Rotto is 'Adventure Island'
Occy on his famous Rusty.
Airs have come a long way.
That was sick, have surfed one of those early Rusty's (WA made?) and it was a goer.
The old manager of gnaraloo camp told me Occy used to walk around camp carrying his bong close to his chest like a security blanket.
Mr Rusty W.A. ?
Don't think that first Rusty was shaped by Mogga. Fairly sure it was RP.
Epic double page spread shot of Occ off the top.
Occy was my favourite surfer for years- including to the present day- and I was mesmerised by those photos. Waves was pretty sick at varying times during its life, absolute shite at others.
Editors:
PC - unreal as it was brimming with great photos, and each issue during that period was dollar-for-dollar about as good value as surf magazines ever got.
Damon Leach - reduction in print size, photo quality, and content too. Perhaps suffered from the introduction of the more bolshie ASL intruding on the glossy market.
Kidman - Easily the highpoint of Waves, mixed old and new with ease, had a confident voice and so gave Waves a distinctive personality. The template for every magazine editor everywhere.
Jesse Faen - Sharp comedown after AK and the first inkling of Waves' terminal pubescence with ongoing and unironic infatuation of Katie Holmes from Dawson's Creek. Lots of stickers on the covers too. They're the overriding memories of that era.
Then went through Aaron 'Ronnie' Blakey, Ryan Glen, and a few others but always played second fiddle to big brother Tracks. AS one editor from that period told me: "I don't even know who my readers are anymore".
Who was editor when they started all that Ozzie Wright inspired “artistic” scribbling bullshit all over the pages? Unreadable rubbish.
Not sure who the editor was but can blame David Carson for introducing that style of art direction.
The David Carson that Beachgrit fetishises?
That’s some heavy duty Emperor’s new clothes shit.
The David Carson that Beachgrit fetishises?
That’s some heavy duty Emperor’s new clothes shit.
There was a period when even the surf brand clothes had that graffiti garbage all over it. Quite funny really. Maybe the same time boardies went below the knee?
Anyway- Occy’s style was incredible. Direct and powerful.
One and the same. Took over as art director at Surfer in the early-nineties, around the same time Mavs was discovered. I link those two because he designed the 'Cold Sweat' article with text using random fonts overlaying the imagery, a new concept at the time.
The style was subsequently copied by graphic designers the world over and pushed to ridiculous levels - scribbles and hieroglyphics obscuring great imagery.
Carson's still a celebrated designer and lives in a villa above a semi-secret wave in the Carribean.
That’s the stuff. Isn’t it strange how something new can be mistaken for something good? Easily the second worst period in surf media. Even worse than when they encouraged pro surfers to write stream of consciousness dribble in the seventies.
The worst period in surf media is the WSL trying to camouflage immoral greed with a veneer of synthetic humanity.
That Mavericks spread is so good.
Just my 5c.
Seems we both disagree with Blowin, though I reckon he's wrong about seventies surfers writing stream of conciousness dribble.
That shit is gold.
I agree.
McTavish is quite an accomplished writer, as is Terry Fitzgerald.
In my opinion surf writing really took the downhill turn when it was captured by the power of the surf industry.
It became mostly advertising copy and the editors/writers frequently went from the media to work for the industry.
Kidman at Waves, what a time to be young and impressionable and new to it all...
He was only 18 when he took the editorial? If so, what depth...
Terry Fitz sure can write.
And Phil J's Stubbies write up in old Tracks ("A week in the Presence of the Lord") is one of the all time articles, as the competition goes on the writer seems to see his sanity devolve in a most 'Fear and Loathing/Heart of Darkness' way, & MP for the win.
What have we got going on in Instabook surfing these days? Any writers (as opposed to aestheticists) of note?
"Any writers (as opposed to aestheticists) of note?"
None.
None that are young and upcoming, that is. Steve is still the best surf writer, and by a fair margin, yet he's even more ancient than I am.
The ranks of wise and witty older writers is thinning out too, what with the transition from print to online, and the concomitant shift from words to images as the primary means of communication.
We employed a younger writer a few years back and it was an insight into how much things have changed. Won't elaborate too much here.
And recently Stab solicited for a Oz-based writer, part of the hiring process a questionaire, its contents an indictment on the narrow vision of modern surf journalism.
When I started at Swellnet I thought I had a few years before I'd be considered over the hill and overthrown, but there's no-one to take the mantle and the most avid consumers of written media are still my generation and the generations above. Seems as long as they're still surfing, they're still reading, and that works out fine for me.
#TL;DR
Can you parse that para into 140 characters Stu? MAFs is on and my 2 minute noodles are almost ready....gotta go.
chicken tendies, Blowin, chicken tendies :)
I didn't think FR was older? Btw, tip of the hat to Steve for the writing. Must be mind blowing to actually get paid for it... Steinbeck (one of my heroes) did a lot of different work and I'm guessing FR has as well; I reckon it makes for a great sense of perception regarding people and place.
I was trained as a writer, sold a dummy, no opportunity at the time to make anything of it and my head is too far in the numbers now to really care. My eldest, however, is young and possesses a truly great sense of narrative and story telling - he's more into fantasy fiction however.
Keep going with Swellnet Stu, as you get better. It's a gem.
We have many Rotto stories; most of them involving coming-of-age mixing with abject stupidity on our part (why did we always end up in the water catchment area on the way home from the pub, having to scale the fence in the dark when plastered?). It was innocent of the dark history which has been revealed, and as fresh as the winds blowing in from oblivion and over the West End (Little Fishook bay, lovely!) My father wanted some of his ashes spread in a corner of Geordie Bay, which we were able to do for him; and I return with reverence.
I've since found a place which I regard as what Rotto was for us then... a couple actually.
I have half completed writing a fictional surf novel....25,000 words deep. I think it's ok..Love writing. There's a few good surf writers floating around still, a fair few in these forums, FR being an obvious one and Swellnets head honchos being another i really enjoy. Plenty of contributors on here can also write really well, even those who i don't always agree with. Keep it up all. BTW didn't Occy have some weird experience with a lightning storm and Orcas surfing Rotto back on that trip? I remember reading about it. Sounded pretty classic.
25 words from you BD is more than enough...please, no.
Two spreads of Rotto from the eighties. Waves '84 and a follow up trip ('Return to Adventure Island') for an '86 issue of Waves.
First trip Banksy, Derek Hynd, and Greg Day, second trip G'Day again plus Occy, Mitch Thorson, and Mike Latronic.
Almost all photos taken at Strickos, which if you haven't surfed it, is a vastly better wave at size, as opposed to what the Woz is currently scoring.