HD008 – Rope Bondage – Marshall Bradford

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

rope, tie, marshall, rope bondage, picture, teach, natural fiber, photography, hang, bondage, couple

SPEAKERS

Mr Fox, Marshall Bradford

Mr. Fox   00:35

Hello everybody and welcome to the show. This is Mr. Fox and you’re listening to the husDOM become a dominant leader podcast In today’s episode I’m going to be talking with Marshall Bradford. Marshall is a good friend of mine, and I have known him since close to the beginning of my DS journey. Marshall lives in Las Vegas and is an integral part of the local rope bondage scene. He is both an erotic photographer and a well versed rope bondage artist. Marshall is one of the best rope instructors that I have met as he seems to have no ego and teaches people absolutely everything he knows holding nothing back, wanting nothing more than to see you reach your full potential. Marshall has attended several of our marriages sexiest secret events, either as an instructor of rope bondage one on one, or as a presenter suspending his assistant during one of our dinner events, or even as a judge of our rope money bondage contest. We have the honor of having Marshall on our show today to talk about rope bondage. And to give us some pointers on where to get started in this art. We discussed things such as the different types of rope available, different diameters and lengths of rope as well. Marshall will tell us what he prefers and why. He will also give us some starting points on putting together our first rope bondage kit, including some reputable places to purchase your rope. Join me today as I talk with Marshall Bradford about rope bondage. Are you like me? Do you find floggers sexy and as a symbol of dominance in the bedroom? Do you want to purchase a quality flogger, but don’t know what you really want or what you really need. Are you wondering what makes a quality flogger and how you know exactly what you’re purchasing and why Fox and Hare floggers prides themselves on handcrafting the ultimate flogger experience for both the top and the bottom. These luxurious vloggers are designed with purpose. A fox and Hare flogger is much more than just beautiful. They have done extensive research on what attributes give a flogger maximum consistency and performance. Check out these magnificent floggers on Fox and hare.com today. The holidays are fast approaching and all of their floggers are handcrafted in the USA. If you want to order one of these sensational floggers as a gift, be sure to place your order today. Today I have a very special guest on the podcast. And actually he’ll be the first guest ever on our show. I’ve been wanting to interview him since the very beginning. I met this man back in 2016. At one of our annual events through a mutual friend. We brought him on board as one of the presenters at our workshops. The workshop was rope bondage 101. The mission was to help us men that don’t have any training and limited knowledge, learn enough about rope that we could have fun with our partners and have a baseline skill set for entry into the art. Oftentimes we find experts that want to just impress us with how much that they know how much more they know than we know. That’s why they’re experts and we’re not. And frequently do we come across someone that has no ego, someone that wants to genuinely help others learn everything that they know, and more. These people are the Payette forward kind of people that I personally have grown to really respect Marshall Bradford is that pay it forward type of man to me. Welcome to the show today, Marshall.

Marshall Bradford  04:20

Thank you very much. I’m really happy to be here. I really appreciate you asking me to do this. It’s a big honor for me.

Mr Fox   04:26

All right. Well, it’s an honor for me to have you on here. Because again, finding somebody that genuinely just wants to help other people. Right? I mean, it really I mean,

04:33

that’s all I want to do. I I really just want people to have fun and learn some new stuff and things like that. And you’re you said something about the ego. I think all of us wrote people have some ego. But I really try hard to keep mine in check because I know where I stand. And I know the skill level that I have and stuff like that. So, you know, I don’t know if a problem in our community.

Mr Fox   04:58

Really it was one of the things that impressed me The most about you and I, and we’ve had you out at 2019, you did a lot of things for us at that annual event as well. Yeah, it was a fun event. I would love to do that again, we’re gonna try the COVID like you and I were talking right before we started the podcast. COVID has kind of taken our annual events and set them to the side right now. They’re sideline, but definitely, we’ve committed in 2022, that we’re going to have another event no matter what. So if anybody’s interested, make sure that they email me or LK because we’re going to do something in 2022. And if we do it in Vegas, there’s no question about it. We’ll invite you Marshall to do something with us.

05:34

Yeah, let me know I would, I would absolutely love it. I think it’d be great.

Mr Fox   05:37

You know, before we get started, I’m going to tell you that I’ve given a lot of thought like how you can be so good at what you do and not have much ego about it. And I do I do feel that I have the reason why. If you can correct me if I’m wrong. But one is like when you do it when I look at your social media and when I look into you as a person, this rope bondage is art.

06:01

Yeah, yeah. When I first began, I absolutely that was the sole reason for me doing it. Okay, I first started doing rope. It was specifically for my photography, it was to do something visually interesting with my photography.

Mr Fox   06:15

So were you a photographer first?

06:17

I am Yes, I’ve been a photographer off and on for years, it’s been my hobby. I don’t really do it as a full time job so much. I do a couple of little full time jobs, with photography, like I shoot marathon races, and things like that. So I make money with my cameras, but to say that I’m a professional photographer, and I make a living off of it. No, I do not. I do it because I enjoy it. And I’ve always enjoyed it. I started doing it when I was in high school. I graduated in 92. So I’m old, I need a cane. Like that. But uh, but yeah, so I’ve been doing it for a long time. And it was just something different with my photography from where I was working at at the time, I was working at a studio that we were shooting a lot of like pinup photography, and like modeling portfolios, and we were doing like product photography, and stuff like that. And I wanted to be different than the people that I worked around image wise. So I picked up a couple books on on rope and started digging into it and it just grew from there and now it’s full time kink. Yeah, I’m it’s totally become my lifestyle as well.

Mr Fox   07:21

Right. Okay. And my lifestyle as well. The things that we learned now I know that that you have a lot of pictures online and stuff. I know that it’s like in Bradford photography.com

07:31

Yeah, in Bradford photo dot photo works is my Instagram. Okay, Bradford photo works is the Instagram that I have on Facebook, just under Marshall Bradford. I don’t try and hide my identity or anything like that. When it comes to the kink community. I kind of feel like everybody knows me that they know what I do so and I work for myself normally. So I don’t have to impress any bosses or anything like that.

Mr Fox   07:54

On your social media to I saw that you had a picture of yourself like some badass picture where you’re in your 20s or something.

