PLB Interview

This is a recent interview on the pacific longboarder magazine web site. I got real into it and wrote this super long response to Moonwalker's questions (photographer/writer PLB). When he got the email he was kind of overwhelmed by the the amount of content so he had to cut some out. Here is the original and click below to read the edited one with pictures.

Your quiver

My quiver is a collection of artistic mood that has altered and evolved both forward and backwards depending on my influence with in my innermost self. Just kidding (I just was pretending that I had something deep and profound to say). Basically I ride Jed Noll’s boards which often include my model which is a 9’0 x 21 3/4 x 2 ¾”, which was influenced by surfing in Santa Cruz and the surrounding areas. The board is foiled very thin in the rails to help put it on rail easily. It has low rocker to accelerate through sections while nose riding and a narrow tail to allow for hard turns. It was designed to be ridded as a true tri-fin and is glassed with 2 4oz layers of glass on top and 1 4oz ounce layer of glass on the bottom.
When I’m being mellow I ride my N-ride which is 9’6 x19 ¼” x 23 ¼” x 17”. The idea behind this board is to provide a wide stable platform, allowing for long steady nose rides. The thickness is 3” in the middle spreading evenly throughout the board with 50/50 rails and a single fin long box. The “N-Ride” is pretty flat in the nose with moderate rocker in the tail. As far as nose riders go it is a fairly light board with two layers of 6 oz glass on top and a layer of 4 oz glass for a deck patch as well as two layers of 6 oz glass on bottom with a gloss polish finish. This is a formula that Jed and I figured out the fits best for the kind of nose riding feel I enjoy. Many others have reinforced the fact that it’s a great nose rider. The best kind of wave for this board is long, drawn out peeling point breaks like Rincon or Malibu.
Finally, I ride Jed’s version of a twin fin, deep swallow-tail board called The Fiske: 5’10”x21 ¼” x 2 5/8”. It’s great for small waves but it’s really fun to ride when there’s some size.


How long you’ve been surfing for and who are your surfing influences?

I’ve been surfing for 18 years, which is the longest, consecutive thing I have ever done. My surfing influences vary, depending on a rider’s artistic talent. Actually, surfing has very little to do with what influences me. I am most influenced by a surfers art, music, the ability to dress really well.
If you could copy your brain for the furture generations, you would:

After a lot of thought, I decided that I want to be like Conner McCloud from the Clan McCloud. For those of you who don’t know who I’m talking about, it’s a character in a movie called “Highland”. This guy Conner can’t die unless his head is cut off . So I was saying that I want to be immortal but I’m probably not…I’m pretty sure I’m not so I thought about this scenario where I would have my brain copied from body to body. It wouldn’t be for future generations, it would just be for me. I figure in two hundred years one of the replicated me’s might be able to surf like Slater and sing like Sinatra.


What’s the worse experience you have ever had at a restaurant.

Well pretty much every time I go and eat out or when someone serves me food there is a hair in it. I’ve worked in over ten restaurants in my life, some of which I’ve done some F@#Ked up things to customer’s food who had the audacity to returned their dish because it wasn’t prepared to their liking. I use to work and this BBQ joint and we’d put root beer in the baked beans to give it that sweet taste. That was the “secret” to our famous baked beans (or so they thought). All of the guys and I would chew this tobacco called Kodiak Wintergreen, which we’d substitute for the root beer if someone complained about their food. One of us would simply add a dash winter green flavored chew-spit to their beans. I know we were petty, but it was those little things that made serving the public that much sweeter. And besides, I know if there is a hair in my food I can just pick it out and feel assured that at least its not chew spit. The moral of the story is: never return your food at a restaurant unless you’re into spit in your food.

Where have you surfed in the world.

