chrome ball interview #59: daewon song

Chops sits down with Dae for donuts and conversation. 

So coming from South Bay, I know you heavily influenced that whole late-80’s Dogtown/Z-Boys scene back in the day. How did World Industries enter the picture for you? Did you even like World at the time?

Yeah, I grew up really being into that whole 2^nd generation of Dogtown and Z-Boys scene. Butch Sterbins, Jimmy Acosta, Scott Oster... I always loved those dudes. Those guys almost looked like gangsters back in the day, working on cars and stuff. It was cool how all those guys kinda meshed together back then. All of them riding Hosoi Rockets. Everyone just got together like that. They got me into it, too. Hey, you got teeth? I got teeth. This could be my thing.

The way I got introduced to World Industries is pretty funny. I actually saw Rodney out skating at 135^th Street School by himself one day. That’s kind of a hood school and I remember seeing him there and wondering what the fuck he was doing! He’s gonna get fucked up! Man, I don’t want Rodney Mullen, superstar skateboarder, getting fucked up at 135^th Street School and leaving Gardena with a bad name!

Funny thing, though, I guess he actually had seen me skating the week before at this other school and was asking my friend Pat about me. It was kind of weird because I never talked to him that day, he just talked to Pat.  He ended up taking off in his Camaro and Pat came over to tell me! I was blown away! But I saw him out skating that day a week later and he took down my number. They started sending me boards after that. Free World boards... which I rode with my Z-Rollers. I got so much shit for that.

“Woah, woah! That’s not cool, man! You gotta open up the new Poweredge and see the set-ups that the guys on the team are running! If you ride for World, you gotta ride Ventures!”

So I went with Ventures. I remember being super bitter about it, too. I can’t ride my Z-Rollers anymore because I’m supposedly on this board brand? I hated it. Super mad about not being able to put Z-Skin on my World board.

But I wasn’t officially on the team at first because a few people weren’t feeling me because I was on this weird thing back then. I wanted to be a gangster so bad. I wore Dickies and would slick my hair back. My combinations were so crazy back then, too. It’s like I had to slash out everything! Kickflips to back 5-0 and slash it out on the bench! It looked so crazy! But that’s what I was into!

I remember rolling up to do tricks and people would be yelling at me! Just do it normal! Nope! Grab that bench and slash it all out!

“Aww, man! Why!?!”

They were screaming at me! Trying so hard to teach me that slashing out was bad but I just didn’t know. I was trying to do my thing.

My mind was twisted up. I went from wanting to skate a certain way to almost needing to skate another way. But the thing was, I was always into the more technical aspect of skating. Always trying to shuffle it out or possibly add one more turn. It was technical combinations but I wanted to keep that edge with a nice slash. Puckering out the lips for that really aggressive grind.  

But Rodney had my back. Anybody that was hating on me, he’d stick up for me. I didn’t even know at the time. I’m out there doing all these weird body varial tail grab shuffle things and had no idea. But Rodney hung in there for me. He was like my body armor, protecting me from all of these bullets and keeping me innocent, in a sense.

What was your experience like with the older members on the squad? You represented that new guard on the team? They could’ve easily seen you as moving in on their turf.

I remember looking up to those dudes. These were the guys I watched in videos. Two World Industries Men and Rubbish Heap! I mean, at the time, they weren’t the guys that I was really looking at but I definitely knew who they were and knew they killed it. I thought they were cool but at the same time, I remember thinking to myself that these guys probably don’t bang. They’re not in a gang.  

I was in such a weird place. All that World stuff was cool but back then, I’d still rather be out with Butch Sterbins and Jimmy Acosta. Bring out the launch ramp and bust some frigids and judos off that bad boy in a back alley launch ramp session somewhere! (laughs)

I thought the guys on the team were cool but it immediately became apparent that these older guys were not feeling the new generation. It was Jeremy Klein, Dune, Randy Colvin… and then us new kids. It was like us versus them in some ways but they just had to warm up to us. It is real easy to fall into that shit mentality of “I can do that!”… especially when we started filming for Love Child. But that’s the poison. That’s the way you don’t want to think.

Things on World changed for me, though, once Shiloh got on. We’d always got out skating together. I actually remember us going out to skate once at 6 in the morning and seeing Mark Gonzales and Jason Lee out! They both showed up in these mechanics uniforms and just took Shiloh and I out! What the hell? This is the time pros go out skating?

