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Open Mic 21: Nolanium
4 Plays1 year ago
On this episode of Open Mic, The MVP chats with one of the leading artists in sports and wrestling, Nolan "Nolanium" Harris! We talk about his early beginnings as an artist, his art style, how he makes money drawing caricatures, creating with pro wrestlers, working with the NHL, and much, much more!
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Transcript
Introduction and Pod Foundation
00:00:21
Speaker
Welcome everyone
00:00:38
Speaker
to another episode of Open Mic with the MVP Marco. Obviously, it's a Chick-fil-A show production on the MVP Marco, of course. And you know, Ali, I don't have any sponsors on the show, but I do like to...
00:00:52
Speaker
do some little house cleaning before we get into the interview. And I get awesome guesses this time around. So my house cleaning is obviously, it's always a pod foundation. That's the crew that I'm a part of. That's a crew that Chick Foley or Sheena Phelps and her husband Seth Phelps started. It was basically a collection of all the, what we thought were the best content creators and podcasters.
00:01:15
Speaker
in wrestling and in general. And obviously that consists of the Chick Foley show with, like I mentioned myself, Seth Sheena and Jordan Wells, a fig God, as we call him, because he's great at fig hunting.
Marco's Role at Turnbuckle Tavern
00:01:29
Speaker
We also have the coming down the aisle with J-Bone. That's my partner on the raw down.
00:01:37
Speaker
on the Turnbuckle Tavern feed. If you're familiar with Turnbuckle Tavern, you definitely should be. They're mainly, they're the workhorses of the Pod Foundation. They literally have a podcast every single week. They don't stop. I'm actually, like I said, I know I'm in the inner workings. I'm a part of that. Like I said, I do their show called The Raw Down. It's on YouTube Thursday nights at eight, live. Me and Jay Bone, we give our musings on the, you know, what's happening in the world of the WWE.
00:02:06
Speaker
And a little bit of AEW if it pops up, if it kind of intersects, we'll do that. Last but not least, the extra cooler show. Nick and Matt and the Survivor Series team, they're a part of the crew as well. They just came back from hiatus. They're pumping out some shows right now. They're the nostalgic part of our crew, so they go back in the archives and they kind of give their commentary on old matches, old paper views, what have you. And they do some current stuff as well, so definitely check
Introducing Nolanium
00:02:35
Speaker
them out.
00:02:35
Speaker
You can always find out all the new information all the new episodes that pop up You'll find on at pod foundation on ig and then all of our individual um, uh instagram accounts as well Definitely follow all of us if you can if not, like I said pod foundation and you'll get all the up-to-date news on what's happening with the pod foundation, so Let me bring in my uh, my guests this time around. Uh, this gentleman is uh, i'm gonna say one of the best
00:03:03
Speaker
artists out there. Definitely go to his page. We do the plugs later on. He definitely won't be disappointed. I'm actually wearing one of his works right here on my shirt, Nation of Domination. Can't get the full picture in there, but as you can see, a pretty swell shirt. This guy's a pretty swell guy. I'm going to bring him on. Nolanium.
00:03:29
Speaker
How are you, sir?
The Nation of Domination Shirt Story
00:03:30
Speaker
How are you doing? Hey, Marco. Oh, man. Like I said, definitely a fan get the rock of the shirt, not not trying to get any brownie points or anything like that. But like I was saying, it's a you know, it's I mean, I'm in Massachusetts. It's fall season.
00:03:46
Speaker
We're starting to break out the long sleeves, the hoodies and all that stuff. So this is one of my favorite pieces here. This is from the black wrestling podcast, which I was talking to you a little bit before we hopped on one of my one of my favorite podcasts out there. How did you get connected with like working with them? Like, did they reach out to you for some of these pieces and things like that? Yeah. Yeah. So so Matt Damon, he hit me up, you know, not Matt, not Matt Damon. Oh, my God. I was like, what? This Matt Damon, in my opinion, is
00:04:15
Speaker
an upper echelon. So, uh, no, Matt hit me up. He, he shot me an email and this was during COVID. Yeah. You know, a lot of, a lot of opportunities kind of opened up for me during COVID because a lot of people were thinking outside the box about some new things they could do, some ways they could bring in revenue and also entice the fans and get some excitement going around. So Matt hit me up and he was like, dude, I want you to do a nation of domination shirt. I'm like,
00:04:40
Speaker
Bro, I freaking love the nation. Like I still think about 98. I'm like sitting in front of my TV watching law and I'm seeing all four of them in the middle of the ring, just stirring up that crowd, getting them all freaking like fired up.
00:04:56
Speaker
And then watching The Rock come into his own and then also Owen being a part of it on the outside was also really entertaining.
Meeting Farooq and His Legacy
00:05:04
Speaker
But yeah, Matt reached out to me. I did the piece and it blew up, man. All of a sudden, they put it out there into the world. And I'm not saying how they put it out. I'm not saying... Yeah.
00:05:16
Speaker
I'm not seeing what the means were of them putting it out, but they managed to sell a lot of shirts and some of the people that I ended up seeing photos of wearing them were people like Mercedes Monet, Big E, and then Ron Funches.
00:05:40
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Ron Funch has ended up wearing it on stage for, uh, for one of his comedy shows. So that was like, I was like, wow.
00:05:50
Speaker
especially when you come up with an idea like that, like just, well, I mean, I kind of want to talk about the nation now that you brought it up and, you know, just thinking because you just brought up all those different iterations of the, of the, uh, of the nation of domination as a, when it started up to up until when obviously the rock took over and, you know, started his own crew, which what's your favorite version of the nation?
00:06:10
Speaker
domination, would you say? I mean, I'm a huge mark for the rock. I'm sorry. The rock. I thought it was just I just thought it was really entertaining. I think the entire idea of the nation is is super valid, even in the even like the current era. Yeah, everything that's been going on, especially with, you know, during COVID, you know, like Black Lives Matter and all that.
00:06:33
Speaker
I feel like something that has the weight of the nation now could be even greater than it was back in 98. Yeah. Also on the same token, man, that's some heavy stuff to like having a wrestling show with like eight-year-olds and like seven-year-olds in the audience. But I
Ron Simmons' Influence on Wrestling
00:06:53
Speaker
met Farouk
00:06:54
Speaker
for the first time, Ron Simmons at WrestleCon in LA back in April. And I made this huge collage piece of all the black wrestlers that I had drawn over like the many years. So it had everybody. I mean, it had like little cutouts from the Nation shirt I did. It had some other stuff with, you know, it had everyone. It had Jade Cargill in it.
00:07:19
Speaker
It had, you know, just had all these amazing black wrestlers that have really made a name for themselves over the past like 30, 40 years. And I gave it to Ron and I wasn't asking for anything in return.
00:07:32
Speaker
It was just a gift. Wasn't asking for an autograph. I just said, you know, Hey man, you're someone I've watched my whole life. I really appreciate everything you've done. I mean, you're, he was the first black world champ. That's huge. So he just stared at it. He just like looked at it for like five minutes and he was just, he didn't say damn or anything like that, but would've, but he was like super grateful, super, super nice. It was a really, really cool experience, dude.
00:08:02
Speaker
Yeah. How, how's, you know, I can't, well, I'll get to my next question, but like, you got to think like he's looking at that, like that, that, that picture that you gave him. And it's like, he's probably thinking in his mind, like all like, you know, obviously, like you said, he's, he's a trailblazer, trailblazer. The first, uh, you know, world champion that, you know, was black. And like now he's seen all these people after him, all these athletes coming out. He's probably looking at it like the, not, not that he's like, you know, responsible for all of them, but like, he's probably looking at it like,
00:08:31
Speaker
like, holy, like, this is like, this is, I, I, not that I started it, but like, this is like something that I kind of like, you know, kind of like started moving forward with all these, you know, all these like young athletes. I want to come into this business because it's something that I did or something I've seen. Obviously you could go for, go backwards and go like Butch Reed, like junkyard dog and all that stuff.
00:08:52
Speaker
But he was the one that showed that it could happen. He won a world championship. He was the face of a company when there weren't any at that time. There weren't any black athletes that were the world champions of a wrestling organization. Not even Junkyard Dog. He was stuck in the mid-card area.
00:09:14
Speaker
Odd enough, he was the most popular wrestler at that time. He's kind of like the, I hate to use it, but he was a equivalent of Hulk Hogan at the time in popularity. Even when he was at the WWE too, when he moved over there, the crowd just loved him. But they just didn't give him that push to obviously win the championship.
00:09:35
Speaker
So at least back in the eighties, there was a person that did that. That was Ron Simmons. He definitely blazed a trail for a lot of people and fans as well, too. Not just not just the wrestlers, like a lot of like, you know, black kids like myself, you know, watching that and then watching like other wrestlers come up, you know, he said to him, he moved over to WWE, Mark Henry.
00:09:56
Speaker
you know the rock, dilo, all these guys like under his tutelage and yeah man it was it was that i i wouldn't i i would like i'd probably freak out if i was in that position you were in uh will you like will you like kind of like will you just like yeah you know this is me i you know i'm the best at this here's my artwork are you just like holy holy crap i'm standing next to uh
00:10:16
Speaker
Well, it's a tricky thing, right? Like Ron's tenured. He was in a predominantly white industry back in the 80s. He played the game, but he was respected and revered by all of his peers. You know what I mean? And when you're an artist, I don't know if people can see me right now, but I'm as white as it comes.
00:10:40
Speaker
Yeah, artists come to you and and they happen to be Caucasian like myself.
00:10:49
Speaker
but they are giving you a piece with like 30 plus African-American wrestlers on it and letting you know, Hey man, like I hold you in the utmost of reverence. I respect you. I respect everything that all these other wrestlers have done as well. But I think the coolest thing is you're talking about being a fan, right? And seeing Ron do his thing, all those other wrestlers were fans too. Yeah, that's right. And that's super transformative. Like if you meet any wrestler in today's era, you know, anyone that's been wrestling in the last 10 years,
00:11:19
Speaker
Those guys are just as big of fans as we are. Yeah. They just put, you know, they put the elbow grease in to like make it all happen. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. He was super, super generous. I gave the same print to Mark Henry, the boogeyman and Devan and all, all of them were just like, whoa. I think the gravity.
00:11:42
Speaker
Or the weight hits you once you see everyone together, you know, yeah, it's it's like I said, it has it. I mean, like I said, I can't read their minds, but just seeing something like that. And I'm being the, you know, the veterans, the legends of the industry and then seeing like all these people like.
00:11:58
Speaker
that like, you know, that were there before them there when they were there. And then after them, they, it definitely has to have some type of effect on like how far, how far are they coming? Obviously with the, you know, with the championship reigns, like, you know, obviously the rock, Colby Kingston, Bobby Lashley, um, you know, just, just to name a few there. And yeah, I mean, it's, it would definitely, definitely be something that, you know, I would, I mean, if I was presented something like that, I'd probably be for it as well. I'd be like, holy crap. But, um,
00:12:27
Speaker
What other wrestlers or stars have you ran into or run into or interacted with because of your artwork?