08:01

Oh, yeah, back when I for summer. I chucked that picture when I was in. I took a semester of college photography, which only lasted a semester because I hate school. Yeah, I got a job and learned a bunch of my stuff. I really hated school. But yeah, it was part of a self portrait project that I found somebody had sent me a photo. I was like, crap, I don’t remember that and took a picture of it. Put it up there.

Mr Fox   08:24

Great picture, actually. Thank you. Yep. And you know, before we get going to I want to say because I mean, you know, I looked in to what I could find about you before we did the interview, actually. And I found a red bubble. red bubble is but I found a red bubble shop.

08:38

Yep, I do have one of those. I don’t do a whole lot off of it. It’s basically a another way to show my work. And people can buy like posters on my some of my photos, T shirts, things like that. All the masks I thought were hilarious. Yeah, yeah. A friend of mine told me I should start doing masks because I would the ball gags and everything right? Yeah, absolutely. And it was funny. I do stuff like that, like I do some of the projects. And it’s basically I put it out on my Facebook page. Yeah, I have enough people on my Facebook page who are like willing to model for me that I just get a stream of people showing up to my house. So like, I put it out one day and I’m like, Hey, I’m gonna do a bunch of masks. It’s gonna be people with ball gags in their mouth and rope in their mouth. Who wants to do it? Tons of people showed up there like I’m there.

Mr Fox   09:22

So they’re kind of fun. They’re great masks. They’re actually for sale. Right?

09:26

They are they’re actually for sale. They’re like 12 $14 Something like that. And keep the profit down on a pretty low I don’t really like I said I’m not really trying to make money off of everything. I really just want the stuff to sell just for people who enjoy it and stuff. And a few of my friends had bought them my one of my friend bought one of the ball gag masks for her dad and sent me a photo of her dad wearing it which is just hilarious. That is in like a 60s. It was funny. Yeah, right.

Mr Fox   09:53

But even if somebody wants a great laugh or wants to get one or something they should check them out because it’s funny.

09:58

red bubble just search Marshall Bradford I’m up there. Alright, so

Mr Fox   10:01

I had no idea you got into the lifestyle by being a photographer and looking to be different. How long ago was that?

10:08

About 10 years a little longer? Something like that 10, maybe 12 years.

Mr Fox   10:12

So is it just like a gradual transition into being in the lifestyle or was there like a moment where you’re like,

10:18

I started doing it for photography. And I joined at the time a rope group called reverse tensions, which was a local meetup group here in town, and started going to that on a regular basis, found a girlfriend through that, that was into the lifestyle as well. And that started triggering more, and start to send me to like conventions and other teachings. And I started meeting other people in the lifestyle, other much better real people than I was at the time, and stuff like that, who probably still are better people than I am at this time. They’ve been doing it, even on top of the time I’ve been doing it. And yeah, just started going from there. And then when reverse tensions kind of dissolved out because of the, the main organizers of it all started having their own lives outside of being able to organize it. Yeah, they handed it over to the second generation in the group, which was us, myself and a couple other friends. And we renamed it, revamped it and became the Las Vegas real social.

Mr Fox   11:18

Okay, is that so current?

11:19

It is still current? We are kind of on hiatus right now, because of COVID. Yeah. Plus that the location that we that we were at, we were at a little theater, a little like, Improv Theater place over close to downtown. And the building got bought, like out from underneath the owner. Yeah. And so we ended up losing our space. So we’re still trying to find a new space, and then COVID hit and it really knocked us all down. I’m currently doing one little event at my home. But that’s about all we’re doing right now. So.

Mr Fox   11:51

So you’re talking about some of the people that were in that first rope group? So who was influential to you? Was there somebody like a mentor? Was there somebody that helped you really like took you under the wing? Or did you have to

12:01

just it was a good friend of mine, who was part of the group he has since moved to Atlanta, his name was Mr. Matt. And he was one of the original starters for the group. And he was one of the guys who took time to teach me stuff. And I’m not saying that, like, none of the other ones did take time to teach stuff. But Matt, and I seem to hit it off really well. Yeah. And he started coming over and doing rope work for some of my photoshoots. And then that spurred me to like wanting to learn more in the rural stuff, because like, every time you show up, you would do these things. I’m just like, I could do that. And then I would try it. I’m like, okay, maybe I can’t do that quite yet. We’ll have Matt back, we’ll be able to do that soon. You know, and every time he would come over, I would push a little harder and push a little harder, and try and get better at what I was doing and stuff like that. And he would show me things. And yeah, he was very, very supportive.

Mr Fox   12:50

So he’s one of those guys kind of like you is what I’m saying wellness podcast started, right. So he takes the interest in teaching other people.

12:57

There’s another guy here in town who actually like, we run the rope social through right now, his name is Robbie, he was part of the second generation who came in with us, and he’s that guy for me now. Super, super supportive friend, helps out when I need shoots, things like that critiques, what I do, makes me push a little harder, because I see some of the stuff that he does, and I start pushing a little harder to make sure that I can do, you know, do it as well, and things like that. So it’s it’s kind of nice to have somebody around you all the time that that helps you do that.

Mr Fox   13:28

Yeah, absolutely. Even like you say, challenges, pushes, right, makes you forces you to continue to learn

13:33

like a competition or anything like that. But it just makes you want to do better. Because you see other people around you doing better up your game. Yeah, no. And when I learn a trick, I teach it to him. And when he learns a trick, he teaches it to me. Right? You know, and it just, it helps us grow. And that’s, that’s what we wanted with the social. Yeah, was the ability for people to grow and get better as far as their skill level goes, because rope can be very dangerous. And rope is one of those things that like, there’s a lot of technical aspect to it. Absolutely. Oh, yeah. Yeah. There’s a lot of technical aspects to it and stuff like that. So people tend to shy away from it sometimes, because I think it’s too hard to do. Yes.

Mr Fox   14:14

And I would almost take some effort, I would almost say it’s a large portion of my audience right now, probably because we see it, we like it, we want to do it. But we probably have enough wisdom that we know that we just can’t jump in without some sort of knowledge or skill set, right? Like you got to start at the beginning. We can’t just spend somebody tomorrow.

