06):
Oh, okay, you know that's part of it. But but
they had to cut motherfuckers had to cut a check.

Speaker 1 (47:10):
Yeah, I got my residuals or what do they call
the music industry.

Speaker 2 (47:14):
And residuals you're oh, you're royalties.

Speaker 1 (47:16):
Yeah, I had to get my royalties.

Speaker 2 (47:18):
That's great.

Speaker 1 (47:18):
We're on a hip hop shows. Yeah, of course I
had to get my royalties.

Speaker 2 (47:21):
That's dope, man, I think it's just so cool every
time I'm a lax and I see your ship and
the Mahmi Franco does your merch. Yeah in Burbank. So
I'll be I'll be at the factory and I'll see
all your ship.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
Yeah. So my boy Mike Missix, who is next door
to him, Barbara know him. No, he was next door
to the building next door.

Speaker 2 (47:40):
Okay, okay, okay, got you, got you, got you.

Speaker 1 (47:42):
He took me over there. Mike Missics was one of
my old oldest friends in like Hollywood. He was one
of the first guy to do raves and he dj'
and he did the clubs, and he was one of
the guys that I used to work the door with
door for and then he got me into DJing and stuff.

(48:03):
So we'd go to DJ like fraternity parties and weddings
and King Sinas and bar Mitzvahs and all that. So
he was like big in the LA scene back in
the days with like delicious vinyls and all that. Like
he was around the times of all that and one
of the bigger DJs of all those parties.

Speaker 2 (48:26):
You you do a lot like like you know when
when you do street photography, like you've done. It could
probably result in you being in some dangerous situations. Yeah,
you've done a lot of dope ship with gang members
and skid Row. Like I want you to kind of
like what's like one of the more sketchy situations you

(48:46):
found yourself in.

Speaker 1 (48:49):
Just rolling around skid Row. Sometimes there's and this is
like old school skied rook Row is what.

Speaker 2 (48:58):
I don't know which one's.

Speaker 1 (48:59):
Worse now for sure A thousand times where do you drive.

Speaker 2 (49:02):
Through skid Row. There's just fires in the middle of
the street.

Speaker 1 (49:04):
And ship and that's nothing. They all got guns, you know,
like there's foods down there with guns, Like I don't
know how they get them because they can't bare to
afford the next fucking.

Speaker 2 (49:14):
Because I remember from the La Originals documentary, like you
have like a pre you have good like you guys
were there, so you had good relationships with.

Speaker 1 (49:21):
Yeah, yeah, we're we're cool with all them down there,
you know, like we've we become you know, you have
to adapt to where you are, you know, so if
you're moving into back then it was a skid row.
Where we were was an extension of skid Row. Right
now it's called the Artists district. They put everybody more
in a compact area. But back then, you know, they

(49:47):
were they'd break into our cars like every day, and
and sometimes we'd catch them and and uh, you know,
explain to them, this isn't the right thing to do,
and uh they got yeah, yeah, they got the message.
And then uh, we made friends with some of the
ones who we see every day.

Speaker 2 (50:08):
Look out for our ship, yeah yeah, and we'll look
out for you.

Speaker 1 (50:11):
So we'd give him like clothes, food, break him up
at money here, and then yeah, and so then uh,
we became really tight with a guy named Pepper. They
he called himself the Mayor's skid Row. He was like
one of the only white guys down there. And he

(50:32):
told me that he got his name Pepper from he
got jumped and that he got a hold of some
pepper spray and went back and you know, gave him
a little issue of the pepper spray when they were
sleeping in tents and stuff. So that's he got his nickname.
But uh, he was cool as fuck. You know, he'd

(50:54):
always look out for us, and and he had the
respect of all the guys down there, so he would
just be like, hey, these are the homies. You know,
if you guys want break in the cars, just don't
break into these ones. Yeah, And everybody from then on
everything went cool and smooth, and so we'd hire him
for like, if we'd have an event, we would hire him,

(51:16):
and a couple other guys would just be like, hey,
you guys be over here on the outskirts.

Speaker 2 (51:19):
Yeah, make sure none of the bullshit gets over.

