Just 10 miles and 20 minutes out of Sarasota on our trip to Florida's East coast to meet Billy Lane and already things aren't going well for snapper Simon and myself. First we have to make an unscheduled pit stop for me to heave my guts up at the roadside, much to the dismay of the passing early morning traffic, and then at the next intersection a state trooper awards us a ticket for running a stop sign. It's not a good start but at least things can surely only get better. Which they do, thankfully, as a couple of car-sick hours later we roll into the distinctly bland and ever-so-slightly shabby parking lot outside Billy Lane's HQ, the fabled home of Choppers Inc.
But before we swing through the mirrored doors with their trademark gun barrel handles to enter the chopper epicentre beyond, time for a little background. I'm sure some of you may be wondering, 'who the hell is Billy Lane?' For those au fait with all matters chopper apologies for the basics, and for the rest of you - all you need know is Billy Lane is at the forefront of America's massive chopper scene right now. Treading the fine line between cutting edge and gaudy tat with impeccable judgement and taste, Mr Lane has made a meteoric rise from humble beginnings and now commands up to $150,000 a piece for his one-off bespoke creations. He is also feted and mobbed most places he goes thanks to his regular (and often winning) appearances on America's hugely popular Biker Build Off show on Discovery Channel, and appears to live a lifestyle better suited to a Rolling Stone than a bike mechanic who hit the jackpot.
But behind the tattoos, dreadlocks, wild partying tales and jaw-dropping bikes, just who is Billy Lane? Squeezing past a badly-parked, ancient, leaky Harley that looks like someone just fished it out of the local canal, I heave hard on a gun barrel handle, shove on the hefty mirrored door and we step into Choppers Inc...
It's not a big place and at first glance it's just another bike shop. There's bikes along one wall, accessories and T-shirts knocking about between them, a counter on the far side of the room and a partition running the length of the place separating curious customers from bikes and bits on benches in the open workshop on the other side.
But a few minutes is all it takes to realise all is not as it seems. The bras and knickers hanging from the ceiling catch my eye first, followed by the surfboard on the wall, then the bar complete with a selection of hard spirits and a (working) beer tap on top of one of the Snap-On tool chests in the workshop. Eyes slowly tuning in, I'm now bombarded with oddness, badness, and every form of cult Americana imaginable wherever I look. A six-foot Elvis leers at me from behind a half-built bike, Al Pacino as Tony Montana in Scarface stares back from another wall, and among it all sits the bike.
Large parts of it have been stripped, but I still know it's the one. MoneyShot was a landmark moment in Billy's bike building and now it's right here next to me. As I gawp at the mind-bending hubless rear wheel and intricate detailing that makes this perhaps the single coolest vehicle I've ever seen, the man himself appears from out of the depths of the workshop behind.
"I put 18,000 miles on that bike before I sold it," he says, snapping me out of my trance. "People think that bike was built just for show but I build my bikes to ride. For so long everyone thought a hubless rear wheel would never work, so when I rode that bike for the very first time after we finished it I was laughing my head off. Man, I couldn't even believe it myself."
He's not a tall guy but he's solid, and the tattoos run long and deep along both arms. There's no doubt that he is one hundred per cent, completely and fully at home here in his shop. We head into the inner sanctum of his office where conversation turns to choppers - as well it should. Stepping right in at Chop Shop kindergarten, I ask Billy where it all began.
"The birth of the chopper scene was in 1945 when all the servicemen and especially pilots were coming home from World War II. They started chopping their Indians and stuff and they became the Wild Ones, the Hells Angels and the Outlaws." Sounds simple enough, but why?
"Because in 1945 America was boring. After bombing, dogfighting and living from day-to-day never certain if the end was just around the corner, these guys needed some new kicks to keep them going and riding a motorcycle became the best substitute they could find".
