The Surfer's Journal presents Soundings with Jamie Brisick

Jack Shipley Oct 13, 2026 50:45 Born in 1952, Jack Shipley moved from Maryland to Oahu by way of Ohio when he was nine years old. Soon after, he took a surf lesson from a Waikiki beach boy and knew right away where his life was headed. Shipley worked at surf shops in his teens, first Hobie, then Surf Line Hawaii. In 1970, he and fellow Surf Line employee Gerry Lopez founded Lightning Bolt Surfboards, which would soon become the

Taylor Knox Sep 29, 2026 56:10 Born in 1971, Taylor Knox started surfing at age eight, riding the beach breaks of his local Oxnard, California. At 13, he and his family moved to North County San Diego, where his surfing thrived. But at 15, he had a major spinal surgery that put him in a body cast for six months. This mortality brush with his dreams may in some way account for the ferocity with which Knox surfs. After a strong a

Keone Downing Sep 15, 2026 53:40 Born in 1953, raised in Hawaii, Keone Downing started surfing at age five at Waikiki. He's won many surf contests, but his crowning achievement, undoubtedly, is winning the 1990 Eddie, on a board shaped by his father, the late George Downing, one of the founders of modern surfing, a big-wave pioneer, a design innovator, and a Waikiki beach boy. Keone inherited his father's waterman ethos. A devote

Dylan Graves Sep 1, 2026 59:54 Born in Florida and raised in Puerto Rico, Dylan Graves is widely known as the creator and host of Weird Waves, a web series in which he chases all manner of freak waves, among them the Severn Bore in England, the Eisbach River in Germany, and the Bono Seven Ghosts in Indonesia, where he got a five-minute ride and did something like 46 turns. It wasn't always like this. Graves started out doing co

Craig Stecyk Aug 18, 2026 55:49 Born in 1950, raised on the west side of LA, Craig R. Stecyk III is a multidisciplinary artist whose work spans film, fine art, commercial design, writing, and photography. He's widely known for the "Dogtown Chronicles," which featured in Skateboarder magazine in the 1970s. In fact, Stecyk co-founded Zephyr, which spawned the hugely influential Z-Boys. During that time, in addition to documenting

Dion Agius Aug 4, 2026 56:32 Dion Agius burst on to surfing's global stage with a spectacular Gorkin Flip in the 2009 surf flick Secret Machine. He fell in with filmmakers Joe G, Taylor Steele, and Kai Neville, appearing in a slew of films, among them Castles in the Sky, Stranger Than Fiction, Modern Collective, Lost Atlas, Dear Suburbia, Cluster, Year Zero, and Strange Rumblings in Shangri-La. Agius' parts punch—he surfs wit

Jack Johnson Jul 21, 2026 58:02 Jack Johnson is a multi-platinum-selling singer-songwriter, surfer, and environmentalist. Before turning to playing music professionally, Johnson had designs on a career as a pro surfer. Having grown up on the North Shore of Oahu, and, in particular, having made his way toward the center of the peak at Pipe, he was well on his way by his early twenties. However, he headbutted the reef out there, g

Jared Mell Jul 7, 2026 46:50 Jared Mell is a surfer and shaper who grew up in Orange County, California, surfing Blackies and riding alt equipment—primarily longboards, but also eggs, fishes, alaias, etc. Mell's competed in many events, and landed many decent results, but they seem almost incidental to what he brings to the surf buffet. "Jared will be walking the nose backside and at the last second he'll turn switch," says A

Paige Alms Jun 23, 2026 53:20 Paige Alms was born in British Columbia, moved to Maui when she was nine, found surfing, found surf contests, and, around the age of 15, found big waves. They would become her forte, specifically Jaws, located not far from her home in Haiku. She spent a lot of time out there, riding waves of course, but also learning the lineup. It paid off. In 2015, she knifed her way into a bomb, angled high, an

