Month: December 2015

HANS ZIMMER

Posted on by Sacha Cosentino

This interview took six months to do. It was done in two different countries, over two different time zones, scheduled and rescheduled numerous times through various assistants. It had to be worked around tour  dates, Grammy rehearsals and Oscar press. It’s without a shadow of a doubt that I can declare Hans Zimmer the Hardest Working Man in Show Business. And I should know, because I’m his daughter.

If you’ve been to the movies at all in the past 20 years you’ll have heard a Zimmer score—they’re hard to miss. After doing some light Googling I’ve found that my father has worked on close to 200 movies since the mid ’80s—everything from The Lion King to The Dark Knight. Action, drama, romance, comedy, animated, good, bad, big, small, he’s done them all. And I’m fairly certain he’ll keep doing them all until he drops dead at the keyboard.

He is not your average father—or your average composer. And he’s definitely not your conventional human being. His work, his music, is what gets him out of bed and down the stairs every morning and keeps him in a studio until the early hours of the following morning. What he does is who he is, and I’m immensely proud of him.

My dad is my favorite person to have a long chat with about life and work and everything in between. The following conversation is just one of our many… except this time it’s on the record.

ZOE ZIMMER: OK, this thing is recording now, so let’s both try to keep the swearing and bad jokes to a minimum, yeah?

HANS ZIMMER: That’s asking a lot…

ZZ: No shit. OK, but really, let’s talk about some stuff. Let’s start easy: Where do you consider home?

HZ:Nowhere.

ZZ: Jesus, really? I guess that wasn’t starting easy after all.

HZ: Yeah, seriously. It’s something that really bothers me. I don’t know… I think language is partly home.

ZZ: Does it bother you that none of your kids speak German?

HZ: No, but it bothers me that none of my kids have the same accent as me. Anyway, I think if I had to go and declare a place “home,” it would be England, but I don’t think the English would ever see me as one of their own. Home… I don’t know, I’m a traveler, I suppose. I’m a gypsy in a funny sort of way. It’s wherever the project is, y’know? It’s wherever there are musicians I want to play with. Look, at the end of the day, I’m an entertainer, the way musicians always have been, and we just go from place to place wherever people want to hear our music.

ZZ: Well, for a long time you were definitely based in L.A.

HZ: Well, “based” is different from “home.” I suppose my studio is home. I mean, my room is more a home than a studio.

ZZ: That studio’s kind of been  everyone’s home at one time or another. I know it has been for me. I mean, I basically grew up in the back of a recording studio.

HZ: Right, exactly and you didn’t turn out so bad! The thing about the studio is that it’s an interesting place full of interesting people, and that should always make you feel at home. It’s full of possibilities, and there’s a creative dynamic that goes on there. There’s kind of a weird sense of community, but it’s not a community in the normal sense of the word. I mean, everyone’s ego is pretty big.

ZZ: Really big.

HZ: And everyone’s a little bit odd…

ZZ: Really odd. But really great.

HZ: And I think the only thing that we all really have in common is not so much even the music, it’s really just that none of us would be able to get a job anywhere else.

ZZ: Right, you’re really all just a big band of outcasts who got lucky.

HZ: Precisely.

ZZ: And there are a lot of outcasts right now—I mean, the studio is just getting bigger and bigger. It might be your home, but it’s also the size of a small village. Do you think it’s just going to keep growing? Do you want it to keep growing?

HZ: No, I think we have enough buildings now, don’t you?

ZZ: I think if there were anymore buildings you would have to start handing out Segways or small ponies for people to get around.

HZ: Definitely small ponies. But you know, I like people moving in and out of there. I like the atmosphere changing and people progressing. What I love is when people get their own careers together, and then they leave and they do their own versions of it, y’know?Like Harry [Gregson-Williams, Shrek] and John [Powell, How to Train Your Dragon] and people like that. And I like new people coming in; I think it’s interesting. I think it’s interesting that I created this little magnet that draws people in from all over the world, and sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t, but it’s always interesting.

ZZ: Does it piss you off when people question the way the studio works? In terms of having people write for you—you know, when it’s made out to be Hans Zimmer’s Musical Sweatshop?

HZ: Well,they can’t have it both ways. Because on the one hand I get knocked for “sounding the same,” which of course doesn’t actually make any sense—look at the films I did with Ridley [Scott], and that’s just one filmmaker: Thelma & Louise doesn’t sound anything like Gladiator, which doesn’t sound anything like Black Hawk Down, which doesn’t sound anything like Hannibal, which doesn’t sound anything like Black Rain, which doesn’t sound anything like Matchstick Men…

ZZ: I really liked Matchstick Men.

HZ: So did I, but I think we were the only ones. So anyway, on the one hand there’s obviously a very strong imprint in the architecture of the studio, and on the other hand… I mean, you already know all of this. I write these pieces and they’re very complete, everything’s done on them—the orchestration, everything. But like everybody, I need assistants. I’m the architect, but I need a couple of bricklayers, y’know? Do you think Michelangelo painted every square inch of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel? Probably not—it would have killed him if he had to do it all by himself!