14:34

But also the bad part about rope in particular is that it’s very visual based art form. So there’s a lot of photography about it, and that’s good and bad. I mean, in fact, there’s a lot of photography on rope is awesome, because I can see all these really awesome real pictures. What you don’t see is the prep work to make those awesome rope pictures. And as a beginner, sometimes you look at it and it looks easy. And what you don’t see is all the effort that went into it and all this stuff. Maybe behind the person, and so on and so on. And that can be bad for people starting out, they’ll get overwhelmed, because you look at some of these photos. And it’s like, they’re just ridiculously amazing the girls hanging for big toe, you know, all this other stuff, but you don’t realize that maybe she was there for like four seconds. Right? Now, that’s a great point. And that’s it, you know, many of the really cool rope photos, if you really looked at them are not sustainable. And they weren’t designed to be sustainable. They were designed to be visually impact impactive, or just interesting, impactful, that’s the word I’m looking for. So they’re not designed to be sustainable. And sometimes people when they first start out in rope, think that everything’s got to be sustainable. You know, and it’s not that way for photos and stuff like that it is more that way, for actual real play. You want somebody to be able to sustain it and be able to hold it and stuff like that. But you’re not going to be throwing somebody up by their ankle, and leaving them there for a half hour

Mr Fox   15:55

looking at some of your pictures online. That’s what I was wondering to, honestly, is if if yours was more on the art side or more in the play, but it sounds like you just do both.

16:04

I do both. A lot of my stuff is on the art side, especially some of the very, very challenging ones, I did one with a girl where she’s got a big backbend, and feet tied to the ring. And then there’s like a 15 pound kettlebell hanging off for that’s eight seconds. As long as she was in that tie. A couple other ones, they may be in it for up to five, eight minutes, something like that. And I’ll change them around a little bit, I’ll raise one leg, lower one leg, readjust a little bit just to sort of give them breaks, and things like that. So those can be in for much longer period.

Mr Fox   16:38

Okay. And I don’t know about those pictures in particular, but at the end or in the shownotes, we’re going to put links to all your social media in the red bubble that we talked about, and all that sort of stuff. So people can go look at some of the work that you’ve done.

16:48

Yeah. And if anybody has any questions about or anything like that, on all my social medias, you can message me, okay, I don’t have messages turned on on everything. So please feel free to ask me questions. I have no problems, taking some time to talk to people and stuff like that I’m on. I’m on Instagram, I’m on Facebook. I’m on Twitter. But anybody can message me on any of those platforms, I’ll be more than happy to help them out.

Mr Fox   17:10

Great. Thank you. And again, that’s why you’re here, actually, because you’re that you’re that kind of guy. So Oh, yeah.

17:15

I mean, I learned it from other people. So I feel like I need to teach it to others. Right now to continue and that sort of thing like that. There were when I first started out, there were a handful of people in our local scene who were unwilling to teach things, for fear that they would become liable to that person, there’s something about themselves, they’re like, Well, you show me how to do it like, Okay, I’m an adult, and you’re an adult, right? I’m going to show you how to make this not. But if you tie it around someone’s throat, and hang them by it. That’s on you, buddy. Right? Right now, I can only show you so much. I can’t tell you how to be safe. So we had people in the community who would not share information. So when we started learning new things and start doing some of them, Robbie, and I and his wife as well, we all talked about it, we’re like, you know, we just need to tell people about this stuff. Right? Oh, them be more open with it and stuff like that.

Mr Fox   18:09

So a minute ago, you were talking and you said something about? You know that it can be dangerous, right? As some of the replay can.

18:15

So have you ever had like a an edge play?

Mr Fox   18:18

What’s your scariest moment? I don’t know if you can really think of your scariest. But if you can, that would be great. Or something where you’re like, Oh, my goodness, your heart staff

18:25

almost dropped a girl on her face on concrete one time. Okay, that’s at the rope social. She was blindfolded. And I was playing with her. And the social is a time where you play with people and you have fun and stuff like that. It’s not really designed for schooling or any of that sort of stuff like that. And I was playing with this girl that I knew. And we were close. We were friends and everything like that. And I was turning around and doing some different positions with her and stuff like that. And I was poking at like pressure points and making it hurt a little bit making it not hurt. And I was readjusting one to uplines to her chest. And it got away from me. And it slipped and I have no idea to this day how I figured it out or how I stopped it but my hands shot forward and I grabbed the upline and did what we call a handbrake where you just squeeze all the uplines and stops the movement. And she dropped, I don’t know 810 inches, her head closer to the ground. That’s where they have that. And she was close enough to the ground that had not stopped it her face would have slapped the concrete. Okay, the we’re in this area, the Heritage Museum, and it’s all concrete floors. So I stopped there just before that happened, super scary. And I’m like, breathing heavily. And I looked up and my friend Robbie is looking across from me and his eyes are really big. And he’s like looking at me like Did that just happen? And I’m like, Yeah, I got it. He’s got his hands out. You’re like, Do you need help? No, I’m good. I’m good. I’m just not doing this all like nonverbal communication, right? Yeah, no, I’m good. So I told the upline back up and I locked it off really safely. And I bent down and whispered in her ear. I teach it like that, too. Yeah, am I good? I might have called a real pour or something like that. But like, you know, I was just like, played it off as digital. Like that scare Was that fun for you?

Mr Fox   20:13

So she had no idea. Not a clue. She’s

20:14

blindfolded. We got done, I untied her. We finished, we did our little aftercare and all that sort of stuff like that. And then she had to leave immediately. So she took off and I didn’t have a chance to talk to her. So I wrote her a letter. And I explained to her what actually happened. And I apologized to her and like four points in the letter, I apologized for her. I was like, I’m really sorry. I don’t know what happened, you know, broke down on my hand, that sort of thing like that. Happy I caught it. Everything was okay. I wanted to make sure you were good. But I didn’t want to freak you out. Which is why I kind of did it the way I did it. I wasn’t trying to like make light of the situation or anything like that. I just didn’t want you to be horribly scared all of a sudden, right? That sort of thing like that. I wanted to continue on and I didn’t want to like freak you out. throwbacks is like I had absolutely no idea that happened. You handled it so perfectly well, that I will tie with you anytime you want. I was completely shocked. I was like, Oh, really? I literally almost dropped your face on concrete. Like, like you went. By then she’s like, No, you handled it great. You didn’t freak out. You didn’t scare me. You know, right. And everything after that was really smooth and really good. She’s like, I’m good. We’re good. We’re still friends. Right? We the scariest thing I’ve ever done.

