Tattoo magazines were usually a mixed blessing, back in the pre-internet Dark Ages. On one hand they connected you to a global tattoo community; on the other they were usually put out as part of a Biker magazine family and didn’t always reflect the cultural standards of something like Hardy’s TATTOO TIME.

As tattoo culture evolved, more and more magazines popped up. Content was king; when you had a family of magazines to put out every month you’d pretty much feature anything and everything you’d photograph at a convention. Each passing issue would have less and less quality work, but you’d pick them up, just in case.

For my money, the best of the bunch was Michelle Delio’s run on Tattoo Revue. (which ran under the banner of Outlaw Biker’s Tattoo Revue) As the editor, she really turned things around, wooing top artists to provide content.

Issue #25 had a multipage interview with Daniel Higgs conducted by Ed Hardy. While Tattoo Time #5 featured some of Daniel’s work, this was a rare sitdown interview that puts you where his head was at the time. I scanned the entire interview last year and put it in my flickr page. Last night, someone submitted my scanned pages to Occult Vibrations for inclusion. Strangely enough, I had forgotten about them, so it was a welcome email.

So, thanks to an OCR program to turn the pictures into text, here’s the complete article:
Daniel Higgs being interviewed by Don Ed Hardy, Tattoo Revue #25:

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How did you get started in tattooing?

I started getting tattooed right after I got out of high school… I got one and just kept going back to get more and more, so I was in the shop all the time time, at Tattoos Tux’s place in Baltimore… and after doing that for a few years I landed an apprenticeship with him to work there for a couple of years, learning the rudiments of it, and eventually wound up out in San Francisco doing some tattooing and it just kind of fell together.

Were you doing other kinds of art before that?

Yeah, I’ve always drawn pictures…

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