ZZ: Fair enough. So do you think people who make those assumptions are just uninformed about the system? Because assisting and writing additional music is basically how you get your foot in the door, right?

HZ: Well, yes and no. It didn’t really used to be like that. When I got to Hollywood it was slightly different. The studios had orchestrators and arrangers on staff, and they never really got credit for anything. They were just “Backroom Boys.” So now I really do fight for credits for people, even really small credits. It’s important to me that people get to participate, and that they get credit and that they are visible, so I really do fight fort hem. They might not be the architects, but it’s still their time that they give me, that they give to these projects.

ZZ: Interstellar was all you though, wasn’t it?

HZ: All me. Interstellar nobody got to write a single note on other than me. And although a lot of musicians played on it, one of the things we tried to preserve was the singularity of my touch and my vision, and literally me playing every note. I mean, on all of these scores I have at one time or another played every single note. But unfortunately the story of me just sitting there by myself and writing is far less exciting and scandalous than the idea of assistants and ghostwriters.

ZZ: Talking about all this always makes me wish I played an instrument. I thought that the other day when I saw Whiplash. I mean, you really hogged all the musical talent in the family. Do you ever wish any of us, your kids, were more musical?

HZ: No. I love that you are all musical imbeciles.

ZZ: Whoa whoa whoa. Hey now…

HZ: No, what I mean is, I think it’s really hard tofollowinthe footsteps of anybody. And I think it’s really important that you go and make your own path. What I say to all of you is “follow your dream,” but at the same time I’m saying “don’t be stupid.” There are all these people who think following a dream means that you have to be some big star or something. All I’m saying is if you want to become a great plumber, or a great chef, or a great whatever, then do it. Just be a great you, and don’t take no for an answer.

ZZ: I know. You’ve always said that. You’ve always been very supportive of whatever I’ve wanted to do. And yeah, of course it can be daunting being related to someone who’s not only successful, but so successful in such a creative industry. Growing up with that made me feel like it wasn’t about finding a job, it was about finding a passion.

HZ: I know, but I try to be a shining example to you—to all of my kids—that the impossible is possible. Having a passion for something is a tricky thing. There are many ways of going about that passion—you can make it your job or you can make it your hobby, and both are equally valid. You got one life, it ain’t that long, so you may as well…

ZZ: Make it count? Have a good time? Don’t fuck it up?

HZ: Yeah, but more than a good time. Get real pleasure out of it, not just fun. Feel it all, have conflict, have difficulties, suffer for it a little bit, y’know?

ZZ: God, that’s so German of you.

HZ: Yes! But you need it. When your mum and I were first together the electricity used to  always get turned off because I wouldn’t pay the bill, and it’s really hard to be an electronic musician with no electricity! But yeah, I know a lot of really talented musicians who will never really make it, because people realized they were talented early on so there wasn’t enough opposition. And you need that, you need friction, you need struggle. Life needs to scare you sometimes; you have to respect it and be in awe of it. So yeah, be a little scared, let it freak you out. I don’t know, maybe you shouldn’t be listening to my advice.

ZZ: No, I always like your advice. Even if I don’t always listen to it. In fact, one of my favorite bits of advice from you was: “Remember, nothing’s less attractive to a man than a weeping woman.”

HZ: [Laughs.] It’s true! It’s true! That’s some great fatherly advice! I try to be useful, y’know? We have good chats, right?When we’re together, I try to give everything there is, I try to come up with ideas…

ZZ: You are useful. I always say that I’d rather have you be the father you are now, rather than the father you weren’t when I was growing up, y’know? You were terrible at playing Barbies, but if I’m having trouble with work? Breakup with a boyfriend? Need to know where to buy the best macaroons? You’re the first person I call.

HZ: Oh, man. The Barbies…

ZZ: I know, you still have Barbie PTSD. Sorry. Let’s talk about something less traumatic. Do you get bored? I sometimes worry you get bored of writing for (insert name of generic comic book movie sequel/prequel).

HZ: Bored? No, not bored. You know, all those big movies still bring me something, they still bring a challenge. Whether it’s Spider-Man or Superman or whatever, I strive to do something different everytime. And I get to work with new people, new musicians who have a fresh take on it all, even if it is a sequel. And I try to do new things too, like the shows last year. [Zimmer played two live shows in London at the Eventim Apollo in October 2014.] That was new, it was exciting, and terrifying—I mean, you know how petrified I get about going on stage.

ZZ: Yeah, but only a few of us know. You always pull it off. And you always have a great time in the end, right? If you don’t then you fake it really well. You looked like you were having the time of your life at the Grammys with Pharrell…

HZ: I do have a good time, despite the fear. After the first show in London, which was terrifying, I thought maybe the stage fright would get better on the next night. I thought maybe I would learn something, but of course it wasn’t better. And I realized that it’s not about it “getting better,” that’s just how I’m built, y’know? I get freaked out. So just do it. Do it despite everything else, because if I don’t do it I think it would be something I would regret.

ZZ: So what do you wanna do now?

