July 27, 2010, 11:37 pm : An Interview with Slightly Stoopid Drummer, Ryan Moran (aka RyMo)
Filed Under: Interviews, Music, Upcoming ShowsDiscussion: C[0]mments
In the thick of summertime, one thing you can always count on is great shows coming to town. And the staple band of great summer shows, especially on the East Coast, is Slightly Stoopid. Last summer brought Stoopid to town with Snoop Dogg and Stephen Marley, and this Summer, Stoopid is treating Baltimore fans to another must-see lineup, including Cypress Hill and Collie Buddz.
I interviewed Stoopid drummer and surfer, RyMo, to get the deets on the upcoming show, forthcoming material and catching water time between tours.
Jeff Schad: Is Legalize It a revival of the last tour of Sublime with Brad, the High Times Benefit? Was that a motivation for this tour?
RyMo: I don’t think so. Miles and Kyle came up with the name a few months back. We were gearing the tour name towards the marijuana legalization movement in California. They were saying we should call it Legalize It, and Kyle has been using the vaporizer a lot, so it came up ‘yeah, hey let’s call it Legalize it.’ So I think it was really the California legalization movement behind naming the tour.
JS: Slightly Stoopid always lines up incredible acts to play with them on tours. How do you guys score such talented supporting acts?
RyMo on the Drums
RyMo: We have been pretty fortunate that we have had a consistently growing fan base for the last ten years that we’ve built by being on the road all the time. I think we’ve been able to get strong supporting acts by selling a lot of tickets. You know, a lot of top album selling bands can’t sell out a 300-500 person venue, whereas we may sell 100,000 or 200,000 albums but we can sell out a big venue. Also, we are on the road between 5-7 months a year, so I think a lot of acts, when they consider going on the road, they know we’re able to sell tickets, so that sells them on touring with us.
JS: There are lots of Pier 6 Pavilion pics on your Flickr page. How does that venue, and Baltimore in general rank among the cities you play?
RyMo: Honestly, we have been lucky, we have a consistent following in most cities now, so Baltimore is just like every other city where we have a good following. You know, it’s always nice to play the West Coast, our home, but the East Coast is great for us too. On the East Coast, Baltimore is right up there with Boston, New York, Philly, North Carolina and Florida. They are more or less even in terms of drawing. We like being there, having some good food and a good show, and it’s all good.
JS: You guys have been going at it nonstop for years. Where other bands take breaks or break up, you keep on keepin on. How do you keep things fresh and stay motivated?
RyMo: It’s a good question. We’re always doing something musical in terms of our own development and the band’s development. We do make some changes at the live show. We don’t always stick to our set list, we’ll throw in some improv, and that’s one way. We like to challenge ourselves instead of being inflexible in the creative process. We always try to play different tunes; we have some that we play every night, but then some that we play once every now and then. At times we’ll say “let’s not play this or beat it into the ground and keep [things] fresh.
JS: Some of your live shows are mostly jammy, others you play clear cut songs. What can fans expect in Baltimore this Thursday?
RyMo: A mixture of both. There’s always some spontaneity going on, we have some songs with open ended sections, but we’re going to approach [Thursday’s show] like any other with balance; with some jams, [lots of] spontaneity and some clear cut tunes.
JS: Can you give fans an idea of any upcoming new material, albums or collaborations?
RyMo: We’re looking to put something together for next spring. We just built a studio in San Diego, and we’ve been taking some time to do some writing and pre-production. There has been some really big collaborations, but I don’t want to let out who just yet. [We do have] a couple repeat offenders, but also some guys we haven’t done anything with yet. We have some reggae guys, some hip hop guys and some rock [artists]. We’re looking to get something going after this touring cycle, working on the next album. Up to now we’ve just been working on the pre-production thing, so we’re looking at spring of 2011 at the latest.
JS: Finally, how have the waves been out in San Diego? Have you gotten any water time?