Creative Collaborations with Wrestlers
00:12:40
Speaker
Well, I mean, there's lots of collaborations. It's a very collaborative type of business. So I think my first real foray into doing a collaborative artwork for a wrestler was with Hulk Hogan back in 2011, 2012. Wow. I helped them launch their beach shop in Clearwater.
00:12:59
Speaker
So we ended up having some phone conversations where we talk about some ideas and some concepts and what they were looking for. I'd send sketches and then we kind of go from there. And then it became its own thing. Um, which was like its own thing that like talking with whole coping over the phone, someone I had watched for decades was just wild to me. But then as I started to kind of get into the industry proper and not dealing with like things that were outside of wrestling that were like tangential, like a beach shop. Yeah. Um,
00:13:29
Speaker
My favorite interactions so far have been with Finn Balor because he himself is also an artist.
00:13:37
Speaker
He draws, he does graffiti. He's a very talented graphic designer if you actually look at some of the stuff he's done. And I've had a collaboration with him where we worked on a chalk line jacket together. Oh, OK. That one was a lot of fun because he actually contributed his own artwork for it. He actually did a special sketch of him doing the finger guns
00:14:04
Speaker
And that's on the sleeves of the jacket. That's awesome. And that's something you can't find on any piece of WWE merch anywhere else.
00:14:14
Speaker
I have a lot of freedom. I'm not going to kind of go down the rabbit hole, but I do a lot of artwork for licensing. So like, WWE, they have their own team of artists that works on stuff for the shop. But a lot of what I do is for licensing. So different companies that do different WWE products. Roosevelt's, Chalk Line, 500 Level, Rockham Socks. There's a little more freedom there.
00:14:41
Speaker
And so I actually have the chutzpah to DM these guys and be like, hey, I need some feedback on this product I'm doing for you. And they'll be honest with me. If the WWE shop did that, I don't know what kind of conversation they'd be having.
00:14:59
Speaker
But yeah, with them hours, awesome. Adam Copeland, as we know him now, but time edge. Yep. Collaborated with him. And that was really fun as well. I did a great couple of shirt for him and Beth and edge was super complimentary, super awesome to work with on that one too. So yeah, it's just really cool. It's, it's really Mercedes Monet back when she was Sasha Banks. I did a shirt for her in Naomi.
00:15:28
Speaker
didn't come out because they ended up leaving. Wait, hold on. Was that the shirt? Was that the was that the one with their faces or was that a different one? No, there was one that was going to launch two weeks later. OK. OK.
00:15:43
Speaker
And Mercedes actually reached out to me on that one on her own. And it was one of those kind of like backdoor deals where sometimes WWE isn't too hot on wrestlers reaching out to artists without their approval, but- They can see that.
00:15:58
Speaker
Yeah, in this instance, Mercedes reached out and she was like, hey, you know, you did some stuff, some fan art of me that I really liked. It'd be really fun to collaborate on something. Yeah. And then, you know, timing didn't work out on that one. But there's a whole world of shirts, man, that have been created and designed that have never made it out there into the world.
00:16:21
Speaker
that you were a part of as well? That you? I think every wrestling artist. Okay. I'm sure every wrestling artist has a story they can tell you about that. Yeah, that's right. Actually, you know, you're right. I did a, when I did interview, uh, uh, extra cooler neck, he did mention that that, you know,
00:16:37
Speaker
obviously he's been, you know, he kind of does the same thing, works with like wrestlers directly and, you know, kind of gets like license and stuff. And I think he did say there was a few times where he submitted something and then it got rejected or it got canceled or something happened with like a contract within whatever company. And they, you know, say if it was like a legend or something like that and the legend's day was over and he was in the middle of, you know,
00:17:01
Speaker
you know, putting something out for like that company and it just canceled. They got rid of the licensing and, you know, that's it. That has to be like a like a is that a like a bummer to you? Does that like kind of, you know, does that like, you know, kind of discredit like anything you do or do you just like, you know, this is an opportunity that I'm missing. I can just move along and do it. How does that affect you when that happens?
00:17:23
Speaker
I think it's a good story to tell. I mean, that's the most important thing. I think it's a really good story to tell because you're building relationships this whole time. And I think the relationship building is probably the most important part of what I do. But it just kind of gives you an idea of how many other industries deal with artists.
00:17:43
Speaker
where their stuff doesn't see the light of day. Think about Marvel concept designers, the guys that create the outfits for the Avengers. They literally painstakingly create 30 different outfits for each character, but only one sees the light of day.
00:18:04
Speaker
Yeah, I feel like on that end, I'm getting like the easy. Yeah, that is true. But you know, it's a storyline driven business. And the fact of the matter is, what the wrestlers and the writers and the producers are working on.
00:18:21
Speaker
the artist might not be privy to any of those things. You know what I mean? Yeah. So like, obviously no one could have predicted Naomi and Mercedes leaving in the manner they did. Yeah. But I'm even working on stuff right now that should be coming out like soon that may or may not see the light of day because of the ebb and flow of the storyline. Okay. Wow.
Wrestling and Comics Synergy
00:18:49
Speaker
That's odd. I didn't even think of that.
00:18:51
Speaker
Yeah, that's actually true because obviously if you are working in the wrestling world, storylines change. People move around in different spots. People might leave the company and go to another company. That might be a heel turn and you're like, I was just doing a t-shirt for this guy. What the hell?
00:19:10
Speaker
I was actually, I want to go back to the Finn Balor thing because that's actually a good kind of like point to pivot to wrestlers that are artists. And I didn't, I didn't know he was one, but I, I knew like, I knew it like Jerry Lawler, um, cause he, you know, if he's at signings and stuff like that, he'll do like artwork and stuff for people and Bret Hart too.
00:19:31
Speaker
And I remember just thinking with a reference in Extra Cooler, he started drawing because of Bret Hart's drawings. He copied how Bret Hart drew, like his cartoons and stuff. How did you start? What was your art style at the beginning? Did you copy anyone or did you have your own type of art style when you started?
00:19:54
Speaker
So my background is predominantly caricatures, like I started drawing caricatures, and actually my primary business, how I make my living and pay my mortgage and all that is I own a caricature company out here in Seattle.
00:20:08
Speaker
But that style was very much steeped in animation and comic books. So like comic books obviously is like very much tangential to wrestling. Larger than life characters with colorful costumes and pageantry, good versus evil, you know.
00:20:32
Speaker
So I drew inspiration from a lot of comic book artists. If you look at my earlier stuff when I first started doing wrestling art, like maybe back in 2014.
00:20:42
Speaker
A lot of my stuff was more cartoony, a lot more exaggerated. But as I started to kind of see what people were more into and what the wrestlers were really gravitating towards, I kind of leaned more towards the comic book style and focused more on that and more on making it dynamic and high concept.
00:21:03
Speaker
awesome did you so when i look at when i look at your art style i don't know why for me it always it kind of reminds me of like a this kind of this kind of like an old school reference hopefully if if you're listening out there definitely look him look him up if you don't it kind of reminds me of like two people for some reason i don't know why i see this jack herbie
00:21:25
Speaker
And, you know, do you know who Eric Larson is? Yeah. Yeah. So like your, your art style kind of reminds me of those two, like an amalgam of both of those art styles. For some reason, when I see some of your, some of your artwork, just like, just how the characters like pop.
00:21:42
Speaker
like they just see like the it's like maybe like the uh like the outlines of the characters just the way they look i just i just i don't know i every time i see that kind of just reminds me of those two if they were to like combine their art styles for some reason that's what it um that's what it looks like to me that's how i interpret your art anyway i mean that's a massive compliment man i mean seriously it's like though those guys were both trailblazers in their own respective ways like jack kirby defined the entire look of marvel comics yep
00:22:12
Speaker
And Eric Larson's run on Spider-Man was one of my favorite runs. Of course. Talk about that all day. Back when he was doing it. I was like, I couldn't wait for the next issue to show up on my doorstep back when he did stuff like that. No, that's a huge compliment. That's a lot of praise. I draw a lot of influence from those guys. Greg Capullo is one. I love him. I'm a huge fan of his. I'm actually looking at a piece I did that was inspired by his work.
00:22:40
Speaker
And, um, I, I absolutely love his stuff too. Jim Lee, obviously. Yeah. He's, you know, I think I'm a little better drawing faces than Jim Lee, but he's got me beat on everything else. Yeah. Yeah. I actually have, uh, man, I could, this is, this is crazy. Cause I can, like, I could actually talk comments or something. Now I actually have a, uh, I have his DC art book that he came up with the deal, the art of Jim Lee and whatever it's called.
00:23:05
Speaker
and it's like the Barnes and Noble icon edition and space it's not any of his obviously Marvel stuff it's all his DC and his DC stuff and yeah you're right man as far as like the like the like the bodies and stuff like that the muscles like he's like and it shows like the sketches in there and stuff like that of like obviously like Superman Batman all the DC characters and then like
00:23:24
Speaker
from his uh his company the uh with the Wildcats and all that stuff yeah like yeah his his art style is probably like my favorite art style but i do love also um i love Todd McFarlane as well he's uh oh man like i could watch him like do his like he doesn't i'm not sure if he still does him on his instagram um because my algorithm is all messed up now but he used to do like quick like one minute like i'm gonna draw this for you real quick and it would just look like
00:23:50
Speaker
like effortless and it would just look exactly like how it would like on a printed comic. You're like, how the hell does this guy do that? Like, who's your favorite? If you have to pinpoint like a favorite comic artist, who would that be for you? Well, I can tell you this, like back in the day, I was a huge McFarland fan. If I were to talk about artists now, I would probably say there's an artist named Ryan Ottley. And he did pretty much all of the entire run of Invincible.
00:24:20
Speaker
Except OK, yes, yes, and now he's he's he kind of does amazing Spidey every once in a while. He had like a really healthy run on there, but that's a guy I look at his stuff and I'm just like floored. It's just absolutely stunning and amazing. So right now he's a big one. Obviously I'm still going to stand with Greg Capullo. His run on Batman with Scott Snyder. Yeah, it was awesome level. That was one of the best runs I've ever read.
00:24:47
Speaker
Um, and then Jim Lee, obviously, you know, I have his whole X-Men run and I love everything he does with DC. Oh man. There's so many artists right now that I'm really high on. Ed McGinnis was a guy that started on Deadpool. Oh yeah. Yep. That's right.
00:25:03
Speaker
And then he jumped over to Superman and now he's doing Avengers. I love his hyper exaggerated style. He's kind of like whittled it down a little bit to be a little bit more basic now. But back in the day, he would just plump everyone up, make him super jacked.
