Killer Merch: Neil Autry’s Clothing Line Is to Die For. (So Is His TikTok)

Neil Preston Autry has a tattoo on his higher proper arm of Colonel Sanders. There’s blood pouring out of the fried hen magnate’s eyes.

“That one, I assume, will get probably the most consideration,” says Autry, 36. “Once I first received it, individuals have been like, ‘Why do you have got that? Are you a vegan?’ I mentioned, ‘No, I’m not a vegan. I simply actually like Colonel Sanders.’

“Actually, it’s simply there due to my adoration for his dedication. The man had a number of companies that failed, and he didn’t hand over. He simply saved going and saved going, after which he lastly grew to become profitable. I really feel like I can relate to that.”

Although he doesn’t a lot appear to be it — the Colonel tattoo is one among numerous that cowl his physique, and he’s usually present in a ripped sleeveless shirt and denims — Autry’s a businessman himself. He owns a counterculture attire firm referred to as Western Evil, which he began in 2010, and sells his stuff on-line and across the nation at locations like punk music festivals, oddities and curiosities expos, and tattoo conventions.

Western Evil (tagline: Get pleasure from Our Filth) makes a speciality of what you would possibly name “homicide stylish.” Involved in buying a costume plastered with the mugshots of serial killers like Aileen Wuornos, H.H. Holmes, and David Berkowitz? How a few “Mickey Manson Household” shirt with the face of notorious cult chief Charles Manson imposed on the physique of Mickey Mouse? Western Evil’s received you lined.

Autry, who moved from Indianapolis to Arizona in 2019, runs the enterprise out of his Maricopa house.

“I’m a one-man present,” he says. “The entire downstairs is mainly my manufacturing store. There are three residing rooms in my home, and I turned one among them into my screen-printing store, after which one of many downstairs bedrooms is my delivery workplace. I tour, I do these pop-up outlets, I design, I ship, I print, I discipline the emails and stuff like that. I do all the things myself.”

That one-man present has gotten much more consideration since its creator received on TikTok a 12 months in the past. As Western Evil has reached a bigger viewers, it’s meant extra gross sales, extra wild feedback from viewers, and extra questions in regards to the morals of creating serial killer merch.

Given Western Evil’s fixation on crime and dying, it makes a certain quantity of sense that Autry began his profession as a member of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Division. He entered the drive at 22 and was requested by the Vice squad to take part in undercover operations as a consequence of his younger look, he says.

“There’s an image within the newspaper of me swearing in. I’m entrance and heart of this photograph and I actually appear to be I’m a 12-year-old in a swimsuit that’s too huge for me. [They were like], ‘We actually need you to pursue this and are available into Vice. We’d love to make use of you, you appear to be a toddler, this’ll be nice.’

“In my thoughts, I’m like, ‘That is going to be 21 Bounce Road as fuck.’ However not lengthy into it, I stop. I hated it. I hated being there. I hated the individuals I used to be round. I hated the perspective, the chip on the shoulder of lots of people.”

Subsequent got here a stint working safety for the Indianapolis Colts, throughout which period he and two pals began speaking about opening a screen-printing enterprise. One of many pals was going via a tough time, and ended up taking his personal life, Autry remembers. It put some issues in perspective.

“After that I used to be like, ‘OK, I’ve to do that. I’m not going to pull my toes and work shitty jobs that I hate.’ After which nearly instantly after that, I received laid off from the Indianapolis Colts, and I collected unemployment, and with that unemployment I began Western Evil.”

Numerous Autry’s preliminary designs have been primarily based on horror motion pictures and popular culture, with a couple of true crime-themed gadgets thrown within the combine. He made the rounds of horror-movie conventions promoting his work, however he started to note that the marketplace for horror-themed clothes and accessories was saturated.

“I began to understand that increasingly corporations have been sort of popping up doing the identical factor I used to be doing, and I used to be making much less and fewer cash,” he says. “And so I sort of leaned into doing extra of my true crime designs, and I spotted that my gross sales received higher as a result of nobody else was doing it on the time.”

Autry’s curiosity in true crime had been simmering for years.

“There was an evolution into it,” he says. “I believe each child as a teen has the curiosity in Charles Manson and all these serial killers. It sort of ties in with punk rock — you have got Suicidal Tendencies having an image of Charles Manson carrying a Suicidal Tendencies hat. It simply is a part of that sort of cult-rock tradition. That’s sort of the place I took curiosity in it to start with.

“The thought of all the time eager to be a cop and having the little detective sort of perspective rising up as a teen made me interested in issues that had been unsolved, just like the Black Dahlia homicide and the Zodiac killer,” Autry continues. “However then after I was a cop, and I used to be going via criminology programs, and prison psychology programs they have been instructing us within the police academy, I received actually fascinated with it that means, too.”

Early examples of his true-crime-themed gadgets embrace designs referring to the Black Dahlia and Jim Jones. His hottest gadgets are the leggings and the costume which can be printed with black-and-white mugshots of well-known murderers like John Wayne Gacy and Jeffrey Dahmer.

In case you’re questioning how Autry can get away with making his designs: Mugshots are within the public area, and prisoners can’t revenue off of their picture. However the best way he makes use of these images are his copyrighted designs.

“The sample is one thing that I did,” he says. “So though these pictures are within the public area, the best way it was assembled and organized was accomplished by me, and in order that sample is exclusive and copyrighted as my mental property and my artwork.”