Speaker 1 (51:21):
Here, right right, And they would and they're so cool
and like and they would tell those guys like, hey,
these guys are the homies. So at eleven o'clock when
it ends, you guys can come back and we would
give them, you know, all the.

Speaker 2 (51:34):
Food, yeah, whatever leftover, and catering whatever, yeah, come through.

Speaker 1 (51:37):
It, drinks whatever. So we just would look out for
them like that. And then we started doing little things like,
you know, we'd go buy like a couple hundred hamburgers,
you know from McDonald's or Farmer Brothers down there, take
a couple one hundred burritos, right, and then we just
started getting into that whole thing of giving back to

(51:58):
the community. This back then the right right right right,
and that felt good, felt great to like you're in
somewhere and you see the struggle every day.

Speaker 2 (52:08):
You're a part of the community to in the middle
of it, you know, you have no choice.

Speaker 1 (52:13):
So it's a good feeling for us to give back,
you know, on a on a regular basis, not on
Thanksgiving or Christmas, just which everybody does, you know, Like
you go down there on skid Row, now there's like
fifty vans people giving out food to where the guys
are rolling around with like four to go trays full

(52:35):
of food, and it's like, what are they going to
do with that? They don't have a refrigerator.

Speaker 2 (52:39):
Yeah, a lot of that's going bad.

Speaker 1 (52:41):
Yeah, it's going to going bad in two days. The
rats are gonna get it. So we would do it
on all the off days, you know, like on a
normal days it's Monday. Yeah, it's Monday. It's freezing, you know.

Speaker 2 (52:54):
And this is pre fetanyl obviously, this is.

Speaker 1 (52:56):
This is pre everything everything twenty years ago, thirty years ago. Yeah,
so we got into that whole thing and you know
taking uh we we used to take our low writers
down there and take like two cars of lowriders and
two cars of the food and stuff just to try
and give them like a you know, make them feel good.

Speaker 2 (53:18):
Right, cool.

Speaker 1 (53:21):
You know, everybody, every one of them had an uncle
or their dad or whatever had a low writer, you know,
back in the days. So they're like, oh, yeah, my dad,
just that one of these bah you chop it up,
and you know they uplift their spirit over there. I
mean you're down there every day, you're.

Speaker 2 (53:38):
You could get psyched out.

Speaker 1 (53:39):
Yeah, like the rest, the yeah, the negativity and just
a dark you know, being in the dark place all
the time twenty four to seven can be you know,
good for you know, it's it's like the perfect remedy
for mental health.

Speaker 2 (53:57):
I got more questions, but I have to take a piss,
So let's take a quick pick.

Speaker 1 (53:59):
Go piss break, all right, put that one up.

Speaker 2 (54:04):
We're back.

Speaker 1 (54:06):
Sorry, you can see it. You can see all the
way over here.

Speaker 2 (54:12):
Just a white It's good. We're back, all right. So
we were talking about you on skid Row. I was
curious because sometimes as an interviewer, there will be stuff

(54:33):
that gets talked about on my ship that I'll know
I won't put out because were there ever any photos
that you got any flack for releasing, or any backlash
or just with the politics.

Speaker 1 (54:49):
You know, you never know, no one girl, tried to
come at me for a photo that was in the
the thing because she says like deflammation her or whatever,
Like come on, man, I looked at her her Instagram
or Facebook.

Speaker 2 (55:05):
Sweetheart, your Instagram's worse than this.

Speaker 1 (55:08):
Yeah, this photo is like blessing you, you know, and
you're you're it's twenty years old, so you look a
little bit better than that. So come on, man, like,
just take take take that one. You know you got.
You got a good photo of me when you were
in your prime for free, and now you're right now

(55:29):
you're not in your prime. You're far from it, and
you're I don't know what the fuck you think I'm
ruining about your image, Like look at your page right
right right for y'alls about it, you know, like the
rest everybody loves all the photos I've done on them
rather family members.

Speaker 2 (55:49):
I can say. When you meet a guy like Baldacci,
that guy's like made for your camera, right like you
guys for people don't know about Dacci's a rapper. He's
a uh really nice guy. Sweet dude. I've had him
on the I mean he's not a sweet guy. He's
a nice guy. Yeah, it's definitely not sweet. Serious guy,

(56:09):
but very talented dude, very nice guy. He's a rapper
from LA but he's also his instagram is the face
of LA because his entire faces.

