Ep. 226 "It's Cotton Candy!" (Diary Entry 1:3 with Wheelyum Dee)

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Hello Diary listeners, welcome!

[00:00:03] [SPEAKER_01]: I have a actual three part diary entry that I'm introing today.

[00:00:11] [SPEAKER_01]: First part today we're meeting with Wheelyum Dee

[00:00:15] [SPEAKER_01]: and Wheelyum, this first part of your three part diary entry

[00:00:21] [SPEAKER_01]: is going to be called Its Cotton Candy

[00:00:25] [SPEAKER_01]: and everybody will see why.

[00:00:28] [SPEAKER_01]: Enjoy listeners.

[00:00:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to the Apprenticeship Diaries where raw meets refined.

[00:00:36] [SPEAKER_00]: Let's be real, we're still working on refining.

[00:00:38] [SPEAKER_01]: What it took, what it takes and the stories that are made.

[00:00:42] [SPEAKER_00]: Join us as we learn from professionals about how their stories begin.

[00:00:50] [SPEAKER_01]: Hello, how are you today?

[00:00:52] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm doing good, how are you?

[00:00:53] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm good. For everybody listening this is Wheelyum Dee

[00:00:57] [SPEAKER_01]: and he works at The Wilted Rose in Tennessee, correct?

[00:01:02] [SPEAKER_04]: Yes, Chattanooga, Tennessee.

[00:01:03] [SPEAKER_01]: Awesome, awesome. Thank you for coming on today.

[00:01:07] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh no, thank you for having me, honestly.

[00:01:10] [SPEAKER_01]: Awesome, awesome. We had kind of a weird divine reconnection.

[00:01:18] [SPEAKER_01]: We've been friends on Facebook forever.

[00:01:21] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh yeah.

[00:01:22] [SPEAKER_01]: But like a mutual almost scamming thing kind of reconnected us.

[00:01:28] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh I know, it was crazy.

[00:01:30] [SPEAKER_04]: I got so many like from you and other artists around the world

[00:01:36] [SPEAKER_04]: like hey, is this you?

[00:01:38] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like no. It was like 20 people a day were contacting me.

[00:01:44] [SPEAKER_01]: Well for posterity and for all of the people who actually want to follow you

[00:01:50] [SPEAKER_01]: and everything can you talk about what happened because your IG, excuse me,

[00:01:55] [SPEAKER_01]: your IG got hacked, right?

[00:01:56] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, it got hacked and so I guess from my understanding

[00:02:01] [SPEAKER_04]: as other artists would tell me that whoever hacked me was acting like me,

[00:02:08] [SPEAKER_04]: reached out to a bunch of artists, reached out to a bunch of clients of mine.

[00:02:12] [SPEAKER_04]: Well the artists they were saying would you like to do,

[00:02:15] [SPEAKER_04]: have you ever done like a sponsorship?

[00:02:17] [SPEAKER_04]: I got sponsored which I've never been sponsored.

[00:02:21] [SPEAKER_04]: I still have, I've been tattooing nine years, I've never been sponsored

[00:02:24] [SPEAKER_04]: so yeah I don't even talk like that.

[00:02:27] [SPEAKER_04]: Same.

[00:02:28] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah when you guys, when you and other ones showed me the messages,

[00:02:34] [SPEAKER_04]: everything was like proper.

[00:02:36] [SPEAKER_04]: It had like periods and exclamation points.

[00:02:39] [SPEAKER_04]: It was like that's not even how I talk.

[00:02:42] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't even think I talk like that and talk like that.

[00:02:45] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't even pause and then talk again.

[00:02:47] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't even, you know, I just say what I say.

[00:02:49] [SPEAKER_04]: But for the clients, they were telling them they want to get tattooed,

[00:02:54] [SPEAKER_04]: send them deposits and everything else which there was two clients that fell for it.

[00:03:02] [SPEAKER_04]: So out of respect for the clients that didn't know any better,

[00:03:08] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to go ahead and honor a full day of tattooing for both of them for free.

[00:03:14] [SPEAKER_03]: Aww.

[00:03:15] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah because it's not their fault, it just next time,

[00:03:18] [SPEAKER_04]: you know, I can tell people if you want to contact me, you come to the shop or contact me on Facebook.

[00:03:25] [SPEAKER_03]: Right.

[00:03:26] [SPEAKER_04]: Facebook yeah because I will video call, you know me,

[00:03:29] [SPEAKER_04]: I'll video call somebody in a heartbeat to make sure I'm talking to them.

[00:03:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah.

[00:03:34] [SPEAKER_01]: No and that's awesome because like typically at the end of these kind of conversations we go through,

[00:03:39] [SPEAKER_01]: how do you get in touch, how do you work with you

[00:03:42] [SPEAKER_01]: and we're just putting that out there right now.

[00:03:45] [SPEAKER_01]: Oh yeah.

[00:03:45] [SPEAKER_01]: Just so people can know.

[00:03:47] [SPEAKER_01]: And that was great.

[00:03:49] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that's what happened to me.

[00:03:50] [SPEAKER_01]: I was offered, it was like you were asking and I've never been sponsored either and never asked.

[00:03:56] [SPEAKER_01]: So that was what I told this person pretending to be you.

[00:04:00] [SPEAKER_01]: And the account, I've seen other artists on there following it.

[00:04:07] [SPEAKER_01]: It's Wheelum with two L's.

[00:04:10] [SPEAKER_01]: That's how they changed it.

[00:04:12] [SPEAKER_01]: So I have since blocked this person and the supply company quote unquote that

[00:04:21] [SPEAKER_01]: they were sending me to, which I'm pretty sure was all the same person,

[00:04:25] [SPEAKER_01]: or in cahoots.

[00:04:28] [SPEAKER_04]: Well actually I got the number.

[00:04:29] [SPEAKER_04]: Some other artists finally got the number to the guy and I called that number

[00:04:33] [SPEAKER_04]: and I was asking to speak to William D.

[00:04:36] [SPEAKER_04]: And the guy said, oh, this is he.

[00:04:38] [SPEAKER_04]: And I was like, OK, well this is William D. also.

[00:04:42] [SPEAKER_04]: I was like, OK, well, how can I set up an appointment with you?

[00:04:46] [SPEAKER_04]: How much do you charge and what is your special style?

[00:04:50] [SPEAKER_04]: He didn't know anything.

[00:04:51] [SPEAKER_04]: So I told him, I said, look, you just need to take it down because this is the real William D.

[00:04:57] [SPEAKER_04]: And then I got blocked after that.

[00:04:59] [SPEAKER_04]: He hung up on me.

[00:05:00] [SPEAKER_04]: But, you know, it's it is what it is.

[00:05:02] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, yeah.

[00:05:05] [SPEAKER_01]: That's awesome.

[00:05:10] [SPEAKER_01]: How long have you been tattooing William?

[00:05:13] [SPEAKER_04]: I've been tattooing nine years.

[00:05:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Awesome. Awesome.

[00:05:18] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, let's go back like before before you got into any of it.

[00:05:23] [SPEAKER_01]: What were you doing?

[00:05:24] [SPEAKER_01]: What was your life like?

[00:05:26] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, what brought you?

[00:05:28] [SPEAKER_04]: Well, I mean, I did a little bit of MMA, you know, fighting and stuff like that.

[00:05:34] [SPEAKER_04]: But also, you know, I had like a regular, as I call it, a job job.

[00:05:37] [SPEAKER_04]: I worked at Volkswagen.

[00:05:40] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, I drove big trucks, everything.

[00:05:45] [SPEAKER_04]: It just I mean, anything that people had me to do at Volkswagen or whatever, I would do it.

[00:05:51] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, I would work overtime.

[00:05:52] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't care.

[00:05:53] [SPEAKER_04]: Hot weather, cold weather, which now when I look back at it, I'm so blessed that I have this opportunity to do what I'm doing because I'm getting older and it's so hot outside now.

[00:06:06] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. That's what I tell people all the time.

[00:06:10] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, don't let a tattoo artist bitch about their life, man.

[00:06:13] [SPEAKER_01]: Like we work in controlled spaces.

[00:06:16] [SPEAKER_01]: Nobody's asking us to pick shit up.

[00:06:18] [SPEAKER_01]: It's you know, I guess not heavy lifting.

[00:06:22] [SPEAKER_01]: I assure you.

[00:06:23] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it's it's taxing because, you know, people are taxing and it's hard to communicate effectively.

[00:06:29] [SPEAKER_01]: But we're not we're not oppressed.

[00:06:32] [SPEAKER_04]: No, no, we're very blessed.

[00:06:36] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, definitely.

[00:06:36] [SPEAKER_04]: Definitely. Yeah.

[00:06:39] [SPEAKER_04]: We're still blessed at the end of the day.

[00:06:42] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:06:44] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I told a client of mine, like, I don't know if I made a case for my my profession, but we were discussing faith and she's like, I just don't see any proof of it.

[00:06:56] [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, are you freaking for real, man?

[00:07:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Like proof of it.

[00:07:01] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, well, here's proof.

[00:07:03] [SPEAKER_01]: We're tattooing right now.

[00:07:05] [SPEAKER_01]: This is stupid.

[00:07:07] [SPEAKER_01]: OK, like what we're doing right now in terms of what one needs to exist.

[00:07:14] [SPEAKER_01]: This is not.

[00:07:18] [SPEAKER_01]: This this is such a higher plane of luxury and reflection and all of this stuff.

[00:07:24] [SPEAKER_01]: Like we are doing something that nobody needs, but people want because it does have a significance.

[00:07:32] [SPEAKER_01]: It does have a value.

[00:07:33] [SPEAKER_01]: It does have something that that we're doing together.

[00:07:36] [SPEAKER_01]: That's really, really cool.

[00:07:38] [SPEAKER_01]: But if you look at it for what it is, I know a lot of people who don't get it, who just sit there and go, I don't get the hell what's happening over here.

[00:07:47] [SPEAKER_01]: Like this is stupid.

[00:07:49] [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like, you know what?

[00:07:50] [SPEAKER_01]: I can see how you see that.

[00:07:52] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah.

[00:07:54] [SPEAKER_01]: I can really see how you see that.

[00:07:56] [SPEAKER_04]: I have to agree with you.

[00:07:58] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I wouldn't know it if I didn't get it.

[00:08:01] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, like if I didn't understand.

[00:08:04] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, what what what moved you from the Volkswagen dealership and an MMA to tattooing?

[00:08:14] [SPEAKER_04]: Well, when I was a young kid, I would always my mom called me Doodle Bug.

[00:08:20] [SPEAKER_01]: My dad, my always.

[00:08:23] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:08:23] [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, for different reasons.

[00:08:25] [SPEAKER_01]: My mom used to call my brothers, my brothers, private parts, doodle bug.

[00:08:31] [SPEAKER_01]: But it got it got elaborated on and called in much more vast terms.

[00:08:36] [SPEAKER_01]: But go ahead.

[00:08:37] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm so sorry.

[00:08:38] [SPEAKER_04]: I love you.

[00:08:39] [SPEAKER_04]: That's funny.

[00:08:40] [SPEAKER_04]: That's but no, when I when I was younger, growing up, Mom used to call me Doodle Bug, which call me bug.

[00:08:45] [SPEAKER_04]: They should call me Doodle Bug because I would draw on any.

[00:08:49] [SPEAKER_04]: It didn't matter.

[00:08:50] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I would draw on a wall, drop on a napkin.

[00:08:54] [SPEAKER_04]: It didn't matter where I was.

[00:08:55] [SPEAKER_04]: I was always drawing on something.

[00:08:57] [SPEAKER_04]: So I got in trouble a lot.

[00:08:58] [SPEAKER_04]: So when I got a little older, I was 10 years old and 11.

[00:09:03] [SPEAKER_04]: I think it was she said bug.

[00:09:05] [SPEAKER_04]: I think when you get older, all that drawing, you should be a tattoo artist.

[00:09:10] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't know.

[00:09:11] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't know what she was talking about.

[00:09:12] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't know what a tattoo artist was at 10, 11 years old.

[00:09:15] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, and I was and I asked her what it was.

