The Legend Of Karma
Photos and words by Richard Hart

The best we can hope for is to be remembered for doing what we do well. You won’t find Karma somewhere midst these pages, bedecked in gold, promoting sunglasses or backpacks with a forced pout. Then again, you don’t usually see too much skate coverage of him either, but what you do see will be solid and memorable. He is one of the skaters that I am always excited to catch something of, here and there, now and then. One of the Drehobls, the Puleos, the Ianuccis of this little world of ours. A Skater’s Skater, and an inspirational figure - Mr. Karma Tsocheff.
This portrait was taken moments after Karma’s wife called to say that she had gone into labor - he was about to become a father. This is documentation of someone at the exact moment they become a real grown-up (after a couple of decades as a professional kid).

How does it feel to be a proper grown-up now?
It feels great. It’s a big life change and you’re designed to want to hold onto things, the way things were, but sometimes things are changing anyway and you’ve got to keep moving with it.

Tell me about the birth.
When Parker (Karma’s son)’s little head popped out, it was pretty intense and I saw a big flash of light - like a camera. Just a ‘POP!’ and then there he was. I think having a kid helps you look at other humans and appreciate them a little bit more, and have a little more openness and kindness towards them. You realize that everyone was a baby at one time, with a family that loves them, and why would you want to be mean or hurtful to somebody that has family that loves that person so much?

You’re living up to your hippie name. Are you managing to fit in some skating these days?
We got a car recently because you’ve got to have a car when you have a baby, so I’ve been driving around a lot more so when I do finally skate I definitely feel rusty. But it makes you fit to have a kid too, so that helps at least.

You were part of the New Breed.
We went down to Del Mar in 1990 for this contest and everyone turned pro that year, all the new breed; like Jeremy Klein, Ron Chatman, Justin Girard, Ed Templeton, Randy Colvin… I think my cover had just come out too, because I remember Mark Gonzales coming up to me and asking “Are you the kid on that cover?” It was all happening real quick, everyone was motivated, really pushing skating. Noses were getting longer, there were a lot of innovations happening, people wanted to find out where skating could go.

How long did Dogtown last for you?
Two years or so. I had about five boards come out, and we did that video. The video turned out really well, a lot of sick skaters involved - Wade Speyer, John Cardiel, JJ Rogers…

How did you end up riding for SMA?
I was hanging with AP (Alana Petersen) a lot and Julien (Stranger) was still on the team. Alan persuaded me to ride for SMA and we started work on the video “Debunker.”

When did Consolidated start? 1992? How did that happen?
Skating was taking a dumper. Steve Keenan and Birdo were working at NHS and getting frustrated. Santa Cruz let a lot of people go so those guys were having to do screen-printing and stuff like that, when they really wanted to do more creative stuff, wanted to do their own thing. I was always itching to do my own company, and I knew AP was down, too.

How quickly did it come together?
Real quick. Keenan and Birdo were the business side of it, Moish was our artist, and Corey Chrysler, AP, Jason Jessee, Jesse Paez, and me were the team. Frank Hirata was going to be part of it, and so was Tom Knox, but that didn’t happen. The name came from the Debunker video - there was a band called Consolidated that we were all into. The Debunker video was kind of a precursor to Consolidated.

When was the first tour?
The first proper US tour was ’95 and that was insane: being on the road, having a good crew, skating everything… skating back then was different; not so serious. We didn’t feel the need to “get stuff”, to put in “work”. We were skating and we were good skaters - we were cocky and we knew it, but all we had to do was show up and rip; we didn’t think about getting tons of photos or footage. It was good times. The blueprint for what you had to do to “survive” in professional skateboarding hadn’t really been written then. We didn’t even bring a photographer. We had a video camera with us and we would break it out every now and then, but it wasn’t a priority. We did a lot of demos - mainly because that was the only way we could make any money. There wasn’t any money in skating then, we were just doing it because we loved it. When I was a little kid and I told my mom “I want to be a professional skateboarder”, I really believed it, but I didn’t know what that meant… I probably still don’t. But it never had to do with dollar signs. I never thought “I want to be a pro skater and get rich”; I just wanted to be a pro skater to support skateboarding to the fullest, and I wanted to take it as far as I could go.

On those early tours, you guys were just winging it, demo to demo?
Yep. Sometimes the shops would stiff us, or they just couldn’t pay us. It was hard times for skateboarding… there was one time on that first tour when we were headed to upstate New York and there was a guy with a skateshop who owed us a load of money - Birdo told us he had ordered a bunch of product but never paid us, so he gives us the guy’s address and we all showed up on his doorstep, all six of us. We were like “Hey, what’s up, we’re Consolidated, we heard you owe us some money!” The poor guy had to drain his bank account and then he let us stay at his house! That kept us going for a bit. We didn’t have any money. We didn’t have insurance on the truck, no gas cards or anything, it was before cell phones, and nobody even had credit cards. If something went wrong, we couldn’t just go to the airport and fly home like kids do nowadays. We were stuck out in the wilderness, for months at a time. 21, 22 years old. Richard was 15. His example to look up to growing up was Andy Roy.

