Podcasts about soundings

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 backyard. Nathan competed in amateur events, but they were never his thing. He preferred big, heavy waves, and he got friendly with Mack truck-sized barrels. Technology conspired in Nathan's favor, specifically YouTube. He started vlogging and his clips connected.  Today, with more than half-a-million followers, Nathan's on what he's dubbed "the Slab Tour," where he searches the planet far and wide for mutant waves. Nathan's wife, Mahina, shoots many of the clips. Nathan and Mahina live on the North Shore. Complimenting his heavy-water surfing is his role with Florence, the family brand, for which he and his brothers are hands-on in the R&D, test piloting, and overall vision.  In this episode of Soundings, Nathan talks with Jamie Brisick about mastering fear, growing up at Pipeline, his brothers, why competition was never a fit, training, close calls, how vlogging changed his life, foiling, and the Slab Tour. Presented by Rainbow® Sandals. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin). Become a TSJ member at surfersjournal.com.

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, which was a new frontier at the time, becoming part of the pioneering crew at Waimea Bay. Muñoz appeared in the new Surfer magazine in 1960, riding at Malibu with Dora and Mike Doyle, all three on the same board, as well as doing the first ever "Quasimoto," a head dip with the front arm aimed forward. Muñoz competed in and won contests, among them the Tom Morey Invitational noseriding event, in 1965, for which the prize was a whopping $750. He shaped surfboards for Hobie, got deep into sailing and catamarans, and brought what he'd learned on the open seas to wave-riding and board design. He wrote a memoir, No Bad Waves: Talking Story with Mickey Muñoz, published in 2011. But Muñoz's legacy is as much about simply living and perpetuating the joy of the surfing life as it is about benchmarks or achievements. And he's still doing it, at age 87. In this episode of Soundings, Muñoz talks with Jamie Brisick about Malibu's golden age, experimenting with shorter boards, early days on the North Shore, riding Waimea, modern performance surfing, riding waves into his eighties, and Miki Dora.   Presented by Rainbow® Sandals. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin). Become a TSJ member at surfersjournal.com.

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. But he never let his surfing slip. He competed in pro longboarding events in the 1990s, then did the short-lived ASP Longboard Tour through the early aughts. He appeared in several surf films—The Seedling, Sprout, One California Day, Single Fin Yellow, and Self Discovery for Social Survival. In 2014, at age 40, he won the Deus 9-Foot & Single contest in Bali. Today, Howard works as the Global Marketing Director for Channel Islands. He's also known widely as a proponent of the egg, or midlength, design. In this episode of Soundings, Howard talks with Jamie Brisick about what makes a great surfboard, working in surfing, the allure of eggs, riding for Donald Takayama, and traditional longboarding. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin). Become a TSJ member at surfersjournal.com   

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 with Pipeline. He seemed to toy with the world's deadliest wave. In 2003, he won the Hansen's Energy Pipeline Pro. In 2004, he won the Pipe Masters. In the aughts, O'Brien revealed his defiant side when he burned an ASP rulebook in a Red Bull-sponsored video. He took his career into his own hands, starring in the videos Freak Show, Freak Side, and Who is JOB?, the latter of which led to a web series. In it, he was self-effacing, absurdist, and refreshingly not serious.  The videos resonated with viewers, and soon O'Brien became his own brand, making YouTube clips that would shoot into the million-views realm. He rode soft tops at big Pipe. He pulled wild stunts, including famously bringing pyrotechnics to Teahupoo. Now 42, O'Brien lives just down the beach from the house he grew up in. He's recently founded a surf school, The Jamie O'Brien Experience. And he's still charging, playing, and documenting it all. In this episode of Soundings, O'Brien talks with Jamie Brisick about growing up on the North Shore, the hierarchy at Pipeline, his relationship to competition, getting creative in the lineup, and documenting his day-to-day life on camera.  Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).  

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 New York Times, The Atlantic, Dwell, The Surfer's Journal, and many others. His 2014 book, DEEP: Freediving, Renegade Science, and What the Ocean Tells Us About Ourselves, follows clans of extreme athletes, adventurers, and scientists as they plumb the ocean's depths and uncover surprising new discoveries. But his big book is, of course, 2020's Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, which explores the million-year-long history of how we humans have lost the ability to breathe properly, and why we're suffering from various maladies because of it. Along with drawing on thousands of years of medical texts and recent cutting-edge studies in pulmonology, psychology, biochemistry, and human physiology, Nestor also found answers in the muddy digs of ancient burial sites, secret Soviet facilities, New Jersey choir schools, and the smoggy streets of Sao Paulo. In sum, Breath turns the conventional wisdom of what we thought we knew about our most basic biological function on its head. Nestor has been a guest speaker at Stanford Medical School, Harvard Medical School, Yale School of Medicine, and the United Nations. He currently lives in Portugal.  In this episode of Soundings, Nestor talks with Jamie Brisick about the fundamentals of breathwork, Ocean Beach, growing up in Orange County, his early days as a reporter, the values of freediving, and writing books. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).