RyMo: This spring was really fun, we had a lot of west, northwest, southwest and south swells; we definitely got some really fun days. Fortunately we haven’t done really long tours, we’ve mostly been flying out to do one-offs, so we’ve all had time to get out in the water. It depends on the schedule, obviously, but when we’re home I’ll usually be in the water 5-6 days a week.
April 27, 2010, 9:39 am : German tow surfer happens to claim Billabong XXL Win
Filed Under: Events, Interviews, News, SurfingDiscussion: C[0]mments
By his own admission, Sebastian Steudtner didn’t aim to win the Billabong XXL Award for biggest wave ridden. Media are full of references to his German background and the fact that he learned to tow surf before he could paddle in. In this Surfline interview: http://www.surfline.com/surf-news/who-is-sebastian-steudtner_42900/, he makes no bones about his unorthodox rise to this prominent victory.
Others (including Christian Fletcher, per his rant as the award presenter at the ceremony) are trying not so subtly to call him out for his lack of a traditional paddle apprenticeship. But anyone that commit to and surf a wave this size deserves the respect of anyone who has never done it. Which is 99.99% of us. Just ask Ken Collins what happens if you eat it on a wave of consequence at Jaws: http://www.surfline.com/surflinetv/ken-skindog-collins.
Check out Steudtner’s 66 foot winner:
March 24, 2010, 9:07 am : Liz Pepin’s New Potrero Industries
Filed Under: Biography, Imagery, Interviews, News, SurfingDiscussion: C[0]mments
Elizabeth Pepin and her husband David have started up Potrero Industries, showcasing both of their photographic works, and Elizabeth’s film and writing work.
I’m eager to see her new documentary, Wasted; a film that details human contact with wastewater and how it affects our lives and health.
If you don’t know just how talented Liz Pepin is, we can sum it up with the fact that she is a five time Emmy Award winner. She has directed and produced award winning works for PBS and independently.
I posted about Elizabeth’s amazing photo of Long Beach, NY here, and interviewed Elizabeth here.
January 26, 2010, 10:06 am : Allan Weisbecker – The Quintessential Interview with the Down South Pirate
Filed Under: Biography, Interviews, Surfing, Travel TalesDiscussion: C[0]mments
Editors Note: I first met Allan Weisbecker in Montauk, earning a brief interview with him following the printing of In Search of Captain Zero.
Ever the Long Island writing hero to this fledgling surf-mag writer, ACW was kind enough to indulge me with several unwritten stories and character links through a few lengthy phone conversations, emails and that one brief afternoon at Ditch Plains.
In all, he had given me hours of his time. I loved the book and, to be fair, am an unabashed fan of his works. All of them. His style and approach are always explained in notes and newsletters, and only improve his works once you understand his writing methodology. I placed a review of In Search of Captain Zero in Surfnews Magazine and received lots of feedback, almost all positive. Weisbecker became a widespread name and a sort of surf folk hero, if you liked him. Not all did.
Allan and me at Ditch Plains
I went to Pavones in 2001 and met with him there at his new home and he seemed squirmy and elusive. I was worried about him, but not close enough with him to find out what was really wrong.
We stayed in loose contact through email until I went back to Costa Rica in 2005, contacting him about staying at the guest house on his property. He wouldn’t be there, but asked me to check on his place for him, make sure everything was safe. Not knowing any better, I agreed to help him out…
I never made it to Pavones on that 2nd trip; the waves were perfect in Dominical and it was very rainy, making the drive South dicey. Lucky for me, or I may have walked directly into a grizzly scene from Can’t You Get Along With Anyone?.
CYGAWA
Cut to the chase, we remained friendly over the years, and Allan has been extremely helpful to my writing endeavors. With his support I approached and gained entry into the Surfers Journal. I did a review of CYGAWA? for the Journal which Allan didn’t like, but he still granted me an exclusive interview, the first in reaction to CYGAWA? long before it hit the mainstream press. I read the first ARC (advanced reading copy) and interviewed him on a crisp 3-4 foot day in Montauk, NY at Gurney’s Inn just after its small release through Humdrumming Books, UK.