HZ: I sometimes wish I could just watch an awful lot of television in bed and not engage in the next battle, y’know? But I can’t, you know I can’t. I think part of what happens is—I don’t think there’s any middle ground. I think you’re either very successful or you’re not successful at all. I think if you’re in that middle ground then the magnetic pull is always to the bottom. I think being a guitarist playing songs in a subway station and doing a hundred-million-dollar movie are equally great. But the slithering around in the middle is not so great. And the middle ground is really where the sharks swim. They don’t swim at the top or the bottom—all the uninspiring people you don’t want to hang out with are in the middle ground.

ZZ: Do you remember telling me what the Four Stages of a Career were? “1. Who is Hans Zimmer? 2. Get me Hans Zimmer. 3. Get me someone who sounds like Hans Zimmer. 4. Who is Hans Zimmer?”

HZ: [Laughs—a lot.] Right!

ZZ: Do you worry about what stage you’re in?

HZ: Nah, not really. I’m not done, y’know? I still have more to say.

ZZ: Well, yeah, you’re not really the type to retire and move to Florida.

HZ: No way. Musicians don’t think about retirement. My hero is [the late British comic magician] Tommy Cooper, for all sorts of reasons. For his humor, for his crazy fez, for his courage for going out on the stage and failing. His jokes going wrong, his magic tricks going wrong, and mainly for having a laugh at himself. Even his death, people weren’t sure it was real for a while. And he died doing what he loved, he died in the place that he loved… standing on a stage.

ZZ: Don’t get any ideas…

HZ: That’s just it—I’m going to be here until the ideas run out.

ZZ: Glad to hear it, Daddy. Now let’s go get some dinner.

 

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GUS SEYFFERT

Posted on by Taylor Norman

Gus Seyffert began gigging when he was 15 years old, playing bass and making good money at a dinner theater in Kansas City that was putting on a production of Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding. Though he was almost flunking out of his arts-magnet high school, he was soon a part of ensembles in the city’s legendary jazz scene six or seven nights a week. These experiences would lay the foundations for the career he’s now built for himself as a respected studio and touring rock musician.

Now based out of the East Side of Los Angeles, Seyffert has played with artists including Sia, Norah Jones, Inara George and Ryan Adams. Behind the mixing board, he’s become part of a circle of respected producers like Greg Kurstin, Mike Andrews and Joey Waronker. He just wrapped up a four-year stretch on the road with the Black Keys and has joined Beck’s band.

While jobs like these can be lucrative for a career musician, Seyffert has put back everything he’s earned into buying vintage and analog equipment to build up his own studio. It’s there that he produces and records for a number of acts, as well as his own group, Willoughby. “Finally, after 10 years or so, some of the stuff I’m doing is starting to get a little attention,” he says. Seyffert put together a compilation of mostly unreleased music for Citizens of Humanity that features the range of artists he has produced. There’s Jake Blanton, who went to that same magnet school in Kansas City, and has similarly taken session and touring work with folks like The Killers. Sean & Zander—two old punks whose résumés include Circle Jerks, The Weirdos and Throw Rag who are now playing Americana—contribute a song. And then you have Suzie Johannes, a librarian-looking lady from Lawrence, Kansas, who spent a week camping in Seyffert’s backyard and recording music.

 

 

These artists, plus more than half a dozen others, represent the myriad ways folks are trying to earn a living, keep creative and figure things out in today’s uncertain music industry. “A lot of artists don’t have a home,” says Seyffert. “There are no labels, nobody is putting any money into anything and it costs so much money to release music in a real way, so everybody keeps hoping that something is going to come along.”

Until then all Seyffert can do is keep playing and pressing records, documenting the people who come into his life and come through his studio. It sounds good, but let’s just try it again from the top.

 

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CHAD COLBY

Posted on by Taylor Norman

Chad Colby may be the most-loved meat chef in Los Angeles right now, but when he cooks at home, he usually goes vegetarian or even – gasp – vegan.  “I love vegetables!” Colby exclaimed over coffee at Stir Crazy on Melrose.  But “the one thing that I absolutely am not a fan of with vegetarian food is when they try to make a weird product into a meat product…  Vegetables are glorious!  Vegetables are delicious!  Let a vegetable be a vegetable!  I’m not trying to make a piece of meat look like a vegetable and taste like a one.”

Truer words were never spoken, because Chad Colby does not try to make meat be anything at all.  As chef of Chi Spacca, Colby’s entire ethos is centered on sourcing amazing product and preparing it simply and beautifully.  And it’s working.  Since opening last February, Chi Spacca has been consistently busy and consistently adored, both in professional circles and its loyal customer base.  For those who haven’t experienced it yet, Chi Spacca is a small, intimate restaurant where large specialty cuts are butchered in house and served family style.  There is also an extensive, much-heralded selection of house-cured meats.  Yes, there are vegetables.  Yes, there is fish.  But it’s all about the meat, specifically the tomahawk chop, which Jonathan Gold dubbed the “consensus hit of L.A.’s meat world this year.”