We started thinking about how we were gonna get out there a little earlier the next day so we’d be warmed up by the time we saw them. We really thought we were gonna shine when those guys get there! So the next day, we got up at the crack of dawn to go skating and, of course, we never saw those guys again.

That time of skateboarding was the best. The thing you get to experience for the first time and the way you look at people… it was all so innocent. Like, “Wow, we’re at the same skatespot as these guys!”

Scrounging up busfare just to get somewhere that you heard so-and-so goes to. I love that part about skateboarding.

Talk a little bit that Love Child-era. A completely different direction for that company with you seemingly at the helm, getting last part and all. Were you psyched on your big debut? I know you turned pro after that, did you feel like you were ready at the time?

Eric, I’ve never thought I was ready to turn pro.

But filming for that part wasn’t even really like filming. We all just hung out and went on trips. I mean, the filmer was somebody I had grown up with. Socrates was filming me when I ran Z-Rollers and had no idea what was going on. It was cool that we were able to be introduced to the industry at the same time. He’s just the mellowest dude. Just talking to Rodney about Socrates, they actually started filming together and that’s largely how all those amazing parts of Rodney’s came out. Like in Questionable where Soc ollies the gap while he’s filming Rodney. So insane.

What’s crazy is that I didn’t even realize I was filming for a part during Love Child. We’d just go to a spot and Soc would ask if I had a trick. I’d land it and it accumulated from there.

The best is that random night footage I had in there. Socrates’s brother used to work at a rollerblading shop so he had this camera bag that was actually a neon rollerblading bag. He was so broke that he just stuffed it full of wrapping paper and placed his camera in the middle of it. But it was so bright, man! And it worked out because when it was dark at Beryl, we would actually place it in front of my truck with the lights on and because of how bright the material was, you could use it to help film.

Like a reflector?

Yeah, I’d do something in front of it and it actually helped us film! It was that bright! I remember checking out the footage once I got the trick, I couldn’t believe it.

But yeah, it definitely wasn’t like we were “filming” for that one. Not like it is now. Nothing was planned at all, just go for it. Everything was so spontaneous.  I remember being really nervous about that part, being caught really off-guard by it, but people really seemed to like it.

Where did the hardflip come from? I know there have been a few others to lay claim to this… Dan Gallagher for one but also Shawn Mandoli in the ill-fated Venture video.

I just remember Rodney talking about Danny Gallagher doing this inside inward kickflip-thing. We didn’t even know what it was but we went to try one across this little gap and I ended up landing it.

I kicked the shit out of that thing! I didn’t care where it went, just as long as I’m rolling away after I closed my eyes. There was no catching back then, we didn’t even know what a catch was! I just kicked the inside shit out of it and made it. It did something weird, bounced off of the ground and I landed on it. But it worked! (laughs)

“Put me in the background before you edit.” Was that just a common line for you guys back then?  And did you realize that it would catch on the way it did?

That just came from us being thirsty little kids, always out there filming tricks. We’d be watching our tricks in the edit bay after every session and it almost became like the news for us, like, “Oh wow, you got in the background!”

That was full-on spontaneous, though. I just happened to be rolling by right after Gavin did his trick and I said it. For us, it was all so innocent. Any sort of exposure you could get, you were hyped on.

Nowadays, people don’t want to be in the background. You see people going out of their way to get out of there, ducking and jumping behind trees. But back then, we were standing right in the front, getting noticed. Look at me! These videos were the showcase! And there I am! I was there! Pause it, that’s me! (laughs)

I don’t even know what we were getting from all that but I was hyped on it!

While Love Child turned heads, New World Order left absolutely no questions. Probably my all-time favorite part of yours, did you get the sense that you were making a big statement with that part or were you still just having fun? I mean, Daniel’s calling you the best in the world as you’re rolling away…

The thing with New World Order is that we got access to a park. It became our training ground and we could skate whatever and whenever we wanted. No pressure and nobody going to kick us out, we could stay there all night if we wanted. It became a way where we could all find ourselves and our own styles.

It was just a really fun time skating there and I was also still feeding off of the response to Love Child. It put a little fire in me. I knew I could do more and was now able to really sit there and try things. I didn’t care if I had to try for hours and hours, I wanted it that bad. Skating with Shiloh and Kareem back then was inspiring, too. Shiloh was so ahead of his time. He did so much before everybody.

