Every era of skateboarding has its legends and the mid- to late- 90s was personified by Chad Muska, a skater from Las Vegas who went from being homeless in Southern California to virtual rock star status and lifestyle in a span of just a few short years. The Muska later went on to become a shoe designer for Supra and a creator of art in general. Rick Kosick gets the scoop on where he's at now in life…
Kosick: So what’s been going on since we shot the “Deconstructionism” video?
Muska: Well, like my life, there’s been a never-ending amount of different projects all going on at the same time and it’s been about balancing all these different things that I do. A lot of it has been focusing more on Supra, helping design and work with them, and on top of that I moved from the flat into a new space downtown a while ago which was in Lincoln Heights. I started working there, continuing the idea and the expression of what was happening, but the space unfortunately sold after a year and we had to get out. This led to my current space that I’m in now on Melrose, creating a new adventure similar to what we did over at the flat.
So what are you doing in this new space now, do you have a different direction you’re going with?
For me, in general, the space dictates what happens with my work, the experience, and ,the energy of the people that have brought together all those things. So I’m really trying to figure out exactly what this is and what it will become. There’s really not a whole lot of planning or thought put into the process, it’s just more about being here day to day and trying to express myself or create something on a daily basis which lives through multiple platforms, whether it’s physical art—creating sculptures, paintings, or creating an installation—or digitally through photography, documenting stuff, or filming things and making small shorts with that material. So it’s various forms of expression happening on a daily basis that don’t really have a master plan except to create and to do work.
So with this new location do you think it’s going to be how it was at the flat, where it would continuously draw people in with an interest in what you’re doing?
I’m at a different time in my life than I was within that space. I was more about partying and that was part of the installation—it was a party, it was people, and going a little bit nuts in order to channel whatever was going on in my life at that time. This place has been more removed compared to that place in as far as not as much the party crowd but more of a creative crowd with smaller groups of individual people coming in. It’s definitely a night and day experience from what was happening before. That’s totally due to where I’m at in my life now, being more about the creative process than the expressive process of nightlife and partying. The one different factor with this space, too, is that it is Supra’s space, not just only mine, so some of the vision ultimately revolves around what they want to do, too. At the moment, I have free reign to create in here and do whatever it is I want to do, but we’re also talking about turning this into a retail front where we can open it up to the public and people can come in here on a daily basis. So I’m not sure exactly what will happen with the space, but I know that I have it right now and I can create in here and that’s what I’ve been doing.
Where are you at in your personal life nowadays? Is sobriety a part of your daily routine?
Yeah, I mean, it’s not anything that I preach about, but I haven’t been drinking for over three years now. I’ve cut out everything. So I’m completely sober right now. I just felt it was time to have a clearer head to know precisely what the vision is that I want to achieve in life and the things I want to do from here on out. I’ve always enjoyed partying in my life—I’ve always been a crazy partier, a lot of people know me as that—and I know that the true person I am is not the person that I am when I’m getting wasted. So the older I get the more I realize that I want to be remembered for the person that I know I am. Not the person that comes out when I’m wasted and partying with all these people. It was important for me to regroup and get it together in my head in order to be happy with the life that I’m living and the things I’m creating. I’ll always be crazy, with or without alcohol, but at this point I enjoy being sober. Once again, I never preach that on anybody. It’s my personal choice. I’m not really an AA guy. I don’t count the days or have chips or any stuff like that—not that I’m against that idea, but for me I just decided to quit one day and I’m still going.
What’s been inspiring you lately?
I’m really inspired by the desert, Joshua Tree, and places like that. Things that are beyond what we see on a day-to-day basis… things that are beyond the city life… beyond companies or skateboarding. I’m interested in purpose in life, in the bigger picture of it all. Ultimately, what this is, what this existence is, consciousness… everything is a very important study for me at this time. Understanding our place in time as humans and where we’re at in this world in general is very interesting to me… things that are greater than what I thought of through my youth and the expression of skating and graffiti and music and fashion. Those things are very cool, but they’re very human to me. I’m interested in things that I think are beyond human, which are usually unspoken because to speak of these things humanizes them and ultimately leaves them up to judgment. I’m interested in the planets and stars and physics and things I don’t necessarily have a degree in… how we perceive reality, how we perceive consciousness… light and how it reacts with us… our relationship with this world that we live in and call planet Earth, with the animals, with the atmosphere, with all these things. Something feels off to me about everything that’s happening right now, so I’m trying to better understand it myself to at least do my part of changing the things that feel off, I guess, if that makes sense. Ha-ha…
So what’s new with Supra? Do you have a new shoe coming out?
Yes, ha-ha… going back from here to there as complete opposites. For as much as my mind goes away from all these things—material possessions and material creation—I can’t change the fact that within our culture and society right now we need money to have shelter and food. We need these things to exist. I’ve been blessed to be able to utilize things that I put my passion into to create. The same as a drawing or a painting or a sculpture, I can create skateboards or clothing or shoes that allow me to live and continue to have the freedom to think about all these other things. So yeah, Supra is something that I have put my passion into for over ten years now, and I’m on my fifth installment of the SkyTop 5 that’s coming out now. I’m really, really hyped on that. I still think material items are important, because they bring joy to people and make themselves feel good, but we have to put them on a balance where the material possession isn’t the leading force of our world and the way we view a hierarchy of a system based on material goods, money, houses, clothes—things like that that we tend to worship more than people and energy within those people. So I’m at a weird balance in life where I’m struggling to make sense of these things that I’m creating. To know that I am proud to create these things but still question the idea of the bigger picture of it all, I guess. Not to get too deep in this interview. Ha-ha…
So we’ve been friends a long time and we’ve done a lot of photography over the years together. Do you have any funny Big Brother magazine stories you can recall?