[00:09:17] [SPEAKER_04]: She said, well, she had tattoos.

[00:09:19] [SPEAKER_04]: And she said this is you put art on people's skin or under whatever they do, but they make it look pretty.

[00:09:27] [SPEAKER_04]: And I said, OK, I didn't think.

[00:09:31] [SPEAKER_04]: So she passed away and yeah, she passed away in 2006.

[00:09:38] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sorry to hear that.

[00:09:39] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah, I appreciate it.

[00:09:40] [SPEAKER_04]: But 2014 mid 2014, I was driving down a road.

[00:09:47] [SPEAKER_04]: And one of her songs came on.

[00:09:49] [SPEAKER_04]: We play at the funeral.

[00:09:50] [SPEAKER_04]: So I had to turn it up, you know, start saying and I looked up and it said tattoo shop and I was like, wow.

[00:09:56] [SPEAKER_04]: OK, well, I won't do tattoo shops and ask the guy and I have to get can I give his name?

[00:10:04] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. OK. Yeah, of course.

[00:10:07] [SPEAKER_04]: I got a tattoo from him back in 2005 because my daughter was murdered.

[00:10:14] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my God.

[00:10:15] [SPEAKER_04]: So like I said, fast forward 2014, Eric Newby, he owns ink expressions.

[00:10:24] [SPEAKER_04]: I talked to him about doing apprenticeship and he's like, oh, yeah, yeah.

[00:10:28] [SPEAKER_04]: So we figured out how much whatever.

[00:10:32] [SPEAKER_04]: So I came up there and did my apprenticeship.

[00:10:34] [SPEAKER_04]: And then we had a little me and his dad had a little fallout.

[00:10:38] [SPEAKER_04]: God rest his soul. I can't say I'm not saying anything bad about it.

[00:10:41] [SPEAKER_04]: We just had a little fallout. So it turned in from every day to just one day a week.

[00:10:48] [SPEAKER_04]: The one day a week, I went up there to learn how to tattoo.

[00:10:52] [SPEAKER_04]: And Eric always told me. William, don't give up.

[00:10:56] [SPEAKER_04]: Stick with it. Don't give up. Stick with it.

[00:10:59] [SPEAKER_04]: You have something there.

[00:11:02] [SPEAKER_04]: So one day a week for a year, I became a professional tattoo artist.

[00:11:09] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah. So I think his dad owned the business at the time.

[00:11:15] [SPEAKER_04]: So Eric signed off on it and I appreciate that he did.

[00:11:19] [SPEAKER_04]: His dad didn't want me there.

[00:11:19] [SPEAKER_04]: So I ventured out and went to another lady, which is Nancy Arp.

[00:11:25] [SPEAKER_04]: She just passed away this year. God bless her.

[00:11:28] [SPEAKER_04]: So she let me work at her shop.

[00:11:32] [SPEAKER_04]: We could eyes. It's in Georgia and super sweet lady.

[00:11:36] [SPEAKER_04]: Super nice. She can really draw like she can paint and really draw circles around, I say, about 98 percent.

[00:11:47] [SPEAKER_04]: Of the women and men that are here in this area.

[00:11:51] [SPEAKER_04]: So I worked with her for some years and then I wanted to travel, you know, so I started, you know, traveling everything else.

[00:11:59] [SPEAKER_04]: But, you know, we'll talk more about that if other questions come up.

[00:12:02] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. Well, what did your initial with Eric apprenticeship look like?

[00:12:11] [SPEAKER_01]: What did he have you do? Like have him? Yeah.

[00:12:14] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my God. He didn't let me tattoo for about three months.

[00:12:20] [SPEAKER_04]: Only thing I did was watch him clean tubes, mop floors, swept, took out trash.

[00:12:29] [SPEAKER_04]: I did basically anything he wanted me to.

[00:12:32] [SPEAKER_04]: Like he said, Hey, I want you to go to the store.

[00:12:34] [SPEAKER_04]: So give me a drink. Okay.

[00:12:36] [SPEAKER_04]: Once you go get me some food for everybody in the shop. Yes, sir.

[00:12:40] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, because I approached it as I'm learning something.

[00:12:45] [SPEAKER_04]: He's way better than me. So I'm just going to shut my mouth and do what I have to do to get better as a to be a tattoo artist, not just a tattooer.

[00:12:55] [SPEAKER_04]: So I did everything. And so I can still this day, every time I see him, I still say thank you, you know, for giving me a shot.

[00:13:04] [SPEAKER_04]: He tells me, so I'm glad you still haven't gave up.

[00:13:08] [SPEAKER_01]: Right. Because this profession can definitely take you a lot of places.

[00:13:14] [SPEAKER_01]: I was going to say, do you do you think that because you did have your initial start with Volkswagen and stuff like that.

[00:13:23] [SPEAKER_01]: But do you think that the martial arts training really helped you like kind of go into that space of being like a young pad one like early year learner?

[00:13:33] [SPEAKER_04]: Whatever you say, I have to agree. Yes, because I was always in it all my life, but it was like dedication, even sports like me just playing sports, basketball, football.

[00:13:48] [SPEAKER_04]: Well, my dad, too. He was in the Marines. Oh, yeah.

[00:13:53] [SPEAKER_04]: So it was me and all my siblings. I'm not going to tell you how many there was living in a like a three bedroom house.

[00:14:01] [SPEAKER_04]: Anyway, there was a lot of him. Yeah, he instilled a lot of discipline.

[00:14:08] [SPEAKER_04]: Like it was we grew up in a time of the child to be seen and not heard.

[00:14:14] [SPEAKER_04]: You do what you're supposed to be able to do what you want to in life is what he basically taught me and my sisters and my brothers and everything.

[00:14:23] [SPEAKER_04]: He was a great man. My mom didn't have to work because he wanted to be the sole provider.

[00:14:29] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, he wanted to make sure that she was taken care of.

[00:14:32] [SPEAKER_04]: All this would take care of. But we got what we needed, not what we wanted. Right.

[00:14:37] [SPEAKER_04]: So I think a lot of that he instilled in me to he wanted.

[00:14:42] [SPEAKER_04]: And also when I was little, I was six, seven years old and he saw me just drawing all time.

[00:14:47] [SPEAKER_04]: He told me sit at the table and draw something to make sure I wasn't tracing.

[00:14:51] [SPEAKER_04]: So I did. So he went out, spent five, six hundred dollars.

[00:14:56] [SPEAKER_04]: This was back in the early 80s. That was a lot of money.

[00:15:00] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, that was a lot of money. He was only I think he was only make 10 bucks an hour to take care of all of us.

[00:15:06] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. And he still took that money, but aside or whatever.

[00:15:10] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't I didn't ask questions. We never asked questions growing up as a child.

[00:15:14] [SPEAKER_04]: I still don't really ask a lot of questions nowadays.

[00:15:17] [SPEAKER_04]: And people don't think I care. It just I do care.

[00:15:21] [SPEAKER_04]: But I just wait till people tell me. But after he bought that.

[00:15:25] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I just man, I used it everywhere. So like that, like I was drawing all the time.

[00:15:41] [SPEAKER_04]: I just started drawing on the calendar, on paper work and stuff like that.

[00:15:47] [SPEAKER_04]: Just little roses or something. I don't know.

[00:15:50] [SPEAKER_01]: That's so cool. That's really cool.

[00:15:52] [SPEAKER_01]: I love that. I love that inspiration and origin story because it's not like my mom suggested tattooing,

[00:16:01] [SPEAKER_01]: but it was like, you know, I was like, oh, I'm going to do this.

[00:16:02] [SPEAKER_01]: I think just trying to be like, kid, make money. Just make like we got it.

[00:16:06] [SPEAKER_01]: You got to like you got to figure out a focus.

[00:16:11] [SPEAKER_01]: I when I started pursuing it, she was just like really, I think.

[00:16:17] [SPEAKER_01]: I think that she was like kind of blindsided by what was involved in learning it

[00:16:23] [SPEAKER_01]: and kind of what I would be exposed to in getting into that.

[00:16:27] [SPEAKER_01]: And it kind of freaked her out until it didn't.

[00:16:30] [SPEAKER_01]: Until I'd been in it for a few years and she was like, oh, she's making money.

[00:16:34] [SPEAKER_01]: Like this is good. It's fine. She's OK.

[00:16:38] [SPEAKER_01]: She's you know, and it's great because we're the career.

[00:16:40] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh my gosh, she's doing great. Yeah.

[00:16:42] [SPEAKER_01]: And more than that, I think she was really excited that I was beholden to a company that I think that really mattered to her.

[00:16:49] [SPEAKER_01]: And I don't think that she really, you know, yeah.

[00:16:53] [SPEAKER_01]: In the beginning of my life, my mom was the one that was like, oh, you could work for Disney.

[00:16:59] [SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, we watched a lot of Disney films.

[00:17:02] [SPEAKER_01]: She loved the medium and it is an amazing medium.

[00:17:05] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, animation is incredible.

[00:17:09] [SPEAKER_01]: I just found out that I'm not a person who likes to draw the same thing over and over and over again.

[00:17:16] [SPEAKER_04]: I understand. I understand.

[00:17:18] [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. So so I like the I love I love the people aspects of our and it sounds like you're the same way.

[00:17:28] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, you know, you had a lot of siblings growing up.

[00:17:31] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure that was yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:34] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, you have to learn to coexist with so many different personalities and you find out that that ends up like really infusing into your artwork and kind of being a meditative space to go to regularly.

[00:17:49] [SPEAKER_01]: But it's never the same. It's always influenced by like all the noise.

[00:17:54] [SPEAKER_03]: I agree. Yeah.

[00:17:58] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, that's super cool.

[00:18:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Did you know this was 2014 ish show?

[00:18:05] [SPEAKER_01]: What were what were the big like his because that's kind of the Renaissance area of like tattooing from what I remember.

[00:18:14] [SPEAKER_01]: Like everybody was there was all these different machines out.

[00:18:18] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, you weren't necessarily starting with coils like, you know, the people who started in like the 90s or like early 2000s though.

[00:18:26] [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you did. So how did he how did he start you out?

[00:18:31] [SPEAKER_04]: I actually started my own coils.

[00:18:32] [SPEAKER_04]: He wanted me to learn how to operate a coil machine, how to break it down, how to put it back together, troubleshoot anything that might come up during the tattoo.

[00:18:45] [SPEAKER_04]: So, yeah, I mean, I already know how I could pick up a coil machine and still use it today.

[00:18:50] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, as long as I figure out like, you know, just different little things not going into detail because you already know, you know, you figure out little things of your hand and other stuff.

[00:19:02] [SPEAKER_04]: Soon as I figure that out with any machine or any coil machine I pick up, I'm good.

[00:19:07] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, you know, I'm good with it.

[00:19:09] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and you got to you just got to, you know, like you got to feel it out for a little bit and you got to tune them and get them running the way that you need.

[00:19:20] [SPEAKER_01]: There's a little bit of troubleshooting with them.

[00:19:22] [SPEAKER_01]: And it's just the fact too that I don't a lot of people that are loyal to the coil.

[00:19:27] [SPEAKER_01]: I love them and everything, but like you need a few of them to be able to have the kind of different range.

[00:19:36] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, in tattooing at least three, you know, kind of like, you know, a small packer kind of like, you know, round shader, a liner and like a mag to kind of, you know, compete with just one modern, you know, rotary machine really.

[00:19:55] [SPEAKER_01]: But you can get some really beautiful, like buttery, like saturation.

[00:20:03] [SPEAKER_01]: They're so nice. So yeah, I, I get it.

[00:20:07] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't really like having that many things to fuck with personally.

[00:20:14] [SPEAKER_01]: So I'm glad though that's cool that you were at least vetted in that, which I do think is a great, you know, it's just historical.

[00:20:26] [SPEAKER_01]: I feel at this point, you know, I skipped that over with one of my with my only apprentice really that was successful just because I was like, we're good to make money.

[00:20:38] [SPEAKER_01]: Then we can go into that.

[00:20:41] [SPEAKER_01]: She was like, what? I just feel like I'm not earning this. I'm like, earn what? Like earn what? Like get it.

