Phil Jarratt is a multi-talented fellow. Most readers will know him as the editor of Tracks through its 70's golden period, but since then he's written a score of books, completed a decade-long tour of the Surfing Industrial Complex, hocked a load of bric-a-brac, and created a Surfing Festival. All whilst sporting Hawaiian shirts of the brightest botanical extraction.

Phil is also Swellnet's amazing Noosa Heads reporter. Amazing because he recently filed the report from New Zealand. But that is something between me and he and we will discuss the matter shortly, in private.

Phil's latest book, Salts and Suits, is a highly entertaining recount of the birth of the surfing industry and its subsequent growing pains. It recently won the Surf Culture Award at the Australian Surfing Awards. I had a chat to him about the book...

Swellnet: Do you think it's in any way ironic that your book, which undermines the credibility of the surfing establishment, is now celebrated by the surfing establishment? Phil Jarratt: Well, I have to dispute your interpretation of the book in that it undermines the surfing establishment. I mean, that was certainly not my intention.

Yeah, perhaps I'm drawing a long bow with that premise - so much for the brilliant opening question. How did the book come about? Well, I'm in a position that very few people are, in that I've been involved in one way or another since the very start with the Big Three companies. Particular the Torquay based companies. I guess I've got enough contacts to find out what goes on behind closed doors and I've actually been part of that closed door crew at various times with both Rip Curl and Quiksilver.

It's very much told from an insiders perspective sharing a few trade secrets and insider knowledge that a few of the executives would've preferred that I didn't come out with. But it was all told with the intention of telling people the human side of the surf industry; that it's not just this multinational cartel, that all the founders are still active surfers, and that there's been ups and downs and every time you bring in somebody who doesn't understand the culture it all goes to hell in a haycart. The overall intention of the book was not to diminish or demean any company or any person, it was to tell the story as truthfully as possible and give a positive interpretation of the industry.

I know personally that the majority of the people within the industry, while they may quibble with certain interpretations, think it is a great book. Derek O'Neill [Billabong CEO], for example, has had a bit of a go at me for one interpretation of an event, but he thought it was great book. I think the CEO's and executives of the companies are able to take the bigger worldview and see that, even if they do get bruised here and there for something silly that happened, if they take the bigger view it is a good, positive story.

You mentioned Derek O'Neill, have you had other feedback from people that were in the book? Before the book was released the publishers offered it to various newspapers and magazines for serialisation and it was picked up by quite a few of them. Of course they all went for the 'sexy' bits so before the books release there were three different extracts which were given pretty broad currency in newspapers, and subsequently all over the internet. A couple of very senior executives in the surf companies were, ahh...let's say, pissed off with me. One really thought I was telling tales out of school and that I wasnt showing any loyalty to the company that looked after me for over a decade. But it was all based on an out of context sexy bit from the book. I think that, once they read the book, they realised it wasn't damaging to them or their shareholders.

I think I know the extract you are talking about, was that the chapter titled 'The Boss is an Asshole'? 'The Chairman is an Asshole.' Yeah, that was one of them. Even though there was many, many witnesses to that exchange the two protagonists still deny that it ever happened.

That's one of the juicier pieces of the book. I think there's plenty of juice in there. Particularly related to Quiksilver's rise and almost fall because I had better internal knowledge of that then anything else, such as the various problems Billabong have had with their board etcetera. I know all about that and I've got documents from a number of sources but for Quiksilver I was actually there on deck. So yeah, there's probably more juice in their story than those of Rip Curl and Billabong.

Talking about juicy bits, did you have any reservations before publishing the book? Having been involved in these companies since they started I've seen enough of the dirty shit that goes on to believe that these people are kind of proud of their scummy roots, you know? And I think the brands have stood the test of time because the people who founded them are real people, real surfers, who didn't always play by the rules. Yes, alcohol and drugs were consumed. In some instances there were illegalities, or close to illegalities. I think the majority of the main players are quite proud of their colourful history so I didnt feel squeamish, or that I was letting the cat out of the bag, by telling those stories.

A lot of the stories have been told in different places anyway, but never all together. If you put all the stories that people tell at dinner parties, if you put them all in one place, of course it looks a bit more intense. But the manuscript came together over about five years, parts of it were meant to be in the Quiksilver authorised history but they were expunged from that by the management of the time. So yeah, I had five years to look at all the juicy bits and work out whether I was going to lose any friends or whether it was in my self-interest to publish them. I basically reasoned that if I was going to lose any friends over this that they weren't very good friends and that it was good story worth telling.

It leads me to ask, did you leave any bits out? Ha ha...some names are changed to protect the guilty! I did leave stuff out but only in the interest of keeping it relevant to the storyline. I mean there are lots of good stories about and they are great stories to tell over dinner or beers in a bar, but they didn't really expand or illuminate the story of the industry. And also, I was edited a bit for being overenthusiastic in some areas about personalised stories. I had a very good book editor working with me and she pulled a few stories that she thought the book would be better without. So yeah, there are a bunch of stories that didn't see the light of day but there certainly won't be a Part 2.

I'd like to get your thoughts on surf journalism: you've been in the game for quite a while now, what's your take on the current state of surf journalism? I've always been a big fan of Tim Baker and at certain times I've even been a fan of Derek Reilly, although I think he's lost the plot. I think his avant-garde humour has gone so far left field nobody gets it anymore. But at certain times he's been terrific, really out there, cutting edge stuff. Jimmy O'Keefe unfortunately doesnt write much that's useful anymore. When I say 'useful' I mean in the context of journalism. But he was a young guy that I mentored when we had Australian Surfers Journal. He's a really talented writer and he's got a wicked sense of humour. Hopefully he'll get back into mainstream surf journalism again because I think he's really a major talent.

Oh god, I don't know, there's a few others kicking around I suppose. To be honest, I don't read that many surf magazines. I tend to get most of my information off the web these days and that's why surf magazines are getting thinner and thinner, which is sad. I don't read Tracks very often and Surfing Life...I think the print is too small for people my age.