thebadnewshughes

I think people have made this remark/complaint about every subculture ever. It's a variation on: "If goths/punks/insert subculture here all want to be different, why do they all look the same?" It is a really tired and angry teenager debate to me.
Industries try and capitalize on trends. That's life. And I think the impulse and passion for getting tattoos cannot be reduced to being about "being yourself/expressing yourself being an individual". People participate in tattoo subculture for a million different reasons, and even the notion of "being yourself" or "expressing your individualism" doesn't mean one specific thing to anyone who feels it. I also think that many people who get heavily into tattoos are like me in that they don't do it entirely for some intellectually thought out identity reason; they just feel it in their gut that this is something that is right to them. And feelings in your gut are very hard to articulate in words, and sometimes come out as "to express myself as an individual" or whatever, but that is really not a true reflection of that instinct.
Moral of the story: I really wish people would stop always assuming that some kind of rebellious individualism is the driving force in getting tattooed. I think that is reductive and misses the point.

I haven't been getting tattooed for long enough to really comment on the ebb and flow of trends, but I will anyways. I have to wonder if a lot of the "trending" back towards traditional tattoos is a result of seeing how some of the other "trendy" tattoos have aged over the years.
As far as the smaller trends within "our community" or whatever--like say forcefields or ladies with animal heads on them or pocketwatches--go, I don't really think there's usually any intentional trend-hopping or whatever, I think that it's just a matter of seeing something cool and saying, "Oh shit, that looks rad. I want one of those," or "That looks cool, I want to try doing that." Particularly in 2012, where it's incredibly easy for the whole tattoo community to see something that someone does within a few hours of it being posted to Instagram. Like @Pugilist, I also kind of think that getting tattoos to "be an individual" is a bit of a farce. At least for people who are really into tattoos. I get tattooed because I like tattoos. If all of a sudden everyone had full back tattoos and full sleeves, I would still get tattooed. If no one did, I would still get tattooed.

This is my back. Can't believe its all done.

My first tattoo was put on by Stano in Daytona. I was 17 and drove down with a couple of scary older skinhead dudes who barely tolerated me. Got the comic character Judge Dredd on my shoulder, because this sort of thing happens when a dyed-in-the-wool nerd tries to be a tough guy - "I know, I'll get a tattoo of the biggest badass in my *pushes up glasses* comic book collection!" Anyway, like 10 years later that goddamn Stallone movie came out and I walked around groaning every time anybody saw the damn tattoo until a couple years back, when I buried it under this:

Heres a good shot of Les Skuse's work.
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It seems Rusty was tattooed by Bill and Les Skuse , Ron Ackers ,Chris Connett, Lyle Tuttle, George Bone , Cash Cooper , Dennis Cockell and Bob Maddison amongst others .
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Ron Ackers 1950's

Short attention span and a pain-in-the-ass scanning setup. I'm gonna post the front and back cover, and about 20 pages, and see if y'all think it's worth doing. There are A LOT of pages in the mag, so it may be better if I scanned it into a PDF and gave it to an admin to set-up as a download?
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nice! saw that on his instagram. liked yours the best of the bunch. my good friend is on the lower right.

got this today by Landon Lewis @ Black Thorn Gallery

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

Got this last night at Anthem in Gainesville FL, from the Last Sparrow board's own Tim Strating. Pic doesn't do the colors justice. Could not be happier.

so this is my latest and first tattoo, from January.
this is as soon as it was done

This one is now healed


I know its nothing impressive to you guys and problably not all that good in your eyes but I really like it.

What it's all about, and who gives a damn what anymone else thinks?!

Picked this up from Mario yesterday at CTC. I love it.

Rumor has it he's get loaded during taping, wear the cape home, and try to fight crime.

Rumor has it he's get loaded during taping, wear the cape home, and try to fight crime.