Miller will be in St. Louis this weekend for the Old School Tattoo Expo and talked about tattooing, punk and being a reality TV star. This interview was conducted while Miller was waiting in line for a ride at Knott's Berrry Farm amusement park outside LA, where he was celebrating his daughter's birthday. Guy is a trooper.
Photo: Tim Sutton
"TV is going to end, this shit is going to end eventually. I took the ride. The circus was in town and you do that," says Miller about his time on LA Ink.
I come not necessarily to look for work, but for me to see what's going on, what artists are doing, who's doing radical new stuff, that's what inspires me. I love going out and seeing guys getting creative and doing neat things. Especially for the fact that it's an old-school convention. I know Lyle (Tuttle), he's a great guy, to be invited by those guys it means a lot to me too. I've been around along time, but now I'm in the big limelight of the whole tattoo industry, and for those guys to appreciate me coming around, it's a good feeling.
At the convention this weekend, will you be tattooing? Will you judge any competitions?
I'm not going to tattoo, because I didn't want to get a license to tattoo in Missouri. They've invited me to meet people, and there are lot of fans of the show. I'm going to show off some tattoos and sell T-shirts, take pictures with people. It's something really strange. The whole TV thing -- three seasons deep into a TV show, there's a lot of people that want to meet you and buy a poster or T-shirt.
Do you make your own tattoo equipment?
I do. I have a couple machines with a friend. Dan Dringenberg. He's traveling to St. Louis with me. We worked the Lyle Tuttle show years and years ago. Definitely old blood.
What's it take to get an appointment with you?
We just finished the third season on November 6. I just kind of hit the ground running and came home and I'm back at my shop, Six Feet Under, opening in December. I'm not booked at all [now]. I try to just keep it basic: I go to work, tattoo and go home. I'm not booked for a year, like people would think. But when I open my books, they fill up really quick. I was booked for a year before I left for Hollywood to go do that show.
Now that you've been on the show, do you charge more for work?
Maybe just a little bit. I'm a little more inland from Hollywood. You don't want to undercut your competition -- you have to keep up with the Joneses. i kept it pretty moderate. If anybody knows me, they know I'm fairly inexpensive.
On Friday when you're here in St. Louis, Jeremy Swan of Silver Lake tattoo near Yosemite National Park will try to double the world record set by Kat on the LA Ink: He wants to tattoo 900 people within 24 hours. Do you have any comment on this guy's effort to beat the record set on LA Ink?
Good luck, man. I watched Kat that night, I wouldn't have wanted to try that. Good for him.
