Ep. 195 ”D.I.Y. Punk Rock Vibes” (A Diary Entry with Nick Baxter)

[00:00:00] Happy Tuesday, diary listeners.

[00:00:04] So cool and happy new year.

[00:00:06] And I don't know if we're still saying that, but I am.

[00:00:09] I'm excited about this new year.

[00:00:10] 2024 is gonna be miraculous.

[00:00:13] And with it, I get to give you all Nick Baxter.

[00:00:19] This is so cool.

[00:00:21] And we're dubbing this diary entry of his DIY punk rock vibes.

[00:01:27] thing right off the top for a long time in my career, because my beginning kind of overlapped with, you know, you as a thing, because you've been doing this a lot longer than me. I think

[00:01:33] you have about 10 years on me in the profession. So when I first started, I was told that I

[00:01:40] should give a shit about knowing you. And so that makes me want to know more. Now I care. Well, thank you. Appreciate it. Well, and I know a lot of other people do too. So this is a really cool time with you.

[00:03:00] So I guess I'll start out, you can correct school, I was obsessed with drawing and was trying to learn painting and considered myself a creative artistic person. That was sort of like forming into my identity, I guess, as a person and because it was always encouraged.

[00:04:22] And so that was kind of the backdrop before getting obsessed

[00:04:26] with tattoos in my teen years was, I was going to be with painting. So had I stuck to art college and not dropped out after three semesters, I probably would have changed my major to painting because when I started to take those introduction classes as a freshman to oil painting and like classical realism, I just really took to it. It just like spoke to me and I was like excelling at it

[00:05:42] like more than a freshman would be, you know?

[00:05:44] So yeah, I just learned that that was like more of a passion

[00:06:46] or some company where I feel like my work would have been stripped down and made kitsch. And, you know, I just I really wasn't liking that framework as I was going more and more

[00:06:51] into like, you know, learning the professionalism of of the job. I was like, this is this is

[00:06:57] not artful.

[00:06:58] Yeah, the expression is lacking. You know, it's more it's more utility. It needs to serve

[00:07:07] an economic purpose. creative. You probably don't see yourself that way, but I'm sure you are. Yeah, it's a mentality as well as your hands actually making something. Mm hmm. Yep. Now, and it's it's so funny because my mom, we're about I think we're the same age, which is weird because you have like a continual baby face.

[00:08:20] Man, I'm like, hell no. You know, since I was like a junior, I think. And I guess I was too young for the people I approached to take me seriously, even though I was the most serious person they probably ever talked to that they just didn't know it, because it was masked behind, you know, a high school baby face and a high school aged kid, but I was

[00:11:02] deadly serious about it. So, but like, yeah, so like, no one would take me serious. And then finally,

[00:12:05] through art school, I didn't have any family or, you know, savings or any help. It was me working a crappy dishwashing job and cleaning houses and applying for federal student aid,

[00:12:14] which I got a bunch of because I didn't have any family help or support behind me. So where,

[00:12:23] so basically I didn't have any money to pay this guy, so no, I mean, I had a portfolio of fairly serious work for that age group. You know, of course I would look at it now and not think it's anything, but for that age group, it was a serious portfolio. And I had applied to all kinds of art colleges with it,

[00:13:42] so it needed to be kind of serious.

[00:13:44] And so that was impressive enough for him, I guess.

[00:13:46] And yeah, so he took me, and I think whatever feels right, I mean, people ask all the time, what's the best thing? But I do think,

[00:15:04] we're talking a lot about just recognizing the passion.

[00:16:10] encouraged to listen deep and deeper and go into those darker places and explore and kind of

[00:16:18] ferret out what was right for us in a lot of ways. And there was a rebellion. I definitely had that very traditional apprenticeship to get back to your question, it was based on that just like old school tattooing mentality. And so it was making your own needles, it was scrubbing tubes, it was either Lyle Tuttle or it might have been Hardy or I can't remember who it was, but it was one of the legends. And I basically just like copied their design, but colored them in my way and tried to add a little more of that like new school 90s, late 90s flair. That was, you know, like that's what I was into back then was like that first

[00:19:03] wave of new school tattooing. And then like things were more like bubbly and dimensional and

[00:20:04] during day. If the whole room just smells of citrus, it's so nice. Exactly. Yeah. It's like natural fragrance.