Tell me a van story.
We were in New Hampshire or somewhere at the Warped tour and Andy slapped some chick’s ass and a big fight broke out. The cops came and busted us, confiscated our video camera and escorted us out of town. We pull into some hotel with this drive-through overhang outside and Doug (Saenz) drove right into it. Our roof got snagged on it because we had this roof-loft thing on top of the van - it’s where Doug and I used to sleep. So anyway, he backs up and the whole roof just rips off in one piece and falls on the ground. It looked like a big canoe. Andy pops his head out the top of the van and is screaming and laughing. We were all just tweaked from the whole day and the whole tour, thinking “What are we going to do now?” We didn’t have any money… the hotel people are out there looking at their roof, freaking out. We thought somebody was going to jail, but we ended up sleeping in the parking lot that night and the next day we got some caulking glue and screws from a hardware store, and fastened the roof back on for the rest of the tour.

How often was it that Andy Roy instigated all the problems?
Always. He just enjoyed fucking with people. One time, we were in Salt Lake City. We skated some ramp and then these guys took us to this snowboarder party. Andy is standing over some guy who is sitting down, drizzling beer on this guy’s head until he finally figures it out and then Andy goes “What? It was an accident! I’m druuunk!” and then he would just do it again. Anyway, a fight broke out and we were in the middle of the living room; me, Richard and Andy, and the room is packed with these jock snowboarders. The whole party turned on us. Imagine being in a pit at a punk show, but the whole pit is surrounding you.  It was really scary. This guy is trying to rip my mouth open but somehow we managed to jam out the side door and run for the van. Andy was scrapping with these two big dudes and I just ran past them and broke a bottle over one of their heads and kept running. I looked back and there were ten dudes coming towards us with hockey sticks and I hid behind the back of the van and hit the first guy with a skateboard. I actually kept that board and it had an inch-by-inch patch of skin with hair on it. I gave it to Keenan and he was stoked on it. But anyway, we’re fighting off all these dudes while piling into the van. The thing was, our van at the time, you had to touch the battery with a wire to get it started. Somebody had to be inside trying to start it while someone else is outside with this wire, jumping the battery… so Doug jumps out with this little wire, just waiting for someone to clock him from behind, somehow gets it started, jumps in, Richard and Jesse and AP were already in the van, but I hadn’t gotten in yet. Andy is driving and he whips around and charges at these dudes and they smash a window with a hockey stick… meanwhile, I am being chased by these guys down the street. You know how in a movie there’ll be a chase scene with people jumping over fences from one backyard to the next? And a dog will chase you across the yard? Well, that happened to me. But I got to a grocery store and hide behind a garbage can. No shirt, full of adrenaline. And then there are cops everywhere, shining lights at all the houses. I’m jacked. Ended up walking all the way into downtown, sleeping on the street, and called this local skater the next day at a pay phone to track the others down.

Are you the last remaining member of the original team?
I guess so. It was like a family back then… but then, there are guys like Roberto (Alemañ) and (Steve) Bailey who’ve been on the team now for a good ten years. They’ve been down for a long time. But I miss the original guys. I still skate with Doug; he’s my friend for life. I’m still in touch with Richard all the time, too. But I miss seeing all those guys.

How long have you been pro?
18 years. It’s weird, as fast as it started, it feels like it’s nearly over. It’s been like a flash.

When and why did you stop drinking?
Oh, you’re asking me that question?

It’s going to counteract all the partying stories.
It was a few things. I was feeling tired all the time, zapped. I’d been on the road for almost 15 years straight; I was burned out. I lost my good buddy Jeff Klindt to drinking, I broke my foot skating while I was drunk, and I got a DUI, all within a short period of time. I was sick of making the same mistakes; I’m just a poor drunk. I needed to step away from that, and this January it will have been five years.

What about music? What did you grow up listening to?
My mom was really into ’60s bands. Beatles, Sabbath, Zeppelin. Then I got way into punk rock when I was 13 because of Tom Knox and Jeff Klindt - they were way into punk. I played in a punk band with Tom when we lived together, we always had guitars and a drum kit set up in the spare room and would jam a lot. I got into nomeansno and King Crimson a lot. And then later in the ’90s it was the Velvet Underground and all the lo-fi indie rock stuff - Guided By Voices, Sebadoh, all that stuff. I liked it because it made you feel like “Hey, I could do this.” My friend Mike and I started jamming around then, and then Ethan Fowler joined us and we called ourselves Six Degree Theory. We recorded 10 songs and all played our first shows together. Then Ethan moved out of town and we got Doug in and became AM Magic. (ammagicmusic@myspace.com)
And now we’re just trying to finish up the new record. It got put on hold for a while: two of us had babies, but we are waiting to finish it in LA.

What’s going on with you now?
Trying to skate, trying to finish a record, trying to do some stage - hand work, trying to make some money… its been one thing after another. I’m either at the crossroads or have come full circle.

How do you feel about skateboarding now?
I love it. It’s just hard when you have a lot of other stuff going on. I’m used to being really focused on skating; that’s what its good for - to block everything else out and get zoned into it. But if you have a lot going on, maybe you feel like you’re not paying as much attention to it as you’d like. But then when you do get to skate or play music its just that much more precious… I don’t know, I just like being able to push down the street. Being able to go from A to B is really fun; and whatever’s in the middle is a bonus.

- Interview from Slap Magazine