[00:20:49] [SPEAKER_01]: Get in there. Make money. You're gonna you're gonna you're gonna cut your teeth on some serious shit because there's going to be a lot of stuff coming down the pipeline that you're not anticipating.

[00:20:59] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, one of them is just not even handling the machines and stuff, but like handling causing pain on somebody.

[00:21:06] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, having a bad review.

[00:21:12] [SPEAKER_04]: Don't get me started on that. Right? No, I know.

[00:21:16] [SPEAKER_01]: So there's so many like there's so much that you're gonna have to I want you with a machine.

[00:21:23] [SPEAKER_01]: Let's we have all this technology now.

[00:21:25] [SPEAKER_01]: Let's get you in there. You're gonna have enough to digest.

[00:21:29] [SPEAKER_01]: We can track it back once you kind of have a little bit of understanding, because for me anyway.

[00:21:36] [SPEAKER_01]: I I need like a point of reference to link it back to so I started out with coils as well.

[00:21:45] [SPEAKER_01]: It was all I knew.

[00:21:47] [SPEAKER_01]: And then I did another apprenticeship and we started out with a whole swath of different things, but I found that it was a lot easier to kind of pick up certain things that people were talking about.

[00:22:04] [SPEAKER_01]: If having started in another spaces and really getting myself like time under the needle playing with it, and then I could go back to other different kind of machines and go, oh, that's why you do this.

[00:22:19] [SPEAKER_01]: And that's why this hits this way.

[00:22:21] [SPEAKER_01]: And that's why you run this voltage and it like all the things were connecting.

[00:22:25] [SPEAKER_01]: But like when people were showing it to me, I was like, how is this relevant?

[00:22:28] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't understand. Like it was very much so like Mr. Miyagi making me wax his floor and I'm like, what's happening?

[00:22:38] [SPEAKER_01]: What are you showing me, man? Like it seems like I'm just cleaning your fucking shit.

[00:22:44] [SPEAKER_04]: I hope that a lot of people that listen to this while they're made to be rude and jealous because I'm not paying her attention.

[00:22:56] [SPEAKER_04]: But no, like the whole Miyagi reference. I hope that a lot of people get that because a lot of young artists or just young people in general do not get that reference.

[00:23:09] [SPEAKER_01]: Ralph Macchio, man, go look it up. Watch it.

[00:23:13] [SPEAKER_04]: Watch it.

[00:23:14] [SPEAKER_04]: Back in the day when I was young, when that came out in 1985, I thought I had the biggest crush on her as a kid. Oh my goodness.

[00:23:25] [SPEAKER_01]: Yes.

[00:23:25] [SPEAKER_01]: Not only that, but like I think it's important to since we're kind of exploring this too.

[00:23:33] [SPEAKER_01]: The level of hope that was given to our generation, you know, like we were we were pumped, man.

[00:23:41] [SPEAKER_01]: Like we were sold something that I think in a very sad way is not being sold to the younger generation anymore.

[00:23:49] [SPEAKER_01]: And it's detrimental to to everything because they're so cynical, so quickly.

[00:23:57] [SPEAKER_01]: And it's like, dude, don't just look at something like Karate Kid and think that would never happen in real life.

[00:24:06] [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, it can. It can happen. You have no idea what could happen.

[00:24:12] [SPEAKER_01]: You have no idea about most things.

[00:24:16] [SPEAKER_01]: You're just being kind of damned before you start.

[00:24:19] [SPEAKER_01]: And that's no way to kind of you.

[00:24:22] [SPEAKER_01]: That's why I started this whole thing was to have conversations with people and kind of illustrate it's a long, sucky road to awesome.

[00:24:31] [SPEAKER_01]: It's a lot of eating shit.

[00:24:35] [SPEAKER_04]: That's a lot of the big old bowl.

[00:24:38] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:24:39] [SPEAKER_01]: And then, you know, like the whole earn it thing like.

[00:24:47] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I.

[00:24:50] [SPEAKER_01]: I think that there is a balance there, you know, like you it's a proper amount of feeding somebody and keeping them hungry, you know.

[00:24:59] [SPEAKER_01]: Right. I don't know the balance yet.

[00:25:03] [SPEAKER_01]: Because I don't even know it for myself.

[00:25:05] [SPEAKER_01]: But I have noticed that's a thing.

[00:25:09] [SPEAKER_01]: And there are people who are really keen on like how is just enough.

[00:25:15] [SPEAKER_01]: So when you went to work at your next shop, were you like then an artist and you just started working for her?

[00:25:25] [SPEAKER_04]: Well, my tattoo license said I was a artist.

[00:25:29] [SPEAKER_04]: And yes, I went straight there and started working and started like doing names and, you know, just the infinity signs and, you know, the simple anchors and all that stuff.

[00:25:43] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. I mean, I didn't do any big stuff right away because I knew I was still.

[00:25:50] [SPEAKER_04]: I was like a professional apprentice.

[00:25:52] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, in my mind, that's how I looked at it, because I was like, man, this is yeah.

[00:25:57] [SPEAKER_04]: Like, I see all these other artists are like Nancy doing these big things.

[00:26:02] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like, oh, man, I got nervous. I was like, wow, like this. Yeah, this is kind of nerve wracking.

[00:26:08] [SPEAKER_04]: So I just said, well, small stuff like a lot of people don't see me do a lot of small stuff, but I actually still can for anybody out there that wants me to do something small.

[00:26:18] [SPEAKER_04]: I actually still can do the small stuff. It's actually really.

[00:26:23] [SPEAKER_04]: Refreshing, refreshing sometimes like I can take a break from the big, the big what is it? The willism stuff that I do.

[00:26:31] [SPEAKER_04]: And just, I mean, even like one day I did a Care Bear on this lady and it was like, I don't know, it took me about three hours to do it.

[00:26:42] [SPEAKER_04]: It wasn't that big, but I took my time and I enjoyed doing it because it was it was just out of the norm.

[00:26:49] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, it's like, wow, this is you know, I didn't do anything.

[00:26:53] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't think anything fancy to it. I just made it look nice, I guess.

[00:26:58] [SPEAKER_04]: Or, you know, like your tattooing, they always tell you to make sure when you first start tattooing, make sure you know how to do the lines, make sure they're nice shading.

[00:27:09] [SPEAKER_04]: Make sure you got black where the black needs to be.

[00:27:12] [SPEAKER_04]: When you do black and gray, make sure it's black and gray and gray and gray.

[00:27:20] [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. It's all going to look black at first, but it's going to look gray when it's you.

[00:27:26] [SPEAKER_04]: Exactly. Exactly.

[00:27:28] [SPEAKER_01]: I just had people being like, it needs more black.

[00:27:31] [SPEAKER_01]: Like that's all they just walk by and they would just look at my shit with my client there and be like, needs more black and leave.

[00:27:41] [SPEAKER_04]: I was like, well, a lot of people tell me that even clients are like, man, I love that we in these art.

[00:27:47] [SPEAKER_04]: I really do. Everything's custom. He has a unique style, but it's too dark.

[00:27:52] [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm like, it's actually not too dark. Yes.

[00:27:55] [SPEAKER_04]: Because I've learned the darker I go.

[00:27:59] [SPEAKER_04]: Well, I learned it later on after a couple of years, we tattoo in that I wanted to go darker, higher contrast because I got tired of doing touch up.

[00:28:10] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:28:12] [SPEAKER_04]: I went light because I didn't know what I was doing. A lot of it was self-taught.

[00:28:17] [SPEAKER_04]: Yes. No, I was just winging it.

[00:28:19] [SPEAKER_04]: I mean, I'm not going to lie to y'all out here.

[00:28:22] [SPEAKER_04]: A lot of artists wing it at first.

[00:28:25] [SPEAKER_04]: You can learn the technique, but to be a great if you want to be a good artist like Costo said you steal to be a great artist, you know, no, or was it?

[00:28:36] [SPEAKER_04]: What's backwards? Whatever.

[00:28:37] [SPEAKER_04]: But I stole a lot of like ideas.

[00:28:40] [SPEAKER_04]: I saw a lot of things, looked a lot of magazines, wanted to be a lot of different artists, tried a lot of stuff.

[00:28:49] [SPEAKER_04]: I messed up hundreds of people.

[00:28:52] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, like the beginning.

[00:28:53] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I didn't know. Like I said, I didn't know what a lot of artists won't tell you that.

[00:28:57] [SPEAKER_04]: But I did. I still there's my first tattoo I ever did was on my sister.

[00:29:03] [SPEAKER_04]: It was a Winnie the Pooh tattoo and it's backwards on her arm looking the outside and I and you know me and you see it on my Facebook.

[00:29:11] [SPEAKER_04]: I grieve about that.

[00:29:14] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my because the reason I grieve because I've done it a couple of times when I first started.

[00:29:20] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, until like you or another big time artist or somebody I look up to finally said, you know, message me or call me.

[00:29:29] [SPEAKER_01]: I had to learn it.

[00:29:31] [SPEAKER_04]: Bro, you need to stop putting things backwards.

[00:29:34] [SPEAKER_04]: You're just making the tattoo industry look like a joke.

[00:29:38] [SPEAKER_04]: Keep messing it up.

[00:29:39] [SPEAKER_04]: You keep putting it backwards. You want to be somebody in this industry?

[00:29:43] [SPEAKER_04]: Do the right. Oh, I've been cussed out.

[00:29:46] [SPEAKER_04]: Talk to Stern, which is fine.

[00:29:48] [SPEAKER_04]: Because it was artists, you know, women artists, men artists would call me on my bullshit.

[00:29:56] [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm glad and honestly, I am so thankful that they gave me the tough love because it made me a little bit better now.

[00:30:05] [SPEAKER_04]: Because I took what all y'all have said and still today, I still ask questions.

[00:30:11] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, yeah.

[00:30:13] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, no, I hear you, man. I hear you.

[00:30:18] [SPEAKER_01]: I was.

[00:30:20] [SPEAKER_01]: Wow, it doesn't matter what my was.

[00:30:22] [SPEAKER_01]: Do you feel like everybody here is heard?

[00:30:26] [SPEAKER_01]: Like Amy, shut up. We know.

[00:30:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Do you ever feel like you were haze unnecessarily or like anyone might have told you things in a way that could have been it had been framed better or had it been done better?

[00:30:43] [SPEAKER_01]: You might have picked it up a lot sooner than the approach.

[00:30:47] [SPEAKER_04]: No, I am glad that they approached me with sternness.

[00:30:52] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm glad they cuss me out. Talk down to me, telling me I need a quick tattoo and I'm not going to make it.

[00:30:59] [SPEAKER_04]: You're just going to turn out to be a piece of shit artist, blah, blah, blah.

[00:31:02] [SPEAKER_04]: Because in my mind, they kept telling me this kept dogging me, talking about me.

[00:31:07] [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm like, OK, so if I give up now, they were right.

[00:31:12] [SPEAKER_04]: I just kept pushing myself.

[00:31:14] [SPEAKER_04]: And you know, I don't know about you because you're the sweetest, but hardly.

[00:31:21] [SPEAKER_04]: I still have and you've probably seen it on social media.

[00:31:24] [SPEAKER_04]: I still have haters or fans, as I call them that talk about me constantly.

[00:31:30] [SPEAKER_04]: I've never talked to or never even met in person is because he said she said your mama said your granny to your cousin, baby mama that said, oh, we indeed said this or did this.

[00:31:43] [SPEAKER_04]: So I'm like, what did I do now? Please tell me.

[00:31:47] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, no, it's fun sometimes.

[00:31:49] [SPEAKER_01]: I had my former boss.

[00:31:53] [SPEAKER_01]: He came up to me at Ren Fair once and he was like, so we're having sex.

[00:31:57] [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, what? And I'm there with he's there with his wife and I'm there with my boyfriend.

[00:32:01] [SPEAKER_01]: We just walked up and I was like, what?

[00:32:05] [SPEAKER_01]: And he's like, yeah, we're having sex.

[00:32:07] [SPEAKER_01]: My boyfriend's going this better get good, like real fast.

[00:32:11] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, what the fuck are you saying, bro?

[00:32:13] [SPEAKER_01]: And he's like, yeah, that's what a former employee has been saying that why he quit instead of why I fired him.