00:25:19
Speaker
Yeah. He was freaking awesome. Is he like a, he's, yeah, I mean, obviously he's not like a, like a, like a Rob Liefeld with the exaggerated. He's an acquired taste. I was, I was a fan of the, when he took over obviously X-force, well new mutants back, back in the early nineties. And then like, yo, the X-force and all that stuff. And I was, I was a fan then, but obviously
00:25:48
Speaker
You get older and you're like, OK, that's interesting artwork. You also hear some of these guys talk and you're like, OK, man, you should probably just focus on drawing. He's like he's like the right back of comic book artists, you know, he might be.
00:26:04
Speaker
That's a good actually comparison. I didn't even think of that for, uh, he's the Sean Morley of combo guard. I mean, the other thing about that too, was like, he was a part of that whole, that whole crew where they all, obviously they all like walked, got up and left, uh, Marvel and created, uh, image comics and stuff like that, that whole thing. Um,
00:26:25
Speaker
definitely uh if you haven't i i'm not sure if it's still on i think it's still on youtube they had the uh hits for pre the documentary about it i'm not sure i don't think yeah i don't think rob what is rob lifehold on it i don't think he's on it no rob rob's on it and um and he's so you can also buy it on apple uh okay you buy it because i bought it it was like six bucks
00:26:47
Speaker
Okay, I don't remember him being on it for some reason, but I remember them just like, you know, they were like pop culture, like they were hanging out like freaking like rappers and like movie stars. They were the NWF comic book artists.
00:27:02
Speaker
Pretty much. Yeah. They were like, yeah, that's right. Yeah. They just got up and, uh, kind of shook the game up and they're still like, obviously they, you know, they changed everything about the comic industry about, you know, being a high paid artist and, you know, knowing your worth and they did prove their worth by, you know, creating a company and creating like long, I mean, spawn is like, I mean, and then they got too big, too quick. And then.
00:27:28
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Mark Silvestri, that's another artist I really grew up to love because he did the Wolverine comics back in the day and I just love his art style. I think a lot of his art style is kind of similar to Jim Lee's, but obviously Jim Lee's a little bit more
00:27:46
Speaker
you know, for me, advance more advanced remarks over three, but that's obviously in my own opinion. But yeah, man, I could talk about comics all day. And you actually brought up a good point about the correlation between wrestling and comic books and stuff like that. Do you do you see a world where that's going to come back? Because remember, like, they had the boom comics. Yeah, WWE was doing comic books and stuff like that. Do you
00:28:14
Speaker
Do you see that coming back again or having any type of like, cause there's always those like one off things like WCW did a back of the day, WWF warrior had his own comic at one point, like.
00:28:25
Speaker
Do you see that as a thing coming back or is that a game issue? I think that's part of a bygone era. I hate to say that because they are so synergistic. I try not to use that word too much, but that definitely is the word I would use for comics and wrestling.
00:28:45
Speaker
No, I think comic book fans now are very sophisticated and they know what they want. And what I do appreciate about comic books right now is that there's people out there that are creating wrestling-based comics
00:29:02
Speaker
But they're not steeped in the world of AEW or WWE. Listen, for me, if I want to get my AEW fix or my WWE fix of those characters,
00:29:16
Speaker
those wrestlers, I'm just going to watch the show. True. It's on every freaking week. Yeah. I mean, so like, that's enough for me. But if someone's creating something that is unique in its own right, that's based in the world of wrestling with all new and all original characters, I think that is way more enticing to me as a comic book reader than having to read like a giant, you know, one one issue book about the shield.
00:29:46
Speaker
You know, yeah, true. I watched the shield for four years. Yeah. I don't need to read a whole comic book about it, about stuff that didn't happen. You know what I mean? Yeah, that's true. That makes sense. So it's like, I think, I think the imagery is powerful and it's, it's, it blows my mind that some of the artwork that was used for the boom comics was never used for t-shirts or never used for any merch or anything like that, because some of that stuff.
00:30:11
Speaker
I mean, it's better than a lot of the things I've done. It's certainly better than a lot of things I've seen in the stores. I mean, there's so many amazing pieces of art that were created as a byproduct of that series that could have been used for lunch boxes, for the backings of action figures, all this cool stuff. And it just was just limited solely to the comic books.
00:30:35
Speaker
Yeah, I actually love the fact that in the, you know, just a pivot to, you know, the artwork being on like, you know, action figures on Elite 100.
00:30:46
Speaker
Um, they had the, they, they had the drawings on the back. They had the, it was, uh, was it Rob Bartlett, I believe. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So they're like, they had those on the back. And I like, instead of having like the pictures on those, I'm thinking they should do that. They shouldn't switch to like more of like an animated style on action figures. Cause it's already, you already kind of played in that world with the action figure. What's the, what's, you know, what's it going with the extra step and making, you know, their whole packaging.
00:31:13
Speaker
you know, kind of like action figurie with like the, you know, comic art style and that type of stuff. So it helps sell it. It helps sell it way more. Yeah. Look at a photo of Drew McIntyre. And then you see the action figure. All it makes me think about is how much the action figure doesn't look like Drew McIntyre. Exactly. Yeah.
00:31:31
Speaker
have like a cool piece of art that's like a little more, you know, not hyper real, but a little bit more stylized, then the people can kind of let go of the fact that it doesn't look quite like Drew McIntyre. And it could be like, Oh, hell yeah, this is like, yeah, you know, this is a really cool thing. So like, yeah, the stuff that john did,
00:31:49
Speaker
absolutely incredible. The stuff that Mel Coleman is doing for Ring of Honor, that's the limited edition stuff coming out right now. Yeah, I'm so happy that they managed to like bring her on because what she does is very much for that world and now she can help contribute to that and make it a reality.
00:32:10
Speaker
Yeah, I've been trying to I've been trying to reach out to her to get her on as well. I want to speak to her because her like everyone like everyone does a lot. I follow a lot of different like artists and stuff like that. And everyone has their own style of art and everyone approaches approaches obviously wrestling because that's the you know, that's the nucleus of everybody that I follow. And everyone has their own
00:32:31
Speaker
interpretation of what that wrestler or that entity looks like, which I think is fascinating. Not everybody is the same when it comes to drawing that certain person. Can you imagine just going back to the comic book? Imagine creating a Seth Rollins comic now that he's wearing all these...
00:32:49
Speaker
crazy like gear and all these like suits and stuff like that just imagine him as a comic book character like uh obviously they referenced him to the joker like having him as a bad guy like a villain and a comic and having him like every you can as an artist you can like come up with literally anything like for him to wear you can put your imagination to like its limits if any wrestler deserves their own barbie
00:33:12
Speaker
with all of the costume options and all that. It's Seth Rollins, like seriously. Like that, I mean, and it's, what an amazing pivot for his character too, because he just went all the way and owned it. And I, it's the funniest thing about Seth Rollins is he kind of joked about that, you know, at the beginning when he was making the shift to being like the visionary to what he's doing now, he kind of joked about it. Like that was a bad thing.
00:33:40
Speaker
And then as you got wilder and wilder and wilder, people just freaking went nuts for it. It just goes to show how cool
00:33:51
Speaker
Getting out of your comfort zone is exactly what wrestling is made for. It's like people will harp on McMahon for making someone do like a comedy storyline or this, that, or the other thing. But that was his way of getting you to shake off your anxiety and just own the fact that if you're over and you're good at what you do, it doesn't matter what the hell you're doing. You're going to get over and you're going to make it work. Yeah.
00:34:19
Speaker
you're right that actually that's a good point because i didn't even you know a lot of people don't think that way when it comes to you know mcmahon and you know his choice of uh gimmicks for for wrestlers and stuff like that but that's just it it's hey if you can if you can make this work and you can you know get it over with the fans and
00:34:35
Speaker
That's that's that's it. You go out there and present it and obviously it fails. It fails. If it doesn't, then you know you now you have the opportunity to like move on to you know to something else. Move on to a different type of gimmick or kind of transition into a new thing.
Wrestlers as Artists
00:34:51
Speaker
So I think about where LA night was a year ago, right? Like yeah, I saw a little graphic. It said October 7th, 2022 is when Max
00:35:00
Speaker
Dupree, he said that he was gonna be LA Knight again, right? And it's been a year and he's over like Rover, like he's freaking nuts. But it's like, yes, he was placed in that role. And let's be honest, that role probably was never gonna work out, but I think it just goes to show that if the performer is invested and they're willing to give it the best go they've got,
00:35:28
Speaker
they, you know, listen, nobody's going to make the Red Rooster a world champion, right? But if Red Rooster can show that he can get over with the crowd in the audience, then maybe he could be transitioned into being like, you know, the Red Rocket or I mean, that's a terrible word. Yeah. That's an attitude error guy, the red. You know what I mean? Like transition them into something else. Yeah, no, definitely.
00:35:58
Speaker
I want to pivot to your beginnings with wrestling, we'll say. When you started doing your art, did you have wrestling in mind?
00:36:14
Speaker
But when you were doing your artwork, was it in a different direction? Like you said, you did say you were doing characters and stuff like that. But was wrestling always a part of that journey?
Nolanium's Artistic Journey
00:36:26
Speaker
Or was that something that came along afterwards? Not always, no. When I was younger, so I had a friend. His name was Kenny.
00:36:35
Speaker
And he was a huge Hulk Hogan fan. I think this was when I was like eight or nine. And I remember it was when earthquake broke Hogan's ribs. Oh, man. And we all sent letters to the Hulkster and we all got the postcard back with like the printed on signature and all that. And that's kind of what got me into the world of wrestling and got me into the stories and everything like that. And in WrestleMania six, I tell everyone this, but WrestleMania six is when I really started to like.
00:37:03
Speaker
dive in and really get invested in it. But no, my art was never like super wrestling centric. I was still like very much steeped in comic books and all that. It wasn't until
00:37:19
Speaker
When I started drawing caricatures when I was 19, we had a wall of celebrity demos that we would use to kind of like sell our services to the customers. So to paint a picture for you, you had a character stand, you know, you've got these demos of like celebrities behind you. So, you know, you have pop stars, you'll have movie stars. Well, I was the only weirdo that was drawing pro wrestlers and heavy metal bands. Like those are like the two things I did.
00:37:47
Speaker
You know, you'd have like Tupac here, you'd have NSYNC over here. And then all of a sudden you'd have Stone Cold Steve Austin right there. And so that started to like, you know, get me, get me a little bit more, uh, into the idea of doing, you know, wrestling is art, but I didn't really like dive headfirst into it until 2012 when I started working with Hulk Hogan.
00:38:10
Speaker
Interestingly enough, it was a caricature that I drew of him that he saw that led to him contacting me for that gig.
00:38:18
Speaker
That was actually going to be my next question. How did with Hulk Hogan had that all come about? So he reached out to you and was like, hey, brother. Pretty much, yeah. Maybe that goes to show, it doesn't matter what form of art you dive into. If the passion's there and the execution's there, it'll lead.
