50 • SKIN DEEP MAGAZINE
sciously influenced me, there have been a few times when other peo-
ple have mentioned how much my work reminds them of his too and
it all comes down to colour.
“I’m a big comic book fan. I grew up with that limited colour palette that
you can still work miracles with if you know what you’re doing. I sure didn’t
do it on purpose though. His flash is always around me and it’s creeped in.
Very few people working today work in the same traditional way. It’s all
black/grey and a tint of red, almost like they’re scared of colour.”
Which brings us nicely to the ‘education’ part of the equation and
how important it is to do your research by diving into the pool and not
just looking at the pool on your phone. Back to Dennis:
“Back in the early days, we of course had to correspond by post
and sometimes, we’d include a photograph of what we were talking
about. Sailor Jerry and me used to write to each other regularly for
instance—and that’s how you get the world into your own shop. Now,
it’s done in seconds but it’s overkill. It’s not the parts of the world you
want... it’s the whole damn thing! Back then, you even had to make a
real effort to find out who the good guys were that you even wanted to
correspond with. Travel is cheap these days but back then, you had to
save up for months to get a flight somewhere.”
I offer up that doing it in the old school way though is surely a lot
more rewarding too. A real treasure hunt in which you valued the fruit
of your hard labour and Dennis agrees:“In this country, I was one of the first tattoo-
ers to travel. A lot of people were very set in their
ways here and were consequently very limited
with what they could give their clients by way of
return. I always wanted to give, well... more!
“Talking of saving money, back then, I de-
cided that I wanted a body suit and I saved my
money to get it done by Sailor Jerry because I
just loved his work. I had it all planned and then
about a year before I was due to go out there,
he died. My second choice from that point was
to get it done by Ed Hardy. He was working in
Japan at the time and I was all prepared to go
out there for it but he said he was coming back
soon to open a new studio in San Francisco andTALES FROM THE CITY
Dennis tattooing a very young Brian SetzerDennis getting^ his^ body^ suit^ worked^ on^ by^ Ed^ Hardy^ back^ in^74My sUiT wAs tHe fIrSt
mAjOr oNe Ed HaRdY hAd
dOnE. I sPeNt oVeR 100
hOuRs tHeRe aCrOsS
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