Speaker 1 (56:19):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (56:20):
So when you meet a guy like that or you're like, yeah,
we gotta we gotta take some pics.

Speaker 1 (56:24):
Yeah, so sometimes you know, sometimes you can see how
they are and there might be on a sick one,
you know, so you're like, yeah, I'm cool, you know,
like you don't want this dude calling you every day
or like you know photos. Yeah. Well then once it's
a food like the so what's up with the next thing?
And you know, like on you you know, so you

(56:45):
meet somebody like Baldacci was like he's you know, all
covered in tattoos and everything, but he's all about the business.

Speaker 2 (56:53):
He's a very very just buttoned up dude.

Speaker 1 (56:56):
Yeah, like super respectful. He was raised the right way
by you know, the right people in that world. And
he's a stand up guy you know, all the way around.
So when you meet guys like that, you're like, this
is this is cool? You know.

Speaker 2 (57:14):
You're obviously, Uh, there's the the exhibit that's is the
hip Hop's Infinity, yeah, which is mass Appeals putting on
how what how much of your work is on display there?

Speaker 1 (57:29):
Me and me and mass Appell go back to.

Speaker 2 (57:33):
The magazine before now his own mass Appeal. It was
a it was like almost like an underground magazine that
like certain little record stores would have. Yeah, it was
dope photos, high quality, high integrity.

Speaker 1 (57:43):
Yeah, it was a badass that magazine.

Speaker 2 (57:46):
Even the paper was like different, the cover was like
a different times.

Speaker 1 (57:49):
Yeah, it was high end, like you said, you know,
it wasn't like these cheap magazines. It was dope. And
then uh, I had a a section there called Rides
and Rims. It was a two page section. We'd feature
cars in there, the car culture, because they they didn't
want it to be too much East Coast, so they

(58:11):
wanted to spread it out, you know, throughout the States
and La New York, the Bay. You know.

Speaker 2 (58:15):
It was a very East Coast republication for sure.

Speaker 1 (58:18):
You So we ended up uh having those two pages
in there, and ended up doing other features for them.
I shot a cover of Eminem and rock Him for them,
and uh, a couple of you know, different spreads, you know,
mixed throughout the years that I worked with them, And

(58:40):
then it came to I did a documentary like some
consulting on the LA Riots with them, and uh. The
next documentary I did with them was called Insane in
the Brain is a documentary about Cypress Hill. That's time, yeah,

(59:01):
and that was like, you know, I think couple years. Yeah,
So that was like another perfect movie for me to
follow up with LA Originals. And the next thing was
this art show and they they've been doing it around

(59:22):
the world and other places, but this is the first
time that's had this much of my work in it.
I have my own room towards the back, and it
said they asked me to put my elements of what
hip hop means to me. So I did one wall

(59:43):
of memorabilia that I have of me and Cypress Hill,
like the jerseys and the clothes we used to take
and the Golden Platinum records and the dat tapes from
the shows and different things like that, and then I
did a wall of Nipsey Hustle. My friend Downtown Daniel
did a mural Never nineteen fifty nine. He also did

(01:00:04):
a mural of Nipsey, but the one of Downtown Daniel
has the actual reference picture that he would look at
and test the colors on that and then he do
the mural on the wall downtown off Fourth and Alameda.
So I have the original photo, the reference picture, and

(01:00:25):
then I have a photo of him doing it, and
then I have his first painting that he's ever done
for like galleries, and that's it's all the same image
of Nipsy. And then I have my bike in there,
and another wall I have low writing, like memorabilia from
all the years I've been low writing, and the other

(01:00:45):
wall is like a gangster wall because to me was
sets La hip Hop aside from other cities is low writing.
There's a lot of always a lot of lowriders in
our videos and our imagery, and there's the gangster element.