00:38:41
Speaker
to other things. So I did this caricature of Holko again, you know, doing like, you know, super exaggerated, like really big, really muscular and beefy. It was like back in 2007. And I guess him and his buddy Ron were doing like a Google search and they were trying to find someone that could kind of match this old NWO shirt that was done. Because that was the idea he had for his logo for his beach shop. So anyways, the long and short of it is I get a call from them.
00:39:09
Speaker
Uh, at first it was his friend, Ron. And I was like, listen, dude, I'm not going to do anything until I hear from the man himself. And then I get the phone call from the Hulkster himself. That's crazy. Which is absolutely nuts. It's like, you can't fake a voice like that. And, and, um, so anyways, the long and short of it is, you know, we had a really good conversation. He had some wild ideas he threw at me.
00:39:33
Speaker
Uh, we collaborated, we made some really cool things happen and a great relationship was forged. And to this day, like we still will every now and then, you know, trade messages and say hi or whatever. But, um, he was an amazing collaborator and it was really fun working on that stuff. And that helped me gain the confidence, which is very huge as an artist. When you get that, that's when you can, you can almost be unstoppable when you get to that point.
00:40:03
Speaker
Yeah, I can't imagine I can't even I can't even imagine, you know Don't just call me out of blue and say like, you know, hey, could you do this for me? Could you I like we could like Roman Reigns gives you a call says hey, I seen your artwork you want to you want Bloodline stuff for me. That would be absolutely nuts Like I would at this point I'd be like, holy shit I
00:40:29
Speaker
Yeah, so that kind of like got me a little bit more confident, a little, helped me lean a little bit more towards that world. Like I had already started a business out here doing caricatures and I was actually starting to like do really well with it and gain a lot of traction. And the money part wasn't really something I was that concerned with because I already had that stability. But there's always that, I think Rocky Balboa said it best in the movie of the same name. He's like, there's this,
00:40:58
Speaker
monster inside of me that won't stop. And so for me, that monster was, I'm such a huge fan. I've been watching this form of entertainment for decades now. And I want to find a way to connect with people that are also into it.
00:41:17
Speaker
And that just led to like this almost like Pandora's box, especially once Instagram started to pick up steam. You know, I started to like get traction with Chris Jericho and then Sheamus and then all these other wrestlers. And it got to a point where it was just like, you know what, I'm just going to go for it. I'm going to start like cold messaging these companies and just say, Hey, like this is a piece that had this many eyes on it.
00:41:47
Speaker
And this many people liked it. Imagine if that was like a jacket. That was like a shirt. Like, you know, I've already created the art.
00:41:56
Speaker
It's already done. So like, let's try and figure it out and figure out like a way for me to monetize and make money and you guys can make your money too. So Chalk Line really kind of helped me launch off with a series of jackets, with the Fanimation jackets. Yeah, those are awesome. They were so much fun, man. Like I got to do one for Kane, for Alexa Bliss, for Finn, for Undertaker, Triple H. All this was COVID, man.
00:42:26
Speaker
I'm just sitting, I'm just sitting around. I'm not, I'm not drawing out at the, you know, space needle. Cause it's all closed. So I'm just sitting in my house just like, yeah, throw it at me. I'll do it.
00:42:40
Speaker
That's crazy man that I can't even I can't even like fathom that like I asked extra cooler when he was on I was like What is what's it like? Actually, you know, we all do we all you know have podcasts and there's a lot of like, you know Content creators out there, but I asked him I was like, what is it like to actually have a talent that you can actually Use it actually make money off of like what is what is that like?
00:43:02
Speaker
That must be like, you know, like you said, it's almost like I feel like I have some type of like superpower where I could like, you know, do anything I wanted to do with with that type of. I mean, I used to draw when I was like younger and stuff like that. I never stuck with it. But that was always something I always like wanted to be a part of is, you know, some type of like, you know, artistry in some type of way, some type of expressive form of things. And this is pretty much what I came up with. Just be
00:43:29
Speaker
on my computer talking to people. So that's how and talking to people with different people. But yeah, I think the other part of that too is I kind of want to pivot to this.
00:43:43
Speaker
social media, the community, the artist community. How does that work? Is it friendly? Is it cutthroat? Do you have other artist friends on social media and stuff like that? Because I spoke to
00:44:02
Speaker
who was at Figure Kingdom, who's a figure photographer, you know, and he said when he started, like, it was like, you know, it was a, you know, he had some some other, you know, figure photographers that were like, you know, they all helped each other out and promote each other. But then there was others that were like,
00:44:17
Speaker
you know trying to undercut or you know trying to like you know put you know put people under you know throw people under the bus all that type of thing so like how is that is that the same thing with artists or do you guys kind of like do you have like other artist friends on social media that you reach out to that you kind of like promote help out is it is the same way okay
00:44:36
Speaker
Yeah, it's an interesting thing because I'll get into the pricing and stuff a little bit later, but there's a really healthy art community on Instagram and Twitter. And I have been very lucky and very fortunate to meet and establish connections with a lot of these people.
00:44:57
Speaker
And as you get to know everyone and as you get to see their work and you get to see the things that they've done, part of the responsibility that we all kind of take on once we kind of get into the professional realm is we trade stories,
00:45:12
Speaker
We talk about experiences, but most important of all, we try to relay to one another ways to avoid the negative experiences and ways to coach each other to be, I'm not going to say the words professional because that's not the right word. The word is to carry yourself in a manner that would elicit more business.
00:45:39
Speaker
Okay. And so there are artists that do their own thing and that's fine. And they might talk whatever smack they want about other artists. Those guys are never the ones that are doing like the really cool high profile stuff. You know, nobody, nobody wants someone talking smack about other artists. You know, it's just that same, same in the wrestling world, you know, um,
00:46:00
Speaker
But yes, we have a great community. It's very tight knit. I actually have used several wrestling artists that I've met online for shirts. Juan Ortiz of the dead. I brought him on to work on an undertaker shirt for Roosevelt's during mania.
00:46:21
Speaker
His one dream was to do an Undertaker shirt. That's awesome. So like I was given the task of art directing a WrestleMania series for Roosevelt's and John Bartlett was someone that I always wanted to collaborate with and I'm so happy I did. And Roosevelt's is very happy I did as well because now he's doing stuff for them like Star Wars stuff and he's still doing WWE stuff for them. But Juan was one of those guys where
00:46:47
Speaker
You know, he's got a very fringe, very punk rock kind of style. He's worked with everyone under the sun on the independence. But that that that one white whale was always the undertaker for him. Yeah. So getting him on board on an undertaker shirt was very gratifying because he got to realize his dream. He created a badass shirt that I wear like once a week.
00:47:16
Speaker
But my proudest moment is a collaboration we did for Scott Hall after he passed away. Roosevelt's did a tribute shirt where... Yeah, I seen that. Yep. Yeah. So essentially Roosevelt said, Hey, listen, you're tight in this community. Can you find 18 artists? Like here's our budget.
00:47:37
Speaker
Can you find 18 artists each depicting Scott Hall at a different point in his career? All their vision 100%. We're not going to edit it. We're not going to. We're not going to tweak anything.
00:47:50
Speaker
And so, it might've been two years ago, I started an Instagram group called The Wrestling Artist Collective, where we all got together and traded stories and all that. It was during COVID, you know, it was just very connected with everybody. But I used that as a forum to bring in people to work on the Scott Hall shirt. So if you look at the Scott Hall shirt, it's littered with different interpretations of him by 18 different artists. And it's incredible.
00:48:18
Speaker
So yeah, that's how we help each other out. It's like, and also if a wrestler wants something specific that artist A can't do, they'll say, well, hey, I know someone that that's their wheelhouse. That's what they're into. I get it. Think about me for your next shirt, but how about for this shirt, I'd forward you over to this person and then they can work on it for you. Yeah,
Pod Foundation's Supportive Nature
00:48:41
Speaker
that's awesome. Because yeah, like I said, just talking to like figure kingdom
00:48:46
Speaker
you know, his like, you know, him saying like, it was like, you know, there are there are photographers out there that help each other out. And there's ones that don't. And they're like, yo, they do other they, you know, they do their own thing, or they just, you know, don't try to promote. And one of the things I loved about, you know,
00:49:02
Speaker
about Chick Foley and stuff like that when I first started following way back in the day. And then understanding her story later on, her idea was to, once she got big, she was going to start promoting people that she followed or people that she's seen on social media. Because back in the early 2010s, there wasn't
00:49:26
Speaker
20, I think it was like around 2013, 2014. There weren't many really wrestling dedicated pages on Instagram. Obviously you had the actual companies and stuff like that, but as far as the community doing it, there wasn't really anything. You had Chick Foley, you had a wrestling classic. I think there was a few others at the time, but they would all promote each other.
00:49:50
Speaker
they would all help each other out. Like I think, uh, uh, when I talked to, uh, Justin about it on, uh, on, on his episode, he's, you know, said, Sheena, you know, bought one of my shirts, my, the wrestling classic shirts. And, you know, she wore it on her Instagram account and, you know, promoted me. And I was like, and that me, that's how I found his page through her. Cause I was following her and I seen that I was like, Oh, what's the wrestling classic? And I clicked on it, started following. I was like, Oh my God, this guy's amazing. So like, that's what they did at the beginning. They all started promoting each other. And, uh,
00:50:19
Speaker
When I talked at the beginning with the Pod Foundation, that's pretty much what she wanted to do was find people that they listen to, other podcasts, and see if they wanted to try to help each other out, help promote each other, help do cross shows or whatever.
00:50:36
Speaker
And it ended up me, like I said, being on like the Turnbuckle Tavern, being on their feet now, like a part of one of their shows. Obviously, my loyalty is with, you know, Sheena and the Chick-Fully show. But it allowed me to, you know, you know, be on there, be a few of their shows. And they're like, hey, you want to be on, you know, our WWE show because they're they're more indie, AEW oriented with their a lot of their shows. So they want to do like a WWE centric show. So they're like, hey, we're going to put you and so and so together.
00:51:05
Speaker
you know, and that was like that type of like community stuff and just doing this show in particular and just being, you know, reaching out to people, you know, making those connections and stuff like that. I've met a ton of awesome people through just doing this show, you
The Appeal of Being a Free Agent
00:51:21
Speaker
included. I mean, I followed you forever, but just like, yeah, it's amazing. Like, I mean, I would, you know, it's, it's, it's great when, um,
00:51:30
Speaker
able to see other people like, you know, flourish. Yeah. You know, you know, like say you're you're you're doing this interview now and then like, you know, tomorrow it's like, you know, you know, no one signed with, you know, WWE is an exclusive artist. I'm like, holy crap, it's crazy. I just had him on my show. But as a free agent, would you consider doing that? Like, would you consider now like signing a contract, nothing like that, like being an exclusive to
00:52:00
Speaker
Uh, but like a brand or a company, no, not at all. Not at all. I've, I've got, I've got a company. I've got my own and we're doing great. And I'm very happy with it. This for me is fun. And if it became my full time job, I don't necessarily know how much fun that would be.