Chi Spacca is the newest addition to Nancy Silverton, Joe Bastianich, and Mario Batali’s Melrose empire, which includes neighboring Osteria Mozza and Pizzeria Mozza, but you won’t find the iconic dishes from those restaurants, pasta and pizza, served there.  “As we talked about the concept,” Colby recalled, “Mario stepped in and had a great sensibility of, ‘differentiate yourself from the other two restaurants.’”  In other words: do one thing, and do it better than anybody else in town.

And they do, largely thanks to Colby’s self-proclaimed “obsession” with his work.  He treats meat with the deepest reverence.

Colby developed much of his cooking philosophy, and his initial interest in food, by watching Mario Batali.  When a high school sports injury left Colby couch-bound, he passed the time watching Food Network, specifically “Molto Mario.”  (Well, that and cartoons.)  Mario Batali “would talk about why you cook something, not just how you cook it, and that’s what differentiated it from a lot of the other shows,” said Colby.  “He’d talk about proximity to soil and why vegetables are better when they’re enjoyed closer to where they were grown and all that stuff.  There was an authoritative description of, ‘one region has olive trees, so they use olive oil, so this pasta’s from here, and where they have grazing land, there are cows, and that’s where you’ll have cream and butter in pasta.’  It just became a great explanation and I like when food makes sense historically.”  Inspired, Colby started cooking at home, and soon enough decided to study restaurant management at Cal Poly.  And the rest just fell into place.  Well, almost…

When Colby first interviewed for the job at Campanile that paved his way to culinary greatness, he didn’t hear back.  But instead of moving on, Colby refused to take “no” for an answer.  “I called maybe three, four times before they brought me on as an extra set of hands,” he said.

 

 

And that’s not the only time he’s fought for something he wanted.  If you go to Chi Spacca, be sure to order the focaccia, if only for all of the blood, sweat and tears it took Colby to track down the recipe and learn to make it.  The backstory: Nancy Silverton ate an incredible focaccia while traveling and the duo set out to recreate it, a task that turned out to be infinitely more difficult than either of them had anticipated: “It took me going to Italy and going to the kitchen where they make it and talking my way into the back and taking lots of photos and getting the contact for where they get their pans and special ordering the pans on a money wire transfer from Italy with broken translation on emails and all of these epically difficult steps.”  It is difficult to picture Colby talking his way into a kitchen — or pestering Campanile until they took him on.  In person, he is soft-spoken and reserved.  But clearly, when it comes to cooking, he becomes a different beast.  “I dream about food, dream about restaurant service,” Colby said.  “So much of what I do is an obsession.”

And that obsession is paying off in surprising ways.  Colby had his first Hollywood role this year; he was the hand double for the opening scene of the Jon Favreau film, “Chef.”  “It’s just like boom boom boom… there’s my hand!”  He laughed.  “It’s maybe a three-second shot.”

At Chi Spacca, however, meat fanatics can get much more than three seconds of Colby’s handiwork; the kitchen is completely exposed, leaving Colby and his staff on full display.  The design is a holdover from the prior incarnation of the space: Scuola di Pizza, where Colby and his crew taught cooking classes.  Colby credits the rare open layout with a lot of the success of the restaurant, because seeing people eat your food so up close and personal creates accountability in the kitchen.  “You have to watch every bite,” said Colby, “so if someone is disappointed in something, you can see it.  And it hurts.  And it’ll keep you up at night.”

 

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BEVERLY HILLS JUICE

Posted on by Taylor Norman

David Otto’s life-changing moment begins in the same way as many revelatory ideas of the 1960s do, as part of a hallucinogenic drug experience. “I was on the tail-end of a psychedelic Saturday and I started to come on again,” says Otto, who was seated at Chuck’s Steak House, a music industry hangout on West Third Street at the time. “I had ordered a steak and started to cut into it, and the steak morphed into this huge, ferocious-looking bull. I had a mental communication with this creature, and I decided that I wasn’t going to eat meat anymore. And I committed to becoming a vegetarian.”

The year was 1967. Otto didn’t immediately transform into your garden-variety vegetarian back then. Prompted by his desire to eat more healthfully, the Los Angeles native began dipping his toes into the world of juicing. By the mid-seventies, he was not only a full-blown vegan and juicing convert; he was also ready to share his knowledge with the rest of the city. In 1975, Otto debuted Beverly Hills Juice Club, now known as Beverly Hills Juice–a go-to fresh juice spot on Beverly Boulevard that has won the hearts, minds and palates of local health-seekers for more than 39 years, and has earned the slight, sharp 78 year-old the moniker of Juice Guy.

As he reflects on his journey, Otto is perched on the edge of the open trunk of his station wagon, parked in the lot behind the juice bar. It’s late afternoon, a baseball game is on the radio in the background, and it’s nearing the end of a shift for some of his employees. “Manana, David!” one of them calls out to him, a sentiment which he echoes in return.

“Growing up, I ate real simple,” muses Otto, who was reared primarily on a staple diet of steak, salad, and potatoes, thanks, in part, to his father who ran a local steakhouse until it shuttered in 1954. A Los Angeles native, Otto was born in 1936 and spent his formative years at military school until fifth grade in 1945, when World War II ended. His mother and stepfather married at that time, and bought a house in Studio City. Otto attended junior high in West Hollywood, and graduated from Hollywood High.