(01:01:05):
The gang culture is starting with n w A. You know.
So on that while I have letters and envelopes and handkerchiefs,
they call them panos that my homiees Big Lucky and
Lepki would send me, so you can see all that

(01:01:28):
prison artwork. Then I have the original tattoo that a
machine that I made for cartoon. He tattooed me the
very first cartoon cartoon tats in a box with some
top ware cups that were sent to me from prison.
And then on the side of that, there's a whole

(01:01:51):
wall of Teenagel magazines, which was the old gangster magazine
that you could pretty much only find in La or
the Bay. Wow, and uh, it's it's you know, it's
it's instinct now or what do they call it? Circulation?
And then a teen Agel died some years back. So

(01:02:14):
but I have a show coming up with teen Angel
and Beyond the Streets in June, So that's gonna be
a what.

Speaker 2 (01:02:22):
Was like for you? Like, uh, you know, it was
nit I mean, obviously Nipsey was from a different generation
than you in terms of just like his come up,
but you know his impact was so crazy. How did
he kind of like like what was your uh what
was it about Nipsey that you respected, enjoyed?

Speaker 1 (01:02:42):
You know, just how he carried himself. Yeah, you know
he was real respectful, real calm and like mellow and smooth.
But you could tell he was with the business, you know,
like at any moment or something, you know, when when sideways,

(01:03:03):
you know, he would he would get your back or
he wouldn't let it happen. You know.

Speaker 2 (01:03:08):
So you also have like a high he had to
have a high respect for photographers because His manager was
j Yeah, who is also a dope photographer and a
dope logo guy created the all money in logo and
the logo so he I feel like Nipsey had like
a real high regard for dope photography.

Speaker 1 (01:03:27):
Yeah, he did.

Speaker 2 (01:03:30):
Those.

Speaker 1 (01:03:30):
The photos that I did for him was for an
old magazine called Ryan Magazine, La hip Hop magazine, And
at that time I had the kind of relationship with
magazines where they would say, what do you want to
do and I would say, you know, I want to
do a story on this guy, this guy, this guy,

(01:03:51):
and they didn't even know who they were, but I would.

Speaker 2 (01:03:53):
Still they would trust you to curate.

Speaker 1 (01:03:56):
So at that time, Jay Rock's album had come out,
Nipsey's album hadn't come out, and who else was there.
I shot some early pictures of Kendrick because he was
with Jay Rock when I did his photos, and there
was one more guy that I was I was always

(01:04:19):
pushing to magazines that the news I just wanted to
show like that here comes a new wave of LA guys.
And I didn't only have connections here in LA, but
I had or New York in the States. I had
foreign connections like in Germany, hip hop's huge over there Australia,

(01:04:40):
just different places where I had a relationship with the
magazine that I could do stories on these guys and
send it over to them and it would come out
and you know, a lot of that would help the
artists out.

Speaker 2 (01:04:54):
For sure, to get expanded to a new place here.

Speaker 1 (01:04:59):
So there was a a lot of that happening back then.
I got to shoot and Nipsee a couple of times
for a couple of different things before he had ever
come out with a record on a label. And then
I think that that deal that we're going to do
made it to where he was like, I'm not even

(01:05:20):
gonna do stuff with a label no more. I'm gonna
I'm gonna just go independent.

Speaker 2 (01:05:26):
Yeah left epic. Yeah, Nip was like a one of
one man.

Speaker 1 (01:05:31):
Yeah. So but I had a big plan friend that
we were going to do. At that time, one of
my best friends, Casey from Known Gallery, had a gallery.
I was already doing stuff with Nick Diamond. So my
my idea was, let's do your like an album cover

(01:05:51):
photo shoot and then we do an art exhibit at
the at the gallery on Fairfax, and then we do
a clothing capsule released with Diamond and that would be
the listening party for the album. Is the album would
be paying in the gallery where all the folos from

(01:06:13):
the whole Day in the Life of Nipsey would be
on display and then the clothing capsule people could go
in and buy merch and the album would be playing
in there. And that wasn't thought of back then. You know,
there's two thousand and eight, I think crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:06:33):
So.

Speaker 1 (01:06:35):
You know, then the deal didn't go with the label,
and then he went on and just started putting stuff
out on his own, so we never got to do that, you.

Speaker 2 (01:06:45):
Know, or you know, obviously that first Print show mixtape
and which he yeah, kind of set up a blueprint
that a lot of artists have been following since.