Honestly, we didn’t even really know what was going to happen with all this stuff we were filming, we just knew that we wanted to film it all. Whatever this stuff was going to end up in was going to be awesome.

The infamous bunks, the trampoline, the blank boards down stairs… and of course, the actual park itself. Give us your best World Park story.

That park was insane. When Rocco put those bunks in there, it just became our own personal skate camp. Just the craziest place with all these crazy guys! Breaking into the closet where all the product was stored… somehow people figured out how to access it from the roof! Rodney would open it up and be like, “Woah! I swear to God I just put 20 boards in there! How is there now 2!?! How is this happening?”

Wrestling matches between dudes. Running off to the editing bay to watch the footage as soon as you land a trick. It became this exclusive club where everything was happening. It was awesome.

People had no shame back then either. You’d walk into the bed bunk area and see dudes looking at magazines, jacking off. You’d be like “Woah!” and then they’d get scared and things would get all weird. It was such a wild place, man. You always hear people talk about “these young kids these days!”… man, we were just as crazy back then. I can honestly say I didn’t take part in all of it, and I’m not going to say any names, but there were some dudes that just went for it. Living like rockstars at age 14!

Insane. But switching over to another popular playground of the day: what’s the most impressive trick that stands out from those years at the Beryl Banks?

I never actually saw the footage but I heard Dan Peterka back noseblunt slid the block on the little ones.

Really? That would’ve been like 1992?

Yeah, back in the day! It was insane! So ahead of his time.

But as far as the big Beryl Banks though… remember when Gino did a cab flip on it? That was already amazing but then he went and did a fakie hardflip on it, too! So incredible! You know, there might be some kids that show up and do all that stuff easy, but no one will ever be able to do it the way Gino did it at the time.

Definitely. So coming off that bonkers New World Order part, I have to imagine that somebody must’ve brought up the possibility of you going to Girl, right? Or were you seen as being too tight with Rocco? Were you even in the mix at all? I know you went through kind of a weird phase here.

Yeah, that was a strange time for me. I started hanging out with this girl and kinda disappeared. She was a Blood from Long Beach. I got super into her and got super into cars. I started buying tools and lowering peoples’ cars… getting under the hood and everything. I basically lost all contact with my skating friends. I didn’t even hang out with Daniel anymore!

I honestly didn’t even know if I wanted to skate anymore at that point. All of this other stuff became my whole world. There’s a point in your life where you have to go through all that. It’s an obstacle that we all run into and you have to figure it out. I always loved skating but just growing up and finding a girl… that first kiss with this amazing girl, you gotta get through that. You gotta figure out what you’re going to do with your life and how you’re going to get money. Skating wasn’t hardly paying at all back then. I could’ve got a paper route and made more money.

So you weren’t even an option to go to Girl?

I didn’t even exist back then. I wasn’t around and nobody was hitting me up.

I remember getting the call from Rodney after it happened and he was crushed. You can’t blame anybody but Rodney’s heart was just broken. Those guys had issues with some things that were going on Rocco. They thought some things were shady and decided to start something new. I don’t even know. Maybe or maybe not this stuff went down but I felt that Rocco and Rodney always had my back since the beginning so I was staying with them. If it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t have anything. 

I just couldn’t believe that it all happened like that. It gave me a real wake-up call. I remember being on the phone with Rodney and he thinks we’re finished.  The whole thing’s done. I didn’t know what to say really so I started apologizing to him. That I was sorry that I hadn’t been around and that things would be different. Thanking him for doing so much for me and promising that I was going to start skating again and filming more. That I was going to try my hardest because I felt I owed them that. That’s how we started it all again.

Luckily, Mark McKee came up with a graphic that ended up saving World Industries, to an extent. That’s what all that Wet Willy and Flameboy stuff was. Those cartoon guys saved the brands! I mean, I don’t really care about any of that stuff but I knew it was able to put Rodney back in the game.

It’s scary to think about where I’d be if World Industries would’ve failed and I didn’t get back in there to film Rodney vs Daewon. I might be able to hook you up on an oil change or something. I’m glad I stuck with skateboarding because it really is what I love the most.

Crazy to think about. But going back a little bit: who’s idea was it for you to take the Goldfish out of the fountain in Trilogy? And what did that mean exactly? I always took that as beef.