[00:32:24] [SPEAKER_01]: That's what he's been telling all of our area.

[00:32:26] [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, we're famous.

[00:32:30] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, he looked at me as like he was like inquisitive that there was not a lot of outrage.

[00:32:37] [SPEAKER_01]: And then I and then I looked at my boyfriend.

[00:32:39] [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, what's not true? You idiot.

[00:32:45] [SPEAKER_04]: Not true. It's like exactly.

[00:32:47] [SPEAKER_01]: Analyze the source.

[00:32:51] [SPEAKER_01]: I think I was like, I don't give a fuck.

[00:32:55] [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, good, good.

[00:32:57] [SPEAKER_01]: All news is good news.

[00:32:58] [SPEAKER_01]: Let that just gossip mill go, man.

[00:33:02] [SPEAKER_04]: You have made it. Yeah.

[00:33:04] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. I was like, I'm like on the cover of Star magazine right now, baby.

[00:33:07] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, this is awesome.

[00:33:10] [SPEAKER_01]: I know.

[00:33:12] [SPEAKER_01]: It was like, this is great.

[00:33:14] [SPEAKER_01]: And I was just like, you know, OK, even if it was true, how does that make me any better or worse a tattoo artist?

[00:33:21] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I'm just saying, like, yeah, we've seen some stuff. Yeah.

[00:33:27] [SPEAKER_01]: It's not true. But like still, that wouldn't impede me about being a good artist or not.

[00:33:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Like that's silly.

[00:33:36] [SPEAKER_04]: What you do in your personal time has nothing to do with your art skills.

[00:33:41] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah.

[00:33:42] [SPEAKER_04]: And I've always looked at that. I've always looked at it that way.

[00:33:45] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. And, you know, I feel bad for haters.

[00:33:48] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's got to suck.

[00:33:49] [SPEAKER_04]: I love them because I every morning when I wake up, I look in the mirror and go, man, how many haters am I going to have today?

[00:33:57] [SPEAKER_04]: Because if I do, I'm just doing something that they wish they could do like they could be me.

[00:34:05] [SPEAKER_04]: Or what is that saying? You want to be me, but you can't or whatever.

[00:34:09] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't, you know, every day I'm glad that I do have haters because it pushes me.

[00:34:15] [SPEAKER_04]: It does. It puts me to get out of that bed, to get up and go do some art.

[00:34:19] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, you know, because I'm like, you know, they're following you low key.

[00:34:25] [SPEAKER_04]: So why are you worried about me or say you or other great artists out here in the industry that we know that might be doing stuff that they're so called not supposed to.

[00:34:37] [SPEAKER_04]: But who cares? This is look at the art. We're tattoo artists like we tattoo art on people.

[00:34:44] [SPEAKER_04]: That's what people need to focus on here.

[00:34:47] [SPEAKER_04]: Like when I go to Wal-Mart.

[00:34:50] [SPEAKER_04]: And I check out, do I care if the man or the woman checking me out like slept with her neighbor?

[00:34:57] [SPEAKER_04]: No, I don't care about that. I just want to get I just want to get my you know, my stuff and go like I'm doing my own thing.

[00:35:04] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, there you go. I don't really care. I don't care.

[00:35:07] [SPEAKER_01]: I am in recent years.

[00:35:10] [SPEAKER_01]: The only way that I have like been more, I think, strategic about this is just.

[00:35:18] [SPEAKER_01]: I've indulged some haters for a while until it was just like, I started like thinking about to your point.

[00:35:26] [SPEAKER_01]: I loved them at first and it was fun at first and they had some fun, some fun digs that I was like, that's kind of funny.

[00:35:33] [SPEAKER_01]: But then after a while, it was just kind of like because I really think the best is when you can just ignore it.

[00:35:40] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, like and what got to me was when friends of mine, like on social media spaces, friends of mine didn't know that this was like like my my troll.

[00:35:55] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, like, like they didn't know. And they would be like they would get involved in these huge like things with them.

[00:36:01] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. And I had to like hit him up on the back at burner and be like, listen, I'm sorry.

[00:36:07] [SPEAKER_01]: I probably should go in all normal worlds. You would block this person.

[00:36:11] [SPEAKER_01]: But I just kind of I just try to ignore them. Right.

[00:36:15] [SPEAKER_01]: And you're like, please don't please don't feel like you need to spend your time like defending me.

[00:36:21] [SPEAKER_01]: I know you're my friend, but like this is a troll like just God bless them.

[00:36:30] [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, you know what? I just owe all these people a service of just blocking this idiot who's just so dead set on wasting people's time.

[00:36:41] [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, I'm really wasting their own, you know, because as you said, you know, it's kind of a kindness to be like, no, I'm not going to let you do this to me.

[00:36:51] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not going to sit here and actively because it's a lot of energy to ignore them, honestly, because sometimes they do.

[00:36:58] [SPEAKER_01]: They do hit a spot that it's like, I want to say something, but I know I shouldn't.

[00:37:08] [SPEAKER_01]: I know. I know that's what you want me to do. You did.

[00:37:12] [SPEAKER_01]: And then and then you're like fighting it. You're like, fuck.

[00:37:16] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, it's really tempting.

[00:37:19] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I it took me. Oh my God, the longest probably about nine years to finally just like not even reply back because I would.

[00:37:30] [SPEAKER_04]: I mean, I would fly back in a heartbeat.

[00:37:33] [SPEAKER_04]: I even go to even if it was other artists locally that would say stuff that wasn't true or want to be tough.

[00:37:44] [SPEAKER_04]: I would go to their shop and meet them. Good for you.

[00:37:48] [SPEAKER_04]: I would walk up, meet them face to face and they were like, oh, crap.

[00:37:53] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, like I did not. I still don't care to do that, which I will.

[00:37:58] [SPEAKER_04]: But I have slowed down a little bit. I'm not going to lie.

[00:38:03] [SPEAKER_04]: He would be having some guns on them.

[00:38:06] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, well, I mean, I like the Second Amendment because I can do to carry what I can carry.

[00:38:15] [SPEAKER_04]: But but I have to admit, though, like I've slowed down a lot in the past year because I have to admit my best friends real quick.

[00:38:24] [SPEAKER_04]: Jamie and Sarah, they are my best friends.

[00:38:27] [SPEAKER_04]: They have. Actually, Jamie got Jamie and Sarah got me on the map of tattooing.

[00:38:36] [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, that's awesome. So there were four real quick.

[00:38:40] [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, please know this is your origin story, of course.

[00:38:45] [SPEAKER_04]: So 2015 wrote around. It was like, finally, I got a year in a good whole year into that doing had this big old ego.

[00:38:53] [SPEAKER_04]: I thought I was better than everybody. Blah, blah, blah.

[00:38:56] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was like, I can take on anything. You know, I could do whatever.

[00:39:00] [SPEAKER_04]: Sarah came in the shop and wanted to get her fiance's tattoo covered up.

[00:39:05] [SPEAKER_04]: It was ex-wife's name. OK, I should be able to do that.

[00:39:09] [SPEAKER_04]: So she showed me it was on his forearm. Big old letters of his wife, big old heart, big flames, everything.

[00:39:19] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was like, OK. So I was like, she said, well, it's a secret. He doesn't know.

[00:39:27] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was like back then. I said, well, I could do a tap out session for 500 bucks.

[00:39:33] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't know what you know. I'm still new.

[00:39:35] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't know anything about tap out. I didn't know how people really could take tattoos.

[00:39:41] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was talking, I was like, how about I do a Batman?

[00:39:45] [SPEAKER_04]: And she goes, oh, he loves Batman. He loves all this. Oh, my God.

[00:39:48] [SPEAKER_04]: So he comes in. Perfect. Almost 10 hours later, I finally got done with this Batman portrait on his arm.

[00:39:58] [SPEAKER_04]: And as I was doing it, I was taking well, she was taking pictures of like every time we took a break, the process of it.

[00:40:06] [SPEAKER_04]: And I posted after I got done with it, I posted on social media, you know, Facebook, whatever.

[00:40:13] [SPEAKER_04]: And everybody's like, wow, where did this guy come from?

[00:40:18] [SPEAKER_04]: Like he like he's doing this realistic stuff.

[00:40:22] [SPEAKER_04]: A lot of people told me it looked like plastic.

[00:40:26] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, you know, I had to interrupt us yet again.

[00:40:31] [SPEAKER_01]: A little shout out to Paradise Tattoo Gathering.

[00:40:34] [SPEAKER_01]: I had to do it, especially with this podcast because William is actually going to be tattooing at Paradise.

[00:40:43] [SPEAKER_01]: So come check us out.

[00:40:45] [SPEAKER_01]: If you are in the Massachusetts or any of the surrounding state areas, it's going to be a fantastic show.

[00:40:51] [SPEAKER_01]: It always is. Lots popping off this year.

[00:40:56] [SPEAKER_01]: What I know is they're just trying to keep scaling.

[00:40:59] [SPEAKER_01]: And the foundation of this show is probably one of the most integral that I've come across.

[00:41:05] [SPEAKER_01]: There's only I think there's only been a couple others.

[00:41:08] [SPEAKER_01]: So if you are a tattoo artist looking to level up or if you are looking to be re-inspired or if you just want to network

[00:41:18] [SPEAKER_01]: or if you just want to, I don't know, take in all of the beautiful sights of Jiminy Peak, Massachusetts in October right before Halloween.

[00:41:29] [SPEAKER_01]: This show is for you.

[00:41:31] [SPEAKER_01]: So please come join us and now we can get back to our podcast.

[00:41:40] [SPEAKER_04]: That's cool.

[00:41:42] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I didn't know what that meant.

[00:41:43] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, you're like, is that a compliment?

[00:41:47] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, like I didn't know.

[00:41:49] [SPEAKER_04]: I was like, is that a compliment?

[00:41:50] [SPEAKER_04]: Because I guess because the way I did the mask, it didn't look real.

[00:41:55] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I guess what looked like plastic.

[00:41:57] [SPEAKER_04]: I still haven't figured out how to do that again today.

[00:42:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I know.

[00:42:01] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I'm like, I did it.

[00:42:03] [SPEAKER_04]: And like I said, if it honestly wasn't for them also letting me do that, I would never probably got noticed.

[00:42:11] [SPEAKER_04]: I probably would have honestly got lost maybe into the tattoo bull crap that because I had a little bit of ego.

[00:42:19] [SPEAKER_04]: I ain't gonna lie, because every apprentice after they do a couple of little, little think they did a couple of good things.

[00:42:25] [SPEAKER_04]: They had this little ego that, oh, I got it.

[00:42:27] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah, I know what I'm doing.

[00:42:28] [SPEAKER_04]: I know what I'm doing.

[00:42:31] [SPEAKER_04]: So, yeah, even Eric Newby reached out and said, dude, that is really good.

[00:42:35] [SPEAKER_04]: He said, but you know the problem?

[00:42:36] [SPEAKER_04]: I said, well, he goes, now you're going to have to do that type of work every time and you're going to have to even grow it and get better.

[00:42:44] [SPEAKER_04]: So I got a little nervous.

[00:42:46] [SPEAKER_04]: I was like, oh my God, like what did I do?

[00:42:48] [SPEAKER_04]: How did I do that?

[00:42:49] [SPEAKER_04]: Like, oh my God, like, OK, I know I added a lot of black.

[00:42:53] [SPEAKER_04]: So, you know, I was like, oh my God, like, oh my God, I just added a little purple, a little blue.

[00:42:59] [SPEAKER_04]: And still this day, like we're actually all roommates.

[00:43:02] [SPEAKER_04]: We're best friends.

[00:43:03] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, that's awesome.

[00:43:04] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, we're still roommates and stuff.

[00:43:07] [SPEAKER_04]: And and I still I tattoo them for free.

[00:43:10] [SPEAKER_04]: Go ahead.

[00:43:10] [SPEAKER_04]: It wasn't for them.

[00:43:12] [SPEAKER_04]: I wouldn't have probably got anywhere if I didn't do that.

[00:43:16] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I said, I don't know where my career probably would have went.