Speaker 1 (01:06:52):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:06:53):
So shout out to nip you when you have a
mutual friend our boy Ritchie and he was telling me
that you do the cold plunge and you do the
you do the cold hot therapy. Yes can you?

Speaker 1 (01:07:04):
Uh? I?

Speaker 2 (01:07:05):
Because for people who don't know the benefits of that,
why do you do it?

Speaker 1 (01:07:11):
Like?

Speaker 2 (01:07:11):
What are the benefits? What's you know? And is that
something you do every day every day?

Speaker 1 (01:07:17):
And it's we have a couple, I have a couple
of guys come over. Who got me into the sun
and coldpluch thing is a friend of mine named Marlin.
He used to have a brand called Sneak Tip.

Speaker 2 (01:07:30):
I remember Sneak Tip. I used to have some of
their T shirts.

Speaker 1 (01:07:32):
Yeah. Yeah. And another good friend of mine Pat from RVCA,
which was Rucaye and Pat would take me out to
Hawaii during the Pipeline Masters every winter for thirteen years
to shoot all his the people that he sponsored. It'd

(01:07:53):
be like twenty of the top world fighters, twenty of
the top world surfers, skaters and street artists. He'd fly
them all out there, rent a few houses, put everybody up,
and you and I would just take picts of the
team fire. And it's during the Pipeline Masters, which is

(01:08:14):
one of the biggest surfing competitions in the world, the best,
the coolest, funnest and uh, I was just documenting all
that for a book. And you know, I wasn't really
into health or working out. I was eating like what
people say, eating good, but really eating like shit, you know,
just a lot of and a lot of it. You know,

(01:08:35):
it's like two sixty five, you know, just getting fat
and out of shape. And it wasn't feeling good, you know.
But everybody's telling you, Oh, you're eating good, you're living
that good life. But it's like, really, you're not.

Speaker 2 (01:08:49):
You're You're even worse.

Speaker 1 (01:08:51):
You can't breathe because you fucking eat so much. You
need a wheelchair to fucking take you out of the restaurant. Yeah,
the food is good, that's why you're eating so much much,
but it's not good for you. So once once a year,
I'd go out to the North Shore with pat in
them and we'd work out every day and do the

(01:09:12):
sauna and a cold plunch. And I just got to
the point where I was like, man, this is a ship,
you know, Like I want to do this back home.
So I bought me a little sauna off of the website.
They shifted to my house. My boy, he hooked it up.
He built like the patio, put the sauna on there.
Then we built like a little roof over it because

(01:09:33):
we want to mess it up. And we got a little,
you know, cool little thing there, got a bunch of weights,
started inviting some homies over and we made it a thing.
And now you know, we do it every day, and
I feel bad when I don't do it. I feel like, man,
you know, I feel guilty, like like I fucked up

(01:09:54):
that day.

Speaker 2 (01:09:55):
How how long did I mean, you probably never get
used to the cold plunch thing, but how long did
it take you to be able to tolerate it.

Speaker 1 (01:10:09):
The first time? I had to? Because I see, like.

Speaker 2 (01:10:13):
Because for people who don't know, when you when you
immerse your body in that cold water going to shock,
it almost feels like your heart might jump out of
your chest.

Speaker 1 (01:10:21):
Yeah, it still feels like that, but you know what's coming,
you know. Yeah, but imagine twenty like all tatted up,
ripped UFC fighters and world class.

Speaker 2 (01:10:33):
They're all doing it.

Speaker 1 (01:10:34):
They're all doing it, and you're there, so you got
to everybody thinks like, oh, you're the cool guy from LA,
like you're not a pussy right, No, hell no, right,
go go ahead and get in that fucking bucket full
of ice. Then you like.

Speaker 2 (01:10:48):
When you get in, man, that shit hits you like
a ton of bricks. Yeah, you're it's it's but it's
also like it's like a shot of dopamine. Yeah, it
almost like better than any cup of coffee. Yeah, for sure,
better than.

Speaker 1 (01:11:03):
It feels incredible when you do it.

Speaker 2 (01:11:04):
When you get out. Yeah, it's just it's rough. It
is rough. It's not easy. It is rough, like you like,
you know, but it's it's so it's like a drug almost.