You know what’s funny? That was my idea! But it wasn’t to go against them. It wasn’t anything about that actually. I just loved fishing. It’s been one of my favorite pastimes for a long time. I remember going to different lakes and trying to get my photo on the wall for different stuff. Biggest trout! I wanted the wall to have a photo of Daewon Song and his 22-inch Trout!

That actually happened once, too! Most Bluegill Caught! It was so weak! I remember thinking to myself about all the big fishing guys that must come in and laugh at me.

But when we did Trilogy, that was my idea. It was kind of a weird thing but I meant it more as like us being all friends still. I still have a lot of respect for Girl and loved all their skating. But you’re right, the more I thought about it afterwards, that thing could’ve went really sour. They could’ve definitely taken it the wrong way, for sure, but it was more about everything being all good with everyone involved. There’s respect for you guys and what you did and we are also still here and doing well. Girl is great company and World Industries stayed in the loop and survived. We’re all still around.

Do you have personal favorite part of your own? And do you even see them as one large continuation or more like little episodes from different eras? Like my picnic table phase, my rocks and trees phase, etc.

I’d say that my favorite part is probably from the Deca Video. There was just more to that video. I was around a lot of people that I had respect for and we were able to go crazy in a warehouse again. We just wanted to film, film, film. 

I slept under a desk for two weeks on that one. I’d skate all day in the warehouse and when it came bedtime, I’d go into the offices, cover over a desk with a blanket to where it was like a tent and go to sleep. The next day, I’d wake up and go filming again. It really was a great time.

I just wanted to build and make all types of obstacles to skate. I don’t even think people really knew how to react to that part when it came out because it was so different. Everything was so outside and at spots that were located at specific places. People like knowing where spots are. Like knowing how steep the Beryl Banks are because you’ve been there and checked it out. In a warehouse, nobody knows how hard or easy it can be.

Never thought of it like that but you’re right. But how do you look back on these different phases? Like your picnic table craze, for example. Did you realize at time that your name was becoming so synonymous with that?

No, I had no idea. Believe me, I went on a Black Label/Deca Tour and everyone started calling me “the Picnic Table Assassin.” It was awful.

And you know the story about me going to some contest in Huntington Beach, right? I went up to one of the announcers and he goes, “Man, we tried to get a picnic table here for you, buddy. We tried. It just didn’t happen.”

“Well, that’s it for me then. Nothing left for me to do here.”

I was so pissed about being “the Picnic Table guy.” I still get it to this day and I hate it. The Picnic Table Assassin.

Is that stuff just your OCD taking control? Taking a premise to its conclusion?

Yeah, that’s my thing. You can tell by looking at my video parts. If you see me get involved with a certain thing, I have to finish it. It has to fit the format of what I want. That’s my OCD.

Like when I was skating trees in 5-Incher, people would tell me about this great ledge spot they knew and I wanted nothing to do with it. Why would I want to go to a perfect ledge spot? I am on the hunt! I don’t need your perfect ledge! I’m looking for a tree that got knocked down or possibly hit by a car.

The funny thing now is that I don’t want to skate that stuff anymore and I have all these people coming up to tell me about this “sick tree spot” they found. No thanks. I’m just not into that anymore but it's what I felt at the moment. I hate that stuff now but I couldn’t get enough of that stuff at the time.

I’ve always been curious as to what your process is like with these combination tricks? What’s going on in your head with a four-trick combination?

That was another point, especially in those Deca days, where I went crazy with the combos. Everything was a combo into something else. A noseblunt bigspin wasn’t enough. I just wanted more and more but there was never enough for me at the time. I’ll noseblunt bigspin to fakie manny and add more stuff as we go. Put that combo in towards the beginning of the part then fakie kickflip out of it later in the edit.

It’s funny how you can get to this point where you’re programming all of this stuff in your head. But you can always do more. Where does it end? It never does. It just became too much. I think I got a little too known for that… “Okay, he’s gonna grind, then manny and kickflip out. Now he’s gonna do it again.”

I remember that there was even a joke going around, “Why don’t you want to interrupt Daewon in the middle of a manny trick?”

“Because he’ll flip out.” (laughs)

Horrible. And again, I just got over it. I got to a point where I wanted to go to a different area of skating. I didn’t want to keep comboing it up. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still doing them but a lot of them are more subtle than what they were.