Otto dabbled in various jobs and college after graduation, but quickly fell in with his mother’s line of business, as a booking agent for bands around Los Angeles. It was in 1967, in the midst of his music career and the unhealthy lifestyle choices that often come with it, when Otto had his hallucinatory vegetarian epiphany. “ I was working with my mother, and she was really freaked out that I wanted to eliminate meat from my diet. I started reading more about becoming a vegetarian. I bought a Champion juicer and made juice at home. It got to the point where it just became part of my life.”
 

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Soon, Otto became known amongst friends for his healthful juice concoctions, which, in the early ‘70s, were a hard-to-find treat to find around town, with the exception of LaHood’s in Grand Central Market downtown and Bruce’s Juices in Redondo Beach, (run by a local surfer who peddled his wares when he wasn’t out catching waves). Seeking to fill a void in the market and to provide fellow health nuts with a consistent alternative, Otto debuted Beverly Hills Juice Club on Santa Monica Boulevard in 1975, which moved to its present day location on Beverly Boulevard in West Hollywood.

In the 39 years since opening its doors, Otto’s hydraulic-pressed juices have developed a cult following, as evident by the line that regularly snakes down the street outside the tiny storefront. Beverly Hills Juice’s popularity is also evident in the number of customers who have been loyal patrons since the day it opened. Even one of Otto’s employees, Hal, has been with the Juice Guy since the beginning, with the exception of a few hiatuses to pursue his career as an artist.

Things really changed five years ago, says Otto, with the release of the juice bar’s Banana Manna blend. “It’s a combo of organic bananas, nuts and sunflower seeds that we blend it together,” he says. “It comes out just like ice cream, and we use it just like ice cream—and that’s the big attraction.” Customers also flock to the spot for other signature offerings, including the Big Ten—a potent combo of carrot juice, celery, parsley, spinach, kale and sprouts.

Along with his wife, Jen, and three children, Otto practices what he preaches. A typical day start out with a vegetable juice, or a dish Banana Manna, followed by quinoa and beans, or something similar, from nearby vegan restaurant Real Food Daily, or a Yo Soy Mucho Mexican-inspired bowl from Café Gratitude. The day ends over a simple meal of salad, lentils or a baked potato, which he often enjoys with Jen at their home in Laurel Canyon.

Otto is also actively involved in the day-to-day operations of the shop. Every morning after his workout (his day begins at 4 a.m.), Otto heads to the juice bar, or downtown, where he picks up pint bottles for the shop. On Wednesdays and Saturdays, he makes his way to the Santa Monica Farmers’ Market where he seeks out seasonal organic produce. When the shop first opened, Otto would pick up organic items daily; now the juice bar does so much volume, it takes in regular deliveries of fresh fruit and vegetables. “I used to have a VW van that we would load up in the ‘70s, now I would have to have a big truck, we go through so much stuff,” he says.

It’s his quest for the best, organic produce that Otto believes makes his juice bar so popular, despite the proliferation of similar purveyors that has popped up in recent years. “We’ve always maintained, to make the best juice, you have to use the best produce. We go to great extremes for that,” he notes.

“We all know what’s bad for us, so don’t find yourself a slave to these things,” says Otto. “The secret to great health? It’s not about what you eat, its what you don’t eat.”
 

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HERBIE FLETCHER

Posted on by Sacha Cosentino

Herbie left home the winter he was 16 with the clothes he was wearing, a surfboard, trunks and a bedroll, headed for paradise. Living in the back seat of a rusted-out Cadillac, even though it was Dewey Weber’s, was anything but. Then again, at first light, when he could see the wave peeling at Sunset Point, he knew his rash decision was perfect. He did odd jobs for a few bucks to keep eating, but when Greg MacGillivray hired him to star in his film Free and Easy, he figured he had it made. Wow, paid to surf … The pay wasn’t much by today’s standards, but he had a place to crash, a ride to the beach and the opportunity to fly to Maui to surf the Bay—he was completely stoked!

We met that winter at the Makaha contest, and two years later, I had the grand idea of leaving home. In the summer of ’68, after our brief stay in Laguna Canyon with some of the more notable characters in the Brotherhood of Eternal Love, we were off to Maui. Hawaii proved to be a haven for many years while Herb perfected his board-building craft and the entrepreneurial spirit that generated more than 100 surf film titles, thousands of stills, surf traction, documentation of surfing’s aerial revolution, jet skiing the outer reefs at Pipeline and the beginnings of tow-in surfing. The late ’80s and early ’90s were a fantastically creative time in surfing, and with our two sons, we were living the dream.

We were now based in San Clemente, and surfing had gone through another radical change, as more money was drawn in and the companies started to become more and more corporate. The rock ’n’ roll vibe that we thrived on seemed to get somewhat lost when sponsors had to worry more about reporting quarterly earnings. It was a good thing for many of the surfers, as it allowed them to make a living that would have been impossible a few years before, but now surfing’s identity was dictated by large corporations who had the advertising dollars to make stars and re-create history.