Almost everywhere in California, EL Salvador, Panama, Northern Mexico, Hawaii, Japan, Indo, Canada and Ireland. Ireland is by far the sweetest place I’ve been to. I don’t mind the cold so that was a plus for me. I feel like I surf better in cold water. So if your not afraid of the cold and the dreaded Irish Finger (ask me about the Irish Finger and I’ll tell you in person) then Ireland it the place for you It’s like the cold water Indonesia except with crazy Irishmen all drunk taking off on waves yelling at each other about who has the best football team. No Seriously Ireland has insane surf and the people are super cool.
Which martial art is best in your opinion and why:

When I was a child my grandfather had me paddle a thin 9’0 High-performance Longboard to Europe and walk five hundred miles to the highlands of Scotland were I learned the Scottish martial art of FUC-U, which was mostly lots of drinking and head butting and kicking people on the ground. When I mastered the technical and deadly art, I came back to the states once again by riding bare back on a pigmy dwarf with poor self esteem then rowed back on a hand whittled Canoe carved by Nigel Malloy (he is one of the oldest and most sensitive of Malloy’s in the Malloy clan. Not many people have heard of him.) Anyway, I was very strict about practicing the Scottish Martial art only in self-defense and also when people would disagree with me and/or when I was drunk (which was all the time so I got a lot of practice). In 1998, the year of the horrible bar brawls, I’d realized I’d gone too far: I killed an 80 year old Russian circus Ninja over a dispute about whether pets of the same sex should be able to get married in the good old country of the United States of America. After that, I laid down my beer forever and vowed to never practice the Scottish Martial Art of FUC-U again.


Is there anything else you’d like people to know about you?

I’m very generous and I’ll give you the shirt off my back but if you don’t give it back everyone will see my boobs and that’s kind of embarrassing. Also, I’m 5’11 and shrinking with a prominent booty chin and slight male pattern balding. I’m just going to say right now that booty chin is coming back, mark my word, you heard it here first. Any time the stash comes back in fashion it is shortly followed by the infamous butt chin or booty chin. The best mustaches reside above a strong butt chin.
I have a gay beagle dog with boundary issues named Jeff . I approach all this with an open, loving mind and don’t care ether way. I’m just pointing out a struggle that me and his therapist are well aware of: he is really having a hard time grasping and accepting his sexuality.
I read a lot of books about wizards and demons and magic, especially ones with barbaric babes wielding battle-axes. Your know the kind, painted on the side of a van standing on the cliff over-looking a landscape with three moons holding a huge weapon, all muscular, wearing a rawhide bikini and fighting a dragon. It is my belief that if my dad didn’t make me go surfing I would be in my parents garage at this very moment rolling the die (that’s advanced dungeons and dragons slag for rolling the dice — it’s a dice game) arguing with my unusually socially awkward dungeon master that there is no way that fourth degree wizard’s fire can burn through my elf armor. Thank god for surfing. And finally, I love (I’m using the word love) Movies.

Would you allow your child to get a tattoo?

Well, if Jeff (my Dog) came to me and asked me if he could get a tattoo I would have to say sure because that would mean that he is a dog that could speak English and that in its self is amazing and worth the reward of really whatever he wants including a tattoo.

What fin set-ups do you prefer

I like a true blue Tri-Fin 9’0 HPLB in the back of my big ass, rockin’, American built ford truck, while wearing a “God don’t make no White trash” t-shirt.

If you could start a band what type of music would you play why.

I would start a band called “The Fascists” which would involve me and a bunch of my totally rad friends. It we be a combination of emocoreindipopaltraock and contemporary jazz. We would all dress up in matching cardigans that have stenciled words that say, “Lick my love pump” along with hot pink nail polish and super-duper tight black pants with a white belt and china flats for out feet. We would play at all our art shows and have this attitude that says, “Hey everybody I’m a terminally unique individual and there is no way you can under stand me and my band.” I guess the reason why I would start a band is because it is probably the best way to could get a sponsor to pay me to longboard. So the next time I say, “Hey will you pay me for surfing on a Longboard”, and they ask, “ What kind of music do you play and what kind of art do you do?” I can say, “I’m in a band called “The Fascists” and I’m into the art of self expression. YEAH!!!!!!!”

http://www.pacificlongboarder.com/gallery.asp?id=33&category=15&action=display