Draw a quick timeline from there and with a hop, skip and jump via the Hollister riots (which demonised bikers in the public eye for good), films like the Wild One and Easy Rider which traded on different sides of that now well-worn image, and the recent mainstream TV explosion of chopper TV shows in America - which are making worldwide stars of their participants - and you've got the chopper story in a nutshell.
So how did Billy arrive in this stretched, bobbed and chopped two-wheeled world?
"It all started for me with a stack of EasyRiders magazines my brother bought at a swap meet when we were kids. Mum thought they were plain motorcycle magazines but chopper magazines were a lot more raw back then and I'd leaf through them for hours, amazed at these dirty guys on crazy bikes with young, naked women all over them. That was me hooked!
"From there I graduated to riding my first bike - my brother's '79 Shovelhead complete with suicide shift (hand gearchange, foot clutch). I grew up around biker parties and that's where I learned how to enjoy myself and from then I've never looked back.
"The building came about because I wanted a cool bike and I couldn't afford it so I started doing it myself. I'd use old car parts, plumbing parts, anything I liked the look of and I'd try to make them look cool and work them into the bike. This way I taught myself how to make bikes."
Talking of which, what does the man behind some of the finest, costliest and most innovative choppers around have as his daily ride?"It's called Le Big Mack, like that line out of Pulp Fiction. It's a 1949 Panhead (that's an old Harley to you and me), and it's pretty stock. I made it like an original 'bobber' by ripping the front fender and crash bars off, cutting down the rear fender and adding a custom seat. This is what these bikes looked like when they first became choppers and this is just what mine is. I love the history."
I can talk modern bikes inside out all day long, but my mind's taking a little longer to process Billy's chopper speak and his past-times Americana references. But as I take this lot in something dawns on me - his bike is the oil-coated shitbox slung almost against the front door of Choppers Inc.
We slide outside to bag some riding shots of Billy and sure enough he fires up the bike that looks as if it shouldn't start and weaves out into the traffic as we follow. And on the move he couldn't look more at ease and at one with the bike, a study in cool for less than the price of a secondhand Vauxhall Nova.
I ride the bike myself later after a quick warning from Billy - "American drivers suck, you've got to look out for them" - and despite the buckled front wheel, brakes that don't and rock solid hardtail rear end, it still ranks up there with some of the greatest bikes I've ridden. Utterly understated, completely pure, and without a hint of self-conscious irony, it's little more than a belching motor and two wheels but it gels beautifully and stirs the soul like a shiny new GSX-R1000 can't.
Back inside the shop and ensconced once more in Billy's office we get back to the story of how he went from being a bloke customising his own bikes and spannering for mates to being a guy who pops out for rides with Brad Pitt between films, and who can't show his face outside the shop without being grabbed for an autograph or a photo with anyone from die-hard chopper fans to grandmas walking their dogs.
"I learned early on I was good at building, but getting exposure was hard and as for a magazine cover, well that was almost impossible. You had to take your bikes all over the country to get them to the shows the magazines put on and enter their contests - I did three EasyRiders shows in '95 and '96 and never even won a single trophy."But finally, in '98, persistence paid off and they liked the bike I'd built at the time. They shot it for the magazine, I won a trophy in the contest and they launched me on my way."
From there came more bikes, more photoshoots, more innovation, and finally a heap of TV work which lifted Billy from cult hero to national legend. Earning pots of cash doing what you love, living the way you want to live and getting famous into the bargain? Sounds like the perfect example of the American dream in action to me.
"Maybe," he says, "but you look around this country and you'd think the American dream was a minivan, a couple of fat kids and a wife on Prozac," he adds dryly before going on. "The way I look at it, I've already achieved everything I ever wanted out of life, probably more. So if the bottom fell out of it all tomorrow I'd be okay. I can always work as a mechanic somewhere and as long as I've got my motorcycle and my surfboard I can always find a girl to go stay with. That's all I really need." Amen to that.
