Photography by Duncan Macfarlane
With two plus decades of riding for the Bong, Creed McTaggart celebrates making it to the big time with a full range of signature garms. And there’s a blinding new Indo edit to coincide with it all courtesy of Toby Cregan. In celebration, we got both lads on the phone to dig into the collection, the making of the video, and everything in between.
WT
Can you tell us the story behind the name “Big Time” for your new Billabong collection?
Creed
I guess the name Big Time was kind of a joke, kind of ironically wanting to make the big time, be rich and famous, through this collection. All the clothes are quite loud colors, quite in your face, and I thought “Big Time,” those two words together, kind of described the collection pretty well. It’s a pretty big collection, and it’s really loud. There’s definitely a bit of tongue-in-cheek in there, it’s a bit of a joke. I’m just trying to make it big time in my 30’s… (laughs).
WT
How many collections have you done with Billabong now?
Creed
This is my third collection, but the first one where it’s all my paintings – I hand-painted all the logos and stuff. So it’s definitely more personal… more me, I guess?
WT
Where would you say you drew inspiration from for the graphics and titles? Did it come from anywhere specific, or did you just freestyle it?
Creed
A lot of it’s paintings I’d done before, and some of it’s a play on old Billabong slogans. “Only a surfer knows the feeling,” I ripped it off and did “Only a horse knows the feeling,” with a flying horse. And they had “Life’s better in boardshorts,” so I did “Life’s better in a flower pot” with a flower growing up. So yeah, a bit of fun, kind of taking the piss, but not really…
Toby
I remember when you told me you were going to call it that, before I was even involved, before I knew I’d get to make the video. When you said “Big Time,” I thought, is this a joke or not? Because it doesn’t feel like a joke.
Creed
Honestly, I just thought those words were a good name for it. I remember painting the words “Big Time” and it just looked really cool. If you take the “rich and famous” element out of it, those two words are actually quite opposite, they kind of don’t make sense together. I liked that nonsensical reason behind it. And it turned out a good excuse to design some clothes, make a short film with Tobes, and go on a surf trip.
WT
Toby, how long have you been filming with Creed now?
Toby
That’s a good question. He rocked up to a party at my house, but he was basically asleep back in 2011 or so? That was the first time, but I don’t think he would remember that. The first time that Creed and I properly met, which he probably remembers, would be just after that in Hawaii when we picked up a homeless guy and we went for a surf (laughs).
WT
A nice acquaintance! And with everything you’ve done together since, it makes a lot of sense for you to have directed this project. What was the process and planning how you’d do it? Deciding to go to Indo?
Creed
We obviously know the area pretty well since we’ve been going there forever and it’s always a safe bet. We went to Bali, hung out for a week, then shot over to Lakey’s for four or five days. We didn’t really get the best waves until the last day, it’s there we got that good session at Periscopes.
Toby
It’s pretty funny, I thought we’d get it done slowly but surely, and then the whole thing came together in the last session, basically over a couple of hours.
WT
Always the way. Wasn’t that the same for your Cult of Freedom part too, Creed? Crazy big Periscopes, same spot?
Creed
Yeah exactly. Somehow I didn’t fall off every wave, and it all came together. Kind of nice!
WT
Toby, how would you approach a project like this differently to, say, a Rage project, filming with Creed versus another brand?
Toby
Not really that different, to be honest. I don’t actually remember when Creed hit me up about it, I don’t vividly remember the details. Do you remember, Creed? I think we just asked, if I could do it (laughs) I thought it’d be fun to go to Indo, we were there almost a month, three weeks maybe?
Creed
Yeah, about three weeks, with a bit of skunky in the middle. We’ve always run this program where we don’t really check the swell forecast, we’re both busy doing our own stuff, and that was the only time we could fit it in, so we just didn’t look at any charts and left. It’s kind of nice that way, it is what it is then.
Toby
It’s a foolproof way to make a surf video, if you’ve got time blocked out, just go and try it, because you know you’re always going to get something, and that’s better than nothing. So when Creed hit me up, I remember him saying it could be a possibility, and based on the name I had an idea to try something. The name seemed kind of funny, kind of absurd, and it resonated with me, I felt like if we went to Bali especially, we could get it. There’s a track at the end, “Starboy,” I kept playing that song over and over. It encapsulated the whole feeling I was trying to capture: people trying to succeed, or something, in a cynical way.
Creed
Unless you go and actually live “the big time” over there, drinking cocktails in the sun, staying somewhere nice, living in some sort of dream.
Toby
There’s a definitely still a hollowness to it too. Bittersweet. Even if you go hang out somewhere like Hollywood, there’s this lingering feeling of emptiness. I was trying to get that across. We weren’t hanging out where I wanted to get clips originally of, like, crypto bros, that’s the kind of energy I wanted to put to that track. But we just ended up with a bunch of footage of old bogans having a good time on their holiday, but I didn’t want to take the piss out of that too much either…
WT
And talk us through the start of the edit…
Creed
My favorite part of the film is the intro, we tried to make it like a mockumentary style. Taro Watanabe was in town and Toby was filming him doing his stuff. We’d started a project, they were down around my house shooting, I was in my garage, Toby came over, and we just said, “let’s shoot the intro now.” Taro ended up shooting handycam, Toby shot 16mm, and we ended up with that funnt skit.
Toby
It’s kind of a “how-to” thing, sometimes surf videos start with getting prepared for a trip and it’s all been done before, so we just went with that. It’s almost like a how-to-make-a-surf-video bit, we were actually trying really hard, but when you put it in that bare-bones form, it’s just fucking ridiculous what you’re up to.
WT
You can see you two have spent so much time filming together, it’s like a piss-take, but not really, just vibing. If you were filming with someone you didn’t know as well, you wouldn’t be able to act like that. I guess that’s all part of it?
Toby
Easily, yeah. If we just get together, film some stuff, have fun bouncing off each other, then editing it is super easy. And the thing is with Creed, even if it’s shit, it’s still fresh.
Creed
Usually we have way too many ideas, and we have to sort through them.
Toby
We definitely had too many ideas on this one. At one point we were going crazy on the computer, trying so much stuff, and then you always end up scaling it back.
WT
You mentioned the Starboy track earlier, can you tell us about the track with Russell W? We love the guy’s music, he’s insanely talented.
Creed
Yeah, it was funny getting him to make that song… I was in the bathroom at my house making voice memos, like “we’re living in the big time,” and then we used a bit from the little guy we were getting drunk with in Kuta (laughs).
WT
That’s probably a perfect place to leave the interview. Thanks for hopping on!
You can shop Creed’s signature collection here, and watch said video below!