Herb and I have been extremely lucky. Owning Astrodeck, we’ve been able to keep creating and designing and have produced snowboards, wakeboards, bindings, clothing and all types of art, which has always been our passion. Since his first resin paintings in ’66, Herb has used traditional surfboard-building materials in new and unique ways. His signature Wrecktangles, made from boards ridden by the greatest contemporary surfers, broken at the Pipeline and assembled as sculptures, hearken back to his Wave Warriors photo shoots of the late ’80s, where the greatest surfers gathered on the beach at Pipeline for a group shot that Herb was able to pull together four winters in a row.

Those shots are now considered among the most iconic images in surf history. With a great personal library of footage and ever- growing collection of paintings, sculptures, photo collages and stories, Herb’s show, Path of a Wave Warrior, is being crated now for its next stop, Tokyo.

 

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CHRISTIAN FLETCHER

Posted on by Sacha Cosentino

When Christian was just 10 months old, I used to have to turn his playpen upside down and set it over him so he couldn’t escape. He knew no boundaries and with reckless abandon would climb up anything, jump off everything and hang out second-story windows at my parents’ house, completely undaunted and without the slightest recognition of self-preservation.

He has lived his life with the same unique sense of purpose, kind of “to hell with the consequences, I’m doing it my way no matter what” mindset. It really chaps a lot of people who love the game of life to fit a tidy format. I think sometimes that’s Christian’s greatest gift—he makes you stretch your own boundaries, and as hard as that is sometimes, that’s where personal growth happens. From his radical aerial surfing style in the late ’80s, which is now, decades later, part of the requirements of modern surfing, to his brash, sometimes arrogant-sounding interviews that got him completely ostracized from the “established” surfing arena, he has been a lightning rod of controversy. Under the sometimes intense public criticism and scrutiny, he has managed to live his life his way as a complete nonconformist and has recently used his insight to envision a way of bringing his design talents and love of motorcycles together under the umbrella of MadHouse Kustom Designs.

He’s now collaborating with professors on 3D printing of fins for his custom-shaped and hand-painted epoxy flying machines, surfboards to most, with special-weave Kevlar for strength, creating light, super strong but sensitive boards for the most progressive surfing. With an award-winning custom bike builder and longtime personal friend he is opening a shop here and in Tokyo that will also carry the clothing he has been collaborating on with RVCA over the past year. It’s all a testament to his insane staying power and his ability to excite people with the idea of personal freedom that was so much a part of surfing and motorcycles’ past lore.

Christian is funny, irreverent and totally bizarre—who knew there were hundreds, maybe thousands of juggling videos on YouTube, or for that matter that they would have such a huge following. When Christian got it into his head a few years back to learn to juggle he couldn’t wait to share it with me. Now, when waiting on anything anywhere, he’s practicing, often wearing one of the scary clown masks he likes to collect. You can imagine this might cause some trepidation out there in the conservative world where labels create certainty, but this is Christian’s world, and he is truly abstract.

 

 

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WALTER HOFFMAN

Posted on by Sacha Cosentino

I first met my father, Walter, when I was 4 years old. My mom, a divorcée with three kids, my older sister Joyce, younger brother Tony and myself had plans on renting out the room off the garage, kind of a standard practice on Balboa Island. I heard a knock on the front door, ran across the UPS-colored linoleum floor to swing open the door, and there stood a huge mountain of a guy in a sleeveless Makaha sweatshirt, M.Nii trunks, a ukulele under one massive arm and bare feet. I was a little peeling-nosed, sun- bleached beach kid, and I knew instantly this was a kindred spirit. Within a couple of years they were married and he adopted all of us. Quite the man.

Walter grew up in Hollywood and started surfing the California coast with his brother, Phillip “Flippy” Hoffman, in the early ’40s. Their father, Rube, was a textile converter, and after Walter’s stint in the Navy, being stationed in Hawaii, where he was able to perfect his big wave riding, he returned to join his father’s business. There he cultivated clients with the company’s fantastic prints inspired by his love of the ocean and the beach lifestyle. It was the early ’50s and California was growing at an unbelievable pace. With the nation finally at peace after WWII and the Korean Conflict, people had a feeling of prosperity and hope; art and design were able to flourish in this environment. The advanced technology developed in the aerospace industry made it possible for designers to push the boundaries of traditional craftsmanship, and this was particularly felt in surfboard building with the introduction of foam and fiberglass. With the boards going from a hundred pounds of solid wood to 40-plus pounds, surfing was now accessible to all, and Midcentury Modern outdoor casual living was the American Dream.