Mr Fox   21:25

Your response, I think comes from probably experience, right? Not having the first reaction freak out. But just take a deep breath and worse timing.

21:33

It really gotten away from me. Yeah. You know, and that was the closest I came to bring somebody down, unintentionally, that sort of thing like that. Um, the only thing I could think to myself was Don’t freak out. Don’t freak out. Don’t freak out. Yeah, you know, you gotta if you freak out, God only knows what’ll happen. Right? Like, she gonna freak out. She gonna start screaming? You know, things like that. Am I gonna ruin her? thean Am I gonna? Is she gonna start riding around in the rope, which will make it even worse on her right? You know. So I was trying to make sure that maintain, like, trying to maintain her in a nice headspace where she wasn’t like, freaking out a little bit,

Mr Fox   22:12

which is probably the more important role because if she does begin to freak out, you can’t get her right out, you just not like you on Bacala cuff and you’re like, Okay, this is

22:20

true, especially when they’re in the air, there’s, there’s procedures you have to do for bringing somebody down. Rope can be cut, like rope is cheap. So obviously cut it if it if need to rope is cheap people are not. But I always tell people in my one on one classes, always carry scissors, always carry some sort of rope cutting device and realize that like your, you may have to cut all your rope. And if you do, who cares? Because you want to get somebody out safe. Absolutely. But in a suspension, it’s a little more difficult, you know, to cut somebody out a rope because they’re in the air. So you got to be careful. And you gotta there’s certain procedures, you got to go through, cut somebody out, bring them down, and stuff like that, which I didn’t want to have to do at that particular moment, just because there were multiple points happening. And I think it would have gotten much worse. So I was trying really hard to not make

Mr Fox   23:01

it worse. And once you saved it, though, really like I shouldn’t say the scare was over. But the threat was over.

23:07

The scare was over the threat was still there. Because after that point, I was really very conscious of what I was doing. That was even more conscious than what I was a minute before. And taking my time and really making sure things were locked off double from that point on. And it stuck with me throughout all my suspension since then, I really make sure that my lock offs are better I really made it made me want to work harder to get my lock off more proper, cleaner, and safer. And all in all aspects of that. So I think it helped define who I am now. Yeah,

Mr Fox   23:42

as a roboticist. That’s pretty powerful. Yeah.

23:46

I tell the story all the time. Because I want people to understand that, you know, I’m not perfect. Right? And you know, things can happen and things do happen. Absolutely. How you handle when those things happen is the difference between a really good rope top and a really crappy, roped off? Yep, absolutely. I have had friends who have been bottoms for people who were things have gone wrong. And the first thing the top does is blamed them. And they’re like, I didn’t do it. Right. Yeah, no, oh, why is it my fault? That’s just a sign of a poor rope top when you have to blame somebody else for your actual mistake or your actual lack of of skill? Yeah. And I’m open to the fact that there are things that I do not know, there are certain suspensions that I don’t do, because I don’t know how to do them properly. And one day, sure, I’ll be able to do them. And I may experiment with them or something like that. But I know for a fact that I have not mastered them quite yet. I’m okay with that. I’m okay with getting better at it. Because one of these days, I know that I’ll be able to do that particular thing, or whatever that is, to the level that I want it to be. That makes sense.

Mr Fox   24:49

Makes perfect sense to me. I mean, it’s all No, it’s all my kind of preaching. Actually. I’m just nodding my head like Absolutely. So with that said, this is another really difficult question. I think what what would you be most proud of with all of your rope. And I’m going to put photography in there too. Like was there a moment or something that you can look back at and say, this was an achievement. For me, this is a milestone.

25:10

Um, it depends on the milestone, there’s a couple of them that I really like. There’s a shot that I have on my Instagram page of a girl in a full rope dress. And it’s incredibly complex. It was like 830 foot pieces of rope. She’s completely naked, but everything is covered. And none of it is sloppy. Yeah, she could turn around and the back looked as good as the front. And that was a big milestone for me. That was like, I’m super impressed that I got that shot that I did that. Then there’s been a few suspensions that I’ve done that visually are really interesting. And they’re also physically very challenging for the bottom. And they’re challenging for the top to put put them in. And those have been different types of milestone. It depends on the milestone you’re referring to, I suppose.

Mr Fox   25:55

Just any? I mean, that was a great answer. But the one with the dress pick, I don’t know if that’s something that is licensed, or can you give me a copy of that? And I’ll put it in the show notes.

26:04

I can I can text that to you. I think I have two or three different ones on my phone. Okay. Yeah, if you don’t mind that. Yeah, I’m pretty sure I can text those to you. Oh, that one where I would love to do that. Because you’re here. I want to see it myself. Yeah, I was really happy with the way it turned out. There’s a couple of like art shots where I’m coming in tight on on the the rope work and all that sort of stuff like that. And I’m like, damn, Marshall, you did? You know, got this. Yeah, it was like, it was pretty impressive. I’ve tried it a couple of times since then. And I’m like, wow, you suck.

Mr Fox   26:34

But you know, it’s possible. So

26:38

you know, it was just one of those days where like, I get really everything came together really nicely. And I’m super, super happy with it. And not to say the other rope dresses I’ve done have been bad. But that one stands out as like, hey, yeah. Good.

Mr Fox   26:51

I can’t wait to see you. Yeah,

26:53

I’ll send that to you.

Mr Fox   26:54

Thank you. Back to the baseline of probably most of my audience, somebody that really hasn’t begun yet doesn’t know exactly where to begin, like, where would you recommend? And this could be anywhere like, like, what do you and you teach it already? You’re a current teacher of it. So is it videos, websites, articles? Like how would you get started?

27:10

Well, there’s a lot of different ways that people build for people to learn. And it really depends on your learning style. There’s some great books out there, they’ll start you off really good. For me, personally, I would suggest finding a local rope group someone around you. And there is one in pretty much every city, every state around. There’s always some sort of small group in town that does report and joining them is really good. I really enjoy peer education. That the hive mind of a nice rope social is really cool. Everybody can come in and say hey, look, I need to know how to do this. And people are willing to show it to you most of the time, right? That sort of thing like that. Books are good. There’s a lot of really good beginner books. There’s a lot of really good intermediate and more advanced books and things like that. Everybody, I kind of feel like when they started getting into row, pick up the books by the two naughty boys to naughty kitty, play on words, that sort of thing. Their books are great, I have a couple of theirs, back to the ropes and something else. What rate for decorative rope work and things like that. And they’re very technically shows you how to tie all the important knots.