Sid Abbruzzi Jun 9, 2026 52:42 Born and raised in Newport, Rhode Island, Sid Abruzzi came to surfing and skateboarding in the early 1960s. In 1969, 18-year-old Abbruzzi drove down to New Jersey to buy a few Rick single-fins, as surfboards were hard to come by in Rhode Island back then. He swiftly sold the boards, then sold another batch, and found a liking for this buying and selling business. In 1971, Abbruzzi opened Water Bro

Harry Bryant May 26, 2026 53:37 Hailing from Noosa, Australia, Harry Bryant is a frothing, underground charger who'll drive halfway across Australia to hunt for remote slabs. He's also a bonafide surf star—his blond bowl-cutted head recognizable in lineups worldwide. One window into his full throttle operation and persona is 2024's Motel Hell, a full-length surf feature that he made with director Dave Fox. It contains a storylin

Rob Machado May 12, 2026 01:01:24 Australian-born, California-raised Rob Machado is known for many things, but perhaps most of all he's known for making it look easy. After an accomplished amateur career, Machado, a member of the New School generation, joined the world tour in 1993. He rose to second overall in 1995, the year he famously high-fived Kelly Slater in the semifinals of the Pipe Masters with the title on the line. He f

Shirley Rogers Apr 28, 2026 55:13 The daughter of an American father and a Japanese mother, Shirley Rogers was born in Japan in 1953. She spent her first nine years there, then a few years in Texas. At 16, she moved with her parents to Oahu. At Campbell High School on the Westside, she took photography classes and found a passion for it. She also found surfing—the act of riding waves, the culture, and the community. In 1971, her p

Kai Neville Apr 14, 2026 58:42 Born in 1984, Kai Neville came to surfing at age 11 on the Sunshine Coast, where his dad pushed him into his first waves. He loved it, aspired to be a pro, but soon realized he might be better off behind the camera rather than in front of it. He got a job at McDonald's, saved up for a High-8 Sony Handycam, and started creating short surf films, which led to a job making promo DVDs for Australia's

Maurice Cole Mar 31, 2026 01:08:33 Born in 1954, hailing from Victoria, Australia, Maurice Cole started surfing at age 12. He got good fast, and won Victorian State Titles in 1973 and 1976. However, he got busted for possession of hash oil, which, after trial, led to a little over two years in jail. That obviously stalled his competitive ascent, but also proved to be formative. He got out in 1978 and surfed vigorously around the Be

Nathan Florence Mar 17, 2026 01:03:16 Nathan Florence, the middle of the three Florence brothers, was born in Hawaii in 1994. Like his older brother, three-time world champion John, and younger brother, Pipe charger and ace skateboarder Ivan, Nathan grew up in a beachfront house looking out to Pipeline, and made the seamless progression from building sandcastles on the beach to getting spit out of tubes in what was ostensibly his back

Mickey Muñoz Mar 3, 2026 01:11:54 Born in 1937, Mickey Muñoz moved from New York to Los Angeles at age six, started surfing at age 10, and swiftly found Malibu's First Point. He became one of the top surfers out there, and made friends with the regulars—Joe Quigg, Matt Kivlin, Miki Dora. Muñoz eventually moved to Hawaii, where he rode Waikiki and worked restaurant jobs to get by. He soon found his way out to the North Shore, whic

Devon Howard Feb 17, 2026 01:04:15 Born and raised in San Diego, Devon Howard came to surfing at age seven. He gravitated to longboarding—both the wave-riding approach and the culture. A graduate of the University of San Diego, he served as managing editor of Longboard magazine from 1999 to 2004. For the next decade or so, he worked as a freelance writer and photographer, and held marketing positions with Patagonia and Spy Optic. B

Jamie O'Brien Feb 3, 2026 55:33 Born in Hawaii in 1983 and raised in a beachfront home on the North Shore, with a view out to Pipeline, Jamie O'Brien started surfing at age three. As an amateur, he went on a contest trajectory—making the finals of the menehune division of the 1995 and '96 US Surfing Championships, and the finals in the 1999 and 2000 World Junior Championships. Most impressive, though, was his close relationship

James Nestor Jan 20, 2026 52:14 Born in Tustin, California, James Nestor spent his teens surfing and playing in a straight-edge punk band called Care Unit. After graduating high school, he moved to the Bay Area, where he studied art and literature and earned an MFA. Nestor's professional life began as a copywriter. Soon he moved into magazine journalism. His essays and features have appeared in Outside, Scientific American, The

