Eric/Gerry

There's something special about artists who say so much with so little. For me these people are the home base, the foundation, the place we all run to when we need to be reminded what it's all about.

I remember being a kid sitting with my ear up to the speaker of our record player listening to Eric Clapton playing in Cream, pushing hard against the speaker listening for the last notes of a fade out. It's a pure sound; one guitar, one amp and buckets of emotion. There's been a myriad of technically better guitarists over the last century but it's the ability to simply and beautifully convey an emotion that to me makes a great artist.

On a parallel to Clapton is legendary '70's surfer Gerry Lopez. Gerry lived and surfed at Pipeline on the North Shore of Hawaii. Mastering the wave like no other before or since. Gerry made extremely difficult and life threatening situations look simple and beautiful. So much so that the term "walk in the park" was used to describe the way Gerry surfed the Pipeline. Just like Clapton, Lopez captured and transfixed people with his style, simplicity and emotion.

To me this is what it's all about.