Mr Fox   28:21

Like five years ago, one of those guys joined R US DOT membership actually,

28:25

really? Yeah. Yeah, Dan, actually, I’ve hung out with him a few times. And Dan ramaa, he actually started hanging out with a good friend of mine not too long ago, and we’ve become kind of friends and stuff like that. And we chat periodically. He messages me on Facebook, I’m friends with him on his personal Facebook page. And few times I’ve posted pictures and I’ve gotten messages from him saying, hey, it’s really cool to start talking and stuff like that. That’s cool to have him respond. Right? Yeah, it really is actually the very first time I ever met him was was years ago at an art show in San Francisco. And I was doing this erotic art show. And I had 12 like 11 by 14 size prints in this show and stuff like that in my own little corner in the room and everything was all photography. It was all like erotic photographers, there was bondage guys, there was guys just doing art nudes and stuff like that. And all my stuff was kind of centered around rope. And I had this shot of this girl with this rope blindfold on. And I had my back to the crowd. I’m talking to somebody else. And I hear this voice behind me going Hey, that’s a cool shot. I really liked that rope blindfold. And I turned around it was damn. And I was like, and the only thing I could think to say was, thank you. I learned it from you. Because I got it like directly from his book, right? He laughed. He goes, I kind of figured you did and I’m like I got your book at home and I like study it all the time and like that. And he’s like, Well, you’re doing really well. Can I have a picture of you with the photo? And he took a selfie of him standing next to me with the photo and I was like the coolest thing ever. That would be you know, because like when I was starting out like nobody knew me. Nobody cared about me or anything like that. I mean, I’m nobody And for him to come up and say, Hey, I really like your stuff. I was like, Holy crap. Really? That’s like the coolest thing

Mr Fox   30:06

ever. That would be one of those big moments, I would think,

30:09

yeah, he probably doesn’t remember it. And I’ve never brought it up to him or anything like that. But I met him at a few other conventions in town. And he’s friends with friends of mine. And so I get to hang out adjacent and stuff like that. And he’s always been really polite to me. And he’s always been a way we chat and stuff like that. And I don’t think he ever remembers that. Yeah, I don’t think he would ever know that. That was like, the coolest moment for me at that art show, right? Was that I was just like, really, it was even better than I actually sold some prints at the show, which like, I was fully not expected to sell prints, because nobody knows who I am. Right. And I actually sold a couple of prints and stuff like that, which was super cool for me. But the coolest thing was just him saying, hey, I really like that shot. It looks really good.

Mr Fox   30:53

So you know, one of the things you’re saying that I think is so important in life, that we don’t realize how much influence we have on people, and sometimes saying something that’s very small. Like you said, he may not even remember the moment in his life, but it was influential to somebody else made them feel really good. You know, maybe you upped your game after that? I don’t know. But

31:11

I did. Because just as soon as he he told me that I was like, Okay, that’s cool. People are starting to notice what I’m doing. So like, I need to get better at it. Right? And it did. It totally made me want to work harder. And the next time when I went out there, I had better stuff, you know? Yeah, yeah.

Mr Fox   31:26

And we’re all having that influence whether we realize it or not. And I think if people knew that they were having it, maybe we’d be more aware of what we could do the influence that we are having positive influence on other people. But absolutely,

31:36

absolutely, we need to remember that we do have an influence on people. And we need to try and make it a positive one.

Mr Fox   31:42

Yeah. So now I’m going to talk some rope. Because that’s why I got you here.

31:47

I might know something about it. Okay.

Mr Fox   31:50

So if we were starting out, like, what would you recommend to that guy that I was talking about that really like he sees it, he knows he wants to do it, he wants to get into it. So he’s gonna buy some books and do some research on it. If he was starting out, and he’s putting together a, like a kit, so to speak. I know there’s so many different kinds of rope. There’s different diameters of rope, there’s different lengths of rope and

32:10

types of rope. The main break down for rope is the materials. And it’s in two camps, basically, it’s synthetic and natural, are the camps of rope. That Bedich is like your polypropylene ropes, your nylons, things of that nature. Natural stuff is your stuff like cotton, jute, hemp, anything that’s grown organically that sort of thing like that. The difference between the two is that the natural fiber rope which is generally used mostly in rope bondage, because of the feel of the rope, and because of the texture of the rope, it has what we call tooth to it. So it holds on itself, without actually having to put a lot of not work into it. And in traditional rope bondage in traditional Japanese robot edge Shabari, or kambaku, or whatever you want to call it, where you’re at that sort of thing like that. There aren’t very many actual knots involved in everything. There’s a couple of basic knots that you use to basically start a tie. And then everything after that is done with hitches reverse tension. Simple lock off very simple things. And what holds the overall tie together is the friction created on the road. So for natural fiber rope that works better synthetic rope doesn’t quite have that doesn’t have that same texture. So it tends to be harder to lock off in place. You didn’t have to do more actual not work to lock it in place to make it safe for people. That’s the like benefit of one versus the other some some of the benefits of Warner’s other benefits is though natural natural fiber rope you can have an allergy to there are people who have grass allergies, so him and Jude are not ones that they should be able to should be using too much because you know irritates their skin, you kind of have to find the one that works for you. When we talk about it at the rope social, we say the phrase that all rope is good rope. It just depends on what you want to do with it. If you’re a natural fiber guy, go with it. If that’s the feel you like the tactile feel, when you’re rigging, the way the ropes lock in place and the knot even some of that work better with that go with that. If you are a guy who’s like I actually have to have scientific proof that this rope will hold X amount of weight, then go with the synthetic ropes because those are physically weight rated. Because you can get a chart for them so you know that your rope will hold so much weight, specifically that sort of thing like that. So I have a few friends and social who are that they’re they’re very technical oriented people. So they actually have to know that this rope will hold 872 pounds right without any problems and you know, so it just depends on what you want to do with it.