[00:20:08] And just so people know, that is a very uplifting scent, just like as far as emotional kind

[00:20:15] of thing. It like energizes and I'm woo woo wee about smells.

[00:20:20] No, it's true though. Yeah.

[00:20:24] Like a citrus smells like it's very crisp and just like, I don't know, it just like gets

[00:20:28] you going. or that you felt like you had a lot of like, whoa, this is different. Uh, just, I mean, there's the human interaction aspect of it, you know, and I'm, I've always been like a shy, kind of socially anxious person. I just like feel deep anxiety around like crowds of people and it. So, I did this really probably in hindsight, poorly done little script, script writing tattoo. That was your first? Yeah, my first real client tattoo. I had done some apprentice tattoos on friends.

[00:23:01] Got you, got you.

[00:23:03] The ones that helped you.

[00:23:05] The ones that helped you get to the apprenticeship. Nope, that was never a thing. So I never tattooed myself until I met a bunch of years into my career when I was like a good tattooer. So I have a good tattoo from myself. Fantastic. Same. I was told in the beginning, no, you don't want to do that. That hurts really badly. And I was like, what? I wax myself. It cannot be worse than that. So, both, it's precarious for me because I'll probably be the first person who's attacked. But at the same time, if it's too quiet, people are like, where's Amy? Where'd she go? And I'm hoping that people will find at least my dead body

[00:25:40] before my cats eat my eyelids off.

[00:25:42] So that's kind of the philosophy that I have.

[00:25:45] Because if you be super loud, people are not playing into the, you know, all the masquerade and all of the games. So I think that that's really awesome. I enjoy it. Well, you know, if for quieter people, they're usually more observant, right? Because you're either like outputting the energy or you're receiving it as an observer.

[00:27:03] So it's like one or the other.

[00:27:05] So if you're quiet, you professional pursuit and all of that. So it was great phase. He was sad and like, he like didn't want it to happen

[00:29:43] but he like big rudgingly, you know,

[00:29:45] did a very cool thing.

[00:29:46] I was like, all right, of people was starting to get into it. And we were, we were raised in a, in a more like, educated environment, we weren't coming to tattooing through some seedy underworld, you know, not to knock on anyone from a prior tattooing generation who did that, but just

[00:31:02] to say, like, it was changing, and things were coming more from did. I took a sip of my tea and that didn't work out as I had planned. Excuse me. I call it the renaissance of tattooing almost. It seemed like that was when this well, I just want to do this. Like, I just want to do this. I don't understand why I have to be grounded in such things. But now I've realized that the history of it is power, like knowing how to make needles,

[00:33:43] how to make your machines, how to work those things.

[00:34:47] wasn't as many production companies of the tools and the things that we use. And now we've kind of lost touch a little bit with the integrity of the elements to which we use. And that's been a kind

[00:34:54] of a hardship lately. Yeah. Yeah. For a lot of tattooers, that's the case. And then that whole

[00:35:02] scene is like splitting off and becoming its own little niche genre of people who still make still influencing it and asking questions. I know that one of my friends, Jake Kirk, he's very interested about the pigments and about the products. And one, it's encouraged him to start making his own products with certain independent companies. So that's a route try to live by my values and impart some of those values maybe to other people because I feel like some of the good values of tattooing are getting drowned out more or getting quieter. Yeah. I mean, can you expand upon that a little bit more?

[00:38:43] And then on the economic side of it, all these companies selling out to huge Chinese conglomerates

[00:38:48] who are just buying up companies.

[00:38:51] And so half the tattooing now is owned

[00:38:52] by a giant Chinese corporation,

[00:38:55] which I don't have anything against Chinese.

[00:38:57] I'm just saying that's who owns it now.

[00:38:59] So it's just weird.