Thank you for all the help and support over the years Allan, Keep The Faith.
A conversation with Allan Weisbecker, October, 2006
Jeff Schad: Most readers will recognize you as the author of In Search of Captain Zero – your surf journey through Central America in search of an old surfbuddy missing in action. Now you’ve released your new book, Can’t You Get Along With Anyone? A Writer’s Memoir, and a Tale of a Lost Surfer’s Paradise. What’s changed about you since then?
Allan C. Weisbecker: Not sure how I’ve changed. “A sadder and a wiser man he rose the ‘morrow morn,” which is from Coleridge, comes to mind, or should. But as Kurt Vonnegut has said, “People don’t change, don’t apologize, and don’t learn anything.” This probably applies to me as much or more than anyone. At least the changing and learning parts. I’ve never had a problem with apologies.
I’ll no doubt just continue stumbling and bumbling through life, putting myself in precarious places, rising sadder if not wiser, as always.
JS: You certainly found yourself in a few precarious places, as described in the book.
ACW: Yes, both through circumstances beyond my control and through not paying sufficient attention to what was going on around me. When I was younger there was also the illusion that I was invincible, which was at least partially a result of the old North Shore (of Oahu) aphorism, “Surfers can do anything.” That dumb-ass sort of attitude will put you in some hairball situations, and not just in the water.
JS: Give us an example.
ACW: Morocco, 1970. A surfbuddy and I went there after our house on the North Shore was destroyed, demolished, with us in it, by the biggest swell to ever hit the Hawaiian Islands. (That we emerged from the destruction without a scratch was predictable – in our deranged minds.)
In order to keep surfing (getting-a-job avoidance) we just automatically got into hashish smuggling. Didn’t even occur to us that something bad might happen.
JS: Did something bad happen?
ACW: Of course not. We were too young and stupid for anything bad to happen. The bad stuff came later, after I smartened up a little. Not much, actually. A real little.
JS: Can’t You Get Along With Anyone? A Writer’s Memoir, and a Tale of a Lost Surfer’s Paradise is the sequel to Zero, correct?
ACW: Yes. Although I futz with chronological structure, the story starts the day after Zero ended, when I left my old buddy and essentially found the surf paradise I was looking for.
JS: Which was where?
Crude map of Pavones
At the end of the road at the bottom of Central America. A place called Pavones (Spanish for “Big Turkeys”), on the Pacific side of Costa Rica. Home of possibly the longest point break in the Northern Hemisphere.
Click here for an excerpt: “A Night at the Cantina”, for more perspective on Pavones from ACW.
JS: Where did you get the title Can’t You Get Along With Anyone?
ACW: It was the body of the email I got from my movie-writing agent as a result of my firing her for her behavior during the In Search of Captain Zero movie deal. I suspect that there is some negative subtext in her question, but book titles are where you find them and I’ll always be grateful for this one.
JS: It’s another surfy memoir.
ACW: After Zero I thought my memoir-writing days were over. As it turned out, what was coming makes Zero look like Fun With Dick and Jane.
JS: What makes the book tick?
ACW: Escalating deceit and treachery. On another level of that, it’s a look at the idea of finding a “paradise,” surf or otherwise. The reality as opposed to the myth. The types of people who show up in unspoiled places, with or without perfect waves. The agendas that surface, the sorts of pecking order games that emerge, and so forth. In the case of one person’s agenda, what happens when you’re faced with treachery that quite literally has no limits. What happens when meaningful options diminish to zero. What happens when you reach a personal End of the Line.
The book also deals with the writing process, the obsession and pain a writer goes through in his work. The cover design, with my bleeding forehead, is illustrative of that. Comes from a quote from the writer Gene Fowler. “Writing is easy. You just stare at the blank page until your forehead bleeds.” My forehead did some bleeding during the writing of this one.