00:52:21
Speaker
Yeah, that's true. To those that are grinding it out, and that's what they're doing full time, more power to you. But for me, this is all the icing on the cake. You know what I mean? Like, I've got
00:52:35
Speaker
I've got everything I could ever want as a human. I've got a beautiful family. I've got financial stability. I've got a company I'm very proud of. I've got artists under me that I'm incredibly proud of. But to be able to kind of jump into this world and just have fun and play around,
00:52:57
Speaker
I'm like, that's where the magic is for me. And I think if it was something where they would bring me in full time and I had to do it year round and I'd have to deal with all these different concepts, I just don't think it would be for me.
00:53:14
Speaker
Yeah, I and I love working with the licensees too because you have so much more freedom. Yeah. With with all these like, for example, Roosevelt's, I know I've mentioned them a few times, you do amazing patterned shirts. Yeah. But they ask me what I want to do. You know what I mean? Like, they're like, okay, summer slams up, what do you want to do? And I'll say, I haven't done a Bret Hart shirt.
00:53:41
Speaker
I do have my heart shirt and they'll say, yeah. But like WWE, they're never going to ask me what I want to do. They're going to just say, okay, well, here's the lineup. Here's what we got going on. This is what we want. You have to do it this style this way. Have it to us in two weeks and then go from there. And that's not, that's not how I like to operate.
00:54:00
Speaker
Yeah, see, actually, that makes sense. I like, you know, I like collaborating with like, you know, different, you know, artists and stuff like that on stuff like, you know, just because extra cooler. Nick is a part of our group. Like he did. He pretty much did all of our logos. Not not these ones here. The Pod Foundation logo he did. But like, he's a great like he he does great logos and stuff like that. So like, yeah.
00:54:24
Speaker
being able to work with him and like, you know, message him back and forth, like, you know, send him an idea like, hey, I have an idea for this. How can you work this? And he'll like, you know, send me a sample and I'm like, can we change this up? And just like having that, like, you know, ability to just like be able to interact with someone like that and have them actually be able to put your
00:54:42
Speaker
ideas to you know to paper or screen if you want to use that like that's insane like just you know if we were to collaborate if I was like you know message you one day hey I'm thinking of you know I'm thinking of you know a character of myself but like you know I want to like I want to look like a superhero I want to like something like that and just going back and forth and being able to you know be able to speak to you and actually try to put my ideas
00:55:06
Speaker
into into play and then you come back with something and that's like exciting yeah exciting beyond beyond my imagination like that that's exciting to me like just just knowing that like i had that like input into it like you see a lot of the logos like i said it's pretty much me working with him creating a lot of pretty much all the the chick foley show logos like all the different variations of it they we ended up um uh going with chalk line they end up making us um shorts
00:55:34
Speaker
Uh, we ended up taking all his logos and putting them like, do like a short pattern thing. So we actually have chalk line short. They're not for sale, but we all have our own, uh, things with all the logos on it. And I'm like, I'm like, holy crap, all these logos. I actually, you know, I was a part of these. I like, yeah.
00:55:51
Speaker
And it's crazy just to see something like that. And like you said, the collective that you have with all the artists, bringing them on it, they get the same feel. They go, oh my god, I worked on this. This is crazy. Is there anything out there that
00:56:07
Speaker
that you've worked on that's that like, that you actually see and you're like, holy, holy crap. This is actually, you know, besides like the, the shirts and stuff we talked about, well, this one in particular, but is there other, other pieces of art besides it doesn't have to be wrestling. It could be anything else.
00:56:24
Speaker
Most of the stuff I have out in the wild is wrestling stuff. I remember I went to SummerSlam in Vegas. It was when Cena and Reigns were main eventing. And I show up and I'm starting to see things that I worked on, just fans wearing them. And let me be real with you, dude. The moment you go up to someone and you're like, hey, man, I designed that. They're going to be like, yeah, that's weird.
00:56:50
Speaker
OK, so now now I just I just like enjoy the moment. You know, I might snap a photo or whatever and just be like, hey, that's a cool thing. But no, I was at SummerSlam in Vegas and I saw a few people wearing my Austin Rock WrestleMania 17 Roosevelt design. The sick one. I saw an NWO reunion shirt I worked on for Hogan back in like 2019. And then I saw a Macho Man shirt I did.
00:57:21
Speaker
And I was just like, oh, this is really cool. It just feels good. Because the one thing that goes through your brain when you design this stuff is, OK, who's going to wear this? You know what I mean? Yeah. Look, are people actually going to buy this? So yeah, you'll see it up on the shop. You'll see it online. You'll see them hype it up and promote it. But it's never really real to you as a designer or an artist until you actually see people wearing it.
00:57:44
Speaker
Yeah. And so that was when it really hit me for the first time. And then, you know, I've been a show since then where I've seen like my work or I've seen my buddy Hal's work or my friend Angie's work on his shirt or even like something Mel did. Like when I was at Wrestle, when I was at Wrestle Dream last week, you know, Mel did this last supper.
00:58:03
Speaker
spread. Yes. You know, awesome piece, man. That's that's it. It was incredible. Like she puts so much work and love into it. And to see that and to see the way it's being implemented. That was that was like really thrilling for me. You know, I can't I can only imagine what she feels like when she's there. And she gets to see it or someone is messaging her saying like, like I took a photo and I was like, you know, there's that's crazy.
00:58:30
Speaker
But that's the thrill for what we do. It's one thing to work with a wrestler. It's one thing to meet a wrestler and collaborate with them. But to know that the fan base is actually embracing it and that they're into it and that they're wearing a cool piece of clothing, to me, that's where the thrill is. Yeah. And I'm one of those people that I have no
00:58:54
Speaker
like problem with wearing things like I don't have to be at a wrestling event to wear like my, you know, my wrestling shirts or anything like that. I just go right to the, you know, I'll go anywhere wearing this because this is, this is a, it's just like, it's a conversation started too. That's a dope sweater, man. You should wear that everywhere. No, I do. I do. I wear it a lot. Um, no, but the other thing too is like a lot of people like,
00:59:14
Speaker
you know, if they weren't, if they're not watching wrestling now, a lot of people watch, you know, attitude, our wrestling. So they see something like this. I got a double take. It's the same thing when they, you know, an NW, NWO shirts, like, you know, out in the wild or Austin three 16. Sure. Like people are going to look and be like, you know, they got to acknowledge it. Like something like this, you see something like this. It's just,
00:59:35
Speaker
This is a badass design. I mean, it was a badass crew anyway. We talked about that. But they never made a lot of shirts for the nation in the first place. That's another. Yeah. The nation deserves their time in the sun. It kind of sucks that everyone's in different companies right now because they can't necessarily do that at the moment. Yeah.
00:59:53
Speaker
But that's, that's the beauty of bootlegs, baby. Yeah, exactly. I mean, I'm waiting for the day when they, uh, I mean, hopefully, you know, they have to be at some point in the, uh, in the WWE hall of fame, like all those guys together on stage and, you know, share their stories and stuff like that. That'd be awesome. Um, what are your, what are your, uh, interests besides, you know, artwork, wrestling? Do you, are you infatuated anything else besides, um,
01:00:23
Speaker
those two things.
Nolanium's Personal Interests
01:00:25
Speaker
Yeah, I've got tons of interest. I love hiking. I live in Seattle, so we're really close to a lot of beautiful nature hikes. I like to take my kayak out. I got a kayak that I'll take out every now and then and just unplug and float around and do stuff like that with my daughter.
01:00:44
Speaker
Um, I like working out. I like running. Those are all things that I really enjoy. I'm a huge beer fan. I've got hops tattooed on my elbow. So that's Nick and I speaking of Nick, you know, extra cooler. Yep. Um, you know, he's a huge beer guy too. Yes, he is about that stuff. But yeah, um, for me, it's mostly art.
01:01:09
Speaker
my business and then, uh, you know, just keeping, keeping the, the dream alive with the family and all that. So yeah, that's all that's, is there, are you into like, uh, like any sports stuff like that? I like football, like I'm a football fan, like my Bengals finally took away Tacoma win today against the Cardinals. So I'm really happy about that. Uh, Seahawks have been doing great. I've been really happy with their performances past a few games.
01:01:37
Speaker
Um, it's gonna be really tough next week when they, when they face off against my boys in Cincinnati. Yep. Uh, so I, I love, I love football. Uh, baseball is always fun. Um, yeah, I got into hockey recently. Okay. Yeah. So, uh, segue. Uh, we have a great team out here called the Kraken and, uh, NHL contacted me.
01:02:09
Speaker
eight months ago, I want to say, to work on a piece for their socials. And I've never really, I've never really done like hockey art. Like I've done, I've done like football art through a sock company called Rockham Socks. I've done basketball art. Basketball art is the one thing I'm like super excited about because I don't have to draw crazy helmets on everybody.
01:02:29
Speaker
Yeah, expressions and stuff like that. Um, but hockey art, man, it's, it's a different story because, um, the main question I had for NHL was, Hey, can I draw these guys without their helmets on?
01:02:43
Speaker
I want to be able to show personality and show all that. So I've done two pieces for NHL so far. The second one is coming out in the next couple of days on their socials. That's awesome. So keep your eyes out. But yeah, sports art is another thing I like to dabble in every now and then.
01:03:00
Speaker
How does that happen? Do they just reach out to you? Do they know of your artist's work in sports and stuff like that? I'll spell it out for you, man. R-A-S-S-L-I-N. That's how they found me. That's crazy.
01:03:21
Speaker
you know we the a lot of the things that we you know i talk about on these shows stuff like that you know obviously wrestling being one of them that's kind of like the the ground or the blueprint um or the base of a lot of these you know conversations i like to have with everybody but like it's just crazy to think that like you don't think wrestling
01:03:39
Speaker
is like you know with us if you're being a wrestling fan you think it's like the biggest thing in the world nothing tops it i mean because we look at the wwe they're you know billion dollar company they're global and all that stuff like you don't think to think that like outside of that people are seeing those types of things
01:03:58
Speaker
and saying hey we want to be a part of that or we oh that looks cool we should maybe should uh bring that into our our realm like that's that's like everywhere like they're everywhere it's crazy yeah i mean it's sports entertainment so a lot of these people see what's done in the wrestling world and i'm not saying they want to piggyback off of it but they see that and they're like oh this guy can draw muscles
01:04:22
Speaker
He's perfect for the NFL. I started doing these socks for Rockham where they just licensed a few of my WWE pieces. And then they came to me one day and they're just like, hey man, it's COVID. You wanna make some money? And I'm like, yeah, what do you got for me? And they're like, we've got about 90 athletes we want you to draw. So I'm like, cool, all right, let's do this. So I started tackling NFL players.
01:04:52
Speaker
intertwined with that tops reached out to me and I did some enough or some, some MLB stuff for tops for their digital platform. And then I started doing NBA for rock and socks. And then through that I started to forge a relationship with my partners at big shots doing UFC dolls.