[00:43:19] [SPEAKER_04]: Honestly, I probably would have quit later because, you know, I got tired of doing like this and this little things and stuff, you know, but I'm I'm so thankful for them to, you know, I really am like anytime they want to.

[00:43:32] [SPEAKER_04]: I got you.

[00:43:35] [SPEAKER_01]: And now you know how to like pay attention when you're experimenting, you know, like in those in those early days, I know exactly what you're talking about.

[00:43:46] [SPEAKER_01]: In fact, there was a man when I was a barber, he's like, you know, you've never cut my hair as good as the first time.

[00:43:53] [SPEAKER_01]: Right. And I was like, dude, you keep coming, though you get he's like, yeah, my secretary, she makes my appointments and, you know, I just take what I can get.

[00:44:01] [SPEAKER_01]: But he's like, what did you do that first time?

[00:44:03] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, honestly, I have no idea.

[00:44:06] [SPEAKER_01]: I I swear I'm doing what I should be doing right now.

[00:44:10] [SPEAKER_01]: He's like, it's not the same.

[00:44:13] [SPEAKER_01]: It's not the same.

[00:44:14] [SPEAKER_04]: I look back at the tattoo and I'm glad that he like he let me they let me do it.

[00:44:21] [SPEAKER_04]: And I did great, which I look at my stuff now how I progress.

[00:44:24] [SPEAKER_04]: I think I've got a little bit better, but some days I'm like, if I'm missing some or does everybody still recognize my heart when they see it?

[00:44:35] [SPEAKER_04]: My tattoos.

[00:44:36] [SPEAKER_04]: Well, people go, oh, that's William D. That's a Willism piece.

[00:44:39] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I still fight with that.

[00:44:41] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, it's good that you wrestle with that because, you know, you don't you don't want to come off as stealing somebody else's stuff like and then it's not even that.

[00:44:56] [SPEAKER_01]: It's it's more being influenced and more being inspired by someone because when we started talking again and we had our call, we talked about Joshua Carlton.

[00:45:07] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, God. Yeah, I know.

[00:45:09] [SPEAKER_01]: And your work does look a lot like his.

[00:45:11] [SPEAKER_01]: So we're meandering through these questions, so it's fine.

[00:45:15] [SPEAKER_01]: But like speak about that a little bit.

[00:45:17] [SPEAKER_01]: Like when did you first see Josh and like go, oh my God.

[00:45:22] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I had to say to the Josh Carlton, his wife, Nicole.

[00:45:30] [SPEAKER_04]: They are some awesome people.

[00:45:33] [SPEAKER_04]: Even I'm just like even shaking a little bit in Goosebumps because, man, he is God rest his soul.

[00:45:42] [SPEAKER_04]: He was just he was one of another one of the top influencers because when I first started, I wanted to be just a black and gray artist.

[00:45:52] [SPEAKER_04]: I wanted to be like Tom Rinshaw.

[00:45:56] [SPEAKER_04]: I want to be like Bob Tyrell.

[00:46:01] [SPEAKER_04]: Man, there's so many.

[00:46:02] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my God. I wanted to be like Joe Capo.

[00:46:05] [SPEAKER_04]: I can't even pronounce his last name.

[00:46:08] [SPEAKER_01]: Everybody calls him Joe Cap.

[00:46:10] [SPEAKER_04]: Joe Cap. I want to be just like him.

[00:46:12] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my God. I wanted to be.

[00:46:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, there's so many styles, right?

[00:46:17] [SPEAKER_04]: Like, yeah, they're all amazing.

[00:46:19] [SPEAKER_04]: All the I wanted to be like all.

[00:46:22] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was just doing only black and gray.

[00:46:25] [SPEAKER_04]: And I was sitting at the I was sitting at a tattoo shop by myself one day.

[00:46:29] [SPEAKER_04]: So we got a tattoo magazine.

[00:46:31] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was like, oh, that's a new one.

[00:46:34] [SPEAKER_04]: And then so yeah, that's a new one.

[00:46:35] [SPEAKER_04]: We got you. So you check it out.

[00:46:37] [SPEAKER_04]: It's OK. I just started flipping through.

[00:46:39] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, you see like the flash or, you know, you see good black and gray tattooists.

[00:46:43] [SPEAKER_04]: And then all of a sudden I flip to the middle and said Joshua Carlton,

[00:46:48] [SPEAKER_04]: that did an interview and it showed his work.

[00:46:50] [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm like, is this real?

[00:46:54] [SPEAKER_04]: Like, and I flipped the page and I was like, hold on, this guy's doing color, but it doesn't.

[00:47:00] [SPEAKER_04]: I kept looking. I was confused.

[00:47:02] [SPEAKER_04]: Like, like I told you, like, is this real?

[00:47:04] [SPEAKER_04]: Like, yeah, I do in this.

[00:47:07] [SPEAKER_04]: So I'm like, who is this guy?

[00:47:09] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was like, man, I wish I could tattoo like that.

[00:47:12] [SPEAKER_04]: So I looked him up.

[00:47:14] [SPEAKER_04]: I said, oh my God, this guy's awesome.

[00:47:16] [SPEAKER_04]: I seen a couple of little videos.

[00:47:18] [SPEAKER_04]: So I sent him a friend request. He accepted it.

[00:47:21] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was fanboy. Oh, my God.

[00:47:23] [SPEAKER_04]: He sent my friend request.

[00:47:25] [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, man, he was a very, very, very genuine sweet man.

[00:47:31] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah. I was like, I want to learn how to tattoo like this guy.

[00:47:34] [SPEAKER_04]: So they had the video of how you can do color and then you can do it.

[00:47:40] [SPEAKER_04]: He had a color piece and he had a black and gray piece.

[00:47:44] [SPEAKER_04]: And he showed how he made his stencils and everything else.

[00:47:46] [SPEAKER_04]: And he told you about how to set up, know what machine told you what liner to use.

[00:47:54] [SPEAKER_04]: Also, what mag and and I bought that DVD.

[00:47:58] [SPEAKER_04]: Every DVD he made, I had to buy it.

[00:48:01] [SPEAKER_04]: I bought it every time.

[00:48:02] [SPEAKER_04]: Like the first DVD made was kind of like a cross patching sketchy technique where you can go.

[00:48:08] [SPEAKER_04]: So I did everything, everything.

[00:48:10] [SPEAKER_04]: I watched that video 100 times even before I tattooed.

[00:48:14] [SPEAKER_04]: I watched it over and over before that.

[00:48:16] [SPEAKER_04]: So then I was like, man, these people ain't coming in to let me do this stuff like he's doing.

[00:48:23] [SPEAKER_04]: So I started doing them for free.

[00:48:25] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.

[00:48:25] [SPEAKER_04]: That's a good way to do it.

[00:48:27] [SPEAKER_04]: I've done so many free tattoos, I think that I've actually made money, but it's OK.

[00:48:31] [SPEAKER_04]: Maybe.

[00:48:33] [SPEAKER_04]: So then I find out he made a tattoo machines.

[00:48:38] [SPEAKER_04]: He made three of them.

[00:48:40] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, he made a liner and he made a packer and a back shader.

[00:48:43] [SPEAKER_04]: I bought all of them.

[00:48:45] [SPEAKER_04]: OK, hold on. Let me rephrase that.

[00:48:47] [SPEAKER_04]: Sorry. The woman I was with at the time bought them for me as a gift.

[00:48:52] [SPEAKER_04]: So I got it. Yeah.

[00:48:54] [SPEAKER_01]: She bought it where credit's due.

[00:48:55] [SPEAKER_01]: That's awesome.

[00:48:56] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. She bought them for me as a gift because she didn't want me to give up.

[00:49:02] [SPEAKER_04]: You want to get better?

[00:49:04] [SPEAKER_04]: So I bought them and stuff.

[00:49:05] [SPEAKER_04]: I kept bugging Josh.

[00:49:07] [SPEAKER_04]: Hey, should I do this?

[00:49:08] [SPEAKER_04]: Should I change it?

[00:49:08] [SPEAKER_04]: He's like, no, just leave him alone.

[00:49:10] [SPEAKER_04]: I would like contact him every day.

[00:49:14] [SPEAKER_04]: So then I started like trying to do what he does.

[00:49:20] [SPEAKER_04]: So then after a while, I'm not saying I do what he does, but I was I was it was kind of like you got Josh Carlton and then you got Timo Josh Carlton.

[00:49:31] [SPEAKER_04]: So I was like, it was kind of so much close to his work.

[00:49:39] [SPEAKER_04]: So everybody and people started calling me and also, hey, man, your stuff looks like Josh Carlton.

[00:49:44] [SPEAKER_04]: And I was like, yes.

[00:49:48] [SPEAKER_04]: He finally he finally commented one day and I bowed.

[00:49:54] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my God.

[00:49:54] [SPEAKER_04]: I was like, I ain't gonna say I cried.

[00:49:56] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, but I was like, are you serious?

[00:49:58] [SPEAKER_04]: So I had to like call it.

[00:50:00] [SPEAKER_04]: He talked to me and stuff like that.

[00:50:02] [SPEAKER_04]: Told me a lot of stuff.

[00:50:04] [SPEAKER_04]: He's actually even before he passed away.

[00:50:08] [SPEAKER_04]: He sent me a lot of stuff for free.

[00:50:11] [SPEAKER_04]: To get better.

[00:50:14] [SPEAKER_04]: He talked to me for hours and hours on video call.

[00:50:17] [SPEAKER_04]: He's actually pointed out things that I need to do to make myself better.

[00:50:23] [SPEAKER_04]: He said, I appreciate your style that you have as William Willism.

[00:50:28] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, you have a little bit of mine.

[00:50:30] [SPEAKER_04]: He said, you do, which is fine.

[00:50:32] [SPEAKER_04]: He said, but you're also putting some of other stuff into it, too.

[00:50:37] [SPEAKER_04]: So you have your own style.

[00:50:38] [SPEAKER_04]: He said, which a lot of people, they will go 15, 20 something years and still

[00:50:43] [SPEAKER_04]: don't even get a style in this industry.

[00:50:46] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.

[00:50:47] [SPEAKER_04]: And like he would even when he found out I was dealing with the same things

[00:50:51] [SPEAKER_04]: he was dealing with, he would call me every now and then and see how I was

[00:50:55] [SPEAKER_04]: doing, how my biopsies came through, how my doctor's appointments.

[00:51:03] [SPEAKER_04]: Try not to cry because I know because it's rough.

[00:51:06] [SPEAKER_04]: I got to see him on video call and I never got to meet him in person, which I

[00:51:11] [SPEAKER_04]: always did, which was one thing was cool.

[00:51:15] [SPEAKER_04]: Brandon Bond, all or nothing tattoo in Atlanta.

[00:51:19] [SPEAKER_04]: He reached out to me two years ago about two and a guest spot at his shop.

[00:51:23] [SPEAKER_04]: And I was like, me?

[00:51:25] [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't go, I was like, really?

[00:51:27] [SPEAKER_04]: Me? He goes, yeah.

[00:51:27] [SPEAKER_04]: He said, I like you come to a guest spot.

[00:51:30] [SPEAKER_04]: And everybody knows Brandon Bond.

[00:51:32] [SPEAKER_04]: He does have whatever.

[00:51:34] [SPEAKER_04]: But as an artist, he is.

[00:51:37] [SPEAKER_01]: He is incredible.

[00:51:39] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, you.

[00:51:40] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, he is top notch.

[00:51:41] [SPEAKER_04]: So when I got there, he's like, well, I know you like I know you love Josh

[00:51:45] [SPEAKER_04]: Carlin.

[00:51:46] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah.

[00:51:46] [SPEAKER_04]: He goes, well, come here.

[00:51:48] [SPEAKER_04]: He said this is your booth for the week that you're here.

[00:51:51] [SPEAKER_04]: He said this is Josh Carlin's old tattoo booth when he used to work.

[00:51:55] [SPEAKER_04]: When he first started tattooing, Josh Carlin tattooed with Brandon.

[00:51:59] [SPEAKER_04]: That is so cool.

[00:52:03] [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, regardless, it's always really wonderful because most of the

[00:52:08] [SPEAKER_01]: time that I asked to do a guest spot, we're like, yeah, man, come.