Speaker 1 (01:11:15):
Yeah. I do it every day. I've been taking a
hot because I have the shower outside. I haven't taking
a hot shower in my house for a few years
ever since I started doing it.

Speaker 2 (01:11:28):
So I just wake up in the morning, hit the
cold shower.

Speaker 1 (01:11:30):
Yeah. I love it. It's like a way to wake up.
And you know, you don't die doing it.

Speaker 2 (01:11:36):
It's not but you get out of that shower and
you feel alive.

Speaker 1 (01:11:39):
Yeah, you feel live.

Speaker 2 (01:11:41):
You take that hot shower in the morning. Yeah, and
it doesn't it makes you almost want to go.

Speaker 1 (01:11:47):
Back to bed. Yeah, you're just sitting in there.

Speaker 2 (01:11:50):
You're sitting there like like you know, I put some
water in my eyes.

Speaker 1 (01:11:54):
Yeah, like all that. I just get in there like well,
you know, like you're just taking Yeah, you just starting
the day, man, you know for sure. But it's a
great feeling, man, So you do it every day every day? Yeah. Wow.

Speaker 2 (01:12:07):
How long you sit in the sauna.

Speaker 1 (01:12:09):
At least fifteen minutes up to twenty minutes depending on it.
If I have to go do something, and if people
come late and you're waiting for them, and you.

Speaker 2 (01:12:18):
Know how many folks do it with you every day.

Speaker 1 (01:12:22):
We have There's enough room in there for six people,
but we've had up to ten, and you just rotate
people like, you know, these guys go in, these guys
go on the ice, these guys you know, well, these
guys are in the ice, these guys are in the sauna,
these guys are working out, hitting the weights.

Speaker 2 (01:12:43):
Is there anything obviously you said Joker brand is barely
just getting you guys are obviously still very much a
Joker brand. I don't think a lot of people knew
you were behind Joke Brand. I didn't know that until
I watched the I feel like I found that out
in the last few years. Yeah, because you'll see Joker
Brand everywhere.

Speaker 1 (01:12:59):
Yeah, I be Real Ship Me and be Real started. Okay,
we got it.

Speaker 2 (01:13:03):
I remember the like ads in the Source and ship
double XL back in the day.

Speaker 1 (01:13:07):
Yeah, that was me shooting be Real. So it was
a cartoon and Sucker Mike and these two friends back
then they were in our car club together and they
ended up doing Sucker Brand clothing, but as an offshoot
they did Joker, and it went to a couple of

(01:13:28):
trade shows at the Magic a couple of magic shows.
Magic was cracking, right, So they ended up not wanting
to do it no more. So they had all this inventory.
I was coming out of this clothing brand. I had
Not Guilty with Lucky and Everlast, and this lady shut
us down because she had a worldwide trademark. We didn't
know we got it incorporated. We thought like, oh, we

(01:13:49):
got we owned the LLC. Yeah, we own everything that
says not guilty. But like, we didn't go to school, nothing,
We didn't know anything about business. Got this not Guilty
incorporating and this lady goes, well, that's great, I have
the not Guilty trademark worldwide. Get the fuck out of here.
So that was over. And then these guys had all
this inventory, and b ro was like, we should do something.

(01:14:12):
I go, well, let's go get that inventory. It's already there.
So we went and bought the inventory off of them
and all the artwork and started just taking it on
tour with us everywhere we went. And then every time
I'd do a photo shoot, I'd bring a box like
to a mob Deeper my fabulous or whoever and be like, hey, Holmianes,

(01:14:32):
you know, thank you for you know, having me do
this shoot with you guys for this magazine or whatever.
Here's a box of our gear. And they'd be like, oh, fuck,
can we wear We're like hell yeah, Like you don't
have to wear it for this, I'm not bringing it.
Like hey, here's my shirt. Put it. You know. It's
like you could wear it later on when you get
back to New York or whatever, but just as a

(01:14:53):
respect thing, they wear it in the shoot and come
out in the magazine and we're all over the place.
And so that just like grew up organically.

Speaker 2 (01:15:05):
Any projects coming for you and that that you got
coming out working on, I'm sure you're always working on something.