As an example, and I hate bringing up tricks I did because it sounds gross, but in 5-incher I do a kickflip manny combo where I fakie flip out over these stairs... but my intention was to use the stairs almost like a bank. But stairs are not a bank and there’s no surface there to go down… which is exactly why I wanted to do it. It’s still there. You can ride down stairs. Who didn’t tremor down a long set of stairs when they first started skating? It was so fun! Just like a machine gun! Not like a firecracker but to actually ride down. Land your front wheels on them and ride down the stairs. It’s a different type of combination but it was so exciting to make that. Just like being a kid again.

Do you suffer from madness at all? I have to imagine you’re a prime candidate…

I definitely have to do things a certain way. Some things are super serious, too. For example, if I’m skating a demo and some suit-and-tie guy comes in that doesn’t know anything about skateboarding, it’s like kryptonite. I can’t skate. Its harder for me to skate around people who don’t know or care about anything in skateboarding but who are pretending to. I can’t do it.

Like if there’s a guy at a demo and he tells me to do an “air”, I can’t even function anymore. Just the way they say it to you. It really does something to me. I’ll go sit down in a corner.

Another thing is with combos, like if I want to do a half-cab blunt to something, I have to do the half-cab blunt first. I have to start at the beginning. That’s what ruins me for contests! I have to do a regular blunt before I do a blunt to tre flip. That’s my set-up trick because while I’m only doing a blunt, I’m envisioning doing a tre flip, even though I’m not. Now that I have envisioned it, I can do it now. Yes, its funny and weird… but I have to do that or I’ll lose my mind.

One thing I’ve always wondered, how come you never tried your hand at any of those Battle at the Berrics or Manny Mania contests?

Because I’m just the worst under pressure. When someone tells me that I am supposed to do something, you’re not going to get it. I’m gonna slam. It has to be spontaneous for me. Every once in a while, I’ll get a request and somehow end up doing it, but usually, I can’t. Even if it’s fairly easy, I won’t be able to do it. 

With those contests, there are all these people watching who have such high expectations for me, I can only lose. I hate it. I don’t want to let anybody down so I just shut down. Even now when I go to skateparks, I‘ve found that it actually helps me to introduce myself to the kids. Talk to them for a little bit so I feel like I know them in a way… then I’m okay. It becomes like we’re all skating together instead of me being there, hoping I can land all of my tricks. But I’m the worst at that stuff. I mean, I still get nervous at demos! Hilarious.

Is that why you’ve never sought out the more marquee spots over the years? The Embarcaderos and the Love Parks?

I’m not sparked on those actually because everyone is going there. I don’t want to go. There were a couple places I skated because I was on a trip and everyone else wanted to go. I hated it.  

“Ok, I’m here at popular spot! This is really popular! I can’t believe everything that’s already been done here.”

I just never had the spark for it. Plus, I hate traveling. I’ve always told myself that I could push a 10-year career just by skating in my backyard. I heard Eric Koston once say that everything I’ve filmed in the last 10 years has been in the South Bay and he’s absolutely right. There are so many spots here but people are lazy. They don’t want to go look for spots, they want other people to scout them out for them. Why wait around for someone to find a spot for you? I mean I love suggestions… but sometimes, I’ll drive around all day and be out lurking in parking lots to look at stuff. Because there is so much. I’ve actually found spots behind those popular spots that I end up liking more.

But how do you get inspired to skate rocks and trees?

Rock skating has been around forever, Sheffey talking about the vibe of it all and everything. Trees, too. The inspiration for that last Almost part was asking myself what I would do if there wasn’t anything left to skate? What would I skate then?

I started thinking about all the spots that I’d wanted to skate but had something prohibiting me from trying. Maybe because you landed in grass or there was a dirt path instead of a roll away. But why can’t you skate that? Who wrote a rule saying that you can’t land in grass?

It became clear that this concept was what I wanted to do, it became something that I wanted to prove to myself. That while the texture on this tree is perfect for a tre flip, the material itself will cake in if you land incorrectly. How do I land on it and shift my weight around so I can roll away from it? I wanted to figure these little things out.

I want to skate a rock, to actually push through and grind it. It's so hard because those things just grab your trucks. I wanted to prove to myself that a kickflip front crooks on a rock is possible. On a bench, it grinds right through. You’re on and you’re off. There’s no real sense of accomplishment. But a rock is a whole nother thing. I didn’t think that would ever grind. I remember sitting there just begging for it to please let me go! Please let me have this!