JS: There are a lot of subplots, or through-lines, in the book. The story of the movie deals on your other two books is an offshoot of the writing-about-writing aspect, correct?
ACW: Yes, and a bit of comic relief from the bizarre relentlessness of the other through-lines.
JS: Your other books have been optioned by major movie stars. Sean Penn for Zero and John Cusack for your cult comedy, Cosmic Banditos.
ACW: Right.
JS: Since Zero is a memoir and Banditos an autobiographical novel, in essence these two mega-stars want to play you. Heady stuff.
ACW: It becomes a little less heady when you examine how the deals went. Penn, for example, never read the book he wanted to make a movie out of.
JS: How could that be?
ACW: Nor did he read the screenplay adaptation I was paid 200 grand to write. This is the producer of the project, keep in mind.
JS: He didn’t read either the book or the screenplay?
ACW: He spent more time writing me emails explaining why he wasn’t going to read than it would have taken to do the reading. I’m not kidding. I reproduce his comical emails in the book.
JS: What was the upshot?
ACW: Sean got upset with me for in effect pointing out how far his head is up his ass and in his last email wished me “something resembling death.”
JS: How did it go with Cusack?
ACW: I had to physically threaten him to get money owed on the deal.
JS: Come again?
ACW: It’s a bizarre story – also in the book – and as utterly evocative of the way Hollywood is as the Penn fiasco. I should say, however, that Cusack himself was not at the bottom of the problem, but rather it was a dishonest lawyer (sorry for the redundancy). John and I kissed and made up and all is fine between us. Good thing, too, since he’s a kickboxer and likely would have beat the shit out of me had the situation gone really sour.
In fact, I have high hopes that Cosmic Banditos will eventually make it to the screen.
JS: You describe Banditos as “a goofball comedy about The Meaning of Life.” How did that book come about?
ACW: In 1981 I did a classic segue-free transition, went from big time international criminal to Hollywood screenwriter. Almost literally overnight I went from barrel-rolling my Learjet over Colombian pot plantations to working with the likes of Michael Mann (Miami Vice, The Insider, Last of the Mohicans, etc.) and Robert Chartoff (Rocky, Raging Bull, The Right Stuff, etc.).
I knew I had to write about the decade of the 1970s, my lunatic life. It started out with an unbalanced expat fugitive hiding out in the jungles of South America (me, more or less) and naturally became a comedy about subatomic particle physics, a full-blown bandito named Jose, a nymphomaniac, a large dog who’d had a depraved puppyhood, and, of course, The Meaning of Life. I mean, these elements were inevitable, if you think about it, given the overall subject matter.
JS: Not really sure about that.
ACW: How else could it have gone? You tell me.
JS: Speaking of segues and of comedy…
ACW: With The Meaning of Life aspect, there is naturally a lot of tequila consumed and hand grenades thrown. Or accidentally dropped.
JS: In your new book…
ACW: As one of the more unbalanced characters points out, “It amazing how a violent explosion in a confined area will separate the men from the boys.”
JS: Speaking of segues and of comedy, in your new book you somehow work genuine belly laughs into the story of the “fiascos and catastrophic shit” you were relentlessly subjected to in your “sorry ass life and times.”
ACW: It was either see the humor in it or blow my brains out. Given that choice, what would you do?
JS: Never mind that…
ACW: Also, at a certain point relentlessness itself can become comedic. I remember one time I got caught in the boneyard at Sunset Beach in Hawaii on a rising swell and the way the sets just kept landing on my head I eventually found myself cackling at the ridiculousness of it. That sort of relentlessness. Like, “How the fuck did I get into this mess?”
JS: Speaking of segues and catastrophic shit…
ACW: There’s also the through-line about the getting it published. “It” meaning the book I was writing at the time and the reader (later, of course) is now reading. Is that what you were thinking? Sorry to interrupt, but that’s on my mind right now.
JS: Your no… nicer…to the publishing business than you are to Hollywood.