Shaun Tomson Jan 6, 2026 01:28:37 Born in 1955, hailing from Durban, South Africa, Shaun Tomson won the IPS world title in 1977. He did 14 seasons on the world tour, and won 12 events, including the 1975 Pipeline Masters, in which he made giant leaps for backside tube riding. He starred in many '70s and '80s surf films, among them Free Ride, where he's seen pumping through the barrel at Backdoor and Off the Wall—an entirely new th

Ozzie Wright Dec 23, 2025 45:22 Born in 1976, hailing from Narrabeen on the northern beaches of Sydney, Oscar "Ozzie" Wright burst onto the scene in the mid-1990s and swiftly ascended to global surf fame—never in contests, but nearly always doing something imaginative, like flying through the air, doing spell-casting things with the tube, or surfing remote Indo in a pair of handcrafted bat wings. Wright appeared in a number of

Danny Kwock Dec 9, 2025 01:30:48 Born in Hawaii in 1961, Danny Kwock rode his first waves at Waikiki when he was ten. Surfing took a brief hiatus when he moved with his family to the San Fernando Valley, but picked up soon thereafter when they moved to Newport Beach, right at Wedge, which is where Kwock made his mark, charging big waves and becoming one of the brightest, flashiest surfers of the Echo Beach scene, wearing pink boa

Sachi Cunningham Nov 25, 2025 01:17:42 For more than two decades, Sachi Cunningham has been training her lens on women and the pioneers of big-wave surfing. After earning a BA in history from Brown University and a Masters of Journalism from UC Berkeley, Cunningham started the first video team at the LA Times, where she produced the award-winning series Chasing the Swell, which documents the first ever Big Wave World Tour. She was the

Randy Rarick Nov 11, 2025 59:45 Born in Seattle, Washington, in 1949, Randy Rarick moved with his family to Hawaii when he was five. He started surfing at age 10, under the tutelage of the Waikiki Beach Boys. He was a Hawaiian state junior champ, and made the semifinals of the 1970 World Championships in Australia. In 1976, at age 26, Randy and 1968 world champion Fred Hemmings founded International Professional Surfing, aka th

Ross Clarke-Jones Oct 28, 2025 01:00:17 Hailing from the central coast of New South Wales, Australia, Ross Clarke-Jones joined the ASP world tour in 1986, at age 19. He was good in the small waves that the tour typically competed in at that time. But when the surf jacked up to 20-plus feet in the 1986 Billabong Pro at Waimea Bay, Clarke-Jones heaved himself over leadges and exited the water as one of the world's great big waves surfers—

Bob Hurley Oct 14, 2025 57:54 Surfwear tycoon Bob Hurley spent his early days around Huntington Beach, California, shaping for labels like Hot Stuff, Infinity, Wave Tools, and Lightning Bolt. After spearheading Billabong USA from 1983 to 1998, Hurley transitioned to the creation of his namesake brand, centered around an ethos of innovation that he observed in the youthful counterculture of Southern California at the time. Whil

Pauline Menczer Sep 30, 2025 52:57 Born in 1970, raised in Bondi Beach, Australia, Pauline Menczer found her way to the surfboard at age 14. Actually, it was half a surfboard—a snapped hand-me-down from her brother. Four years later she won the 1988 World Amateur Champs, hopped on the ASP world tour, and finished the year ranked fifth overall. Her surfing was loose, springy, full of hurled tail. She won lots of events, and, in 1993

Chris Burkard Sep 16, 2025 01:15:39 Born in 1986, Chris Burkard grew up on California's Central Coast and knew from a young age that he had to get out. Photography became the avenue. Primarily self-taught, Burkard won the Follow the Light Foundation grant in 2006, and away he went, working as a senior staff photographer for Surfline, Water magazine, and Surfer magazine, as well as freelancing for The New Yorker, National Geographic,