Just 10 miles and 20 minutes out of Sarasota on our trip to Florida's East coast to meet Billy Lane and already things aren't going well for snapper Simon and myself. First we have to make an unscheduled pit stop for me to heave my guts up at the roadside, much to the dismay of the passing early morning traffic, and then at the next intersection a state trooper awards us a ticket for running a stop sign.
It's not a good start but at least things can surely only get better. Which they do, thankfully, as a couple of car-sick hours later we roll into the distinctly bland and ever-so-slightly shabby parking lot outside Billy Lane's HQ, the fabled home of Choppers Inc.
But before we swing through the mirrored doors with their trademark gun barrel handles to enter the chopper epicentre beyond, time for a little background.
I'm sure some of you may be wondering, 'who the hell is Billy Lane?' For those au fait with all matters chopper apologies for the basics, and for the rest of you - all you need know is Billy Lane is at the forefront of America's massive chopper scene right now.
Treading the fine line between cutting edge and gaudy tat with impeccable judgement and taste, Mr Lane has made a meteoric rise from humble beginnings and now commands up to $150,000 a piece for his one-off bespoke creations. He is also feted and mobbed most places he goes thanks to his regular (and often winning) appearances on America's hugely popular Biker Build Off show on Discovery Channel, and appears to live a lifestyle better suited to a Rolling Stone than a bike mechanic who hit the jackpot.
But behind the tattoos, dreadlocks, wild partying tales and jaw-dropping bikes, just who is Billy Lane? Squeezing past a badly-parked, ancient, leaky Harley that looks like someone just fished it out of the local canal, I heave hard on a gun barrel handle, shove on the hefty mirrored door and we step into Choppers Inc...
It's not a big place and at first glance it's just another bike shop. There's bikes along one wall, accessories and T-shirts knocking about between them, a counter on the far side of the room and a partition running the length of the place separating curious customers from bikes and bits on benches in the open workshop on the other side.
But a few minutes is all it takes to realise all is not as it seems. The bras and knickers hanging from the ceiling catch my eye first, followed by the surfboard on the wall, then the bar complete with a selection of hard spirits and a (working) beer tap on top of one of the Snap-On tool chests in the workshop. Eyes slowly tuning in, I'm now bombarded with oddness, badness, and every form of cult Americana imaginable wherever I look. A six-foot Elvis leers at me from behind a half-built bike, Al Pacino as Tony Montana in Scarface stares back from another wall, and among it all sits the bike.
Large parts of it have been stripped, but I still know it's the one. MoneyShot was a landmark moment in Billy's bike building and now it's right here next to me. As I gawp at the mind-bending hubless rear wheel and intricate detailing that makes this perhaps the single coolest vehicle I've ever seen, the man himself appears from out of the depths of the workshop behind.
"I put 18,000 miles on that bike before I sold it," he says, snapping me out of my trance. "People think that bike was built just for show but I build my bikes to ride. For so long everyone thought a hubless rear wheel would never work, so when I rode that bike for the very first time after we finished it I was laughing my head off. Man, I couldn't even believe it myself."
He's not a tall guy but he's solid, and the tattoos run long and deep along both arms. There's no doubt that he is one hundred per cent, completely and fully at home here in his shop. We head into the inner sanctum of his office where conversation turns to choppers - as well it should. Stepping right in at Chop Shop kindergarten, I ask Billy where it all began.
"The birth of the chopper scene was in 1945 when all the servicemen and especially pilots were coming home from World War II. They started chopping their Indians and stuff and they became the Wild Ones, the Hells Angels and the Outlaws." Sounds simple enough, but why?
"Because in 1945 America was boring. After bombing, dogfighting and living from day-to-day never certain if the end was just around the corner, these guys needed some new kicks to keep them going and riding a
motorcycle became the best substitute they could find".