ACW: I’ve burned a lot of bridges with this book. I’m talking major conflagrations here. Hey, I burned bridges that I’ve never even crossed. I’m a bridge burning kind of guy.
JS: With predictable results, right?
ACW: One predictable result has been a problem finding a U.S. publisher, or even an agent, since I fired the last 27 agents that I had. No, wait. Twenty-eight.
JS: The book is in print in the UK, though.
ACW: Bizarre how that came about. Last summer some lunatics in Canada launched a stage production of Cosmic Banditos. Right. A play. I shit you not. My goofball comedy about The Meaning of Life ran for ten days at an arts festival in Vancouver. And it was a hit! They were rolling in the aisles, apparently. It was also reviewed by some nutcase up there. A smart, literate nutcase. Turned out he was connected with this Brit publisher. One thing led to another and boom! Can’t You Get Along With Anyone? found the light of print.
JS: Since your two other books are selling very well…
ACW: Last time I checked they were both outselling the Stephen King novel that was published at the same time.
JS: So why wouldn’t your old publisher (Penguin Putnam) publish the new one?
ACW: You read it, right?
JS: Right. You do happen to mention them.
ACW: Can’t I get along with anyone?
JS: There’s another segue here, I think… To the love of your life.
ACW: I don’t want to give away too much about the book, but the through-line that emerges as dominant has to do with male/female relationships. Right: Speaking of fiascos and catastrophic shit and wave sets landing on your head and blowing your brains out. And, again, the idea of paradise, as opposed to the reality.
JS: On the surface of it, you had it all, didn’t you?
ACW: Sure did. Two successful books, movie deals, famous actors wanting to play me, a gorgeous home I built within walking distance of my own semi-private warm water perfect wave in paradise, plus a beautiful, very sexy woman who surfs and was totally in love with my sorry ass. At 55 years old, I finally had it all. The Endless Summer meets 9 1/2 Weeks…
JS: Then?
ACW: Pulp Fiction showed up.
JS: There were warnings, though.
ACW: There were warnings all right… Had I been paying attention.
JS: In the book you talk a lot about paying attention.
ACW: An underlying theme is that people do not really pay attention to what’s really going on around them. Metaphorically, dawdling around at Waimea without keeping an eye on the outside. This applies to their personal lives as well as world affairs, whatever.
JS: You don’t have a lot of respect for our current president (Ed note: George W was in office at time of interview).
ACW: The book starts contemporaneously with the invasion of Iraq. As it turned out, this was convenient, in terms of symmetry: The greed and deceit and treachery, the death and misery, the incessant lies, the levels of denial everyone was living under.
JS: The war in Iraq–
ACW: I was talking about my personal life.
JS: Okay.
ACW: I suspect that our current president has a suite reserved for my sorry ass at Guantanamo. Do you know if there’s surf on that part of Cuba?
JS: Not sure. But moving on, give an example of your paying attention powers. Or lack of them, in your personal life.
ACW: In 1998 at Pavones, right after the fiasco that was the ending of In Search of Captain Zero, I investigated the shootout killing of an American expat named Max Dalton. This was for Men’s Journal magazine. When I returned to Pavones in 2001, I sort of forgot about the stuff I’d uncovered in ’98. Sort of forgot about the death threats I’d gotten and how I was armed to the teeth and how everybody lied about everything and how it was every man for himself down there in surf paradise. I wasn’t paying attention.
Hey. I forgot!
JS: You reprise the story of the Dalton murder investigation for CYGAWA.
ACW: I hadn’t planned on doing that but then the murder investigation and other events from ’98 came back to bite me on my ass, and did so in a way I could never have seen coming. In fact, I couldn’t have made up the shit that happened in my wildest fiction dreams. The section is also an object lesson in how it goes when greed descends on a perfect wave. One upshot of the investigation was that “it was the wave here that killed Max.”
JS: I understand you’ve sold your house and property in Pavones. Ever going back?