Jeff Hakman Sep 2, 2025 01:05:22 Born in California in 1948, Jeff Hakman's father introduced him to surfing at age eight. Four years later, the family moved to Oahu, and the year after that, at the age of 13, Hakman surfed Waimea Bay for the first time. In 1965, he was invited to the inaugural Duke Kahanamoku Invitational, held at Sunset Beach. Hakman was 17. He won. In the ensuing years, on his Dick Brewer-shaped boards, Hakman

Holly Wawn Aug 19, 2025 44:55 Born and raised on the northern beaches of Sydney, Holly Wawn's father started pushing her into waves at their local Bungan Beach when she was three. She started competing in her teens, won local events, and won the 2012 Australian Junior Titles at age 15. From 2015 to 2019, she competed full-time on the 'QS, bagged a few thirds, but came to realize that she was happiest surfing outside of the con

Derek Hynd Aug 5, 2025 01:07:52 From Newport, New South Wales, Australia, Derek Hynd is known for his unconventional approach to surfing and all else. Hynd was a pro surfer in the late 1970s and early '80s, making his name both for his surfing in a jersey and for the pieces he wrote for the surf mags of the era. In 1980, while competing in South Africa, he suffered a brutal injury that resulted in the loss of vision in his right

Cheyne Horan Jul 22, 2025 01:00:43 Born in 1960 in Sydney, Australia, Cheyne Horan joined the pro tour in 1977 at age 16, and finished second in the world four times, in 1978, '79, '81, and '82. He surfed with an urgency and potency, weaving in and around the pocket on his needle nose, fat-tailed Lazor Zap single-fins. His boards had vibrant, elaborate airsprays. His wetsuits were bright and loud. His hair was peroxide blond. He be

Kelia Moniz Jul 8, 2025 56:19 Born and raised on Oahu, Kelia Moniz is a two-time world longboarding champion, freesurfer, wife, mother, and entrepreneur. From a deeply rooted surfing family, Moniz rode her first waves around the time she learned to walk. She started competing at age 15, racked up a string of victories, and turned pro shortly thereafter. She is the 2012 and 2013 world longboarding champion. She spent much of th

Tom Pohaku Stone Jun 24, 2025 01:16:02 Born in Honolulu in 1951, Tom Pohaku Stone made a name for himself at Pipeline in the early 1970s as a stylish goofyfooter. Around that time, he was imprisoned after a drug bust. While incarcerated, he found books and higher learning. He studied, and, after his release, got a job as a lifeguard and enrolled in college. He got his BA in Hawaiian Studies from the University of Hawaii in 1998 at the

Michele Lockwood Jun 10, 2025 59:58 Michele Lockwood is an artist, writer, photographer, clothing designer, mother, activist, and environmental scientist. She grew up in the boroughs of New York City and started sneaking out to hip-hop gigs, house music clubs, and punk shows while in high school. She hung out at the Brooklyn Banks in the late 1980s, and played the character "Kim" in Larry Clark's 1995 film Kids. The X-girl logo, des

Bob McTavish May 27, 2025 01:04:38 Born in 1944 in Queensland, Australia, Bob McTavish started surfing at age 12 on a 16-foot plywood paddle board. Best known as a surfboard shaper, he started working with Sydney's biggest board builders at age 17, then became a major player in the shortboard revolution. He worked closely with George Greenough and Nat Young, helping Young design "Magic Sam," the thinner, lighter, shorter longboard

Mark Healey May 13, 2025 01:07:31 Born in 1981 on Oahu, Mark Healey started surfing at age three, turned pro by the time he was 17, and made his name in heavy, scary waves, first in Hawaii, then around the world. But big-wave surfing was only part of it. An avid diver, Healey won the World Cup of Spearfishing in La Paz, Mexico, in 2008. And then there were sharks. In 2011, he traveled to Mexico's Guadalupe Island to dive with grea

Kylie Manning Apr 29, 2025 01:00:28 Kylie Manning is a painter, surfer, and fisher based in Brooklyn, New York. Her parents were both art teachers, and, while she was growing up, the family moved between their home in Juneau, Alaska, to various regions in Mexico, which would inform her artwork—and her surfing. She is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College, Massachusetts with a double major in philosophy and visual arts. While she was g