Me and you met over the years and started shooting, but I had known who you were way before that. I was a fan of Big Brother before I was even sponsored, not knowing that someday I would actually be in it. Everything about Big Brother was funny, you know? Doing the interview for the documentary you guys are working on, it brought up a lot of good memories of great times in skateboarding where there was fun left in it. Where it wasn’t so serious and wasn’t just about counting stairs or who’s the best and all that. You guys were this group of outcasts that all came together, which is a perfect representation of skateboarding to me because as a skater when I was growing up, I was an outcast. In my school I was the only skateboarder. I had green hair and baggy pants and everybody was like, “What the heck is up with this guy?” I found a home within skateboarding, and I feel like Big Brother was a similar thing.
One of the craziest ones I remember—that I even forgot about until they brought it up was like, “Oh, you did an interview with Big Brother, right?” and I was like, “Oh shit!” like my heart kind of sunk. The internet didn’t really exist at the time, so it’s a pretty underground article that is out there that is hardcore. I was going through a lot of shit. I left everything and came homeless to San Diego to try to be a pro skater. I was living a hard-ass life on the streets trying to come up. We connected just around the time where I wasn’t even necessarily successful yet, but it was like the light was there, like I’d seen something was possible and I was making a little bit of money. I think I was making like 500 bucks a month or something at the time, but to me then that was like a million dollars. We connected at the birth of my career and when it started to happen. Those will always be some of the fondest memories ever.
There never was and never will be another magazine like Big Brother within skateboarding. It’s not going to happen again. The times are too different for that to exist. A skateboarding mag where there’s people shooting themselves with guns, and dildos, and drugs, and drinking, and bong Olympics? If that happened nowadays it would be all out internet warfare against the publication. You guys pushed the limits of everything… but you weren’t even pushing the limits, you were just capturing the reality of what we were all doing at that time. That’s what was happening and you guys were like we’re not gonna be some perfect-ass, Southern California company, you know, with sunset shots and skateboarding and palm trees. You were like, here it is, this is what these guys are doing, and we’re going to give you guys the realness of life. It was funny, man. Big Brother was always comedy.
What did you think of the Big Brother book?
I thought it was great. So many things are happening nowadays that you tend to forget and it’s important to put out these reminders, to bring up those memories and to bring back that time, because without that we wouldn’t be where we’re at today. So it was a glimpse into a time capsule for me… crazy, funny memories both good and bad. I got the quote on the back of the book, “There wasn’t any other magazine I was scared to open up but Big Brother,” or something to the extent, which was very true. You didn’t know how they were going to put you on blast. I know I’ve done some goofy-ass shit over the years, you know what I mean, dressing crazy with this whole posse and the ghetto blaster coming through, but it was so important to me at the time. I was putting everything I had into it at the time, so even if looking back it is corny to me, at that time it was so real to me. So I was very sensitive of anything that came out at that time. Skateboarding is very fickle like that, too, where one wrong thing can be said about you in the industry and you’re done, like your career is just gone. I’ve seen it happen to a lot of people. It’s kind of weird because it’s like we should be this brotherhood united, which in some ways it is, and in that time it was, because what other sport could I have played where I ran away from home as a kid from Las Vegas and showed up in LA like, “I’m a basketball player, let me stay at your house, man!” I don’t think you could actually do that in any other besides something like skateboarding… maybe surfing.
Do you ever see yourself doing another skate part?
I would love to, but I have an injury in my back right now… a herniated disk that they want me to get surgery on because I have the risk of being paralyzed right now if I fall and twist weird. I’m terrified to death to get the surgery, so it’s taken me away from skateboarding. I still cruise around on my board, ollie up curbs and stuff like that, skate some mini-ramps, grinds here and there, but the last couple years I haven’t gone after it like I have in the past. It’s not because I don’t have it in my heart anymore and I don’t want to, but I have that bad injury that’s holding me back. That’s a major factor why there’s not something new coming out right now.
I’ve found ways to express the energy I have in me through art and sculpting and designing and photography and video and all these other things I experiment with that have been equally stimulating, but I do feel a piece of my soul is missing without skateboarding and it’s been very hard. Watching [Steve] Caballero, Lance Mountain, and [Christian] Hosoi shredding, I’m like, “Gosh, if they’re doing it, I gotta be out there doing it with them still!” So time will tell. I would say it’s definitely not over, though. Especially after not drinking and smoking, I’m just so clear and so good… like my body is so good except for that one factor. Maybe eventually I’ll get the surgery or they’ll invent some new stem cell thing that can grow me a new spinal cord or something… ha-ha… that’s easier than the surgery that exists now, but in the meantime I’m very proud of all the things that I have done and put out there and I don’t feel the need to try to prove myself to anybody at this point. It would never be about that, it would just be about continuing the true passion I have for skateboarding that I will always have—even when I’m an old-ass grandpa in a wheelchair, I’ll still have this strong passion for skateboarding. It’s something that will never go away. It’s not over until it’s over.
(Photos and video by Rick Kosick)
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Posted by: Milko Milkovich | 03/23/2016 at 10:33 AM