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 thing at the time. But Tomson's surfing was only part of the equation. He was business minded, and in the late '70s launched a clothing label, Instinct, and in 1985 a surf shop, Surfbeat, in Santa Monica. He holds a BA in Business Finance. In 1991, Australia's Surfing Life mag named him as the world's all-time best tube rider. Tomson co-produced Bustin' Down the Door, a 2008 documentary film chronicling the rise of pro surfing in the early '70s. He's the author of the best-selling Surfer's Code: 12 Simple Lessons for Riding Through Life. In this episode of Soundings, Tomson sits down with host Jamie Brisick to talk about transformative experiences in the tube, growing up in South Africa, the influence of his father, the highs and lows of his professional career, writing his book, and the passing of his son. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin). 

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 Volcom-produced videos, among them BS!, Psychic Migrations, Lobotomy, and One Hundred and Fifty Six Tricks. A prolific maker of artwork in a variety of mediums including painting, drawing, sculpture, collage, ceramics, furniture, skate ramps, film, and video, Wright is also lead singer of the Goons of Doom, an experimental, piss-taking punk band. In this episode of Soundings, Wright sits down with host Jamie Brisick to talk about the differences between North and South Narrabeen, airs, childhood memories, the influence of grunge, dealing with criticism, style, unlocking the self through creativity, going on tour with his band, and finding fun in subpar waves. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin). 

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 boardshorts and riding polka dot twin-fins when most Californians followed a far more understated ethos.  Kwock was featured on the cover of Surfer and Surfing magazines in the early 1980s, did a short stint on the world pro tour, but soon became a forerunner to what we now know of as a professional "freesurfer." But he also saw the virtues of the long game. When the opportunity arose to work in a behind-the-scenes role at Quiksilver, he jumped at it, and he hit his straps as the marketing director, a position he held from the early 1980s up until the mid-aughts. (It should be noted that Kwock's relationship with Quiksilver began a few years earlier, when he and his Echo Beach buddy Preston Murray got caught stealing boardshorts from the warehouse.) Kwock's early team captain/marketing position started in what were wild days. The industry grew fast, and he played an instrumental role in that growth.  In this episode of Soundings, Kwock talks with Jamie Brisick about meeting Duke Kahanamoku, surfing Wedge, the Echo Beach era, fashion, negotiating contracts, Andy Warhol, the wild days of the surf industry, and signing Kelly Slater to Quiksilver.  Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin). 

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 first person, male or female, ever to have water shots published of wily Ocean Beach.  Other "firsts" include serving as the first female board member of Save the Waves Coalition and first woman to receive the Wave Saver Award from the non-profit. She documented the first women's heats at the Mavericks WickrX Invitational, the Puerto Escondido Big Wave Challenge, the Da Hui Backdoor Shootout, and The Eddie. Cunningham has been included in both Surfline's list of top filmmakers and Surfer magazine's list of top photographers. Her feature-length documentary, SheChange, about the quest for pay equity in big-wave surfing, is presently in post-production, and has been featured in the New York Times and on the Today show. A mental health advocate and cancer survivor, Cunningham lives with her husband and daughter in the Outer Sunset neighborhood of San Francisco, where she's a Professor Emerita at San Francisco State University. In this episode of Soundings, Cunningham sits down with Jamie Brisick to talk about shooting from the water at Ocean Beach and Maverick's, the importance of journalism, her quiver, motherhood, and her battle with cancer. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).