A clothes firm that sells a Black Flag-style shirt with crime scene images of the Black Dahlia homicide and a copy of the “Burn Bundy Burn” shirt that retailers hawked exterior of Ted Bundy’s execution raises a query that Autry is effectively acquainted with:

The place is the road between an curiosity in true crime and glorifying murderers?

“I really feel like as quickly as I began, I all the time sort of coined [my aesthetic] as exploitation,” Autry says, referencing the movie style. (Because it’s defined within the e-book Exploitation Movie by Ernest Mathjis, “exploitation movie is a kind of cinema, usually cheaply produced, that’s designed to create a quick revenue by referring to, or exploiting, up to date cultural anxieties. Examples embrace movies about drug use, nudity and striptease, sexual deviance, rebellious youths or gangs, violence in society, xenophobia, and concern of terrorism or alien invasions.”)

“So exploitation is, I assume, glorifying one thing to a level, however on the similar time I’m not attempting to let you know that Ted Bundy is horny. I’m not attempting to let you know that Richard Ramirez is sizzling. Numerous my merchandise have footage of their mugshots. It’s them being caught, being executed,” Autry says. “So if you wish to say that I’m glorifying it, I assume so, however there’s additionally the notice that these individuals did do issues that have been incorrect they usually paid the value for it, or are paying the value for it.”

The true crime renaissance of the final a number of years has made it a little bit extra “regular” to be fascinated with serial killers, Autry says. Podcasts like My Favourite Homicide, Netflix reveals like The Staircase, and even information tales just like the seize of the Golden State Killer Joseph DeAngelo draw large consideration from the general public.

As media like this goes mainstream, an curiosity in true crime “turns into increasingly accepted, and people who find themselves within the prison psychology of it develop into much less and fewer chastised and judged over it,” Autry says.

EXPAND

Autry reveals off an genuine John Wayne Gacy “Pogo the Clown” portray, simply one of many items of serial killer memorabilia that fill his house.

Neil Preston Autry

Within the 12 months of our Lord 2021, no interview is full with out asking the topic what they did in the course of the coronavirus pandemic.

In Autry’s case, he received on TikTok.

In early 2020, he was already toying with the concept of getting on the favored video app simply to maintain himself distracted after a sequence of breakups. Then, it grew to become a matter of necessity.

“The pandemic hit, and also you go from doing reveals the place you’re making hundreds of {dollars} in three days to having zero revenue. My on-line presence was by no means that sturdy as a result of I by no means pushed on-line — I used to be all the time doing these reveals. I had to determine a approach to pay my hire.”

He’s @neil_diemond on TikTok, the place he’s received nearly 90,000 followers. He’s not unaware that a number of his viewers is there for his bad-boy beauty and kinda-sinister, kinda-charming persona.

“As useless and silly as this sounds, I learn some article saying that TikTok was pushing creators that have been enticing. And I used to be like, ‘Hey, I sort of match that mildew. Let’s see if I can promote some shit with my silly face.’ In order that’s what I did: I received on there and I began making movies. I performed the a part of, like, the thirst entice child and I began peppering within the issues that I really do, of screen-printing and artwork design, and that I make these T-shirts and I run this label, and it labored. It labored quick. I couldn’t sustain with it.”

Watch his TikTok lengthy sufficient, and also you’ll see glimpses of Autry’s serial killer memorabilia assortment (he’s received John Wayne Gacy work and Richard Ramirez letters, simply to call a couple of gadgets); his canine, Werebear; the costume he wore throughout his days as an Elvis impersonator; and his quite a few tattoos. Of the latter, highlights embrace a dying steel Dolly Parton, ALF, Misfits-inspired designs, a again piece of the Zodiac Killer (his favourite true crime story), and wrestler “Macho Man” Randy Savage.

Autry’s movies are typically humorous, typically topical (in regards to the Capitol riot, say, or true crime trivia), and sure, typically a little bit thirst-trappish — which had some unintended penalties.

“Individuals don’t know the right way to act proper now. Individuals hadn’t had face-to-face interactions for months, they usually have the anonymity of the web, they usually’re saying loopy crap that you simply wouldn’t say to somebody nose to nose. The messages and emails that I received, they have been disturbing. Individuals telling me that they might get bare in entrance of youngsters to get my consideration, or they need me to tear out their coronary heart and have intercourse with their coronary heart in entrance of them and spit on them. And I’m identical to, “Oh, my God.’ It will get a little bit a lot.”

With the pandemic trying prefer it’s on its means out, Autry is again to touring usually for reveals (Werebear comes with him typically, and different instances Autry leaves him along with his mom, who lives close to Sedona). He continues to pursue his pastime of pictures. He’s really a vegan now. He’s at present single.

As pertains to Western Evil, he says, “I’ve sort of been fascinated by doing a brick-and-mortar retailer, however I don’t even know the place to start. Within the first 12 months being out right here, all the things sort of closed, so I’m unsure the right way to even arrange something, as a result of I simply didn’t go away the home for a whole 12 months.

“However I’m continuously evolving and doing new stuff. It’s important to. You gotta keep related. You bought to remain forward of the competitors and the curve, as a result of there’s increasingly individuals popping up who’re doing the identical factor that I’m doing. They’re not doing it nearly as good, however they’re nonetheless attempting.”

One concept he’s toying with: making a restricted sequence of John Wayne Gacy shirts utilizing ink constituted of filth from Gacy’s yard.

“My unique plan was to cut up [the dirt] right into a powder after which combine into ink and screen-print precisely 33 shirts for each sufferer that he was charged for,” Autry says. “And I’ve not accomplished it as a result of I’m simply not prepared to half with it but. However ultimately I’ll.”