Jeff Divine Apr 15, 2025 01:09:01 Born in 1950 in San Diego, California, Jeff Divine is one of surfing's preeminent photographers and photo editors. Divine began photographing anything and everything around his hometown of La Jolla, California, as a teenager. Surfer magazine first published his photos in 1968, and by the early 1970s his work was all over the surf sphere. He shot everything—water and action, portraiture, lifestyle,

Lee-Ann Curren Apr 1, 2025 47:24 Lee-Ann Curren is a freesurfer, musician, and artist. She grew up and lives in Biarritz, in the southwest of France. Her father is three-time world champion Tom Curren. Her mother is Marie-Pascale, a top-ranked European surfer in the 1980s. Her grandfather is the late Pat Curren, one of the pioneers of Waimea Bay and shaper of big-wave elephant guns. Her aunt Marie-Paul is the 1967 French national

Tom Carroll Mar 11, 2025 58:07 Thomas Victor Carroll is a surfing godhead from Newport Beach, Australia, known for his radicality, focus, and power. He competed on the world tour from 1979 to 1993, winning the world title in 1983 and 1984, and taking home a total of 26 event victories, including the Pipeline Masters in 1987, 1990, and 1991. In 1988, he made history by signing surfing's first million-dollar contract. He won the

Ed Templeton Feb 18, 2025 01:16:40 Ed Templeton is a professional skateboarder, contemporary artist, and photographer. A teen skate prodigy from Orange County, California, Ed turned pro in 1990, just before graduating high school. He did a lot of touring for skate demos, along the way picking up a camera and documenting the scene around him. He painted and drew, and later incorporated his artwork and graphics for Toy Machine, the s

Leah Dawson Jan 28, 2025 01:08:21 Leah Dawson grew up in Florida, and moved to Oahu to attend University of Hawaii, where she earned a BA in Creative Media in 2008. Soon after, she started work as a production assistant for the Vans Triple Crown, launching her into a career behind the camera. As a surfer, Dawson's approach is grounded in freedom of expression and dance, on all manner of crafts, with nods to the surfers who have in

Matt Warshaw Jan 7, 2025 58:32 Matt Warshaw grew up surfing in Los Angeles at a time when surf and skate culture were beginning to meet in Venice Beach and Santa Monica. After a stint as a pro surfer in the 1980s, Warshaw became the editor of Surfer magazine. In 1990, he left his editor's post at Surfer to attend UC Berkeley, where he got his BA in History in 1993. He remained in the Bay Area, parking himself in an apartment in

Torren Martyn Dec 17, 2024 53:12 Born in 1990 in Bangalow, Australia, not far from Byron Bay, Torren Martyn is hailed as one of the great stylists of our time, riding all manner of surfcraft, and with a special penchant for twin-fins. He's also one of surfing's great explorers. In 2016, he and his filmmaker pal Ishka Folkwell spent three months circumnavigating Australia in a Land Rover, riding A-grade waves and documenting their

Carolyn Murphy Nov 26, 2024 01:00:37 Carolyn Murphy is a supermodel, actress, and environmental advocate. Her Vogue shoot with Steven Meisel in the late 1990s launched her into a fruitful, three-decade long career. In 1998 she was named VH1/Vogue's Model of the Year. She played Dubbie in the 1999 feature film Liberty Heights, directed by Barry Levinson. She was also one of the "Modern Muses" on the November 1999 millennium cover of A

Darrick Doerner Nov 5, 2024 01:07:02 Darrick Doerner is a big-wave surfer, tow-surfing pioneer, Hollywood stuntman, and former North Shore lifeguard. He grew up surfing in the LA area in the 1960s and '70s, moved to Hawaii his senior year of high school, and discovered himself joyous and at peace in heavy water. Hungry for waves too big to catch manually, Doerner and his pals Laird Hamilton and Buzzy Kerbox started experimenting with

