Cut Loose Album Art Backstory
How a few moonlight surf sessions changed my life.
Surfing Swamis under a full moon, with a head full of powerful mushrooms. An experience like no other on this earth.
A few years back, some local surfers from Carlsbad invited me on a boat trip, one of the many times I’ve beckoned to the call of surf travel. It was one of the most profound experiences of my life. Surf trips depend on good people, so care was taken when selecting from an already tight crew of local surfers. The results were so spectacular, I’ve already been back once and hope to go back to Indonesia again in 2024. It’s my sources of inspiration, as well as an endless spring of life.
The road is an earnest teacher. Teachings from the road often vary, from the smallest personal interaction, to the grandiosity of crossing the ocean into a sky of fire. Memories of my travels are living parts of my personality. To this day, I can still see the lines coming in at KFCs, an open swell hitting the break with just my friend Adam and I out there alone. On the other side of the channel, Macaronis was packed with goofy footers. I can hear Jody screaming from the yellow ponga boat as he was checking up on us in our session. I was just kicking out of the back of a dream wave, 10 to 12 long drawn out carves on a wave that just kept on going forever. “I THOUGHT that was you Mark, Holy shit! What a wave.“ Jody shouted. Captain Jody, what a cool MF.
When it came to making art for the single release of “Cut Loose”, I wanted the art to evoke one of my fondest travel memories. While the actual surf break in this picture is somewhere in Indonesian Mentaiwai island chain (look up my Mentawai Surf Journals), it’s meant to represent a local break (Swammis). It wasn’t taken at midnight under a full moon, it was taken in broad daylight, and it sums up the way I surf. I don’t surf all that well, but I go for it. My technique is often sloppy. Most of my drops aren’t pretty, elegant, or even remotely graceful. Just raw power, like the Iggy Pop album.
Normally in surfing you don’t think at all, everything is feel.
It was a late drop, with my arm up to my elbow in the wave to pivot quickly with the wave, and it just stood up perfectly. As the wave started to kick into overdrive, I could feel myself getting pulled up and back towards the foam ball fast. I remember specifically thinking to myself, “dude, you need to take your fucking arm our of this wave, stop stalling, and get some speed”. When I pulled my arm out and leaned into it, the board kicked into sonic overdrive. The board, a Rat channeled quad from 2015, had already been to and from Indonesia. I found out it has a 5th gear that kicks in, right when you need it.
It was a magic session, like so many others towards the end of that surf trip. Everything, all the training, the wisdom, came together. But I digress, I’m not here to talk about Indonesia. True, the photo is from there, but I thought it somehow reminded me of another session. Guessing that session was over 15 years ago. I modded the photo a bit for the single release cover (that’s me being a designer and photographer). Which brings me to the session I’m here to talk about. It was a doozy.
Surfing Swamis With a Head Full of High Octane Mushrooms
Another lifetime ago, before kids, we used to regularly surf by moonlight. I think the first time we did it was 12:30 am or 1 am mid winter with overhead swell in the water. I met my buddies for a beer at the Office in Cardiff, CA and one (Rick) says “Hey man we should go surf.“ At that time in my life, all of us always had a board and a wetsuit in our trucks, ready to go, anytime. I tried to back out due to the fact that I was already quite buzzed, my buddy shot back, “XXL wetsuit right?! I have a spare in my truck, you can wear my 4/3.“ I balked, “yeah, but I have no board either.“ “You can ride my KG fish dude.” “Faaaaaaakkkk, I played right into it.“ I thought to myself.
My buddy wasn't taking no for an answer so three of us finished our beers and pulled off the road by the train tracks across the street from Swami’s parking lot. Surprisingly, the visibility was great and we got an amazing amount of waves. You have to understand, Swami’s is one of the most crowded breaks in San Diego. I swore off the place years ago due to the fact that it was loaded with grumpy old kooks. Not tonight, those crusty old farts were sleeping. Fast asleep getting ready for their morning sessions.
A few hours laters we ascended back up the stairs still laughing our asses off. It was one of the best experiences we could’ve hoped for, and we were stone sober and ready for sleep based on the all the exercise. With that crew , every full moon it became a thing. We’d play some music, have some beers, then late night, by full moon we’d hit the waves. It was pure comedy. After about 6 sessions in, my good friend had in his possession a decent back of mushrooms. As we were suiting up, he said “hey man put out your hand.“ He proceeded to dump a bunch in my palm laughing, “Let’s do this brother!“
The moon was directly overhead in a high noon angle at midnight, it was bright as day. Amplifying the light was a 360 degree colosseum of clouds on the horizon. It almost looked like a domed ceiling with a hole in the roof to let the moon and stars light the interior. Something out of a Harry Potter movie, or those crazy Underworld vampire and lycan movies. The light was a cold, deep, Prussian blue. The surf was a few feet overhead so by the time we made it out to the main peak, the shrooms were in full effect. It was pretty intense, but the beauty was so out of this world that fear dissolved around us.
I spun into position and paddled for my first wave, as I stood up, the off shore winds blew the tops off the waves like shining diamonds all around me. It’s was eye popping visual candy, and riding the wave felt just as stunning as the surrounding visuals. Countless waves, one after the other, each one feeling like you were surfing on top of the living Milky Way, will all of its sparkling precious stones of light. We must’ve been out there for two hours, the psychedelic effect would pour out into the open, and just like that, cool down to a point to where you’d think the trip was done. You’d stand up on the next wave and it would kick back into full effect, the feathering wave blending into the night sky. A massive conflagration of water, energy and light.
As I kicked out of a wave toward the end of the session, my mind started to drift to the boys in grey suits. It was night, I was in the zone, but sometimes the mind wanders and you need to wrestle it back from oblivion. My mind was doing exactly what I’ve always been taught not to do in the open ocean. If you think about predators, your fear attracts them. Apex predators sense fear, and are drawn to it, sort of like a self fulfilling prophecy. Part of surfing, and doing anything in the dark in the water is controlling your mind, and making sure fear doesn’t come into the picture. All night, the clouds I gazed upon morphed into mythological reliefs, moving and changing across the sky. Active personification of the surroundings.
Now all I could see in the sky was shark fins, shark teeth.
I laughed and thought to myself, “unicorns, teddy bears, fluffy shit“. It was working until a cloud shaped shark devoured the unicorn. Funny AF. Luckily the bad mental mojo didn’t last long, just during the paddle back to the peak. Hearing my buddies laughing and hooting at each other brought me back quickly to a good place. I wonder if I just sensed something, or was just being paranoid. After a few more rounds of waves, we decided to call it quits. As we were drying off across the train tracks from Swami’s parking lot and exchanging stories from the nights session, every cop car in Encinitas pulled into the parking lot. Weed was still illegal back then, we had just lit up a joint and we decided to get the hell out of Dodge and finish the doobie in my buddies back yard with some beers off Santa Fe drive.
So it was just another hell of a night, a hell of a story. I hope the modified picture holds up to the story. It certainly reminds me of that night in the water, lifetimes ago.