Prints were everywhere—wallpaper, upholstery, curtains, rugs and certainly clothing. With designers specifically going after the active-lifestyle enthusiast, right place right time, Hoffman Fabrics was there. From the swimwear designers of the early times to the young startups that were specifically targeting the surf enthusiast, my dad, with a large in-house art department, helped create the “surf look” with the prints they were creating. In the early ’60s we were spending every Christmas in Hawaii, so my dad and older sister, Joyce, who by this time was going after the women’s world surfing title, could surf in the perfect Hawaiian conditions. We would spend a few weeks there while my dad judged the Makaha contest, which he had won in the early ’50s and in which my sister now competed. Our family life revolved around the beach culture, and all my father’s friends, most since he was in his teens, were the first generation of surf enthusiasts who would go on to create the magazines, films, boards and clothing that would define the early surf lifestyle.

 

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GREYSON FLETCHER

Posted on by Sacha Cosentino

After a starring role in a cable show at 16, Greyson had many offers to pursue something more in that arena. He told me that he just didn’t see the fit for him and he started to drift a bit. By 18 he was set on moving forward with his skating and decided to drop by and stay with his dad, Christian, for a while. They both came to work at Astrodeck, the Fletcher family business—what better college education could we offer Greyson than actually being involved in an action sports business? He thrived in the environment and took off early to surf or skate every afternoon.

There were domestic and foreign road trips; videos and photos started surfacing of his unchoreographed, fast, loose surf-style bowl skating. It seemed fresh and reminiscent at the same time, with many skate legends from the past rallying their support. At first, just like it was with Nathan, Greyson didn’t want to get thrown into the “Fletcher” mix, wanting to earn his own place with his own ability. Completely understandable, but it is what it is, and for better or worse there is no separating, there is only excelling if you want to stand your own ground. And excel Greyson did for sure!!!

Getting a board and a clothing sponsorship to help with a travel budget, Greyson started life on the road. He went all over Europe, Australia and the States, and his reputation as a skater—but to me more important, as a fantastic guy—started to grow. Everywhere he went he was greeted by people who knew his dad, his uncle, even his grandpa. At first these intrusions were irritating to him, but now, as he told me a couple of weeks ago, it makes him feel at home everywhere he goes. People welcome him as an old friend of their family, not as an interloper into their “locals only” vibe. The great contemporary Brazilian skaters took Greyson immediately under their wing, and he has matured as a competitive skater immensely with their help. Skating like surfing is an individual sport, but the young Brazilian skaters all practice together, travel together and push each other to be their best. Their acceptance of Greyson into the tribe has helped him develop a sense of being part of a team, and they love being part of Team Fletcher.

Greyson stopped by the Deck for a family photo shoot after returning from an East Coast filming trip. He split the next day for 12 days in Japan; he’ll be home for a week and then it’s Australia for 13 days, etc. When you say to people my son is a surfer or my grandson is a skater, they roll their eyes, like yeah, right. Everyone’s road is a road; Greyson has been blessed with talent and has pursued it with a sincerity and sense of awe that inspires me. He’s quiet, unassuming, completely shreds, and I’m sincerely grateful to have him as my friend and grandson.

 

 

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NATHAN FLETCHER

Posted on by Sacha Cosentino

Nathan was always a big wave rider. At 5 he used to paddle out to the reef, about 350 yards offshore in front of my parents’ house, to catch the biggest waves, completely fearless. He wore a hot-pink wetsuit so we could spot him in the lineup in case of emergency, but with his keen sense of adventure there was also a cautiousness that gave him an interesting sense of balance. Whether being towed into waves behind Herb’s jet ski or riding Waimea Bay at age 11, he pursued his goals thoughtfully, respectful of the challenge and the degree of danger.

Christian was five years older and of course cast a shadow; at 18 Nathan all but gave up surfing, put on a helmet to enjoy the anonymity and pushed headlong into motocross, taking his surf/skate maneuvers in a whole new direction. With a couple of friends he helped to pioneer the aerial acrobatics that are enjoyed in the sport today. A few injuries later, that siren song that all men of the sea have spoken and written about at length was beckoning, and Nathan heard the call.

Always a believer in the magic of nature, when he scored two 10s in a heat during an event at Teahupo’o, he knew his return was the right road to follow. Even though absent for a while and not on the tour, he was still an asset, and sponsorship was available that would allow him to follow the surf. He had the hard-earned maturity and experience to take advantage of the opportunity and bring something more to the bargaining table. With memories of how important films like Wave Warriors were, he started working with his sponsors on film projects, which helped chronicle his travels with his teammates and became in-store advertising vehicles. By this time all major companies had their own cameramen and film crews to capture the surfing/ adventure lifestyle.

All the traveling soon took its toll, though, and the industry itself was going through major changes as the economic downturn had companies folding, firing and trying to stop the bleeding before it could right itself. Nathan found himself without a clothing sponsor, which is usually the main source of income for surfers, and skaters for that matter. Vans had been his shoe sponsor for years, and they felt a head-to-toe program with Nathan was a perfect fit. (As a side note, Vans had been buying fabric from Hoffman’s since the two Van Doren brothers started the company in 1966.) Nathan once again put together his travel itinerary to follow the waves.

