photo: rockography

Sinner is living the life. At least, that’s what I thought from watching his Instagram over the last several months. Scattered stories of EDM festivals, clubbing with Nyjah, models and skating – this is the setup that many kids dream about but never actually experience outside of sneaking into the VIP section of a club. But for every epic molly high, there exists an epic low, and it wasn’t until I got on the phone with him late one afternoon that I understood where he’s truly at in his life.

At 30 years old he’s joining the list of skaters who made names for themselves as partiers but left it behind either to be more productive or to just stop waking up feeling like shit every day. Caught in a transitional period of his life, he’s since moved into Nyjah’s skatepark and works everyday on “sending it” while maintaining his sobriety in post-rager years. Fortunately for us, Sinner wasn’t trying to hide anything, and shared his battles with depression, pursuing new career opportunities and the challenges of keeping his company LE alive.

I see you’re partying a lot and skating on Instagram. It seems like you’re living a pretty good life these days.
Just to give you an update, I’ve been sober for the last 7 months. 100% sober, except cigarettes, coffee, and energy drinks. Some people think those energy drinks are pretty hectic but they help me a lot as far as not drinking alcohol goes.

Was there a final rave you went to before calling it quits?
Yeah, it was a solid 8 months of going so hard, bro. I got sober after Electric Daisy Carnival in Vegas over the summer. I was going off the rails then. I was obviously trying to self-medicate my depression and it wasn’t really working at all. I was crying like every day. I was just sad. I was living in a studio apartment in Long Beach, by myself. I was struggling super hard to make rent because I was partying so hard. I was kind of suicidal and then I was like fuck, maybe I should just try to stop using all these substances.

“I just wanted to retire…from like, killing myself…”

You quit drinking and drugs cold turkey?
Yeah, I just went cold turkey dude. I never really thought of myself as a gnarly alcoholic and I’ve been to AA meetings before that were court-ordered shit. I got the feeling that those wouldn’t hurt if I was trying to do this on my own. It honestly hasn’t been that hard for me because I partied so hard since I was a freshman in high school. I’m 30 years old now. It’s been like 15 years of all that shit, just a gang of partying.

I kind of got a realization like “What have I done?” You start thinking about where you’re at in life and being sad and shit. I guess just having regrets that you’re not further ahead when you’re 30, you’re just kind of broke. I’m tired, bro. Partying starts to become a job, all that. So the idea of stopping…I just wanted to retire, [laughs]… from like killing myself, so I did. Now I have LE and my bandana company to work on and keep me busy.

photo: bart jones

Are you still living in Long Beach?
No, I started coming to terms with myself that I couldn’t afford my apartment because I needed to stay 100% focused on being sober. I couldn’t make rent and I asked Nyjah [Huston] if I could move into his warehouse. Nyjah built his skatepark in a warehouse with offices and the offices are pretty vacant. It’s nice, there’s a shower in the bathroom, there’s a lounge, they turned one of the offices into a bedroom with a bed and all that. There’s also a break room that’s like the living room with a couch and a TV.

The worst part about it is there’s no kitchen, but I made a bootleg kitchen. I bought a microwave and a hot plate and there are Monster refrigerators everywhere. I need to get some rugs in here though. It’s been like 3 months at Nyjah’s. I just moved in there and making the best of it. I really appreciate him for helping me get back on my feet.

Do you have structure in your life right now?
I’ve had such a messed up sleeping schedule this whole winter. I think a lot of it has to do with partying. Like, partying but not getting fucked up, but I still party, for sure. Some of those nights when I drive Nyjah and everyone to the club I won’t get back until 6am. I’ll get back and go to sleep and wake up at like 1pm and it kind of rolls into the week. On average I go to sleep at like 4am or 5am and wake up at like 12pm.

I’ll stay up working late on all those bandanas for my company, B Bandanas. I sew the tags on myself, I iron them into triangles myself, and then I roll them up and put them in the fancy packaging they come in. All myself.

Since I sobered up, I’ve been trying to make up for all the lost time. I’ll get into these gnarly work moods where I go for hours making these bandanas. It’s a madness thing. I’ll be like “I’m going to make 100 bandanas tonight.” When I was partying a lot, I was always thinking like “Fuck dude, my companies could be doing much better if you just fucking stop raging so hard and actually focus on that.” I haven’t necessarily gotten there yet, but it’s been less stressful knowing I’m on that path.