01:05:11
Speaker
Like the pillows. Oh, I see that. Yeah. Yeah. So it's like, it's all just this amazing circle of, of stuff and, and wrestling kind of gets you there. And who knows, man, there might be guys that start off doing NFL stuff.
01:05:27
Speaker
where they see their stuff and people in the wrestling world are like, hey, let's bring them in this world. But for me, it's been really cool to see how guys like at the NHL, they will use a piece of wrestling art I did as reference for what they want for this NHL piece. That's awesome.
01:05:49
Speaker
I'm like, that's dope. That's awesome. Like that's really cool. How all that stuff happens. You know what I mean? That's crazy. That's, that's, that's just crazy to think like the, uh, just see like the impact that like, like I said, we kind of like as wrestling fans, we kind of live in a bubble and we're like, you know, we have our own thing, but it's crazy to think of like the, the.
01:06:08
Speaker
the amount of like, you know, impact it has on the outside of, uh, on the outside of the, you know, wrestling stuff like that in sports. And obviously it's, you know, this athlete set of wrestling fans and all that type of, all that type of stuff. You see it all the time. You'll see athletes show up at, you know, wrestling shows and things like that. So it's not far fetched. It's just, it's just to think that the executives are like the people that like the owners of like NHL and the NBA and stuff like that. Like those people are like looking at, you know, wrestling and going, Hey, how can we do this? And I, I always credit, uh,
01:06:38
Speaker
Vince McMahon for starting the, you know, streaming boom as far as like, you know, taking your own library and making an app out of it. Cause like WWE network happens. Then shortly after that, like, you know, HBO wanted to do it. Like, you know, all these like movies companies started doing like, Hey, maybe we should do what happened. You know, it's our own library. So like, it does kind of make sense. We're all broke. We're all broke now.
01:07:03
Speaker
Yeah, I know exactly, right? That's very true. Thanks, Vince. Thanks for starting the streaming boom for us. Were there any, did you work with obviously individual wrestlers and stuff like that? Were there any, did you get to work with any athletes or anything like that with some of these things that are more straightforward?
01:07:24
Speaker
Athletes are such a different machine because if you work with wrestlers under the WWE banner, a lot of the upper echelon wrestlers have their own managers to manage their business for them. But with a company like the NFL, every single athlete's got a manager.
01:07:45
Speaker
And these are like super high level guys and there's a lot of oversight, you know, so I've never dealt with an athlete directly. Uh, no, no wrestlers are a different story. They're performers, man. They, when they, when they, you know, case in point, like, let me just use Joe burrow, you know, it doesn't matter what you put out as long as it's got his face and says, Joe burrow, it's going to make millions of dollars. Yeah.
01:08:15
Speaker
with an athlete like Finn or Edge or I don't know, even like Mercedes, you know, they wanna have direction into what you're creating for them because that's integrated into their character. They want it to be representative of their character, you know what I mean? So it's a much different thing, man, with performers versus actual athletes, you know, it's a completely different ballgame, man.
01:08:44
Speaker
I would, I would, I'm surprised I like, you don't get a lot of, do you get any like MMA guys?
01:08:50
Speaker
like I mean or anything or UFC or well I've done a ton of stuff for UFC like I I've done a ton of like you know we like big shots for example we have the UFC license so we've created I want to say close to 40 different fighters for the UFC uh but those guys have much different back end deals than wrestlers do and then athletes do um
01:09:15
Speaker
They want you to sell as many of these dolls as possible. So it raises their value in the eyes of the UFC management. Okay. So no, I haven't gotten a lot of feedback or anything like that. Like Conor McGregor is really high on our stuff. He really likes what we do. Okay.
01:09:36
Speaker
And there's a few fighters that I met at the most recent UFC expo in Vegas that were really, really stoked in what we were doing. But no, it's, it, UFC is a much different thing than WWE. They're, you know, I know they're the same company now, but it's much super different.
01:09:54
Speaker
Yeah, I would have thought they would have had more like the fires themselves are like more not freelance or anything like that, but like more free to do like their own. Not anymore. They used to be. Yeah. All right. Okay. Yeah. I've had conversations with friends about that because they're, they're talking about how they used to have like endorsements on their, their shorts and stuff like that. But UFC put a stop to that. And once they had their own, like, you know, fighting gear and all of that,
01:10:21
Speaker
Oh yeah, that's right. I forgot they did. They did that and obviously now it's going to be a lot harder with with the merger that happened. They have a lot. They have a lot of saying like pretty much everything with UFC there. They're very much. You know hands on. That's crazy. Do you see? Do you see any?
01:10:42
Speaker
Do you see yourself working for like, not working, sorry, like working with like TKO, not like WWE, but like, has that, has that like crossed your mind at all? They're like, at some point when you're doing these like licensing things, they might be, you know, not a WWE specific thing. It might just be, you know, TKO because you had on, um,
01:11:03
Speaker
Nick Khan did an interview recently saying like they might do like a TKO weekend, where it's like, you know, a UFC event, a Saturday night, and then Sunday night, a WWE pay per view. And like, you know, you, you might get a call, like you said, with like, results might call you and say, Hey, the TKO weekend's coming up. What do you have? What do you have for, uh, for, you know, UFC, whatever. Oh, you know, WWE that like, I get that all the time. Like, like,
01:11:30
Speaker
They, so to give you an idea of what the world of a freelance artist is like working for licensees, every shirt I design for SummerSlam, for example, I'm doing during WrestleMania. Like that's how far in advance they want you to do things for them to like get the product ready to go. So place in point, anything WrestleMania related, I'm working on like around survivor series time.
01:11:58
Speaker
So there's a lot of lead time for stuff like that. There's been a couple times, it's usually from WWE corporate where I'll have to do something kind of last minute, like make like a last minute change or adjustment to something that they want to roll out like pretty quickly. But dude, if TKO wanted to do like a bonkers like four day weekend, they don't even have to ask me, I'll just show up. That sounds like the most, I went to my first UFC fight in Vegas a few months ago.
01:12:27
Speaker
I am. I have never had that much fun in my entire life. Like wrestling is so great and is such an experience, but go to a live UFC fight. Oh freaking. It's absolutely nuts, man. How many like celebrities have you seen when you were like, did you run bump into anybody? Did you see any, any, uh, celebrities out there when you at that UFC event? Well, I can't, you can't really bump in anyone there because there's so much security.
01:12:57
Speaker
That is true. How do you think of that? We were we were lucky enough to get some really good seats through Ghost Ninja. He's a streamer that does. He does video gaming on Twitter. Yeah, so Ghost Ninja had some sort of like partnership deal with UFC and he got a bunch of really cool seats. So we got this great this this great area where you know we had the most perfect view of the octagon and behind me was Rob
01:13:28
Speaker
He's a guy from, he does, he does like the, there's like a putt putt show on NBC or ABC. Oh, what was that called? Oh. Holy.
01:13:39
Speaker
holy moly or something like that. He was also on the Daily Show, Rob something and then Guy Fieri was like four rows in front of us and that guy was the shiniest man I've ever seen. I don't know what moisturizer he uses. I don't know if he was like eating his product.
01:14:03
Speaker
But he was so shiny. But and then all the UFC fighters were out there promoting because it's during fight week. So, you know, you've you've got all these elite fighters. It's kind of sitting like a few rows away watching all the action. So that was really cool to see, too. That's insane. Did you have you ever have you ever gone? Would you ever work in like the like movie realm, like do like
01:14:31
Speaker
like artwork for like, you know, not movie, I shouldn't say, just like entertainment in general, just like, you know, movies, TV, that type of stuff. Has that ever come up or is that, you know, have you ever thought of doing?
01:14:43
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I mean, I love movies. I mean, if you can't love wrestling and not love movies and TV, they're the same as comic books. It's all very, you know, tangential. So I love movies. I love I love sci fi. I love action. I've drawn multiple caricatures of my favorite, you know, celebrities doing this, that and the other thing. That would be a dream come true. Absolutely. Especially if there were animation.
01:15:12
Speaker
And in the design of something, like you just watch like across the spider verse and it's just like, Oh my God. Like the things they created for that and the vision, the vision that they had, it's absolutely nuts. Yeah.
01:15:28
Speaker
all the different art styles within that movie, too. Like it's not all the same artwork. Like it's all different. Like it's it's insane to just see just the amount of artists that that they had on that movie is it's ridiculous. Like every Spider-Man is a different type of art, every computer from computer animation to like a real person. Essentially, that's how they pretty much did it. Like the craziest thing on that movie to me was Z when
01:15:57
Speaker
Gwen fights the Renaissance culture. It was drawn in Renaissance. The art style was running. That's crazy. That's hard to fathom that. You can actually see a movie nowadays, or they can actually incorporate a different art style to interact with some other type of art style. Because you would think everything has to be the same.
01:16:21
Speaker
I mean, when it comes to art or on a movie anyway or like in an animated movie, everything looks the same. You wouldn't think that each like her world is different from, you know, Miles, like his his world is more like vibrant. Her her world looks more like like almost like a painting. Like it's all like it's it's it's pretty it's insane. Like that that aspect
Animation Industry Insights
01:16:41
Speaker
of it. Would you could would you ever be a part of that process? Do you think you could like be a part of like a movie, like an animated movie process like?
01:16:51
Speaker
hand draw like that? Like how would? I mean, I could certainly be a part of it. I it's a matter of like, the workflow for something like that's pretty intense. You know, you have to spend a lot of man hours to make that stuff happen. And it's very collaborative. So you got to work with a ton of different people. I actually studied animation in college. So I studied 2D animation at the Savannah College of Art and Design. Nice. So the animation aspect, that's something I could definitely, you know,
01:17:21
Speaker
ebb and flow with and make work. But man, you're asking a lot of interesting questions and it gives me an opportunity to kind of expand upon the world of the working artists and what our expectations are and stuff like that.
01:17:36
Speaker
For a lot of people that have studied animation their entire lives, working on a Spider-Man film like that is a dream come true. But they're also mentally and physically prepared to work like 70, 80 hour work weeks to get there. And dude, I'm 42, man.
01:17:57
Speaker
Those years are behind me like I work hard and I play hard But you can't convince me to do any job where I have to work more than 40 hours a week You know, it's just not that's not where my headspace is anymore. Yeah Very standpoint dude just to be in a room with those guys and just to bounce ideas and sketches and like all these different concepts man Yeah, that's the candy store Yeah, I was watching
01:18:25
Speaker
Toy Story. Was it the Toy Story movie? It was actually it was Lightyear. The one that came out during like kind of like the pandemic. Yeah. They have like the documentary on Disney Plus and like, just like you were talking like, you know, a lot of that movie was done during the pandemic. So a lot of those people were remote.