[00:52:11] [SPEAKER_01]: But there's one thing to be asked and then offered one.

[00:52:14] [SPEAKER_01]: And it's really cool when you're offered one.

[00:52:16] [SPEAKER_01]: And that's such a cool thing.

[00:52:18] [SPEAKER_01]: So you were able to feel that vibe.

[00:52:22] [SPEAKER_01]: That's awesome.

[00:52:23] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. Oh, yeah.

[00:52:24] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I was sitting there just kind of eating it up.

[00:52:28] [SPEAKER_04]: And I did a couple, I guess.

[00:52:30] [SPEAKER_04]: OK, I think that was OK because I was more nervous.

[00:52:33] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, you got a bond there.

[00:52:34] [SPEAKER_04]: And then I'm like sitting in the booth of, you know, Josh Carlin, how he

[00:52:39] [SPEAKER_04]: got his start from like when his first ever tattoos was there in that

[00:52:44] [SPEAKER_04]: booth, you know, and like to where he progressed.

[00:52:47] [SPEAKER_04]: So it gave me hope.

[00:52:50] [SPEAKER_04]: Honestly, like this is where he said.

[00:52:53] [SPEAKER_04]: And then all these years later, what he has done for this industry,

[00:52:58] [SPEAKER_04]: what he is going for not just only me, but for everybody that tries their

[00:53:04] [SPEAKER_04]: hardest and wants to be an artist, not just a tattooer, not just a

[00:53:09] [SPEAKER_04]: rock star, but somebody that really is passionate about this career,

[00:53:16] [SPEAKER_04]: this industry, which I get told a lot.

[00:53:18] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm too passionate because some of the things I say or I'm like, OK,

[00:53:22] [SPEAKER_04]: well, that if other artists tell me this and I tell them, I said,

[00:53:26] [SPEAKER_04]: well, then you're the problem.

[00:53:27] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:53:28] [SPEAKER_04]: If you're not as passionate as I am, then why are you still tattooing?

[00:53:32] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:53:33] [SPEAKER_04]: But you know.

[00:53:34] [SPEAKER_01]: No, no, I I I've I've I've come across that.

[00:53:41] [SPEAKER_01]: I've come across that a lot with a lot of different people.

[00:53:44] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I've seen a lot of people who have been doing something

[00:53:46] [SPEAKER_01]: It makes people uncomfortable.

[00:53:48] [SPEAKER_01]: It does because, you know, they think they're doing something wrong.

[00:53:52] [SPEAKER_01]: I think when they see a very willful person who attacks the things

[00:53:58] [SPEAKER_01]: that they want.

[00:54:00] [SPEAKER_01]: So so potently.

[00:54:01] [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, a lot of people, man, like and I get it because lately

[00:54:05] [SPEAKER_01]: I've been a lot more like trying to like be on social media.

[00:54:08] [SPEAKER_01]: And that's a fucking cesspool, dude.

[00:54:10] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, it's so it is.

[00:54:13] [SPEAKER_01]: I can't even imagine growing up with this shit.

[00:54:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, it's like crack.

[00:54:17] [SPEAKER_01]: It is.

[00:54:19] [SPEAKER_04]: It is.

[00:54:19] [SPEAKER_01]: I know really hard to turn.

[00:54:21] [SPEAKER_01]: I have a lot of empathy for the younger generation.

[00:54:24] [SPEAKER_01]: Let me tell you, which is why I like to do this, too, is that like,

[00:54:29] [SPEAKER_01]: you know, you find your way here.

[00:54:31] [SPEAKER_01]: You can hear long form conversations of people that have done it,

[00:54:37] [SPEAKER_01]: have done it at different timelines, kind of give you their ideas of things.

[00:54:40] [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, like I think that everybody is going to try to lessen your shine

[00:54:50] [SPEAKER_01]: because when you're really doing something, it's like what you said about the haters.

[00:54:53] [SPEAKER_01]: It's like when you're doing stuff that, you know, shows that you have

[00:54:59] [SPEAKER_01]: a direction in life.

[00:55:01] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, the world will conspire to stop you.

[00:55:05] [SPEAKER_01]: And it's really important that that happens because it really does forge

[00:55:10] [SPEAKER_01]: the purest kind of passion and the purest kind of heart.

[00:55:16] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's like anything that's forged in fire, man, it comes out

[00:55:19] [SPEAKER_01]: like stronger, you know, more more ready to take on whatever things.

[00:55:25] [SPEAKER_01]: And I do think that those are the earn it walls, you know,

[00:55:29] [SPEAKER_01]: like hurdles that you have to go through.

[00:55:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, I always tell people, well, fuck me for caring, man.

[00:55:37] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, yeah, what do you care about?

[00:55:41] [SPEAKER_01]: Let's let me let me let me trash something that you find valuable, bro.

[00:55:46] [SPEAKER_01]: Like because I've had people say that shit to me my whole life.

[00:55:49] [SPEAKER_01]: Like I was vegetarian at one point and somebody was like,

[00:55:52] [SPEAKER_01]: don't you think it's a little like, I don't know,

[00:55:55] [SPEAKER_01]: a lot for you to dictate what you will and will not eat when other people

[00:56:00] [SPEAKER_01]: are starving. And I was like, well,

[00:56:04] [SPEAKER_01]: what's that? I was like, what?

[00:56:07] [SPEAKER_04]: Why do you care about me?

[00:56:09] [SPEAKER_01]: I know. I was like, how are you spending your time?

[00:56:12] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you're talking about like starving kids.

[00:56:17] [SPEAKER_01]: Where's your outreach program?

[00:56:19] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, like, are you feeding the hungry on a regular basis?

[00:56:22] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, where is this opinion coming from?

[00:56:24] [SPEAKER_01]: Are you just trying to shit on me?

[00:56:26] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I know what you're doing.

[00:56:28] [SPEAKER_01]: You dick.

[00:56:32] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not a vegetarian anymore.

[00:56:34] [SPEAKER_01]: Fucking love me.

[00:56:35] [SPEAKER_01]: But.

[00:56:37] [SPEAKER_03]: It was a moment.

[00:56:39] [SPEAKER_01]: I was very passionate.

[00:56:41] [SPEAKER_01]: I was very passionate.

[00:56:44] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I love that.

[00:56:47] [SPEAKER_01]: Because I noticed that a lot about your work too,

[00:56:49] [SPEAKER_01]: and it does have its own style to it.

[00:56:53] [SPEAKER_01]: What I like about your style is that it's clear that you

[00:56:57] [SPEAKER_01]: really try to pull your client into there as well.

[00:57:01] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, like I said this to a guy at Pagoda

[00:57:04] [SPEAKER_01]: and he was really like kind of a bash because he's like, I didn't have

[00:57:08] [SPEAKER_01]: I was trying to get people for interviews.

[00:57:11] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. And I said, you know, I love your work.

[00:57:13] [SPEAKER_01]: It reminds me of Chrome, the Chrome comics.

[00:57:18] [SPEAKER_01]: And he's like, oh, my God, that's so cool that you pick up that influence.

[00:57:22] [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, yeah, dude, I was like, I love that guy.

[00:57:25] [SPEAKER_01]: He's like, it's so cool that you know him.

[00:57:26] [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, well, he liked his ladies six.

[00:57:28] [SPEAKER_01]: So that's why I know him.

[00:57:30] [SPEAKER_01]: He started laughing. He's like, you know, I feel

[00:57:34] [SPEAKER_01]: I would feel kind of like an imposter.

[00:57:36] [SPEAKER_01]: I struggle with that a lot because I didn't have it.

[00:57:39] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I self-taught traditional apprenticeship.

[00:57:41] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, I don't even know if I have a style.

[00:57:43] [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, oh, you do.

[00:57:44] [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, I don't know if I have a style.

[00:57:44] [SPEAKER_01]: I said, but what I like about your work is it

[00:57:47] [SPEAKER_01]: it suggests like a lot of care

[00:57:49] [SPEAKER_01]: for the people that you work with and really trying to combine

[00:57:53] [SPEAKER_01]: what you do with what their vision is.

[00:57:57] [SPEAKER_01]: And I said, and that's we're in a commercial industry, man.

[00:58:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, you know, I I there are some artists

[00:58:05] [SPEAKER_01]: that like I think they they go the route of like everything's pre-drawn.

[00:58:09] [SPEAKER_01]: It's like all their style. People like gush over it.

[00:58:12] [SPEAKER_01]: They want it cool.

[00:58:14] [SPEAKER_01]: I really get a lot of inspiration from my client.

[00:58:18] [SPEAKER_01]: I really like tackling their their ideas that like come from a very,

[00:58:22] [SPEAKER_01]: you know, like core place.

[00:58:25] [SPEAKER_01]: And I see that about your work is like you can tell that you

[00:58:28] [SPEAKER_01]: you take their idea and marry it with what you do

[00:58:32] [SPEAKER_01]: and what you bring to the table, which is great because, you know,

[00:58:36] [SPEAKER_01]: there's something very integral about that.

[00:58:37] [SPEAKER_01]: There's a lot of care for your client.

[00:58:42] [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yes. And I think that that's great because

[00:58:45] [SPEAKER_01]: it it brings people into our world.

[00:58:49] [SPEAKER_01]: It allows them to partake in something really cool

[00:58:53] [SPEAKER_01]: that they thought they could just walk into a shop and buy, you know?

[00:58:58] [SPEAKER_01]: Like, I'm going to walk in and I'm going to buy an orange juice.

[00:59:01] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, whoa, buddy. Do you like pulp?

[00:59:04] [SPEAKER_01]: Do you like Valencia oranges?

[00:59:06] [SPEAKER_01]: Like what? You know, fresh squeezed, you know.

[00:59:11] [SPEAKER_04]: I mean, that's true. You can't.

[00:59:13] [SPEAKER_04]: I mean, people need to look at it more like that. Yeah.

[00:59:17] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. And then pick it apart and like show people like all these things

[00:59:21] [SPEAKER_01]: that you buy, all these things that you are a part of that are luxurious

[00:59:25] [SPEAKER_01]: society has had the benefit and blessing to be.

[00:59:29] [SPEAKER_01]: There is a creator of those things that took all these questions

[00:59:33] [SPEAKER_01]: and ran it through like, you know, a lot of different processes

[00:59:38] [SPEAKER_01]: to get to this space.

[00:59:39] [SPEAKER_01]: And when you can pull that apart and like bring your client into that

[00:59:43] [SPEAKER_01]: and let them take, you know, take on certain questions about it,

[00:59:47] [SPEAKER_01]: it's really neat.

[00:59:49] [SPEAKER_01]: I wish I could embrace it a little bit more for my wedding.

[00:59:52] [SPEAKER_01]: As I'm thinking about it, like friends of mine are like,

[00:59:54] [SPEAKER_01]: what do you need? I'm like, I want it to be over.

[00:59:58] [SPEAKER_01]: They're really.

[01:00:00] [SPEAKER_01]: I just can I just have a wedding?

[01:00:03] [SPEAKER_01]: And now you got to have preferences.

[01:00:04] [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like, you guys, I just this is like having somebody craft

[01:00:08] [SPEAKER_01]: a tattoo who never wanted one.

[01:00:10] [SPEAKER_01]: It's like, I don't I don't know, you know, but like,

[01:00:14] [SPEAKER_01]: but I do see that about your work.

[01:00:16] [SPEAKER_01]: Fused with a lot of Joshua Carlton influence,

[01:00:20] [SPEAKER_01]: and it made perfect sense that you guys were very close like that.

[01:00:24] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. Yeah.

[01:00:26] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, you know, from what from what I've heard from Nicole,

[01:00:30] [SPEAKER_01]: she's put out a blast that they're going to continue to sell his,

[01:00:34] [SPEAKER_01]: you know, his creations, his lessons and all that stuff

[01:00:39] [SPEAKER_01]: and give to charities that they all have always had,

[01:00:43] [SPEAKER_01]: you know, in the background going on.

[01:00:46] [SPEAKER_01]: So the legacy will continue.

[01:00:48] [SPEAKER_01]: So that's a beautiful thing.