You mentioned you drive Nyjah and his crew to the clubs? Are you the permanent designated driver?
On the weekends, since I’m not drinking anymore, Nyjah actually pays me to drive him and the homies around. Which is probably why a lot of people still think I drink and stuff. I still party, but I’m not using. A lot of people don’t understand how I live this lifestyle sober. I like partying, I like dancing, it’s fun. It’s misinterpreted, people think you have to get fucked up to party or have fun. Maybe people are just insecure about partying without getting faded.

Is it hard dealing with drunk people while you’re sober?
It does get frustrating. That’s the hardest part of partying and not being fucked up. I’m like the babysitter because you naturally want to make sure everyone is good, safe, and not getting into trouble or fights. When I find myself getting frustrated I have to remind myself that these people are just fucked up and you’re going to look back tomorrow morning and laugh about it, so why not just laugh about it now?

I make the best of it. A lot of the time, I’ll go out to the car while they are at the club and just chill to get some peace of mind. I’ll mix music on my laptop. I’ve been messing around with production so eventually I can mix my own tunes. That’s the goal.

photo: flavio ruiz

Is your company Life Extention done now?
No, LE has been through a lot though. We were with Blitz Distribution when we started in 2012 then they went out of business so we went with Element to distribute, and they were kind of slacking with sales. The whole thing with a distribution is they’re licensing deals where you get a percentage of whatever’s sold then you’re expected to put the profit into marketing to help them sell more boards. But if they’re not selling anything, you don’t have money to market it. We were getting royalty checks that were so small. Some months would be like $100, so you’re pointing your finger at their sales team and the sales team is pointing their finger at you for not enough marketing. It’s like the chicken or the egg type thing. You can’t market it if they can’t sell it and they can’t sell it if you’re not marketing it.

We wound up moving LE to Surplus and Element was more than happy to let us go. They were like, “We can’t sell it, so take it.” I started doing Midwest sales for Surplus too which was sick because they were paying me to sell my own product. But eventually shit hit the fan and they had to let me go, so they let us take LE back and now [Nick] Trapasso and I moved everything into his garage and run LE from there.

“We were getting royalty checks that would be like $100.”

Were you sober when you started doing LE out of Nick Trapasso’s house?
Absolutely not. I was fucking raging [laughs]. I wound up dropping the ball on production. I was so focused on doing sales that we ran out of boards. We were just cold out of boards at the most inconvenient fucking time, springtime. But I was thinking about life and what I wanted to do and it wasn’t sales. Going to Nick Trapasso’s and working 9-5, Monday through Friday and going to shops was not making me happy.

It was just a waste of time in my mind. Not trying to big up myself or some shit but I still can skate and I still want to skate. We’re like the owners and faces of the company, we shouldn’t be inside Monday through Friday. We should be outside skating, filming and getting content to market the brand and keep our fans hyped.

photo: ben karpinski

You must be getting girls at least though, no?
Dude, you would think so! I don’t get laid, ever… A lot of these girls are in the nightlife for — well, I guess some of them are trying to get laid — but for the glitz and the glamour. I get a lot of false leads. I remember this past weekend I got some girl’s number and I was like, “Come to the after party!” Because we always go to the after party after the club at these super fancy Hollywood mansions. She was like, “I can’t make it to the after party, but we should hang out soon.” So I was hyped that there was a girl who actually wanted to hang out. I got my hopes so high, I thought we would go out for some food or coffee. Sure enough, no responses during the week. That happens more often than not, bro.

“I don’t get laid, ever”

What’s a Hollywood mansion after party like? How do you find out about it?
Typically the people don’t own the house the party is at. It’s always an Airbnb. I just learned this the other night. It might be some rich dude that isn’t even from LA, he’s just on a business trip and he’ll hit up club and party promoters. The promoters set up an Airbnb and hire security. The promoters make it a nightmare to get in. The standard is like five girls for every dude that gets in. So you could not know anyone and just be a random dude showing up with five girls and you could get in.

They’ll make exceptions too like, “If you’re with three super girls, we’ll let it slide,” but it’s ridiculous. Luckily for us, we know a lot of these promoters and they’ll let us slide. Also, a lot of the time Nyjah has like 10 girls with him but technically that only covers me and Nyjah. There are always a few other homies that get to slide, but who fucking rolls around with five fucking chicks and no dude? I can understand if it’s a gay dude, but that’s not normal for straight guys.