01:18:43
Speaker
And that must have been hard, like not being able to, like you said, bounce ideas off of each other. Like you're sitting in your room doing the animation and you get like a web, like a web call with someone and say, hey, I just did this. And how would you share? Like that must have been like the hardest thing to do, like to create a movie like that and not be able to interact with another artist to like feed off of, you know, what they were working on. I couldn't, I couldn't even imagine. But just seeing that, like just seeing that process in general,
01:19:11
Speaker
just the animation, the ideas that go into it, the ideas that these artists come up with. I think it's amazing to me to see that type of stuff. I'm very interested in that type of process when it comes to creation.
01:19:29
Speaker
Um, especially with art.
Art as Communication
01:19:31
Speaker
I mean, it's, it's one of those things that it's like, it's not that it's primitive. It's, it's just, art's been around since the beginning of time. So it's like, you know, start like cave, like cave drawings on the wall. That's where it started. Communication. And to this day, it still is communication. Yeah.
01:19:50
Speaker
And that's the most powerful thing about art. It's not necessarily the process. It's not necessarily how the finished product ends up looking. It's what does that communicate to the viewer? What do they get from it? That's why I said earlier when I see someone embracing it, and I see them wearing it, or I see them commenting on it, or I see that they're really into it. I'm like, OK.
01:20:15
Speaker
that's the communicative aspect of what I'm doing. And if you create a piece and you're not necessarily communicating to someone, then it's not necessarily a successful piece, you know what I mean? And that blame can be placed on the artist, can be placed on the wrestler, you know, because they're the ones that are putting that idea out there. And there are tons of wrestling shirts that have flopped.
01:20:41
Speaker
Yeah. That's why you got to thank goodness for rep pro wrestling teams because they're, they print on demand. So they'll, they'll just put it all out there. And if people want to buy it cool. And if they don't want to buy it, well, then that's that. I mean, think about how many shirts Kenny Omega has had that he hasn't sold. You know what I mean? There's lots of designs out. So it's just like, um,
01:21:02
Speaker
So it really does fall on the artist in some instances to communicate those ideas in a manner that will really get the fans excited. And that's the thing. Yeah, I was actually almost worn by the Bad News brown shirt because I love that shirt. I got the T-shirt of it. I'm not sure if they did any other variation of it, like a sweater or anything like that, but I got the T-shirt. I love I just love it because it's like
01:21:30
Speaker
He looks almost like a comic book. He almost looks like a superhero. He has flames on his hands and stuff like that. Tell him to explain. It's amazing. I was just like, oh, man. The lettering is like, obviously, it's a variation of the SummerSlam logo and stuff like that. So that's just that type of stuff right there. Like I said, I wear that shirt all the time, too. I love that shirt.
01:21:56
Speaker
Well, that idea was all Matt, that idea was Matt, like Matt, Matt came up with it, and then I put it there. And then we, you know, we just kind of jumped off, you know, and, and communicated what we wanted. And that's, that's why you should be excited when you get to have input on these logos with it. It's because, you know, sometimes us artists, we really do thrive off of direction. Yep.
01:22:22
Speaker
because there are times when we're really creative on our own merits, but then there are times where we're working on something and we're basically the tool. We are there to implement the ideas.
01:22:35
Speaker
So in the case in the case of the nation shirt matches said make something badass with the nation. I'm like, hell yeah, I got that covered. And then with with, you know, bad news, he was just like, this is my idea. Can you make that happen? And then he gave me direction on it and that ended up becoming something really cool. That's sick. I thought they were going to do it. I'm not sure if they did one, but I remember there was like one with slick.
01:23:03
Speaker
But I don't think it was. I didn't do that one. That was Redneck Kung Fu. Oh man, that's that was a sick one, man. I like the fact that they do. They do like you. Like we talked about this earlier. I like I like the shirts. I like you wouldn't necessarily. Well, the people you would necessarily see with merch at all like bad news.
Designing Wrestling Merchandise
01:23:22
Speaker
now like they should dominate they didn't really have anything slick didn't have a t-shirt like is there any i mean obviously i mean if there's if this is a secret you can't say anything uh that's that's fine but are there any other like are there any other pieces that they've reached out to you that you know that that are going to be coming out or any
01:23:43
Speaker
Any other cause I might, I mean, I might actually just reach out to you and just have you do one for me. I have a, uh, my, my, uh, a sentimental cause I talked about this, this gentleman earlier, junkyard dog. So my father, um, huge fan, my father's from this, he's born in Mississippi, grew up in Arkansas, Southern Southern, Southern guy.
01:24:03
Speaker
I mean, he passed away 10 years. Actually, no, it's gonna be 13 years ago. But his favorite wrestler, I grew up watching Mid-South wrestling, because he's from the South. So that's when I started watching wrestling, like Butch Reed and Dusty Rhodes, watching the Von Eriks and all that stuff. So I watched other wrestling when I was little, and then I
01:24:25
Speaker
worked over to WWF at the time, but I was, I mean, I was enamored with, with, with junkyard dog back then. And, uh, and he, he, he's one of those, one of those guys that I always wanted to see like on a t-shirt. I know they, they, they do some merch sometimes like WWE will roll like a legend shirt, but I want like a, not like a picture of him, like an actual picture. I'd rather see him like, like the, like the, um,
01:24:51
Speaker
bad news brown type of like deal like just like a badass like I don't know. I did. I did. Yeah, I did. I don't know.
01:25:02
Speaker
I don't know what they ended up doing with it, but I do know Matt has a JYD piece I did for him. The thing is, it's tricky because when you deal with deceased wrestlers, you have to deal with the estate. I'm not saying you have to deal with the estate. Even if it's like a bootleg or something that you're doing for the fans, you got to
01:25:27
Speaker
You got to be respectful to the estate. So I don't know. I don't know what ended up happening with that. I did a Sasha Bianca shirt for WrestleMania 36 that they put out. I remember that. I didn't get that one though. Yeah. I was seeing that though. That was awesome.
01:25:48
Speaker
That was a lot of like, hey, keep it on the DL kind of stuff. The way I consider it, it's like work for hire. So they hire me to do a drawing, and if they're the ones selling it, then that's on them. That's the thing that they deal with. But I did that one, and then I did a JYD.
01:26:08
Speaker
And then after that I ended up getting busy. They did a really cool Chris Bay one not too long ago. Yeah, I see that one in his hands. Yeah, that's awesome. That was an awesome one.
01:26:21
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know how heavy they're getting in the merch right now. I mean, speaking as someone that's gotten a few cease and desist in his time. Yeah, I remember when I got this, was it this one? Yeah, I think I got this shirt, this one. They actually, they said, well, they had like a little postcard with the printed cease and desist. I still have it. I think on the flip side of it is the
01:26:46
Speaker
the Sasha Banks, Bianca Belair. I love it. So I have it. So I kept that. I was like, this is awesome. I didn't get the bird right there, man. I like it. I like it because like, you know, I'm glad they don't do like a lot of birch because it's like exclusive. It's like
01:27:05
Speaker
I got this when it came out. They haven't released it, I don't think since. It's the Hogan with the red X. Yeah, I have the hoodie of that. And I have the t-shirt of it too. So I never see it again. It's like one of one type of thing that you'll never get from them ever again. So I take pride in owning those types of
01:27:29
Speaker
Yeah, like that member of Delia anyway. So I love it, man. It's like it like pays homage to like the old school culture of doing like bootleg shirts. You know what I mean? Like you go to like a like a hip hop show or you go to like any like big show back in the day and and you wouldn't really care about the official shirts. You want to go get the bootleg shirts because those were always like the best looking ones. The best designs and you knew that there were limited edition. I still remember buying bootleg shirts at Metallica shows.
01:27:59
Speaker
But like, I love that. I love that idea. And that's kind of like the old school in me where it's like, okay, it might not be on the up and up all the time, but it is fun to kind of dabble and have a little fun in that realm. Yeah. Have you done any? Have you done? I'm not sure if I asked or if you answered. Have you done any?
01:28:19
Speaker
Thanks for any like music artists or anything like that? Or is that? No, I'd love to. I would love to. Like I'm a huge music fan. So like I would love to do something for like my favorite bands. But you know, I've done I've done like pieces just for fun. You know, like I did like a really cool James Hadfield and I did Josh, Josh Homme from Queens of Stone Age. I did stuff. But but yeah, that would be really cool.
01:28:45
Speaker
My buddy won from of the dead. He's done a lot of band shirts. It's kind of how you got to start, you know, getting into doing shirt designs. That's why all of his shirts kind of look like they got the punk rock vibe. Um, but yeah, I'd love to do some band stuff in the future. Yeah, man. I was, I've actually like getting ideas in my head now that I won't say about the show, but we'll
Future Aspirations
01:29:06
Speaker
say it. I'll say it off air, but, uh, actually I have some ideas that I, that I want to run across, but, um, so,
01:29:14
Speaker
What's the future of your brand? What do you see yourself going? Is it something where you're just cool with what you're doing now? Or do you want to take it to a bigger level at some point? Well, it's definitely changed over time. When I was doing mostly fan art, that was kind of my way of getting more gigs and doing more work.
01:29:40
Speaker
Now, now work is all I do, which is why I'm not as regular with like art posts and stuff like that, because it's like, well, I got to wait until the thing comes out. You know, I can't really hype it up. Um, I'm really happy with where I'm at right now. Like big shots, for example, here's a Ric Flair. This is a license. Yeah. I am at the whole time. That's awesome. Yeah. So I'm partnered with these guys, big shots. Uh, uh, a gentleman by the name of Adam Olson.
01:30:10
Speaker
and we do licensed wrestling buddies for UFC. Rick Flair, Mike Tyson, Jay and Silent Bob. Keep it on the DL, but we're gonna be putting out Bret Hart once soon. That's gonna be really cool. Hopefully in the next couple of weeks here.
01:30:31
Speaker
And then that stuff I'm really stoked on right now. Like I'm really excited to like put my own stamp on it. Cause that's like the caricature artist in me. It's like, I get to design something from scratch. On top of that, you know, I'm still freelancing for Roosevelt's every now and then, but I actually, I was talking to a friend of mine at Wrestle Dream. I showed him a list. One day I sat down and I made a list of all the wrestlers I've done stuff for.
01:31:01
Speaker
And I was looking at that list and I was like, damn, like I've really, I've done some cool stuff for like really high profile names. I probably only have maybe four or five more names on my bucket list. And then after that, who knows?
01:31:21
Speaker
pretty much it after that. I'm not gonna throw in the towel and hang it up. I'm not gonna be hitting it as hard is what I'm saying. I wanna be able to hang my hat on all these other things that I did and just be like, okay, well, if I can do a few things for these wrestlers that I respect and admire, then I can say, okay, well, I got to do at least one thing for every wrestler that I grew up or that I currently
01:31:51
Speaker
love watching. And that right there for me, that's it. Like, I mean, who wants to do like 20 shirts of the rock? Who wants to do 20 shirts of Brett Hart? You know what I'm saying? Like, if I can do that one Brett Hart shirt, I always wanted to do, I'm going to do it. And then
01:32:08
Speaker
You know, if I can do that one stone cold shirt that I always wanted to do, I'll do that and then tap out. So I got a few more on the list. I'm not going to say who they are, but fingers crossed that it happens in the next couple of years. And then I can say, all right, if anything else comes up, great. I'll take it on, but I'm not going to actively seek out any more stuff. I'm just going to.
