I grew up in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and in Las Vegas, Nevada, and now live in Albuquerque. .
Here's a pic with my sister Nieve Pearl, who sings and writes with her band Doomless.
Las Cruces was a good town to grow up in, being quiet and open, with a good mix of country people, regular working folks, Mexicans, Apaches, and scientists. (Not many black, Asian, or other, but experience is making up for that as I meet all kinds of new friends.) My grandfather Cecil was one of the first genuine "rocket scientists" who created the space age at White Sands Missile Range fifty years ago, and some of my friends' families once knew Billy The Kid and Pat Garrett, who used to hang out back in 1900 at one of the houses we lived in. My grandmother Barbara was an artist I never got to meet. My mom Lynne is a massage therapist who lives on Maui.
Here's a pic with my friend Sommer, in my fully-tagged bedroom, back about 1996.
My father James
has been through a lot weird stuff. He's seen a lot of bullshit all the way from Vietnam to Woodstock, from Osiris to Jesus, from airline pilot instructor to sports book gambler, and through four marriages. All of which is great for me cuz now I aints gotta put up with all that rappity-crap stank-ass shit they went though while their generation was trying to figure out how to get out of the box of illusions their parents had raised them in. But that don't mean I don't go out and have adventures to tell my kids later in life. I do have a son, a great little guy I call Doc, but due to some of the problems that devil my generation, I don't get to see him much.
Here is a picture taken in 1997 on the way to a Las Cruces Community Theater awards banquet. The artwork is by my Dad, which might tell you something about how I got to be who I am.
At seven years old I stuck a needle through my left ear and put a gold stud through it. That was the begining of a beeautiful friendship. In middle school I put a safety pin through my nipple in class, which upset the teacher, to my great delight. When the school called my Dad, he said, "A safety pin? Yeah? So what's the problem?" That was major cool. I have since gone through the stinging pleasure of piercing my eyebrow, labret, tongue, nipples, and navel, and have just recently added some neat spikes through the dimples in my cheeks. After waiting since I was about fifteen to be sure I had just the right piece, I finally put my tat across my shoulders, pair of dragons I spent a long time designing. Piercing is fun, but there is a commitment about tat work that as an artist I have always felt should be taken very seriously. You only get one canvas.
Here's a picture of a couple of my character bongs, made back when I was about sixteen. As I was raised to be socially responsible and hopefully sensible even if one of the outlaws, I did check out most of the stuff going around that wasn't obviously stupid shit, you hear what I'm saying. I tried a few that turned out to be stupid shit after all, some I liked a lot but didn't want to live there, and I figure I came away with a pretty good handle on being able to take or leave all that shit. I found good shit and bad shit on both sides of the law, and I can say honestly that my drug of choice is beer after all, and I'm happy to let the rest go.
Here is a picture of a very old Boy -- in costume for Grandpa in a 1997 production of "You Can't Take It With You" -- and yep, the usual long red locks were shaved out and whited for the part.
I have worked in several media -- tag-artist, painter, stage actor, singer, songwriter, jeweler, and sculptor. To see a group of my sketches made a few years ago, click here on dBook o' dBoy. My recent work has been mostly large oil paintings, often working with my friend and partner Scott Famin. To see some of that, click here on dBook Two.
I love being an artist, and I love being a singer, and I love the celebrity and party lifestyle of being a performer. Mostly I just like to talk to people, and hang with people, and get to know somebody who can show me something new.