Mr Fox   34:50

What type of verb do you have?

34:52

I use jute personally, okay. I like natural fiber. It is not load rated or weight rated, like have you treated properly and everything like that I’ve never had an issue with any of my my ropes. And I’ve put girls up who are 100 pounds I put girls up who are pushing a little over 200 pounds never had an issue with it, I treat my ropes properly, oil them make sure they don’t get dry check for for damages on a regular basis stuff like that. And they’ll treat you well. I will also like the feel of jute physically in my hands. And that’s some of it for me when I’m typing, I like the tactile sensation, that’s what become part of the fetish for me. So of all the ropes that I could be using and I’ve tried a bunch of different types of rope, jute seems to have that feel that works for me. So because of that, that I tie in a style that is work works for that

Mr Fox   35:47

is that a feel like that you can describe is it different, like so much different or is it just

35:52

well the rope itself has some some grit to it has some texture to it, but it also has a density that I like a lot. Not a lot of squish in the rope when you when you squeeze it when your fingertips. Okay, not a lot of like flattening of the of the rope or anything like that it’s got a nice dense feel to it. I enjoy the smell, a lot of it has to do with the smell. Jute has this great grassy natural scent to it. And so a lot of it has to do with that. It’s really funny scent can be like a major portion of your memory. Right and you know, stuff like that. And it definitely, I definitely enjoy that.

Mr Fox   36:29

It’s an experience there, right. And that’s what you’re saying to it’s just it’s just like a scene, I guess there’s so many different facets that build that whole, like you’re building the entire scene right down by scent even that’s part of it.

36:40

There’s a lot more different styles of natural fiber rope as well. There’s more more of that than there is of synthetic rope. You can use cotton, you can use mohair, there’s a company out there that makes it from like horsehair. Like there’s all sorts of different styles and things like that. There’s what’s called coconut rope, which is made from the husks of coconuts. And you can get that in your gardening your lawn and gardening sections like Target and Walmart and stuff like that. Not weight rated.

Mr Fox   37:08

So you say that doesn’t sound strong to me, but

37:10

oh, it is not it is not strong. But what it is, is it feels like being tied up with barbed wire. Okay, like it’s very scratchy, very The sensation is very much different from all the rest of the types of rope. So if you’re a sadistic rope top, or masochistic bottom, somebody who likes pain, who likes the scratchy feel of it. Coconut rope is awesome. It’s super fun. I keep a bag full of it. I keep it separate from everything else that I use because it sheds and gets little pricklies everywhere and stuff like that. So yeah, its own little bag, but it’s fun to tie with as well. For a completely different reason.

Mr Fox   37:46

It has its time and its place right that’s our say absolutely.

37:49

Absolutely. But somebody likened it said it’s the closest of feeling to being tied with barbed wire would actually out being tied with barbed wire.

Mr Fox   37:57

I’ve never heard of it.

37:59

Terrific. Well, next time you’re in town, I’ll show I’ll show you some of the stuff that I have I get is it’s so horrifically fun. It’s just terrible. I tie with it sometimes. And I’m like I’m surprised even let me get near the road again.

Mr Fox   38:15

Oh hey, everybody. I’m gonna take a quick minute out of today’s podcast episode to let everybody know about some exciting news on has Dom Well Axios has DOM and services. We have recently developed our own Discord server and have connected our membership subscribers to it. If you aren’t familiar with discord or know what it’s about, Discord is an app that connects us members through text, audio and video. Since this product is app base, it will work on your computer, as well as your mobile device, better connecting our membership and creating a more powerful peer to peer sharing and learning environment. With the launch of our new discord app, we’re going to offer new members an amazing offer to join our network of dominance and submissives. If you’re interested in learning more about this offer, we have listed the details of how to take advantage of this discount in our other podcast. Marriages sexiest secret. Find marriages sexy and secret in your podcast app and listen to our most recent podcast episode, Episode 11. The art of seating for more details. And yes, dominance. You can speak directly to me Mr. Fox on our has DOM server and submissives you can speak directly to LK on the submissive server. We look forward to chatting with you there soon. And now let’s get back to Marshall and today’s episode. When I first bought any rope, I know that like it just seemed like there was so many different kinds and diameters and lengths like I just didn’t even have any idea Where to begin on what to do or what to get?

40:03

Well, the thicker the rope, the more comfortable it’s going to be on your bottom. But there is a limit to the thickness to make it useful to you. Most natural fiber ropes come within they come in 456 and eight millimeter diameter. Okay, four millimeter being pretty thin, close to your like iPhone cords, things like that maybe a little thicker than that five and six is generally where a lot of people hang out. That tends to be the size that most people who use natural fiber rope for Japanese style bondage. That’s about where they stay. There are some real peers out there like I have to have 5.5 millimeter rope, right? Get six use it for a month, it drops down to 5.5. Thursday. It’s okay. But that seems seems to be about the the middle portion for it. It’s thick enough that when you lay enough bands on the person, it’s comfortable, but it’s not so big around that when you tie a knot in it, it makes a huge lump. That could become a pressure point in your tie. You have to sort of balance between that some people use five and six millimeter for their ties. And then they use eight millimeter for their upline because it’s thicker, more robust, right? So you can definitely do it that way. I’m not that guy, I use five millimeter for everything that I that I work with. So just it’s it’s comfortable and easy for me.

Mr Fox   41:31

So what type of links because that was the other thing I remember when I was chopping wrote for the first time it was like, I don’t know what I need.

41:39

Right? Well, what what you need depends on the bottom that your time personally, on an average, most people utilize it in meters. And they usually use about an eight meter piece, which is roughly 26 ish feet, right? Okay. eight meters tends to be the standard for Japanese rope bondage. A lot of Europeans that’s what they stick with. Most of the Japanese guys stick with that eight meter piece. Here in the US, we sometimes go to 10 meters. So a little bit longer, depending on who you’re tying up and maybe a little bit thicker. That sort of thing like that. Again, that’s personal preference, I use eight meters, always under the impression, you can add another piece of rope if you need it. But if you make a tie, and you have all this excess rope left over, what do you do with it? Yeah, I like an eight meter piece of rope.

