“There are terrific stories in this book–not just tattoo stories, although Jeff Johnson has many good ones, but also stories about human nature. Jeff Johnson is a gifted and natural storyteller, and he knows about things you don’t know.”
– John Irving, author of Last Night in Twisted River, Until I Find You, The Fourth Hand, [...]
The topic is prickly, but Tattoo Machine is a charmer. Jeff Johnson is a sharp-eyed master tattoo artist, and an extraordinary writer. His own remarkable story of up-from-under redemption weaves through this engaging, gritty, and meticulous examination of the shadowed art of personal symbolism. As co-owner and manager of the famed Sea [...]
Tattoo parlors are showcases for the socially disreputable, the brazenly nonconformist and the indelibly creative, all on display in this colorful memoir. First-time author and veteran tattoo artist Johnson has a million tales of the tattoo demimonde, who come to his Sea Tramp in Portland, Ore., as well as tattoo shops around the country. Into [...]
In addition to the interwoven account of how the author survived a messed-up youth (which included crime) to become co-owner of the Sea Tramp, the oldest tattoo parlor in Portland, Ore., and a brief but very interesting history of the business and how it works, Mr. Johnson delivers a virtual cornucopia of rogues and rascals. [...]
In “Tattoo Machine,” Jeff Johnson gives a salty tour of the shops that nervous mothers once forbade their sons and daughters from visiting. As the co-owner of Sea Tramp Tattoo Company in Portland, Oregon, and a practicing artist who has wielded an ink-and-needle gun that “smacks the skin between 60 and 120 times per second” [...]
In his new book Tattoo Machine, Jeff Johnson does something I wouldn’t have thought possible in a town as ink-saturated as Portland: He makes tattoos seem cool again. Johnson is co-owner of the Sea Tramp, the oldest tattoo parlor in Oregon, and his behind-the-scenes account of life in the industry is a swaggering, gossipy read.
Read [...]
The Sea Tramp Tattoo Co. is the oldest tattoo parlor in Portland, but it’s not the Shop That Time Forgot. Sure, there are some old military recruiting posters high on the south wall, and some of the flash — the drawings by tattoo artists that show their skills — that covers the walls dates back [...]
Most tattoo artists prefer not to share the tricks and tales of their trade, but not Jeff Johnson. In his newly released memoir, Tattoo Machine, the Portland-based inkman shares some of the weirdest, wackiest and most disgusting details of his profession, from cleaning up after chudders (look it up) to the time he tattooed a [...]
NEW YORK (Reuters Life!) – The sad lament of every great tattoo artist is that their work will never be preserved for future generations — their canvases die and turn to dust sooner than almost any other medium.
But Jeff Johnson, author of “Tattoo Machine: Tall Tales, True Stories, and My Life in Ink” and co-owner [...]
When it comes to authoring books, tattoo diva Kat Von. D could learn a thing or two from Jeff Johnson.
In a magnificently written testament to the art of decorating the body, Johnson – a former Torontonian, now co-owner of the Sea Tramp Tattoo Company, Portland’s oldest tat shop – provides a definitive and authoritative take [...]