Scott Hulet Oct 15, 2024 55:41 A writer and editor from San Diego, California, Scott's known throughout the surf sphere for his work with The Surfer's Journal, which he edited from 1999 to 2019, and where he remains as its creative director. Hulet was drawn to words from a young age. At six, Hulet was experimenting with making his own hardbound, nail-stapled books. As a college student, Hulet became well-acquainted with the wor

Ryan Burch Sep 24, 2024 01:03:28 Hailing from Encinitas, California, Ryan Burch is a goofyfoot, a shaper, a husband, a new father, a free surfer, and a free thinker. His approach to wave-riding might be described as experimental, both in the lines he draws and the surfcraft that he rides—everything from asyms to gliders to old-school twin-keeled fishes to sawed-off chunks of raw foam. Burch shaped his first board at age 20, loved

Robert Trujillo Sep 3, 2024 01:03:22 Robert Trujillo grew up on the westside of Los Angeles, where he found music, skateboarding, and surfing at a young age. He first rose to prominence as the bassist for Suicidal Tendencies, which he played in from 1989 to 1995. He was a member of Ozzy Osbourne's band for a number of years starting in the late '90s. Since 2003, he's been the bassist for Metallica. He played—and still plays—with the

Carissa Moore Aug 13, 2024 41:09 Five-time world champion Carissa Moore started surfing at age 5 with her dad in the hallowed waters of Waikiki. As an amateur, she won 11 national titles. In 2008, at the age of 16, Moore became the youngest winner of the Triple Crown of Surfing. She qualified for the WCT in 2010, and won world titles in 2011, 2013, 2015, 2019, and 2021, with dozens of event wins along the way. She was the first-e

Mark Cunningham Jul 23, 2024 57:56 Mark Cunningham, aka The Human Fish, is hailed as one of the greatest bodysurfers of all time. He grew up in Hawaii, became a lifeguard in the mid-'70s, and for nearly 30 years guarded primarily at Ehukai Beach Park, with a view straight into Pipeline's barrel. Through the '70s, '80s, and '90s, Cunningham won nearly every bodysurfing event he entered. But, as Cunningham would be the first to tell

William Finnegan Apr 2, 2024 01:09:31 Award-winning author and The New Yorker staff writer William Finnegan came to surfing early while growing up between Hawaii and Southern California. He helped bring surf writing, as a genre, to the literary fore in 1992 with the publication of his two-part essay "Playing Doc's Games" in The New Yorker, which chronicled both his and "Doc" Renneker's pursuits at Ocean Beach, San Francisco. His 2015

Shane Dorian Mar 26, 2024 01:01:22 A core member of the Momentum Generation and an 11-year veteran of the world tour, Shane Dorian is best known for his big-wave accomplishments over the past 20 years. Born and raised on the Big Island of Hawaii, Dorian received his big-wave education under Brock Little, Todd Chesser, and others after relocating to the North Shore as a teenager. Today, with multiple XXL Awards under his belt and a

Jaleesa Vincent Mar 19, 2024 56:31 Hailing from the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, freesurfer Jaleesa Vincent leads a life deeply immersed in explorative practices of self-expression and connection with nature. If she isn't hunting for waves, she's playing music, painting, cooking, writing poetry, and experimenting with taxidermy. Over the past few years, her output has helped define a new generation of paradigmatic Renaissance surfer

Nate Tyler Mar 12, 2024 01:13:33 Born and raised in Central California, Nate Tyler eschewed the world of competitive surfing in favor of pursuing the path less trodden as a teenager, building a free surfing career defined by a steadfast dedication to filming, traveling, and artistic exploration. His profile rose through the aughts and 2010's, due in no small part to his performances in some of the most cult-classic surf films of

Jack McCoy Mar 5, 2024 01:11:13 A preeminent figure in surf filmmaking, Jack McCoy started surfing when his family moved from Los Angeles to Hawaii in 1954. In the 1970s, he began experimenting with film and photography and, in 1976, released his first film, Tubular Swells, produced and directed with Australian photographer Dick Hoole. What followed was a four-decade run filming, directing, and producing classics of the surf gen