[01:00:49] [SPEAKER_01]: And you can always marry what you do to that, too, you know,

[01:00:53] [SPEAKER_01]: and I think that's what's going to be the most beautiful thing

[01:00:53] [SPEAKER_01]: as time goes on.

[01:00:56] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure he'll he'll feel it from where he is now.

[01:00:59] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.

[01:01:00] [SPEAKER_04]: You know,

[01:01:04] [SPEAKER_01]: he'll be there to like give you a big high five and a hug at this,

[01:01:08] [SPEAKER_01]: you know, when it's your time.

[01:01:09] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[01:01:10] [SPEAKER_01]: Feel like.

[01:01:15] [SPEAKER_01]: It took a minute, but you know,

[01:01:17] [SPEAKER_01]: it was all pretty in the air.

[01:01:21] [SPEAKER_01]: Now, I felt the same way about him and and that magazine,

[01:01:26] [SPEAKER_01]: I believe it was Tattoo Society that really came out with him as like

[01:01:31] [SPEAKER_01]: a headliner at first.

[01:01:32] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not sure.

[01:01:35] [SPEAKER_01]: But Tattoo Society is where I witnessed him first.

[01:01:37] [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, what the hell is this?

[01:01:40] [SPEAKER_04]: What it was. Yeah.

[01:01:43] [SPEAKER_01]: Great magazine.

[01:01:44] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, yeah. Yeah.

[01:01:45] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm excited now.

[01:01:47] [SPEAKER_01]: I haven't invested in it, but I think it's you say

[01:01:51] [SPEAKER_01]: Olin jar or Olingar is the it's what Jeff Goegway is putting on

[01:01:57] [SPEAKER_01]: with Laura Jade and all of them.

[01:01:59] [SPEAKER_01]: They're producing a magazine.

[01:02:01] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[01:02:02] [SPEAKER_01]: Oligar.

[01:02:03] [SPEAKER_01]: I haven't I've seen like the people involved.

[01:02:06] [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like, oh, my God, I got to like,

[01:02:09] [SPEAKER_01]: I got to get this magazine.

[01:02:10] [SPEAKER_01]: This is awesome.

[01:02:12] [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, their magazine is pretty cool.

[01:02:14] [SPEAKER_01]: But Tattoo Society was like that kind of thing.

[01:02:16] [SPEAKER_01]: It was like really trying to explore like people who are breaking

[01:02:20] [SPEAKER_01]: the boundaries of the space.

[01:02:23] [SPEAKER_04]: And that's why I said, well, I'm going like everything they asked

[01:02:27] [SPEAKER_04]: was just it was tattoo related, but also get to know the person

[01:02:32] [SPEAKER_04]: like how you're doing.

[01:02:33] [SPEAKER_04]: You're like, and I love this because it's not just asking me about

[01:02:38] [SPEAKER_04]: tattooing, but you're like trying to get to know the real William

[01:02:43] [SPEAKER_04]: D.

[01:02:44] [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, yes, because it's important to the client.

[01:02:48] [SPEAKER_01]: One of my friends, Casey Hart, she she's been on here twice

[01:02:53] [SPEAKER_01]: and had, you know, multiple, multiple sessions.

[01:02:56] [SPEAKER_01]: But she said, you know, people found me like clients found me

[01:03:00] [SPEAKER_01]: through listening to your podcast and knew that I was the perfect

[01:03:03] [SPEAKER_01]: artist for them.

[01:03:04] [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, wow, that's so great to hear, because I was

[01:03:08] [SPEAKER_01]: like, that was part of the point was like, you're going to be

[01:03:11] [SPEAKER_01]: like, you're going to sit for hours with an artist and, you know,

[01:03:15] [SPEAKER_01]: your style.

[01:03:16] [SPEAKER_01]: I think her style is a little bit more done right now.

[01:03:19] [SPEAKER_01]: Like it's very fine line, like beautiful, delicate,

[01:03:22] [SPEAKER_01]: but not mandala work and oral and stuff.

[01:03:26] [SPEAKER_01]: But you I think when you're getting that kind of work,

[01:03:31] [SPEAKER_01]: you really want somebody who kind of embodies that kind of

[01:03:35] [SPEAKER_01]: persona.

[01:03:35] [SPEAKER_01]: And that is her persona.

[01:03:38] [SPEAKER_01]: Like that is her.

[01:03:39] [SPEAKER_01]: So it really helped people like find her and realize how attached

[01:03:44] [SPEAKER_01]: she was to her art.

[01:03:46] [SPEAKER_01]: And people want to be a part of that, you know, like that's important.

[01:03:51] [SPEAKER_01]: Very important.

[01:03:52] [SPEAKER_01]: And it's very synonymous because I think we become if you really

[01:03:57] [SPEAKER_01]: are like you, where you wrestle, which, you know, the

[01:04:01] [SPEAKER_01]: the term Israel is people who wrestle with God.

[01:04:04] [SPEAKER_01]: So I think, you know, true artists are people who wrestle with

[01:04:09] [SPEAKER_01]: their their kind of God sense, you know, like they're

[01:04:16] [SPEAKER_01]: they're channel of like creation, like, OK, like, you know,

[01:04:20] [SPEAKER_01]: like they kind of like really want to like dive deep into that

[01:04:23] [SPEAKER_01]: and pick it apart and like invest all this time and space.

[01:04:28] [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, those kind of.

[01:04:32] [SPEAKER_01]: Wrestling's with it, it ends up pulling out, I think, a style like

[01:04:36] [SPEAKER_01]: Josh saw about you that's so you like it not only is you, but

[01:04:41] [SPEAKER_01]: it draws in clients like you that will write, you know, that

[01:04:46] [SPEAKER_01]: will be able to sit for hours.

[01:04:48] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, oh, yeah, the women said so good to like, oh, my

[01:04:53] [SPEAKER_04]: God, I love tattooing a woman because y'all women said so

[01:04:58] [SPEAKER_04]: good. Like, there's no I don't know.

[01:05:01] [SPEAKER_04]: There's no like I have to take a break.

[01:05:03] [SPEAKER_04]: There's no like griping.

[01:05:05] [SPEAKER_04]: It's like you women can sit there on an iPad or read a book

[01:05:10] [SPEAKER_04]: or even take a nap.

[01:05:11] [SPEAKER_04]: And it's like, wow.

[01:05:13] [SPEAKER_04]: So even though even though like a lot of my stuff that I do

[01:05:17] [SPEAKER_04]: for women is like still my style, but, you know, still up

[01:05:24] [SPEAKER_04]: some of the beauty or the I don't say.

[01:05:30] [SPEAKER_04]: How would you put it?

[01:05:31] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I try to make it a little bit brighter, not so far, but

[01:05:36] [SPEAKER_04]: also like, you know, just I don't know, just classy.

[01:05:40] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't know.

[01:05:42] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't even know where I'm looking.

[01:05:43] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm just glad that there's women out here that do get tattoos

[01:05:47] [SPEAKER_04]: because you guys are awesome.

[01:05:49] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I could sit there and tattoo women every day.

[01:05:52] [SPEAKER_04]: Even if I tattoo flowers every day or jewels or whatever in my

[01:05:56] [SPEAKER_04]: style for a woman, I do not care because I know I'm not going

[01:06:01] [SPEAKER_04]: to have to worry about every 10 minutes.

[01:06:03] [SPEAKER_04]: Let's take a smoke break.

[01:06:04] [SPEAKER_04]: This hurts.

[01:06:05] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh my God.

[01:06:06] [SPEAKER_04]: I feel like, you know, I feel like I'm gonna pass out

[01:06:08] [SPEAKER_04]: and I get up, bro.

[01:06:10] [SPEAKER_04]: I need to call somebody.

[01:06:11] [SPEAKER_04]: What time are we going to shut up?

[01:06:16] [SPEAKER_01]: Do you know I have a philosophy.

[01:06:19] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know exactly why, but I think the reason why

[01:06:24] [SPEAKER_01]: we do that better is because we're more we're more

[01:06:29] [SPEAKER_01]: allowed.

[01:06:30] [SPEAKER_01]: I think in the common concept to be vulnerable

[01:06:33] [SPEAKER_01]: and because we're allowed to feel pain,

[01:06:38] [SPEAKER_01]: we we embrace it really well.

[01:06:41] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, and we are uncomfortable a lot of time.

[01:06:46] [SPEAKER_01]: Like a lot of being a lady is very uncomfortable.

[01:06:48] [SPEAKER_01]: So like it's just we're just used to that.

[01:06:52] [SPEAKER_01]: But I think in male world, it's hard to be vulnerable,

[01:06:56] [SPEAKER_01]: especially in front of another guy, because you're like,

[01:06:59] [SPEAKER_01]: it's like this like I'm like I'm I'm breaking down, man.

[01:07:04] [SPEAKER_01]: And I can't like I can't show like you can't show it.

[01:07:08] [SPEAKER_04]: Nothing.

[01:07:09] [SPEAKER_04]: Dude, dude.

[01:07:09] [SPEAKER_04]: They like, man, can we have how many hours we got today?

[01:07:13] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like, well, you set up all day session for seven hours.

[01:07:16] [SPEAKER_04]: If I OK, well, if I do like three, I was like, no,

[01:07:20] [SPEAKER_04]: you still have to pay me the amount for the all day.

[01:07:23] [SPEAKER_04]: If you wait at the three hours, you're still paying me the full amount.

[01:07:26] [SPEAKER_04]: And they're like, are you serious?

[01:07:29] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like, that's that's how that's how it works.

[01:07:32] [SPEAKER_04]: That works. Sorry.

[01:07:34] [SPEAKER_04]: So, you know, why are we toughen it out?

[01:07:36] [SPEAKER_04]: They're just like, you know, I bro, let's just go like

[01:07:39] [SPEAKER_04]: I've heard everybody tell me I have a light hand

[01:07:41] [SPEAKER_04]: because I guess when they see me, they see this big scary guy,

[01:07:44] [SPEAKER_04]: whatever. And it's like, man, you got like a really soft touch.

[01:07:49] [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm like, well, yeah, like the needles are sharp.

[01:07:52] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't have to. I don't have to do much.

[01:07:55] [SPEAKER_04]: I just I just basically hold the machine and it kind of does what it does.

[01:07:59] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I just guide it.

[01:08:01] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I tell me, I just guide the machine.

[01:08:03] [SPEAKER_04]: That's all I think. The only thing I do is guide the machine.

[01:08:06] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. Well, I've noticed like a prudence about how you tackle things,

[01:08:11] [SPEAKER_01]: which I think is good so that you're not being too overly confident.

[01:08:16] [SPEAKER_01]: You've noted that a couple of times in our conversation already,

[01:08:19] [SPEAKER_01]: that you've come in with a lot of confidence and be like, oh,

[01:08:23] [SPEAKER_01]: so I can tell that like and that's that's something that's very artistically

[01:08:27] [SPEAKER_01]: sound to is you want to start out light and build up until you know.

[01:08:33] [SPEAKER_01]: And a lot of people you notice, like if they start out really heavy,

[01:08:37] [SPEAKER_01]: it's like, dude, you better be really sure that that's the mark you want to make

[01:08:43] [SPEAKER_01]: because there's no going back.

[01:08:46] [SPEAKER_01]: Even with like erasable kind of materials, if you're dealing with,

[01:08:51] [SPEAKER_01]: you know, nice paper and graphite, you go too dark, man.

[01:08:55] [SPEAKER_01]: You're not going to be able to erase it. Like it's just there.

[01:08:58] [SPEAKER_01]: So that's a good I think that's a good quality to have,

[01:09:02] [SPEAKER_01]: especially if like you're like, I don't know.

[01:09:05] [SPEAKER_01]: I want to feel this out a little bit and see where we're going with it

[01:09:09] [SPEAKER_01]: before I really commit. Right. Oh, yeah.

[01:09:11] [SPEAKER_01]: And it's like you said, I people I think that's a good admission, because I don't even.

[01:09:17] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't even think that I could say like when you said that

[01:09:21] [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't know what I was doing, I can't even say that now I fully know

[01:09:27] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm just I'm just practice enough to know that.