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 the IPS, which linked together what at the time were fragmented pro events around the world. They established a ratings system and a world tour, which ended with the crowning of a world champion. In 1983, Randy spearheaded the Triple Crown of Surfing, which linked together the three North Shore events, and also crowned a champion. Randy would helm the Triple Crown for the next 30 years. Randy is also a surfboard shaper. He was taught how to shape by Dick Brewer and George Downing, and went on to make boards for Surf Line Hawaii, Dewey Weber, and Lightning Bolt. While Randy might be one of the most widely traveled surfers of all time, having ridden waves in over 70 countries, he's called the North Shore home since 1969, and has lived in the same house at Sunset Beach for more than 50 years. He surfs out front, i.e., his backyard, regularly. In this episode of Soundings, Rarick sits down with Jamie Brisick to talk about about the birth of the IPS and the Triple Crown, learning to shape from the masters, rating systems and standardization, surf purism, the importance of Hawaii, and spending a year traveling up the west coast of Africa.  Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).

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—and has held that position ever since. He's been a major force in nearly every Eddie, winning that coveted event in 2001. He's paddled Jaws, towed Mavericks, Nazare, and Shipstern Bluff, and pioneered several mutant, way-out-to-sea slabs. He was the subject of the 2006 documentary titled The Sixth Element: The Ross Clarke Jones Story, narrated by the late Dennis Hopper. He and Tom Carroll starred in Storm Riders, a big-wave surfing reality show on the Discovery Channel, which led to Storm Riders 3D, a feature-length documentary. In this episode of Soundings, Clarke-Jones sits down with Jamie Brisick to talk about glory and catastrophe at Waimea Bay, manifestation, his lifelong relationship with Hawaii, racing sports cars, overcoming injury, maintaining motivation, dealing with fear, and the joys of small waves. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).

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. While he stepped down as Hurley's CEO in 2015, he remains deeply involved in surfing, still sculpting foam, as well as working with John John Florence on the latter's own namesake company.  In this episode of Soundings, Hurley and Jamie Brisick sit down at the executive's ocean-front home in Newport Beach to talk about the key ingredients for his entrepreneurial success, Southern California's surf scene through the decades, the highs and lows of the industry, sponsoring Occy, learning to shape, and legacy. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).

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, the world title. Menzcer has appeared in many surf videos, including 1998's Blue Crush (the surf video, not the feature film), 2001's Peaches: The Core of Women's Surfing, and 2004's Surfabout: Down Under. She's the unofficial star of the 2021 documentary Girls Can't Surf. She released her memoir, Surf Like a Woman, in 2024. She was inducted into the Australian Surfing Hall of Fame in 2018. In this episode of Soundings, Menczer talks with Jamie Brisick about grommethood hazing in Bondi Beach, winning a world title, overcoming adversity, battling stereotypes, adjusting to life after pro surfing, and writing her memoir.  Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin). 

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, and ESPN.com. In 2009, he was contracted by Patagonia to be a projects photographer. Burkard's photo books include The California Surf Project, Come Hell or High Water: The Plight of the Torpedo People, Distant Shores, High Tide, and The Boy Who Spoke to the Earth. Along with still photographs, he makes films, including Russia: The Outpost Volume 1, Faroes: The Outpost Volume 2, The Cradle of Storms, and Under an Arctic Sky. You might glean from those titles that Burkard has a penchant for the colder locales. On that note, he started photographing Iceland about two decades ago—and fell so in love with the place that, a couple years ago, he up and moved there with his wife and two sons. Along with photography, Burkard is also an avid adventurer, recently completing a 90-mile fat-tire bike ride across Vatnajökull, Europe's largest glacier. In this episode of Soundings, Burkard talks to host Jamie Brisick about traveling, Ansel Adams, the allure of cooler climates, finding purpose, moving to Iceland, the state of surf photography, and the challenges and rewards of environmentalism. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).  

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 transitioned seamlessly from longboards to shortboards—and went on a winning streak. He won the Duke again in '70 and '71; won the first Pipe Masters in '71; won the Hang Ten Pro and Gunston 500 in '72; and the Hang Ten again in '73. Bookending his stellar competitive run, he won the Bells Beach event in 1976. After winning that event, Hakman sat down with the owners of a fledgling Aussie brand called Quiksilver and convinced them to make him the US licensee. Today, Hakman lives in Bidart, France, where he sits down with Jamie Brisick for this episode of Soundings to talk about surfboard design, growing up on the North Shore, the birth of the surf industry, humility, and the challenge of returning to an everyday existence after living the extraordinary. 

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 contest forum. Now 27, based in Coorabell, near Byron Bay, Wawn is a freesurfer known for her big, swooping hacks. In this episode of Soundings, Wawn sits down with Jamie Brisick to talk about lineup hierarchies, her relationship to competition, life as a freesurfer, producing content, the importance of self-expression, and her cinematic goals.