Darryl "Flea" Virostko Feb 27, 2024 48:37 A three-time Maverick's champion and a central figure in Santa Cruz's explosion onto surfing's main stage in the late '90s and early '00s, Darryl Virostko learned to ride big, heavy surf as a kid at Steamer Lane. His introduction to Maverick's, the wave that defined his career, came when it was still considered a myth in surfing circles. His fast success and notoriety within surfing, and the big-w

Aska Matsumiya Feb 20, 2024 41:59 Born in Japan to a mother with a profound passion for classical music and a father whose singing and guitar resounded throughout her early childhood, Aska Matsumiya was playing music before she could talk. Allured by her family's player piano as a child, she became a proficient classical pianist by age 3. But after a move to Orange County, California, at 12, Matsuyima was introduced to the haywire

Gordon "Grubby" Clark Feb 13, 2024 01:19:44 The mastermind behind large-scale production of the surfboard blank, Gordon "Grubby" Clark's pioneering of polyurethane foam in constructing the modern surfboard enabled the progression of surfing as a culture. Enthralled by materials from a young age, Clark received a combined degree in math and physics from Pomona College before working as a glasser at Hobie Surfboards and as an apprentice to To

Cliff Kapono Feb 6, 2024 01:00:37 A molecular scientist with a PhD in marine conservation and sustainability from UC San Diego, Cliff Kapono devotes himself to putting his two greatest passions—science and surfing—into productive conversation. For Kapono, a Native Hawaiian from the Big Island, surfing necessitates meaningful, intimate care for one's environment and is a practice deeply embedded in the familial and social histories

Steve Olson Jan 30, 2024 01:18:43 Steve Olson honed his skateboarding expertise sneaking into swimming pools across Southern California while growing up in the 1970s. His skating was wedded to a surf-centric childhood at a time when the crossover between the two was at its height. Olson earned a sponsorship by Santa Cruz Skateboards in 1979 and quickly became notorious for introducing a punk rock aesthetic and cool defiance to the

Coco Ho Jan 23, 2024 54:26 From one of surfing's most accomplished and recognizable families, Coco Ho was raised in the thick of the surf universe on the North Shore of Oahu. As a kid, she quickly gained notoriety as a high-performance surfer in her own right, winning multiple junior titles before eventually joining the Championship Tour while still a teenager, where she posted solid results and year-end rankings for over

Nat Young Jan 16, 2024 01:03:47 Dubbed "The Animal," Nat Young has spent nearly 60 years as one of surfing's most influential and esteemed figures. At the forefront of surfing's stylistic evolution during the 1960s, Young's victory at the 1966 World Championships in San Diego on his self-shaped "Magic Sam" helped cement Australia's place as a budding progenitor of high-performance surfing. In the decades since, he's maintained i

John John Florence Oct 8, 2023 58:35 Two-time world champion John John Florence looms large in surfing's landscape. The eldest of three brothers, Florence grew up on the North Shore, where his mom took the family to the beach every day after school. He quickly made a name for himself as a kid, inching his way from bodyboarding the shorebreak to sitting center peak in the lineup at Pipe. His knowledge, talent, and skillset extends bey

Keala Kennelly Oct 1, 2023 57:06 Keala Kennelly grew up on Kauai in a geodesic dome built by her parents and began surfing at the age of five, a contemporary of the Irons brothers. Through the 1990s and early aughts, she was consistently ranked top ten on the World Tour and was the first woman to tow Teahupoo. She has since pursued successful careers in both acting and music. Kennelly's life has been also defined by her pushing b

Brad Gerlach Sep 24, 2023 01:02:57 His father an olympic diver from Hungary, his mother a professional water skier, Brad Gerlach drew inspiration and drive from his parents' athletic accomplishments and competitive mentality. He gripped professional surfing by the horns in 1985, when, as a rookie on the tour, he took out the tour's major players to emerge victorious at that year's Stubby's Pro. Victories continued to color Gerlach'

Thomas Campbell Sep 17, 2023 51:07 Surfer, artist, and filmmaker Thomas Campbell's unique perspective was informed by upbringing in Dana Point, California, his background as a skateboarder, and his experience serving as editor of Skateboarder magazine in the 1990s. His films The Seedling (1999), Sprout (2004), and The Present (2009), which function loosely as a trilogy, aestheticize surfing on the basis of its inherent capacity for