01:32:32
Speaker
kind of ride it. That's awesome. One more one more question before I let you go. So I always I always have to show up with this. And obviously, if you're a wrestling fan, if you if you if I could interview people that aren't wrestling fans, I don't ask them this question.
Recommended Wrestling Matches
01:32:46
Speaker
But if you are, I do ask you this. So I always go with a scenario where you know, you have a friend
01:32:53
Speaker
that may have, you know, you know, watch wrestling and then, you know, they kind of like, you know, grew up, you know, didn't stop watching it, whatever. And, uh, they're kind of like a casual. So my question to you is if you were to try to, you know, bring that person back into wrestling, whether it be, you know, you know, golden age, you know, attitude error right now, what match would you show them?
01:33:20
Speaker
Actually, it would have to be now, technically. What match would you show them to bring them back into wrestling, to be that like, you know, get their eye back on the product? Oh, man, that's hard. Hmm. Okay, there's two different levels to it, okay, man? Okay. There's the entertainment aspect, and then there's the storytelling aspect.
01:33:45
Speaker
From an entertainment aspect, I would probably show them any match with the Lucha Bros and the Young Bucks.
01:33:56
Speaker
and FTR if they're in the mix. I don't know how many matches they've all done at the same time, but I just recently watched the Bucks go up against like three other teams at Russell Dream. That was so damn exciting and so much fun. And you didn't have to know anything about anyone. You just watched it and you were just like floored. None of it made any sense.
01:34:21
Speaker
so much fun to watch. You know what I mean? So there's that for that. And then, I mean, if I'm going recently, you know, Zane and Raines at Elimination Chamber is probably, and that's strictly for storyline purposes because
01:34:45
Speaker
they show you the whole package of the year leading up to it. So like I have a friend actually, his name's Ted. And I remember watching Sammy and the bloodline with him. And I was telling him, I was like, dude, this is long form storytelling at its finest. This is like a year long story and it's all culminating. And so I think I would probably show them that match, not based off the merits of the match itself, but the story.
01:35:13
Speaker
that led up to it. That's awesome. Yeah, I took my son to the Survivor Series in Boston when they did the first ever war games on Survivor Series. And that was like the pinnacle of obviously the whole bloodline storyline with all of them together and all that stuff.
01:35:33
Speaker
he was like freaking he was that that brought him into like, I mean, Roman Reigns pretty much brought him into watching wrestling. Yeah. But like, you know, just being able to see like that whole thing as he watched on YouTube, they still have it up there. You can watch like it's like a two hour like bloodline movie pretty much. It's like it's literally all the segments from 2020 when Roman Reigns returns all the way up to, I think.
01:35:58
Speaker
uh up to WrestleMania when uh the Usos are gonna face Sammy and KO so literally all those segments it's about two hours and 20 minutes of like the whole and it's literally a movie like you'd sit there just watch it like it's a movie it is weird because you see the you know the Thunderdome and the the crowdless stuff but that's where all
01:36:19
Speaker
That's where that's that's the beautiful part of it is that's where that whole like that's where they were able to express their, you know, artistic integrity, essentially, that's where they would, you know, be able to develop those characters. Who's to say, you know, that storyline would have like been better was if there was no man.
01:36:38
Speaker
like I wish I could have been a fly in the wall when that whole storyline was kind of presented, you know what I mean? Because like, you know, Roman took that six month break. Yep. And it came back full on. Yeah. And you know, you know, it never ended where they had intended, like it was like its own thing. But I wish I could have been a fly in the wall when like Paul Heyman, like I can just imagine him just saying, okay, everybody, we have this.
01:37:11
Speaker
And then like he's going to squash everyone that comes his way, but somehow still elevate them. And yeah. And then the whole story with Jay.
01:37:21
Speaker
You know, like the whole abusive relationship and then like it all builds Jay up to be like the only guy that's pinned Roman. Yeah. I was main event Jay and now he's currently tag champions with Cody. Yeah. Jamie now is like going nuts. You know, when, like, I just think it's so, it's so intriguing and everything Sammy did with them. I love it. I'll tell you what, during, during survivor series when Sammy did the,
01:37:50
Speaker
Oh, yeah, the full I was like, yes, this is so cool. Yeah, so before I let you go, just to get to the, the Paul Heyman did an interview, I think it went, I think it went, we did a podcast, I think it was podcast, it was but he actually talks about that whole, you know, the whole whole inception of the bloodline storyline and what happened and you know, what happened with Roman when Roman took off and was like, you know,
01:38:15
Speaker
obviously with the COVID stuff and you know him having a you know his immune systems kind of compromised in that sense he wanted to be you know protect his health but at the same time Paul Heyman said he was like pretty much done like he was like done with like you know he his character like he wasn't happy with what they were doing with like the Roman Reigns character blah blah blah so he said he got a call from Vince McMahon
01:38:41
Speaker
Um, and Vince said, Hey, Paul, do you want to come back and manage somebody?
Vince McMahon and the Bloodline Storyline
01:38:45
Speaker
And then he, Paul Heyman was like, I don't know who the hell are you going to put me with? Cause like, you know, Brock's not coming back. He's pretty much like he's done with like after that WrestleMania, he's like, I couldn't even imagine who he was at a puppy with. And then he goes, he said, Vince McMahon goes, what do you think about you teaming up with Roman Reigns? And he was like,
01:39:05
Speaker
oh okay that will work and then hence that you see that smack down episode with roman rain sitting down yeah that was the camera pans over and so as much as my the moral of my story is as much shit people want to give vincent man you can thank him for
01:39:22
Speaker
The bloodline storyline. No, listen, he might not listen to most people's ideas, and he might not listen to what a lot of people say, and he might have some dumb ideas. But he's also got the clackers to come up with crazy ideas and go for it. Because he knows what's going to happen. Nothing. Nothing. He's not going to lose money on it. He just sold his company for $9 billion to TKO. Yep.
01:39:52
Speaker
It's one of those things where as a business person myself, you want to take risks because even if you do fail, you learn. You know that, okay, well, I won't do that again. And for better or for worse, people might perceive you to be the fool for making a mistake, but they're technically the ones that are the fools because listen, they didn't have the gumption or the gall to do it on their own.
01:40:20
Speaker
You know, so it's like better to fall in your face, pick yourself up and learn from it and move forward than to never have tried at all. So yeah, he's, he's a, he's, I mean, he's a creepy dude. Let's not forget that. Yeah. But at least, at least the man, the man has the guts to like take risks. And yeah, I can't even imagine what the phone call was like with Roman, you know, where Roman was just like, dude, the only way this is going to work is if I'm heel.
01:40:50
Speaker
Yeah, yep. You know, even Paul Heyman was like, I don't he's like, he's like, you want me to work with Roman? Like, I don't like he's a good guy. I don't know how it's going to like.
01:41:00
Speaker
Uh, like pan out and then, you know, Vince was like, no, he's going to be a bad guy now. He's going to be healed. And they, you know, like you said, they were lucky. They didn't have a crowd. That's the whole thing. Like, I think actually probably would have worked if they did have it because they were booing them anyway. So it would have worked just fine. I think the Thunderdome was a good, a good thing because you're able to like show more emotion and they're able to like workshop stuff and like even hell in a cell with Jay.
01:41:25
Speaker
like just them crying in the ring. Like I, I couldn't believe I was seeing that on a wrestling show. You know, Oscar worthy right there. Oscar, Oscar worthy acting from Roman, but this was awesome, dude. This is a, this is a great interview. I mean, you are, you're amazing dude. Like just here, just this story, the, the, you know, the things you accomplished since you know,
01:41:50
Speaker
with the artwork and stuff like that. Like I said, I'm one of those people, I'm excited when I see someone that I've watched from afar, just be successful. We're not close friends or anything like that, but just seeing
01:42:07
Speaker
Just seeing your growth, just following your page with so long and seeing the different, and you telling me all the different people you interacted with and all the different things you've done, it's inspiring to me anyway to do what I do. And I'm hoping if people listen to this episode, they get inspired as well, but I definitely want to thank them. Well, you're doing the thing, man. You're doing the thing. The secret sauce is communication.
01:42:34
Speaker
I was talking about that with artwork, but the secret sauce really is if you want to be successful in anything, you know, build relationships, grow relationships, create a positive environment, shake off any of the negativity, then just keep pushing forward, man.
Building Relationships in Art
01:42:50
Speaker
Like I've seen some stupid ridiculous stuff myself and I just throw it all out there and focus on things that are good. You know what I mean?
01:42:59
Speaker
Yeah, you want to surround yourself with with like minded people, as they say, like nothing, nothing that's going to deter you. The only thing that's going to, like you said, the only thing that's going to stop you is yourself from not even, you know, going forth and doing it. Yeah. And that's, you know, that's I mean, that's where that's where I was at with this. I was kind of.
01:43:17
Speaker
You know, just talking to Sheena Chick Foley saying like, you know, I want to do this, but, you know, it's kind of I'm going to be by myself. I don't have you or staff or anyone else. Alina, we're all bouncing ideas off each other. And, you know, we do a podcast with like I'm doing it with three other people. So, you know, it's easier that way. But like when you jump in by yourself, it's it's a little bit different. So especially with like I'm talking to people I never talked to before. So that's another that's another like, wow, that's why I want to do it. So.
01:43:47
Speaker
Yeah, you're totally doing it and I I wish you nothing but the best. I think it's going to be amazing. Yeah, thank you man. But before we go, well, I mean, obviously you can tell them tell them tell people where they can find you.
01:43:59
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, so the main way you can find me is on Instagram.
Where to Find Nolanium Online
01:44:02
Speaker
My handle is nolanium, N-O-L-A-N-I-U-M, as in mother. That's where I put a lot of my content. I'm also on Twitter every now and then, but that house is kind of crumbling apart, so I don't know how to go on there.
01:44:18
Speaker
And then I'm also on Facebook, nolaniamart, facebook.com slash nolaniamart. I'm always updating. I'm always posting things that I'm working on, especially in my stories more often than not.
01:44:33
Speaker
And I'm always here if you have questions. I'm not currently taking commissions, but if you are a fellow artist and you have questions about what I do or how to kind of get your foot in the door, I can help steer you in the right direction. So that's why I take a lot of pride in. Awesome. And we'll end it there. Again, thank you for joining.
01:44:57
Speaker
Yeah, we'll see everyone next time. Thank you for listening on this audio journey, as I like to say. Peace out, everyone. Yeah, thank you, Marco. Thank you.
01:45:33
Speaker
you