Draw a quick timeline from there and with a hop, skip and jump via the Hollister riots (which demonised bikers in the public eye for good), films like the Wild One and Easy Rider which traded on different sides of that now well-worn image, and the recent mainstream TV explosion of chopper TV shows in America - which are making worldwide stars of their participants - and you've got the chopper story in a nutshell.
So how did Billy arrive in this stretched, bobbed and chopped two-wheeled world?
"It all started for me with a stack of EasyRiders magazines my brother bought at a swap meet when we were kids. Mum thought they were plain motorcycle magazines but chopper magazines were a lot more raw back then and I'd leaf through them for hours, amazed at these dirty guys on crazy bikes with young, naked women all over them. That was me hooked!
"From there I graduated to riding my first bike - my brother's '79 Shovelhead complete with suicide shift (hand gearchange, foot clutch). I grew up around biker parties and that's where I learned how to enjoy myself and from then I've never looked back.
"The building came about because I wanted a cool bike and I couldn't afford it so I started doing it myself. I'd use old car parts, plumbing parts, anything I liked the look of and I'd try to make them look cool and work them into the bike. This way I taught myself how to make bikes."
Talking of which, what does the man behind some of the finest, costliest and most innovative choppers around have as his daily ride?
"It's called Le Big Mack, like that line out of Pulp Fiction. It's a 1949 Panhead (that's an old Harley to you and me), and it's pretty stock. I made it like an original 'bobber' by ripping the front fender and crash bars off, cutting down the rear fender and adding a custom seat. This is what these bikes looked like when they first became choppers and this is just what mine is. I love the history."
I can talk modern bikes inside out all day long, but my mind's taking a little longer to process Billy's chopper speak and his past-times Americana references. But as I take this lot in something dawns on me - his bike is the oil-coated shitbox slung almost against the front door of Choppers Inc.
We slide outside to bag some riding shots of Billy and sure enough he fires up the bike that looks as if it shouldn't start and weaves out into the traffic as we follow. And on the move he couldn't look more at ease and at one with the bike, a study in cool for less than the price of a secondhand Vauxhall Nova.
I ride the bike myself later after a quick warning from Billy - "American drivers suck, you've got to look out for them" - and despite the buckled front wheel, brakes that don't and rock solid hardtail rear end, it still ranks up there with some of the greatest bikes I've ridden. Utterly understated, completely pure, and without a hint of self-conscious irony, it's little more than a belching motor and two wheels but it gels beautifully and stirs the soul like a shiny new GSX-R1000 can't.
Back inside the shop and ensconced once more in Billy's office we get back to the story of how he went from being a bloke customising his own bikes and spannering for mates to being a guy who pops out for rides with Brad Pitt between films, and who can't show his face outside the shop without being grabbed for an autograph or a photo with anyone from die-hard chopper fans to grandmas walking their dogs.
"I learned early on I was good at building, but getting exposure was hard and as for a magazine cover, well that was almost impossible. You had to take your bikes all over the country to get them to the shows the magazines put on and enter their contests - I did three EasyRiders shows in '95 and '96 and never even won a single trophy.
"But finally, in '98, persistence paid off and they liked the bike I'd built at the time. They shot it for the magazine, I won a trophy in the contest and they launched me on my way."
From there came more bikes, more photoshoots, more innovation, and finally a heap of TV work which lifted Billy from cult hero to national legend. Earning pots of cash doing what you love, living the way you want to live and getting famous into the bargain? Sounds like the perfect example of the American dream in action to me.
"Maybe," he says, "but you look around this country and you'd think the American dream was a minivan, a couple of fat kids and a wife on Prozac," he adds dryly before going on. "The way I look at it, I've already achieved everything I ever wanted out of life, probably more. So if the bottom fell out of it all tomorrow I'd be okay. I can always work as a mechanic somewhere and as long as I've got my motorcycle and my surfboard I can always find a girl to go stay with. That's all I really need." Amen to that.
Billy Lane is currently serving prison time for vehicular manslaughter. Click here for more imformation