Mr Fox   42:27

What would you think would be a good beginner kit for somebody would that be like four? Yeah, like

42:32

four to six pieces, depending on what you want to do, if all you’re looking for is bedroom bondage, or just playing around, like with simple ground ties and things like that four pieces is more than enough. If you’re looking to tie somebody down to a bed, and you want to put some decorative rope on them, you’re looking at about six pieces, okay? That sort of thing like that, and the kit can grow from there. For me personally, when I buy a kit, I usually buy 10 pieces of rope. And then I take two of them and I cut them in half. So that gives me four short pieces of rope that I can play around with an add to it, and then eight others for what I want to do. And that that tends to be my kit that I like, because sometimes when I’m tying, if I untie somebody want to tie something again, I may not have the center point in the rope ready, or I may not be ready to use that piece. Again, it’s nice to have a couple extras you can just grab fresh, and start into the next piece that you want to do. Not that I’ve ever used all 10 in one most of the time. So

Mr Fox   43:32

So you said something interesting. I think you were saying like bedroom bondage because it really that’s what 95% Of the people listening in this probably is going to be like, absolutely like what kind of tie to tie somebody down to a bed or bedpost or something like that, like what kind of tie so when they’re looking for a video or they’re looking at a book, what kind of tie would you recommend

43:51

to like one that’s a non collapsing tie, or a non collapsed with a call a non CLABSI not YouTube has tons of videos on them, what you’re looking for is a single column tie, okay? Or a Summerville bow line. Okay, those are the two most common names for them. But basically what they are is it’s a wrap around a limb or something with a lock off on it. Now that wrap around once you do it, and you start pulling on it that those bands that you wrapped around the limb or whatever, once you lock the knot, do not get any tighter. Okay, so you set the tension, you can tie it snug, with a little bit of room for the person to wiggle, tie the knot and pull on it all day long. And those bands will never get tighter around the person’s arm or leg or something like that. That’s what you’re looking for. You’re looking for a non collapsing kind of knot to begin with. Okay, and the most common one is a single column time.

Mr Fox   44:50

And then that again, that’s probably the eight meter that you talked about. Yeah, like you said eight meters

44:53

is enough to put one of those like say you want to put somebody down on a bed for point, arms and legs spread So you tie a single column tie around each wrist tied around each ankle, and then run the rest of the rope down to the edge of the bed and tie it off on whatever the foot of the band is. Or something like that. And then now they’re tied down spreadeagled. Perfect. Yeah, you know, all the good stuff, or tied over bent over over a kitchen table or something like that, but four of them will will definitely do that for you with plenty of room left to be creative with

Mr Fox   45:26

because you teach a lot of people and a lot of like is rope bondage want to want I think, like what what are your favorite ties are those the ties that you’d be teaching people, like new people, when

45:35

I’m teaching one on one and stuff like that, I really started the beginning, I teach a good solid single column tie, which is one that my go to single column tie, okay, I can tie it without having to look at it or even think about it, it’s burned into muscle memory, which is what you want for that anchor tie to be and then teaching the standard chest harness or what they call it Takota, Cote, shortened down to tk through most of the people are gotay Depending on who you talk to, just to wrap chest harness where there’s two wraps above the breath line and two wraps below the breast line with the arms tied behind the back. Okay. So when I teach them that I teach them a basic single column tie, and stuff like that, how to handle rope, mostly when I when I’m teaching my one on one class, when I was learning, I would take these classes and they’d be like, Okay, we’re going to learn x, so and so’s chest harness from such and such, whatever. And we’d go through that, and everybody would tie it two or three times. And when we’d leave, people would forget all the little nuances of that particular time, right? Remember, remember. So when I did a one on one class, I could change it up towards that of trying to teach you how to tie a tie specifically, I was teaching them some basic ties that everybody should know. And I was teaching them a lot of how to handle the rope to begin with, to make your life easier to tie simpler and more efficiently. And then that can grow into now I can memorize, Osada, Steve’s three rope TK or whatever like that, because now I’ve got the rope handling doubt write better for me. And that, to me was a more more useful one on one class. The ones that I remember from taking taught me tricks on how to hold that rope and how to handle it and how to make it my friend versus trying to teach me a really specific tie.

Mr Fox   47:23

Yeah, I’m trying to think there’s a there’s a martial art statement. And I wish I could remember right now like, Jujitsu, one or something. And it’s something to the effect of, you know, you could No 10,000 have done 10,000 moves one time, or have done one move 10,000 times, right. And like the master would want the one move 10,000 times like, you don’t need to, don’t need to show me all this crazy stuff. Just teach me the foundation, the fundamentals,

47:47

right, and the foundation, the fundamentals are the starting of everything. If you really look at rope bondage. In particular, the Japanese style rope bondage, there’s a lot of what I call, step and repeat. Right? So there’s a couple of very simple knots that you learn are very simple hitches that you learn. And then you repeat them. And when the when the ties get super complex, if you really just break them down. It’s a lot of the same thing over and over and over again. Right. So I like teaching that really basic starting point. And then saying, Oh, go wild. Right, you know, Oh, I see a cat.

Mr Fox   48:19

That cat walking by his Storm Cat. Yeah, she’s getting part of the podcast today. Absolutely. Talking on the microphone.

48:26

Yeah, I locked mine out of the room. Because of that fact. I didn’t want to have to fight with them.

Mr Fox   48:31

I thought we did. But she got in. Yeah.

48:35

I saw your eyes. repeatedly. It was like a fourth up. It’s coming off the screen.

Mr Fox   48:40

She just she walked right over top of everything. So I’m glad she didn’t turn anything off. Or there’s still there noises right? Everything’s still going good. So that was great. That was Storm Cat. She’s part of our podcast. So it’s always

48:57

helpful with rope bondage to loosely

Mr Fox   49:01

be helpful facing the ends on the play.

49:03

Yeah, helpful in a way that they’re not right. I was doing some practice stuff for myself one time and I like to like suspend chairs and objects around my house and stuff like that when I’m just playing around because all I’m doing is just getting my hands operating the rope and you know, teaching myself rope handling some of that. And I put up a couple of chairs one time, and halfway up from getting the chair suspended everything about one of my cats jumped up in the chair, laid down and went to sleep. And I was I was doing this whole suspension thing with this chair. Like I was gonna turn it upside down and flip it around and do all sorts of that. And like, at that point, I’m like, Well, I guess I’m done now. Right? I just kind of tied it off and walked away and the cat just sat up in this chair spinning in the air.