[01:09:33] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure I'll figure it out while I'm doing it, you know, like

[01:09:37] [SPEAKER_04]: I think good artists like us and great artists, even better than us.

[01:09:41] [SPEAKER_04]: I think they do a lot of happy mistakes like a Bob Raul.

[01:09:44] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. And I go live and I'll be honest.

[01:09:48] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, we talked about, you know, because I was nervous coming on here.

[01:09:52] [SPEAKER_04]: I get nervous because I've never done one of these.

[01:09:56] [SPEAKER_04]: So like my first one ever. This is awesome.

[01:09:59] [SPEAKER_04]: A lot of times. And I think the reason I have my style a little bit,

[01:10:04] [SPEAKER_04]: because if I white area and it looks good, if where I white looks good over here,

[01:10:12] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm just going to add it over here, too. Yeah.

[01:10:15] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. And it's like, oh, man, I love how you did that.

[01:10:17] [SPEAKER_04]: How do you it's amazing how you know where to put it and do this.

[01:10:21] [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm like, and I always say I try. Yeah.

[01:10:24] [SPEAKER_04]: But it's a lot of it's like I know what I'm doing with certain parts.

[01:10:29] [SPEAKER_04]: But also, is the is the happy mistakes that like, hey,

[01:10:33] [SPEAKER_01]: I think you should leave about 15 percent of mystery.

[01:10:36] [SPEAKER_04]: You know, we know the we know the techniques.

[01:10:39] [SPEAKER_04]: We know the basics.

[01:10:41] [SPEAKER_04]: But to be an artist, you have to explore a little bit.

[01:10:45] [SPEAKER_04]: And there there is like even painting and drawing.

[01:10:48] [SPEAKER_04]: There's a lot of mistakes to get where you want.

[01:10:50] [SPEAKER_04]: And then there's happy mistakes to get better, as I call it.

[01:10:54] [SPEAKER_01]: Right. Yeah.

[01:10:56] [SPEAKER_01]: Now, do you think that you gathered a lot of that when you started

[01:11:00] [SPEAKER_01]: working at your second shop and you were around somebody who was

[01:11:03] [SPEAKER_01]: a really good artist and like did she rub off?

[01:11:07] [SPEAKER_04]: Um, honestly, me saying this is no disrespect.

[01:11:11] [SPEAKER_04]: No, OK, because she was a great artist,

[01:11:15] [SPEAKER_04]: but she had her own style of tattooing.

[01:11:18] [SPEAKER_04]: She her style was watercolor.

[01:11:21] [SPEAKER_04]: Gotcha. And she did a lot of it and she was really good at it.

[01:11:24] [SPEAKER_04]: But I didn't want to go that way.

[01:11:28] [SPEAKER_04]: I wanted to go like more realistic stuff.

[01:11:32] [SPEAKER_04]: A lot of people see my step, too, and they see maybe the background

[01:11:35] [SPEAKER_04]: of some things I've done for women and they go, Oh, I like your watercolor.

[01:11:38] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like, it's not watercolor.

[01:11:40] [SPEAKER_04]: They're like, really? I know it's cotton candy.

[01:11:45] [SPEAKER_04]: I said, if you really look at it,

[01:11:48] [SPEAKER_04]: it looks like a great day at the county fair.

[01:11:52] [SPEAKER_04]: And everybody loves cotton candy.

[01:11:54] [SPEAKER_04]: It has because if you look at something, if you go back and look,

[01:11:57] [SPEAKER_01]: I would I know you probably will call this episode that it's kind of candy.

[01:12:03] [SPEAKER_04]: If you go back and look, if you really look at the color pieces

[01:12:08] [SPEAKER_04]: for women, you will look at the background or something like that.

[01:12:12] [SPEAKER_04]: You go, Wow, it does look it's not water.

[01:12:15] [SPEAKER_04]: It doesn't like cotton candy because as a kid,

[01:12:19] [SPEAKER_04]: every time I went to the fair, the first thing I wanted to do is get cotton candy.

[01:12:24] [SPEAKER_04]: I want to see the guy do the little swirl thing.

[01:12:28] [SPEAKER_04]: And you know, when he's doing all this and he makes it come out to me,

[01:12:32] [SPEAKER_04]: it was the most I don't know, it was just like I had like a child moment.

[01:12:38] [SPEAKER_04]: Like, wow, this is I can't get no better than this.

[01:12:41] [SPEAKER_04]: It was just a simple and then when I got older, I found out how they did it.

[01:12:45] [SPEAKER_04]: But to me, it was magical.

[01:12:48] [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, that's awesome.

[01:12:49] [SPEAKER_04]: Like Disney, like everybody loves it was magical when you go to Disney World.

[01:12:54] [SPEAKER_04]: Even as an adult, if you ever have you ever been?

[01:12:57] [SPEAKER_04]: Mm hmm. Yeah. OK.

[01:12:59] [SPEAKER_00]: Even as a little though.

[01:13:01] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. Even as an adult, when you go when you're older, like I am,

[01:13:05] [SPEAKER_04]: it's still magical. It's like, wow, they even though it's

[01:13:10] [SPEAKER_04]: just a performer. But anyway, the cotton candy is I don't know.

[01:13:15] [SPEAKER_04]: It's just I looked at it like that because I'll take different colors

[01:13:19] [SPEAKER_04]: and just land each one even together and do my little thing that I do special,

[01:13:25] [SPEAKER_04]: which I'm not going too much in that right now.

[01:13:28] [SPEAKER_04]: But I'll mix it all together.

[01:13:30] [SPEAKER_04]: And they're like, man, because even the women, they always say,

[01:13:33] [SPEAKER_04]: I love my tattoo.

[01:13:35] [SPEAKER_04]: But we'll the way you did your cotton candy in the background.

[01:13:39] [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my God. I just love that. It just I love this term.

[01:13:43] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't think I've ever known this term.

[01:13:46] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, like, well, I did it like I started doing it years and years ago.

[01:13:51] [SPEAKER_04]: And people kept saying watercolor.

[01:13:53] [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like, no, what color?

[01:13:55] [SPEAKER_04]: I don't do watercolor because a lot of people do watercolor.

[01:13:58] [SPEAKER_04]: It just sucks. It falls out.

[01:14:01] [SPEAKER_04]: They don't know what they're doing. It just looks like crap.

[01:14:04] [SPEAKER_04]: But the ones that really know what they're doing, they have

[01:14:09] [SPEAKER_04]: artist background. They know how to paint.

[01:14:11] [SPEAKER_04]: So I can't remember her last name, but there's a woman.

[01:14:15] [SPEAKER_04]: Her name's Rachel.

[01:14:16] [SPEAKER_04]: She does like a lot of watercolor flowers and stuff, but it's just so beautiful.

[01:14:23] [SPEAKER_04]: I can't remember her last.

[01:14:24] [SPEAKER_04]: She was in Texas. She's in another state.

[01:14:26] [SPEAKER_04]: She went back home to her state.

[01:14:28] [SPEAKER_01]: And I know this person.

[01:14:30] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, you probably do. Probably knew her art.

[01:14:33] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. Yeah.

[01:14:34] [SPEAKER_04]: But what she does are flowers. Yeah, it's watercolor, but it's just beautiful.

[01:14:38] [SPEAKER_04]: It doesn't fall out.

[01:14:39] [SPEAKER_04]: It's saturated, but it's still it's still it's just beautiful to look at.

[01:14:45] [SPEAKER_04]: I can't I can't do it.

[01:14:48] [SPEAKER_04]: I wouldn't even try to do what she does.

[01:14:50] [SPEAKER_04]: She's even told me like I started painting watercolor.

[01:14:55] [SPEAKER_04]: What you do and she'll tell me, hey, put a little bit more here or put some dots here.

[01:15:01] [SPEAKER_04]: Right. Even in my paintings.

[01:15:09] [SPEAKER_04]: I mean, I can actually draw and paint.

[01:15:19] [SPEAKER_04]: But it's like I said, I don't do watercolor people.

[01:15:22] [SPEAKER_04]: It's cotton candy.

[01:15:23] [SPEAKER_04]: What do you use when you paint?

[01:15:26] [SPEAKER_01]: What do you use when you paint?

[01:15:28] [SPEAKER_04]: I use actually I use acrylics for a painting.

[01:15:32] [SPEAKER_04]: I block everything in.

[01:15:36] [SPEAKER_04]: OK, and then I go back to oil.

[01:15:38] [SPEAKER_04]: And sometimes here lately, I've been taking it's funny.

[01:15:43] [SPEAKER_04]: I've been taking spray cans and going over the top of the acrylics to

[01:15:49] [SPEAKER_04]: give it a layer and a shine.

[01:15:52] [SPEAKER_04]: So it being like it would just pop out more because I like the goldness sometimes

[01:15:58] [SPEAKER_04]: of a certain area.

[01:16:00] [SPEAKER_04]: But then I want it brighter or make it more alive, as I call it.

[01:16:05] [SPEAKER_04]: More. I don't know.

[01:16:06] [SPEAKER_04]: I grew up in the age of like the 80s.

[01:16:10] [SPEAKER_04]: Like we watched a lot of, you know, like legend.

[01:16:15] [SPEAKER_04]: Mm hmm. Watched.

[01:16:17] [SPEAKER_04]: What is it? The never ending story.

[01:16:20] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. Willow will will still some of my greatest movies.

[01:16:25] [SPEAKER_04]: I love to watch and their fantasy that it only they made those movies.

[01:16:31] [SPEAKER_04]: Somebody thought about this in their head and they made it and it's beautiful.

[01:16:35] [SPEAKER_04]: So I'll take different mediums and put it together.

[01:16:39] [SPEAKER_04]: Like I said, if it looks good, like I said, it's a happy mistake that I got it wrong.

[01:16:43] [SPEAKER_04]: And if it looks good, it looks good.

[01:16:45] [SPEAKER_04]: And you know us, it might look great to a thousand people out there.

[01:16:50] [SPEAKER_04]: But to me, I'm like, man, I forgot that that yellow right there.

[01:16:53] [SPEAKER_04]: Mm hmm. I got more purple there.

[01:16:56] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, you are.

[01:16:57] [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah. But yeah, people like I said, it's not watercolor.

[01:17:00] [SPEAKER_04]: If you like to get more of my cotton candy, it's cotton candy.

[01:17:05] [SPEAKER_04]: It's cotton candy.

[01:17:10] [SPEAKER_01]: OK, now you know.

[01:17:12] [SPEAKER_01]: Now you know the origin of cotton candy.

[01:17:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much, William.

[01:17:17] [SPEAKER_01]: We will have you as a spotlight for the next two weeks.

[01:17:22] [SPEAKER_01]: So listeners, please come back.

[01:17:24] [SPEAKER_01]: There's more. It's an awesome conversation.

[01:17:27] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't really call what I do interviews anymore.

[01:17:30] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, you learn a lot about a person, but I think that you learn more when it's less formal and it's it's more of something that's long form and conversational.

[01:17:42] [SPEAKER_01]: So so come back next week because we have a part two and then we'll have a part three.

[01:17:48] [SPEAKER_01]: I would navigate you all to IG to follow William.

[01:17:53] [SPEAKER_01]: But as we learned at the top of this episode, that has been captured by a nefarious villain villain.

[01:18:00] [SPEAKER_01]: So we're going to rather send you to Facebook.

[01:18:04] [SPEAKER_01]: It's William and it's an interesting way to spell that.

[01:18:07] [SPEAKER_01]: It's like wheel W.H.E.E.L. and then yum.

[01:18:14] [SPEAKER_01]: Y.U.M. and then D. D is very, very easy.

[01:18:18] [SPEAKER_01]: D.E.E. That is where you can find William and follow him his work.

[01:18:24] [SPEAKER_01]: He is a wonderful person and we thank him very much for all of the time that he gave to this podcast.

[01:18:31] [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much.

[01:18:32] [SPEAKER_01]: And as always, God bless you listeners.

[01:18:35] [SPEAKER_01]: We would be nothing without you.

[01:18:38] [SPEAKER_01]: So you are in our hearts and I am praying that we all have a very powerful week.

[01:18:46] [SPEAKER_01]: Bye everybody.