[00:39:04] Okay, Apprenticeship Diary listeners. gone missing and I need your help and your prayers for him to come back and if nothing else for God's will to be done and for the people who are left to have to manage this the pleasure of recording. So if you wanted to listen to him, it's actually a really good podcast episode. And again, Nick, I'm sorry to pullms about saying that they, the way that they run their workforce is very abusive. And, you know, like, their factories, I can't imagine are a place that,

[00:44:03] that I think you can give when you like to do custom work where it's not kitsch and it's not these replicated ideas

[00:44:07] that it's like a million,

[00:44:08] like you just see a million of the same thing

[00:44:10] over and over again.

[00:44:12] And I love that about how you work,

[00:44:16] because I feel that too.

[00:44:17] I probably could make more money if I did the other,

[00:44:23] but I never did it for the money.

[00:44:25] So I did it because I loved it.

[00:45:24] this, so don't bother coming to me if you don't want this exact thing, which is more the norm now. And that's better for promotion and all the things I was just talking about

[00:45:27] like a minute ago. So it's a lot harder to market yourself in today's tattoo world when

[00:45:34] you're doing a variety of genres or trying to yourself? Like, is trust hard to get already do, like seminars, workshops, like stuff like this right here.

[00:48:21] So I'm just just trying to be like an actually developing more of that. I'm going to start to offer that on my website. And you know, for people who are already seasoned tattooers can sign up and like, how do we work together for a very limited time span, not like an apprenticeship, but like, like, you know, like a workshop style thing of how do we work together to get you where you want to go?

[00:50:44] that make it successful for that medium. And so not everything crosses over.

[00:50:46] So that's definitely like a big thing with tattooing

[00:50:51] is understanding tattooing.

[00:50:52] And then if you understand painting on top of tattooing,

[00:50:56] then you can see where the Venn diagram overlaps

[00:50:59] and where it doesn't overlap.

[00:51:02] Yep.

[00:51:02] So.

[00:51:03] Yeah, no, and that God, you're genius. I'm like, no, not just color theory. But yeah, yeah, it was really awesome. So I'm definitely interested more and more in that because it's very similar. My background's in hair as well. And there's a lot of hair theory that's tattoo schools, there's apprenticeship. Is there something that you see as like a vision for that? I think for me, I would rather see it be reverse engineered based on outcomes. So if any of

[00:53:43] those things you listed produces an amazing tattooer who appreciates the craft and is So, you know, we all need to draw the line wherever it feels right for ourselves. But yeah, no, I'm very thankful and grateful for like my extremely easy privileged, like right place, right time, like upbringing into tattooing. I feel like I was very, very fortunate and that's not what a lot of people experience, unfortunately.

[00:55:03] But just to put it out there, like it can be that way

[00:55:05] and don't be me to pay and then, because he didn't need me, that was really the case of it. He didn't need a shop lackey.

[00:56:20] He had a piercer and he had a front end person

[00:56:22] and he didn't need me.

[00:56:23] So he was gonna ask me to pay for it.

[00:56:25] And it was around the same. So I like that exchange. And like I said, in the beginning, it's really about what makes sense to you. And I do think you hit the nail on something very important.

[00:57:40] Know your value systems very much so before you go into this,

[00:57:43] because if you don't know your boundaries or your hard lines,

[00:58:43] Yep. It's a good serving size. Yeah. Yeah. What was, so you did, your first tattoo was script.

[00:58:50] How?

[00:58:51] Well, no, that was my first paying customer.

[00:58:54] Paying customer. Okay. Yes. Yes. What was the first one? Do you remember on your friend?

[00:58:59] It was a cartoon character actually that he had drawn it. So it wasn't even my art. And

[00:59:04] we, and we never even finished it. It got like more walk-in based kind of traditional street shop. And there was this really custom like appointment based, like nationally renowned shop a few towns over. And I was like, all right, let me try to work there. Got you. Got you. And what did you when over to that? I had actually, I had been tattooing, I think for like six months, honestly. Okay. First, first six months of like real professional tattooing, actual clients at the first shop. And then just those floodgates open level. Like I said, artistically, mentally, technique wise. And then that's awesome.