Nathan and Sion Milosky, a friend and truly inspired big wave rider, traveled to Mavericks in November 2010 for a huge swell; when they got out of the water and were drying off in the parking lot, they were told of Andy Irons’ death and immediately headed to Kauai to be there for Bruce. The trip was surreal, and Nathan recounts the story of a white owl not long after, which in hindsight he felt sure was an omen. Four short months after Andy, Sion would drown at Mavericks, after what some said was a two-wave hold-down. Nathan searched frantically for his friend, until he finally recovered the lifeless body and brought him to shore.

These events changed Nathan. For months he was depressed and inconsolable, but then little bits of the magic of life started to seep back in. He felt the gift of friendship that these two men had given him and he rededicated himself to living a life that would honor their memories. In August 2011, he caught a wave at Teahupo’o that would be seen around the world as one of the most awesome rides in surf history.

With the birth of his son, Lazer Zappa, in November 2013, the cycle of life begins again, and Lazer shows all the signs of being another thrill seeker…

 

 

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FRANCESCO CARROZZINI

Posted on by Sacha Cosentino

You may have thumbed through his photographs in Italian Vogue, L’Uomo Vogue, New York magazine and Rolling Stone; you may have streamed his music videos for the likes of Beyoncé, A$AP Rocky and Lana Del Rey. His name is Francesco Carrozzini, and like a latter-day Richard Avedon, the Italian lensman deftly captures the essence of celebrity with an ease that can only have come from growing up surrounded by those things.

Born the only son of Vogue Italia editor-in-chief Franca Sozzani, among the most influential media personalities in Italy, Carrozzini was immediately destined to live a life less ordinary. His mother is, after all, a European counterpart to Anna Wintour, with the exquisite wardrobe and A-list contacts to match. “My mother is my best friend, my confidante, my mentor,” he says on the phone from Miami, where he is attending Art Basel. “Curiosity is one of the most important things she taught me—to be curious and never be satisfied, to always try to learn more, experience more and travel more. She’s a legend in her own field, and she’s legendary to me as a son.”

Stories of him being picked up from school by Naomi Campbell are already documented—while one can’t fault a man for being born into a fairy tale, one can fault him for never writing his own chapter in it. Carrozzini’s fairy tale, we are pleased to report, is shaping up beautifully, as he develops his own compelling creative narrative.
 

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His story starts not in Italy, as you might imagine, but in New York, where he arrived, aged 20, gripping his Leica camera, his eyes scaling the impossible skyscrapers. Willing to start from the bottom and work his way up, he saw America as a place where “everyone comes to dream, in a way. Things happen here that can’t happen in other places.”

It was 2003; America was still reeling from 9/11 and a few years shy of the recession that would claim the careers of so many in the creative fields. But for Carrozzini, the era would become one of the most productive of his life. “I started doing my first big jobs with American fashion and beauty companies. And once the recession hit, there were even more opportunities for young people like me who had nothing to lose, unlike the big players.” In New York he flourished and built a reputation as a photographer to watch, one able to combine authenticity and glamour in the same frame—not an easy feat.

Shooting more and more celebrities, he started to spend more time in Los Angeles, setting up camp at Chateau Marmont. Living in a hotel helps him avoid the isolation that can come with the calm indifference of L.A. At the same time, living a nomadic life has forced Carrozzini to find ways to stay grounded, usually through the simplest things: cooking a meal for friends, or going back to Europe and enjoying the fact that the stores are closed on Sunday. “I think being European means we are in general more grounded. We live simpler lives. I always try to keep a hold of that.”
 


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A major shift came at age 28, when his father passed away. A sobering rite of passage for all men, it was especially so for Carrozzini, who had never been close to his father. “The moment he was gone, I had a strange and sudden realization. I’m up next, I’m the only one left. That sense of mortality made me feel like I better hurry up and become an adult, take responsibility and grow. If there was a true turning point in my life, apart from coming to America, it was my father’s death.”

This new maturity translated in his work as a renewed sensitivity and openness of vision. “While before I would do things more instinctively, I started to think about things more, researched them and moved toward storytelling and film.” For the last three years he has been shooting a documentary about his mother, their relationship, her work and her legacy. He learned a lot about his mother in the process, even some things he didn’t want to know. “Making the film was like going to therapy, an incredible process of discovery and journey. It made me realize who she is, who we are together and who I am.”

With his mark already made in photography and music videos, the next logical step is feature film. He’s been passionate about cinema since he was a child, weaned on Fellini, Antonioni and Bertolucci. Blow-Up and 8½ are “seminal movies” for him. “I reference them every time I do anything creative, in some way.” 1937, a short film he directed in 2008, competed at the Venice Film Festival, and in 2009 he was nominated for a Young Director Award at the Cannes Lions advertising festival, for a viral video he made for Ray-Ban. In terms of a feature film, the question for Carrozzini is not if but when. He’s not sure of the answer (yet).

“I met and spent some time with Polanski,” he says. “He told me, when you make a film, make sure you have a real reason to do it. And I kind of never forgot that. I also shot this cover with Angelina Jolie, and she reiterated the sentiment. She said, ‘Compared to acting, it’s such an undertaking to direct a film … it’s two years of your life. Just make sure that it really means something to you.’ I’ll make sure.”
 

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