When I finally landed it, I was so happy! I even put a little wax on it but I got so much satisfaction from having grinded this rock!

Even with the river bed that I was skating. People thought that water was so disgusting, even though it really wasn’t all that bad until I started landing in it. But that came more from a sense of just not caring anymore. The enjoyment I got from approaching it and kicking a judo! I was going back to my old school roots with the Z-Boys! Judoing with the Z-Boys in mind and landing in a gross waterfall in the LA River… it was awesome! Even if I did get whiplash from it. It was so fun.

It was at this point where I just stopped giving a shit what people thought about these video parts. Who cares about what they think of my skating or what it is that I’m skating. It wasn’t for them. It was for me. If I want to go out there and have fun, I don’t need a skatepark. I wanted to prove that there are no structures that we have to build or that have to exist on this planet for us to go out there and have fun on our skateboards.

I got a lot out of that part for myself.

Incredible, man. But one project I can see falling in line with this school of thought is Cheese and Crackers just because it seemed like so much fun! How did you arrive at this crazy concept in a warehouse doing all these nutty tricks?

It just came from Haslam being around.

Nobody knew that I liked skating mini-ramp as much as I did but I was always so amazed by how good Haslam was on it. I wanted to showcase that somehow…hey, let’s do a mini-ramp video!

Haslam was down and we ended up renting a warehouse in Long Beach to film it in. Its funny because the warehouse actually used to be an old Meth lab so the landlord rented it out to us for dirt cheap and let us do whatever we wanted to with it. We might’ve had it for 4 months or so. It actually felt like the old World warehouse a bit.

Everything just kept building on itself. There just happened to be these old tires around and Haslam ended up skating one when it hit us like, “Holy shit! Let’s just build all kinds of random stuff! Just like the Deca days!”

It ended up being one of the funnest projects ever. Haslam started building all of these crazy boobie traps with tires rolling around everywhere. Trying to make swings on the deck We just let ourselves do stupid things off of each other. So much fun.

At the same time, though, we didn’t want any hype for it. We didn’t want to promote it as a “mini-ramp video”. We just wanted it to come out. There are people out there that love skating mini-ramps but there was never any real thing for them. It was almost like they were embarrassed that they skated those things. Why? Why would you be embarrassed?

We’re actually talking about doing a Cheese and Crackers 2 but you always hate sequels, ya know? You always feel like they’re going to ruin what was done in the first one. But you never know, what if we did something completely different? It’s definitely a possibility in the future.

What is your response to critics of this stuff that call it all “circus tricks”? The difficulty involved with this is incredible and it does appear that you guys were just having fun…

They are “circus tricks”, you know? When people call them that, I completely agree. Because if you say that you can see something I did in the circus, that’s great. I go to the circus all of the time! I love the circus! I love everything I see in there!

But there comes a point where some tricks, I watch them and realize there is a lot going on there. It is a little circus-y… but who am I to judge? I have plenty of circus tricks myself. If that person had fun doing that “circus trick”, more power to them. Circus tricks either make me wonder how they did something or just put a big smile on my face. It’s a mixed response with me honestly because I love them and hate them.

It’s always seemed like you’ve been above all trends. That you were out there on your own trip, doing your own thing. Where do you see yourself in skateboarding? How much do you pay attention to “the industry”?

With all of the new things that have come into skateboarding, there must be a few guys that sit at home and just hate every new thing that is happening. I’m not that way although I definitely look at it in disbelief some times. There are some things that I don’t necessarily like but I feel are inevitable. Everything is evolving, including me. It’s a little weird but it’s not all bad. If that’s the style of skateboarding those guys want to do, that’s fine. It’s not affecting me. It’s a love/hate thing but I really do try to love it all. Why waste time hating on it? I’m just gonna sit back and watch it all go down. If I choose to be a part of something, I will. But in the meantime, I’ll be going my own direction. I don’t care about visibility, I’m fine doing my thing in the background. 

Killing it, for sure. As we bring this thing to a close, is there anything you’d like to add? Any words of wisdom or anything?

There’s something that I always say and it always rings true: just be you. I’ve been able to do what I believe in and have survived in this crazy industry. There can be so much politics in the industry but just believe in yourself and push forward with what you got. People always say that it’s so hard, everything is hard. If you believe in it, go for it. You never know. You just have to go for it.

special thanks to daewon, luis cruz and mark whiteley.