Young couple here to stay – for as long as they can afford to.

You might not know it on first glance, but Bradd Tatum and Carrie Hosfeldt are as homegrown as it gets.

Young, pierced, dyed and devoted to “horror punk,” the couple are almost an island demographic unto themselves. Yet, both were raised on Bainbridge and say they were deeply shaped by it.

“There’s a lot of freedom on the island,” said Hosfeldt, 23, who is engaged to be married next summer to Tatum, 21.

“If there’s a theme on Bain­bridge Island, it’s to be individualistic and everybody supports that,” said Tatum. “The island has so many creative people, but it’s off the beaten path, and that’s one of its charms.”

The couple have blazed their own creative trail with Blood and Guts Records, a music label tapping a special vein of punk rock that isn’t afraid to show its ghoulish side. The label boasts an international roster, including the bands T-Virus and Casket Casey from Sweden and Italy’s Rival Skulls.

“Basically, I started it with $12 I borrowed from a friend,” said Tatum. “I started a tape trade and promoting concerts at the Teen Center. I put up a website that said what I had in mind for a label.”

The fresh-faced teen even tried to recruit legendary horror punkers the Vladimirs for his bedroom record label. They declined at first, but Tatum is proud to report that Blood and Guts has just released the Vladimir’s latest album.

Attracted by their love for the genre, Tatum and Hosfeldt now share the label’s growing responsibilities.

“I met him because he was in a Horror Punk band,” Hosfeldt said.

“Yeah, that was at some old place in Seabeck,” Tatum added. “We found that we were also way into the romantic side of old ’50s horror movies.”

While Hosfeldt serves as the label’s graphic designer, Tatum tackles the technical side of the Blood and Guts website. Everything else is split evenly between them, including negotiations with bands, marketing, sales and budgeting for tours, recording and merchandising.

“It’s a great learning process all the time (and) we’ve seen a huge jump in business,” said Tatum, who recently quit the evening shift at a local gas station to devote more time to the label.

Blood and Guts, he said, recently hired a “PR guy” and now sells CDs in some of the larger music chain stores.

“We learn more about how to do this all the time,” he said. “We’re in no way the masters of what we do.”

Gumption

Having the gumption at such a young age to undertake a globe-spanning business enterprise is rare, Tatum admits, but it’s not such a big surprise on Bainbridge.

“The people we grew up with – they’re all over the place, being original, creative people with life missions and goals,” he said. “A lot packed up immediately for college. Some went to Israel or Europe and some are in some fairly successful rock bands.”

Few, however, actually stay on the island to pursue their passions.

“It’s hard for young people to live here,” Hosfeldt said. “I think that’s the main problem – that people can’t afford to live on their own in the place they grew up.”

All the people they knew in high school who still live on the island are camped out in parents’ basements, resigned to life in the nest or an eventual leap off-island.

“We kind of fell into this place,” Hosfeldt said of their $700-per- month rental house on Ferncliff Avenue. With four bedrooms, a fireplace and front and back yards, the house is a steal by island standards.

“It’s really the only way we could have stayed here on the island,” Tatum said. “I really have to emphasize what a miracle it is that we have a place here.”

Tatum and Hosfeldt moved to Poulsbo and then Bremerton after graduation. Their home in west Bremerton – although cheap – wasn’t exactly ideal.

“Our neighbors were meth dealers and partied 24 hours a day,” Tatum said. “We didn’t really feel comfortable.

“I was trying to go to school at O.C. (Olympic College) but we were worried about everything. It was hard to focus knowing it wasn’t safe.”

Tatum’s mother, who was struggling to make rent on Bainbridge, asked the couple to move in with her at the Ferncliff house. After she moved out, Tatum and Hosfeldt stayed.

“It’s our sanctuary,” Hosfeldt said. “You can really stretch out.”

For Tatum, the house has also been good for business.

“It’s really comfortable and there’s not so many distractions,” he said. “Here I can focus, big-time. Now I want to put a recording studio in one of the rooms.”

But both know their time on the island could be limited.

Buying a home and raising kids on the island is a dream Hosfeldt speaks of often. But she knows from her parents’ experience that even owning a home on the island offers little permanence.

“We had 2 acres on Point White, but my family was taxed off the island,” she said.

Rebellion

Hosfeldt spent much of her high school years in Chimacum, where her Bainbridge-bred idiosyncrasies didn’t go over well.

“I was expelled for painting a bomb on an American flag,” she said of a painting that initially earned her an “A” from her art teacher.

But a schoolwide crackdown after the Columbine, Colo., shootings had school administrators rifling through student artwork and removing youths they deemed potentially violent, she said.

“They led this other kid away in handcuffs (because) he wore camo pants and drew pictures, too,” she said. “It was unbelievable they thought I was a threat. I had an overwhelming feeling of not being welcomed.”

Tatum is quick to contrast Hosfeldt’s high school experience with his own.

“And then at Bainbridge we had the (punk band) Misfits played over the intercom,” he said. “The school president had a mohawk and was the prom king. Every morning, because he was the president, he’d play punk on the intercom.”

Tatum saw that same rebelliousness in island adults, who eschewed chain stores in favor of “ma and pop” businesses; favored local arts over the mass-produced; and preserved green spaces while other communities opted for subdivisions and condos.

Much of that spirit has died down as the island has grown, Tatum believes.

“I don’t think that people shouldn’t be welcomed here,” he said. “But cramming as many people into this place as possible rubs me the wrong way.”

Hosfeldt agrees that the island’s values are changing.

“We’re losing sight of the idea that we should embrace originality,” she said. “Just look at all the overpriced houses. They’re all the same color with the same 3 feet of lawn.”

Tatum says this change is also visible in island storefronts.

“We used to have this firm front against corporations, but now we have Starbucks and Subway,” he said. “We’re slowly letting our guard down.”

Despite all the changes they’ve seen in their short lives – fewer forests, beach accesses and locally owned stores – Tatum and Hosfeldt say only money, or the lack of it, could push them off the island.

“I chose to come back and, hopefully, I can stay here,” said Hosfeldt.

“We were just in Cincinnati to visit one of our bands,” added Tatum. “Housing there was dirt cheap. You could buy a house with six bedrooms and a big yard for like $100,000. Here, you can maybe get a house – that’s way smaller – for $850,000.”

Until prices push young couples like them off the island, Tatum said he and Hosfeldt will continue “living the dream.”

“It’s mind-blowing and self-validating that we’re doing what we dreamed about in high school,” he said. “It’s totally satisfying that we did it and we’re still here on Bainbridge Island.”

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Islandwise

These profiles are part of an ongoing series on Bainbridge families and individuals, coinciding with a new project called Islandwise that’s looking for shared community values. To get involved in fireside chats on community values and vision, call Dwight Sutton at 842-3011, Rod Stevens at 780-1444 or Connie Waddington at 842-9483.