Earlier this year, in a high rise along Australia’s Gold Coast we hung out with Luke Davis. It had been a while. The last time we’d hung with him was probably under an NSSA tent, back when he was a stylish grom among the San Clemente pack that included Kolohe Andino, Jeremy Carter, Ian Crane, and Tanner Rozunko. They were the modern pack and Luke fit right in. But the Luke we met in Australia was different. He wasn’t your typical Orange County-raised grom we thought we knew. He was completely different. And we couldn’t have been more psyched to learn that.

Luke had all sorts of interesting philosophies. He wasn’t jaded. Or cocky. He was passionate. Fired up on surfing. Fascinated by old punk rock bands. Modern DJ’s. And Rihanna. And none of it felt contrived. It was all genuine. He knew his shit. And his hair was super purple (which is behavior we encourage). Since then, we’ve gotten to work with Luke on our collaboration with Reef, the film Anything Sing and watched him hone that style that is one of our favorites in the game. It may not translate to results on the WQS with it’s squad of flipping grinders, but there aren’t many people we’d rather watch high-line and arc than Luke. He’s the kind of surfer who could never do another air and we’d still enjoy every nuance of his style. (Although we do appreciate his ability to flair very much.)

So here you are, a couple coffees, a few turns and his main squeeze Cailin Russo in a new episode of Fairly Normal.