One thing that I always hear is, “That’s Nyjah Huston, he’s the best pro skater in the world. You better let him and whoever he’s with inside.” But, a lot of times you wind up waiting outside of the gate for like 20 minutes and looking like a total fucking loser until you wind up back in the car on your laptop.

Do girls try to get to Nyjah through you?
Yeah, we call them “infiltrators.” It’s the fame and fortune thing, and I’ll deal with it a lot just because I’m close with him. They’ll use me as a stepping stone, and they’ll make me think that I have a chance and really they’re trying to get at Nyjah. I’ve learned more about that now. When that’s happening and you’re getting fucked up you’re not really thinking about it clearly. I was getting my feelings hurt and growing a huge resentment towards females. I was like, “Fuck chicks!” But now that I’m sober I just expect it. If I get that vibe I won’t give them that attention that they want. Girls are a waste of time for the most part, anyway.

“You notice all the girls that have big noses use the
reindeer filter to make their nose small?”

On Tinder, is your name Sinner, Bandana B, or Pat?
I have it as Pat. But I’ve deleted that app so many times. I met up with a few chicks from Tinder and they were nasty. They didn’t look anything like their photos. They were also looking for relationships and I was like, “Bro, first off, I’m not looking for anything but a one-time hookup right now.”

Tinder is like Snapchat, some chick just convinced me to download Snapchat. I’m not sending anything out but sometimes chicks send nudes or provocative videos and it’s not even worth taking up storage on my phone. The worst is when I’ll be DMing a girl on Instagram and then she asks for my Snap. I’m like, “Why? So you could make yourself hotter?” You notice all the girls that have big noses use the reindeer filter to make their nose small? Every time I see a girl with that filter it’s like a red flag, she’s got a huge schnoz.

I will admit that I tried Bumble. I was hearing good things about it, but it doesn’t fucking work for me, bro. You match with them and then the girl never messages you in the 24-hour window. They want the matches to feel good and feed the ego. Like, “I could bone that dude if I wanted to, but I’m not going to message him.” Fuck Tinder, fuck Bumble, fuck Snapchat. It’s all about real life… or Instagram. That’s fucking lit.

photo: kyle seidler

When you were partying, what were you doing exactly? How many times have you dropped acid or done molly?
Mostly alcohol and weed. In my lifetime, probably like 10 to 20 times. Acid gets a really bad rap, dude. A lot of people are scared of it because it’s called acid. Let’s refer to it as LSD. I think everyone should do it once in their life. I don’t think I’ve ever had a bad trip on LSD. I’ve seen crazy shit but I guess I’ve been able to take a step back and realize, “Woah, you’re on drugs right now. Just breathe, this is all temporary.” A lot of people just forget to do those things while they’re experiencing heavy effects. But it honestly helps you see things from a different perspective and appreciate life in a different way. Life changer for sure.

Mushrooms are way harder for me to ride out, to be honest. Those things are more of a roller coaster. You’ll get hit with waves of being fucked and it’ll start making my stomach upset and flip. I used to be able to handle them when I was younger. Now that I’m older whenever I eat some of those things those trips are bad, bro. I’m not trying to give mushrooms a bad name, but they’re really intense.

“I think everyone should do LSD once in their life”

Look, I’m not promoting that activity but I’ll be 100% serious. When I used to go to those shows on ecstasy, the sounds and lights were amazing. Any music sounds good when you’re on those type of substances, especially EDM. Like I said earlier, I still go and have a great time watching the sets, running around, and dancing. The only difference is I have a way better memory of the experience.

I’ve probably done molly like 20 or 30 times. Ecstasy, I‘ve probably done like 20 times. I haven’t done a crazy amount of drugs. It seems like a lot more, but 50 times is kind of a lot when you think about it. Like maybe a couple times a year for like 10 years. I started doing that shit when I was 15. Over 15 years, it’s honestly not that many times.

When I look back in I just remember, “Bro if you hadn’t gotten this shit out of your system in your 20’s you’d still have the urge to do that shit now.” So it reminds me to stay positive because I would rather be the guy doing that in my 20’s than in my 30’s. We’ve all seen those guys, it’s depressing. You don’t have to go that hard in your 30’s.

People are probably going to read this and be like, “Fuck you, this dude is fucking fried.” I’ve told my parents shit since I’ve sobered up. I pretty much just laid out all my cards because I don’t have anything to hide anymore. If people want to judge me that’s fine, I don’t have any regrets.

Interview by: Ian Michna
Photos by: Ben Karpinski, Flavio Ruiz, Kyle Seidler, and Bart Jones
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