TAMDING TSTETAN

Tibetan's, for the second year in a row, suspended their new year's celebrations in defiance and solidarity. Tibetan tattoo artist Tamding shares his art, and talks about how he uses it to make a difference.

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TARA DAKIDES

Long before Tara Dakides was an X Games champ and leading lady of snowboarding, she was another 18-year-old having doubts about her next tattoo. "He had a twitchy eye," Dakides remembers of the tattooer who took a turntable in payment for a tattoo. "I should've known from that point that he probably wouldn't have done good work." She took the plunge anyway, and the artist left her with a giant mushroom design that spanned the side of her torso and ribs. Dakides never felt the image reflected who she was at the time. She always considered herself an outsider and spent her teens at basement punk shows and partying with ...

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TARA LEVITIN

Old keys and tiny faucet handles. A pocketknife and a wolf tooth. Where others see antique oddities, Tara Levitin sees jewelry....

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TARA MCPHERSON

Sitting down with artist Tara McPherson you’re likely to get a lesson in physics these days: “When you take a super bright object, like a quasar, and place it in front of a massive object, it creates the illusion of four identical objects surrounding the original. That’s called Einstein’s Cross gravitational lens.” To hear this pouring so fluidly out of the mouth of an artist who is known more for gothic characters and insanely beautiful rock show posters than for having a keen acumen for science is surprising. McPherson, a California native who transplanted to New York three years ago, speaks of this as she sits in her storefront studio ...

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TATTOO CITY

Co-owned and operated by venerable artists Ed Hardy and Fip Buchanan, Tattoo City, in the heart of the historic North Beach area, is at the apex of the tattoo world. Hardy himself hand picks each of the store’s artists to carry on the tradition he began more than 40 years ago. “Everyone has an individual style, but they all work under Ed’s eye,” says Tattoo City manager Aleph Kali. “It’s quite an honor to work here.” Small and covered from wall to wall with antique flash from Sailor Jerry, Hardy, and other legendary artists, Tattoo City is also part “ink museum.” “A lot of the flash is older than most of the customers that come in here,” says Kali. But don’t head there expecting to pick up any Hardy gear. ...

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TAYLOR STREET TATTOO

Opening up a shop in Chicago’s Little Italy wasn’t easy for Keith Underwood. In fact, the Taylor Street owner has become almost as famous for the battle he faced trying to get his business open as he has for his art. “You can’t just rent and open here,” says Underwood of his difficulties. Strict laws about property ownership, coupled with ambiguous, antiquated licensing and regulations edicts in the state of Illinois, meant that attempting to open a business centered around tattooing was not only a hassle, but a big gamble as well. Then, there was the trouble with the neighbors. “It was a real us-versus-them-situation,” says Underwood about the college-prep and Catholic schools that showed up at his community hearing to voice protests and air concerns that the shop would ...

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TEAR IT DOWN

They pioneered metalcore, then spent a decade pushing its limits. Now Atreyu talk about who they are, where they've been, and why sometimes it's a good idea to wear long sleeves in Orange County.

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TED LEO AND THE PHARMACISTS
THE BRUTALIST BRICKS [MATADOR]

Ted Leo may be the hardest-working man in punk. Although his sixth full-length with the Pharmacists may not have any songs as infectious as “Me and Mia,” from his incendiary 2004 effort Shake the Sheets, it is probably his most consistent effort to date. While the album is teeming with plenty of politically motivated rock songs, The Brutalist Bricks also has sonic surprises, such as the half-time acoustic breakdown on “Bottled in Cork” and the dissonant introduction to the Elvis Costello–worthy anthem “Gimme the Wire.” “We all got a job to do, we’re gonna do it together,” Leo sings over a bed of pounding piano and tribal drums on “Woke Up Near Chelsea.” Leo’s doing his part—what about you?