Make Art, Make Money

I'd been wanting to have a proper sit down with YakkaBlakka mostly known as Yak, a really cool dude I met through the Unified Championship Wrestling connection. Yak performs as the character Mr Star Power Archie Bower at UCW but much like myself comes to wrestling from a different art form, in this case it's hip hop and more specifically hip hop dance. Yak told me all about the history of hip hop dance in New Zealand and specifically Christchurch and he told me how a lot of teams from Christchurch compete on the world stage and really make their prescence known. He talked about a new movement they're working on bringing people from all different disciplines of dance together which has a real rising tide lifting all boats effect on the scene. Really really fascinating interview, I enjoyed it a lot, hope you do too!Follow YakkaBlakka Online:https://www.instagram.com/archiefknbower/And catch him at any upcoming UCW shows where he'll likely be boxing my ears at some point or another!Follow Taylor Ruddle Online:Instagram • Facebook • Tiktok • YouTube

Today I sat down with Renee from Tusken Traiders, an online business selling vintage toys and apparel, they have some freaking cool stuff from the 90s and 00's, very y2k coded. Renee has been doing this as her full time gig for just under a year so it was awesome to talk to her about what that experience was like, as well as getting a bit of an insight about the reseller industry. I'm huge into toys and collectibles so this was really cool to hear the nuts and bolts about how it all functions and Renee was an awesome guest to have on the pod. Big shout out to Liv Fox for putting us in touch!Follow Tusken Traiders Online:https://www.instagram.com/tusken_traiders/https://linktr.ee/tuskentraidersFollow Taylor Ruddle Online:Instagram • Facebook • Tiktok • YouTube

This week I had a yarn to my pal Troubadette, a musician and comedian who's been swinging away at the full time hustle for 2 years now. We talked about Troob's backstory a bit and how they got into the position they're in currently to be able to pursue art as the main thing and do enough relief teaching work to have a base to work from and pay some of the bills off of. One part of the podcast that I feel is particularly pertinent was Troubadette talking about how they've had many doors essentially closed in their face in the traditional music industry and so comedy was an unexpected area where they felt accepted and like they could make some real progress in. The guts of the episode is about what life can be like when you take something you used to do as a hobby and try to make a living from it. Overall this episode is a great listen and in the afterward debrief we agreed that we were surprised at how deep it got at points. I think you'll enjoy this a lot. Troob even sang us a song in the middle!Follow Troubadette Online:https://www.instagram.com/troubadette/https://www.facebook.com/troubadettenzhttps://troubadette.net/Follow Taylor Ruddle Online:Instagram • Facebook • Tiktok • YouTube

I sat down with Sean Tinker, a fella I've known for many a year. We initially met doing stand-up shows together but at the current time Sean is making his living as a musician playing pub gigs and corporates. We recorded a podcast in 2024 on my old podcast, Ruddle Me This where we talked about what it was like that early into his career as a full time musician and we thought it would be cool do a catch up 2 years later. Sean's going strong and it's great to hear his insights about what he wished he knew when he started out.You can also check out the previous interview right in this feed as I've reuploaded it here, dropping very soon.Follow Sean Online:https://www.seantinkermusic.com/https://www.instagram.com/seantinkermusic/Follow Taylor Ruddle Online:Instagram • Facebook • Tiktok • YouTube

The first episode of my (sorta) relaunched podcast, Make Art, Make Money! Liv Fox is a Christchurch based tattoo artist who was kind enough to sit down with me for about an hour and talk about the ins and outs of being a self employed tattoer.We covered Liv's journey going from apprentice to tattooer to self employed to owning a studio and what are some of the lessons and pitfalls along the way.Check Liv Out Online:https://www.instagram.com/livfoxtattoohttps://www.tiktok.com/@livfoxtattooFollow Taylor Ruddle Online:Instagram • Facebook • Tiktok • YouTube