Speaker 1 (01:15:11):
Yeah, I'm working on a documentary with the Bua tribe
because I feel like, you know, that story needs to
be told. It's a la story, and I agree, if
you know, you know, and if you don't, you should.
So I'm working with Gotti and Cobra, the remaining brothers.

(01:15:31):
Uh that's Godfather rid Mosco rests in peace. Big story
to tell, man, and it needs to be you know,
like those dudes, you know, we're there from the beginning
of LA hip hop.

Speaker 2 (01:15:47):
And like I just feel like that area, like the
Carson area of LA. I don't think people fully understand,
you know, like the Pacific Islander or the Samoan or
the oos like culture that comes out of there, and

(01:16:07):
how it also can be wrapped into like the street
side of things as well. It's just like, you know,
it's it's it's just it's crazy because if it's it's
almost like a tribe is out right now active like
they were in the nineties and ship like with the
with the allure of gang culture nowadays on the internet.
It's so fucking crazy. I don't get it. But it's like,

(01:16:28):
it's dope that you're doing that.

Speaker 1 (01:16:30):
Yeah. And then the Cobra's son, D Boy, he's wrapping down.
He's bad, He's sick with it.

Speaker 2 (01:16:38):
That's dope. So that's oh ship, So that's that's gonna
be dope.

Speaker 1 (01:16:41):
Yeah, he's bad. I have a home for that project,
not yet, we're just getting interviews together. I went with
D Boy to UH New Zealand. They did a tribute
to the tribe out there at this festival. He performed
and then they a bunch of the older guys from
that didn't music with them came out and did like

(01:17:01):
a tribute show to them. So that was like some
you know, cool footage that you just can't get for
any other group, right, you.

Speaker 2 (01:17:10):
Know, that's dope, that's super dope.

Speaker 1 (01:17:14):
I got the Joker and the Steven Orioles and Zoomies. Now,
so where you know.

Speaker 2 (01:17:19):
Go support a Zoomies.

Speaker 1 (01:17:20):
Yeah, you trying to have it somewhere where you know
the regular folks can get it.

Speaker 2 (01:17:25):
Have you guys done a collab of cookies yet?

Speaker 1 (01:17:28):
I did you? Yeah? Steven oriol Yeah, I did a
That was one of the things that kept me going
in the in the COVID because I did a couple
of collabs like Food's Gone Wild, Cookies, Trollo, Fit Coeper
and Born and Raised, and those things are what kept

(01:17:50):
me going during the COVID because I couldn't go outside
to shoot nobody because when I shoot people, I'm like
very close within ten feet. So my whole job got
shut down also, you know, along with everybody else's. But
those collaborations kept me afloat that Stipe man.

Speaker 2 (01:18:10):
So, uh, go support if you're in Zoomies, yeah, if
you uh? If you uh, what's the official website that
people can just go.

Speaker 1 (01:18:18):
To purchase Mistellanil dot l A or Joker brand dot com.

Speaker 2 (01:18:23):
So go support, go check out the exhibit.

Speaker 1 (01:18:25):
It's in l A.

Speaker 2 (01:18:26):
I think until March.

Speaker 1 (01:18:28):
You know, they extended it. They did, Yeah, because it's
been doing great. Kids.

Speaker 2 (01:18:32):
Yeah, I've been telling Alan show, I'm gonna take my kids.

Speaker 1 (01:18:34):
To go check it out.

Speaker 2 (01:18:35):
Oh it's cool, man, I've seen photos. It's it's because
it's been at least a month and a half or so,
it's been there.

Speaker 1 (01:18:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:18:40):
Yeah, it's been there for a while. So go check
it out. Go check out your you got a whole
area of it. Go follow this guy.

Speaker 1 (01:18:47):
You're a legend. Man.

Speaker 2 (01:18:48):
Thank you for seeing what you got up your sleeve. Next.

Speaker 1 (01:18:51):
Yeah, it's coming there.

Speaker 2 (01:18:52):
It is, man, that's appreciate you, brother.

Speaker 1 (01:18:55):
Yeah, thank you guys.

Speaker 2 (01:18:56):
Boom