The first time I was interviewed for a publication was this article in February, 1980.A friend of mine from high school named Gilberto was already getting some gigs with his photography, even though he was probably only seventeen years old at the time.
One of his gigs was providing photos for a free newspaper that was distributed around Brooklyn back before Brooklyn was trendy. You could pick this paper up in the local grocery stores (it was cleverly named “The Brooklyn Paper”). Gilberto and my girlfriend Deirdre (aka “Morticia 13”) rode around the subways all night with him taking pictures for the article. I let him show my face because I figured the paper’s circulation was about 500 copies and Hickey and Ski probably wouldn’t see it (or anyone else for that matter). I was still a crazy looking hippie with a ponytail down to my waist. Deirdre was goth before they invented goth. Later that month I let Deirdre’s punk friend Tarek chop off all my hair with a blunt pair of scissors. Lo and behold, when we boarded a Brooklyn-bound M Train, I had tags in it with Revolt (probably from our graffiti missions to the Sheepshead Bay lay-up). That was some crazy serendipity for sure, and turned out to be a good backdrop too.
I’ve only included a piece of this article. Trust me. It’s the compassionate thing to do. The interviewer, Jonathan Dobkin, was obsessed with the books on my bookshelf and that fact that I was a white guy. Really? Really? Yes, really.