Mr Fox   49:45

She thought you did it for her. She’s like, totally great.

49:47

100% She was like that. Thank you. I appreciate that.

Mr Fox   49:50

Right? Go. Yeah, what are you gonna do tomorrow when it’s nap time?

49:54

I think there’s a picture of it on my Instagram or something like that. Look for that kind of far down. It’s kind of I’m like, Yeah, you guys are really helpful, like really, really helpful.

Mr Fox   50:05

What are any storage tips you have for you rope like what do you what’s proper handling of your rope, you throw in the bottom of your drawer

50:11

natural fiber rope, you want to store it basically on, coiled and hung over like a beam, or something of that nature so that it just hangs straight, okay? If you’re using it, or if you’re using it on a regular basis, you can coil it. And there’s a ton of different ways of coiling rope, to make it easy to untie that sort of thing like that. But the more you leave it coiled, the more of the rope will get a memory. And when you undo it, you’ll notice kinks in it. Okay, match up with those coils. Yeah, so for long term storage, your best bet is to hang it over something like hanging over like a closet pole, or something like that. You want it to be in like a cool a cool section of your house, don’t hang it in front of a window where it gets direct sunlight all the time will dry out.

Mr Fox   50:58

You know, you said you oil it how do you oil at natural fiber rope,

51:02

I use your hobo oil. Yeah, which is a actually your hobo oil is actually a low temperature melting wax. And I just put a little bit in the palm of my hand and run it down the rope, the rope gets a little bit damp feeling I don’t want to do it too too much, but it gets a little bit damp feeling. And then I hang it for a good day day and a half to let that oil soak in to the core of the rope. A rope that has like a for lack of a better word moist core will be a stronger rope. When it starts drying out those small rope fibers and stuff like that start cracking and start coming apart. Okay, so keeping it with a little bit of moisture in it a little bit of oil and that sort of thing like that tends to make the rope a little bit stronger. How do you do that? Depends on the usage of the rope for me, okay, generally like every month and a half or so I will pull rope out and check it and oil it if it needs needs be. You also get a little bit of oil in when you’re using draw people’s skin. Like just the oils, natural oils from people’s skin, sweat, things like that will also soften the robot and condition the robot a little bit. Those sort of fluids I don’t worry too much about. If I get spit on it or some other bodily fluid, then the rope gets washed and stuff like that. And depending on what the fluid is and may end up being that person’s rope after that, right, but standard like just body sweat will evaporate off of it. But the moisture will hold a little bit and the rope will get a little softer, a little more condition. Okay, so so it’s not a bad thing to have that on it. You don’t want to have like perfumes or lotions, from somebody’s skin on the rope, because that tends to break the rope down. But just somebody whose natural sweat perspiration is okay.

Mr Fox   52:52

All right. That’s Do you have anything else? I mean, what else would you add? Is there something else that I’m missing that maybe a new dominant would like to or should know about?

53:01

I don’t know be honest with you. There’s so many things. It’s just so many things, right? As a new dominant, read everything you can. There’s a lot of great books out there. There’s a lot of great websites out there, stuff like that, learn as much as you can never think that you know everything. Period. Always, always think that there’s more to learn.

Mr Fox   53:22

Any advice? Yeah,

53:23

I think that’s so on both sides of the slash personally. Yeah, tops and bottoms. Always be willing to learn. And always be willing to listen to the person on the other side of the slash to as a top. I like listening to my bottoms. And they tell me what ties worked, what ties don’t work. If it works for them. It may not work for somebody else. Right? So try and learn those things.

Mr Fox   53:46

I always say they have all your answers. Everybody’s Yeah, that’s what I say.

53:50

Like the answers are out there if you just ask them. Yeah, you know, ask the questions. So

Mr Fox   53:54

crazy that communication thing.

53:57

Wow, that’s amazing. Communication that that’s kind of important. Yeah,

Mr Fox   54:02

and everything. And everything. All right, Marshall, why thank you so much for coming on here and sharing your knowledge.

54:09

I forgot to say where to buy rope. Where Where would

Mr Fox   54:11

you buy it? Oh, okay. Well,

54:13

there’s a few places. My personal favorites. There’s a guy here in town, kinky contraptions, okay. You can order it from him. There’s also a company out of I believe they’re in the Carolinas called kambaku Studios. Alright, they’re on Etsy. They have great rope, really inexpensive, good quality, stuff like that. Then there’s another person out of Oregon, who makes really nice rope, relatively inexpensive. Rope bound kitten is her name.

Mr Fox   54:43

I like that name.

54:44

Those three people are the three that I are very reputable for me, okay. I get good quality work from them. I like their stuff. And people should go check them out for sure. Oh, okay.

Mr Fox   54:56

Thank you so much. Remind us again how we can go see some Your artwork, how we can get in touch with you if we’re in Vegas, maybe if we want to come get a photo shoot, I think you do photo shoots. If somebody wants to learn ties, how can people get in touch?

55:11

You can find me on all the social media platforms basically are all the important ones. Anyway, Instagram, and it is M Bradford photo works on Instagram, on Facebook, just search Marshall Bradford. And you’ll find that really cool picture of me with the beard when I was in my 20s Black and white so it’s artsy. And then red bubble just under my name Marshall Bradford?

Mr Fox   55:33

It sounds great.

55:34

I try not to hide.

Mr Fox   55:35

Yeah, it does need to get if you’re hiding, right? Yeah, yeah, it really doesn’t. Alright, sir. I thank you. I really do. Thank you and

55:43

having me on. I’m really, really happy that you did. Yeah, this was a lot of fun. Well, thank

Mr Fox   55:47

you very much.

55:48

If anybody has questions, please feel free to message me. I have no problem answering. Okay, even the embarrassing moments. I’m okay with it.

Mr Fox   55:55

Sometimes those are the best. Those are. Alright, Marshall. Thanks again, man.

56:01

Thank you. I

Mr Fox   56:02

appreciate it. Have a great night. All right. Guys, do you want to help the Hassan podcast? It’s simple. Go to your podcast app or go to has domme.com backslash podcast and leave us a five star rating and a positive review. It’s that simple. Until next time, gentlemen.