[01:01:44] It was just time to,'s no way around it. Um, and then transitioning into that mindset of like, you know, if we're going after the best here and that's what I'm hoping to deliver to you, and that's

[01:03:01] what you're asking for, this is what you're going to have to do.

[01:03:05] That's a, that's like a next level sales kind of pitch, I think.

[01:04:02] Or at least that I can put it in your skin. I would never intentionally slow this down.

[01:04:04] Right.

[01:04:05] Yeah, for sure.

[01:04:07] Yeah.

[01:04:08] Okay.

[01:04:09] Well, I guess, you know, we're running into like an hour of talking to you here.

[01:04:17] Your time is very valuable.

[01:04:18] So I guess what is, what are a few like, you know, one of the OG like tattoo gods at this point, he's still just like a chill dude. And he does his best to give back

[01:05:42] and do a lot for the tattoo industry still.

[01:05:45] So that's amazing.

[01:05:47] So I've always looked up to him where it's just, it's like a group of artists who all like work in a shared studio space. It's not like a super top down approach, you know, it's just like, we all rent and share this space together and just come and go as we please and just try to make a nice like quiet, working environment for people to just really focus in on their art and on their

[01:07:04] clients.

[01:07:05] So that's really cool. It's like your typical booth rental set up with our artists, with our resident artists. So we don't do percentages, we do booth rentals. And so that makes it more of like a co-op kind of shared studio space vibe where we all each have our space. And yeah, so it's more of like an appointment

[01:08:20] only type of like custom art studio vibe.

[01:08:24] Yeah, no, I love that vibe, even though it's, you know,

[01:09:40] more challenging at times because everybody's

[01:09:42] their own entity.

[01:09:44] Yeah, but it's less challenging in a lot of ways

[01:09:46] because you're not a babysitter. that I get a very similar thing in the future. I would like that, but that's really, really cool. I really liked that, that you guys came together that way and that it's worked out really well. I will say I was kind of stalking it a little bit and looking at the studio and I always am late to following everybody.

[01:11:01] So I followed ArtRealm afterwards,

[01:11:03] the social media part of it, I'm so bad.

[01:11:06] So I'm going to offer like one on one, you know, like kind of workshop style mentorship not like apprenticeships, like a masterclass kind of thing where, yeah, where

[01:12:23] we take a day or two days or three days's kind of like a tattoo mentality I was saying before. Yeah, that was a Jeff Kogway quote, one of his seminars. He was like, you know, I determined that I'm not really good with money, but I'm going to be good at making it. And you know, along the way, if you can figure out how to be good with it, that's always good.

[01:14:46] why it was not. But you know, that was something that I loved about Paradise too, is that, you know, the conversation of money and kind of taking away our, our feelings, our prejudice

[01:14:54] against money and our relationship with that and kind of, you know, fixing that a little bit.

[01:14:59] Because, you know, sometimes we have these, these preconceived notions, and it's really Of course, of course. I was going to say in terms of Guy Acheson, a thing that I love about you and him is that you have a lot of passion to creating your own references. And that is something that I think as an art kid, we kind of learned was that, not taking stock images or pre-planned photos and stuff,

[01:16:24] like making our own photos.

[01:16:26] And something that I think for both of you is a huge inspiration is that you nature and all its facets and how it paints a picture and how you can pay

[01:17:42] homage to that and get back to that and analyze it. Yeah, no, these are definitely in-person workshops for sure. That's where the best learning occurs. I couldn't agree more. Awesome. Well, Nick, how can people best reach out to you? You said your website, if it comes down to a one-on-one,

[01:19:01] but in terms of tattooing, is it the same?

[01:19:04] Go to your website.

[01:19:05] Yeah, website nick no, totally. And I thank you for that. I agree. And I mean, part of my learning has always been about listening to other people's stories and kind of siphoning from there what feels good for me.

[01:20:21] So I've always wanted to provide that for others