Jock Sutherland Sep 10, 2023 53:17 One of the shortboard revolution's seminal figures and a Pipeline pioneer, Jock Sutherland hails from a family of watermen: His mother swam the northern coast of the island of Molokai, a journey which she later detailed in her 1978 book, Paddling My Own. His father, a World War II navy officer, was a seasoned kayaker, fisherman, and surfer. Sutherland and his family moved to Hawaii from Long Beach

Michael Scott Moore Sep 3, 2023 01:10:20 Journalist and author Michael Scott Moore's interest in piracy emerged from research conducted for his first novel, 2010's Sweetness and Blood, which traces the history and spread of surfing from pre-colonial Hawaii to the rest of the world. His interest in the issue spiked when a trial of ten Somali pirates began in Germany in 2010—the first time in 400 years that pirates had appeared in a Europe

Takuji Masuda Aug 26, 2023 56:05 From Kamakura, Japan, Takuji Masuda has been a progenitor of surf culture since the 1980s. After traveling the surfing world and competing professionally with the Oxbow Longboard team, whose members included Joel Tudor, Duane Desoto, and others, Masuda pursued an interest in storytelling and cultural production. In the 1990s, through his reverence of surf and skate magazines and inspiration from t

Chris Malloy Aug 20, 2023 59:55 The oldest of three brothers, all with prodigious surfing talent, Chris Malloy grew up riding waves between Point Conception and Point Mugu, where he learned how to navigate its competitive lineups. By the early 1990s, he was a core member of the Momentum Generation. An injury, however, forced him into the role of observer and ignited a career in filmmaking, resulting in projects like Thicker Than

Ashley Bickerton Aug 13, 2023 52:54 Born in Barbados and raised between Hawaii and California, the late Ashley Bickerton was a surfer, thinker, and artist whose mixed-media practice explored themes of identity and meaning, often critiquing consumerism, modernity, and social communication. He achieved early success in New York in the 1980s, alongside the likes of Jeff Koons and Peter Halley. In 1993, Bickerton abandoned the New York

Selema Masekela Aug 6, 2023 01:07:58 When Selema Masekela, storyteller and son of South African jazz musician Hugh Masekela, moved to Carlsbad in high school, surfing became his doctrine. He spent years working odd-jobs to fund his habit until he began producing and commentating for Transworld Skate, before he found his calling as an action-sports commentator and storyteller, using his voice to broaden the scope of representation in

Lisa Andersen Jul 30, 2023 49:16 Lisa Andersen's surf story began in the mid 1980s, at age fifteen, in her Florida hometown, where surfing—especially women's surfing—was an underground endeavor. She soon ran away from home and wound up in Huntington Beach, California. By the turn of the decade, she was a professional surfer, turning heads with an elegant and aggressive style that stood out among the ranks of both genders, and cha

Gerry Lopez Jul 23, 2023 51:27 Hawaiian stylist Gerry Lopez couldn't make a takeoff during his first time surfing Pipe in 1963 at age 13. Today, at 74, he is still widely known as Mr. Pipeline, after having devoted most of his life to the infamous patch of reef. His approach is the expression of a life lived in pursuit of stillness, mindfulness, and regard for the natural world. Sixty years after that inaugural and fateful sess

Mick Fanning Mar 12, 2023 57:23 On stepping off the world tour, grief, finding solace in competitive surfing, and dealing with the aftermath of his near-shark attack at J-Bay.

Raymond Pettibon Mar 5, 2023 36:27 On purism and art making, punk, surf culture, misheard song lyrics, art world disenchantment, what keeps him going as an artist, and Black Flag.

Kathy Kohner aka "Gidget" Feb 26, 2023 37:52 On the Gidget enterprise, surfing Malibu in the 1950s, feminism, Malibu's cachet among the Hollywood intelligentsia, the beach, and boys.

The Surfer's Journal presents Soundings with Jamie Brisick

Episodes

Recommended