ACW: Possibly. When I’m tired of being alive on planet earth.
JS: You’ve got one of your lists regarding this, right? Like the list of women you’ve had sex with? In this case, it’s who’ll be out for revenge on….
ACW: You can say it. “On my sorry ass.”
JS:…revenge on your sorry ass.
ACW: Yeah, and that list is pretty long. Not as long as the Women I’ve Had Sex With List, thank God, but pretty long. Come to think of it, though, there’s one person who is on both lists.
JS: Care to name names?
ACW: No, but here’s a related question I’ve been mulling: What do you think Sean Penn meant when he wished me “something resembling death”? I mean what resembles death, aside from the dirt nap itself?
#
Click here to go to a short excerpt from Can’t You Get Along With Anyone? A Writer’s Memoir, and a Tale of a Lost Surfer’s Paradise.
August 31, 2009, 2:08 pm : Breaking Down Bill & Danny
Filed Under: Interviews, UncategorizedDiscussion: C[0]mments
Hurricane Bill and the waves that it spawned received unbelievable amounts of mainstream surf media attention last week. Blame the internet, blame the ever-growing number of surfers in the water, blame whatever you want, but it seems odd for East Coast surfing to get that much national attention.
It’s not like we only get hurricane swells while demurely staring at a flat ocean the rest of the year. Seriously. Plus, Bill generated large swells pretty much up and down the Right Coast, but was only middling when compared to the QUALITY of the waves it produced. I know, I’m gonna hear it for that one, but considering how fast the storm moved and how much wind it produced, Bill was a short-lived phenom.
Long-time East Coasters surely remember the stretches of surf pumped out by tropical systems in recent years. Namely, 1995, 1999 and 2005 stick out as banner years for tropical juice. 1995 in particular delivered substance without the hype. Now, we get one storm and it’s all eyes on the E.C.
1995 was a very good year
Truth be told, from my vantage point in the Outer Banks, Danny delivered the better surf. Mostly for personal reasons, but after all, isn’t the amount of stoke directly related to one’s personal experience? Not sure? Let me explain.
Bill, for all its hoopla, jacked up the surf along the entire coast to the big-to-huge range. Florida was well overhead, the Outer Banks weighed in with surf that was easily 15-20 feet, breaking way outside, on Saturday, August 22nd, backing down to overhead to well-overhead on Sunday and still solid on Monday. The best place in the Outer Banks looked to be S Turns, which I personally stayed away from, with all the attendant pros and photogs cramming in. And the Northeast delivered huge surf as well, from Montauk all the way up to Nova Scotia, daring the intrepid to get their guns out and have a go. But winds were mostly funky, with periods of clean conditions, meaning that most people scored only moments of perfection, if any at all.
Click here for aerial pics of the Bill swell in the Outer Banks
Click here for aerial pics of the Bill swell in New England
Danny, on the other hand, popped up like a surprise jack-in-the-box in the Western Atlantic, daring to form into a hurricane that could potentially smash into the Outer Banks. That never happened, but it did sit in place long enough to make Thursday, August 27th one of the funnest, most rippable days of surf this writer has had in some time. 3-6 foot clean lines groomed by a slight offshore breeze that backed off completely around lunchtime, hitting some sandbars that could easily rival S Turns. Not to mention that school was back in session, so the daytime surfer didn’t have to contend with hoards of frothing groms. And while the lineup certainly wasn’t empty, it stayed low key and spread out, giving everyone plenty of stoke.
Playful Danny peak, somewhere in Hatteras. All photos c. Jeff Schad
And that wasn’t the end of it. After Danny ground down to an unimposing sub-tropical storm and raced by the Outer Banks early Saturday morning, the lingering swell was overhead and thumping. Drifty and a bit disorganized, yes, but sizable barrels were on tap for those that wanted them. So proving that hype definitely doesn’t equal stoke, the surprising and unheralded Danny dished out the real treats in this tropical combination. At least that’s how my stoke meter counts it.