Where'd you go ? I missed you so...

So, I haven't posted in a few months and here is why. After Evan and I finished our own local skate video back in August I really had a bad taste in my mouth as far as criticizing anyone's skating. I tried pretty hard for some of the footage that I had in my part and showing it in front of a group of people that I'm sure were judging every second of my footage was a mind trip to say the least. I'm sure pro skaters go through the same insecurity. Here's something that they worked their butt off on for a couple years and some little kid that only does flatground in his driveway comes on the internet and rips on the dude when in reality the kid probably will never do a single trick in that pros part. Have I completely changed ? No. I still hate on certain skaters but this blog will not showcase that. That's something that will stay among friends and in the skateshop/skatepark. The new goal of the blog is to inform everyone on who I think rips. Probably alot of old footage will be up here. Some names you might have heard of, some not. Some new footage that I've filtered through, in all the countless internet video garbage that floods todays skateboard market. Today I'll start with a classic. Wade Speyer, the man. His skating speaks for itself. Burley, fast, could slam at any second.

Oh, You were finished ? Well then allow me to retort...

So with the youtube generation of skaters never quite understanding what it means to actually wait for a video to come out and have to buy it or watch it with a friend, it seems company's like Zero and others have begun to fight back. The result, short videos with cheap packaging for a low price. Reasoning because videos don't sell like they used to ( did a skate video ever break even ? plane tickets, hotels, equipment, etc. ) and it'll immediately go straight to youtube or some other video hosting site. While I understand the idea behind the change it seems that it has also "dumbed" down the skating. Zero's Strange World is a great example ( and not the only one mind you ). The am's went off and pulled some sick parts together (as they should to "prove" themselves worthy of the Slap forums). The pro's slacked, I understand many were coming off of the fallen video but what was Elissa Steamer's excuse again ? Or Rattray's ? Well ... Rattray had just finished the Osiris Feed the Need Part like ... 3 years ago, ummm so did Balding Brockman and he pulled out a full section ( quite ridicolous at that, frontside bluntslide like whoa ). I just wonder if these promos, short online videos and new "Strange World" styled dvds are going to be the downfall of video progression. Will everything just go straight to youtube and be simpley park clips of your used to be favorite pro doing front 5-0s on little transition in some slip ons talking about his low key day ? Hopefully I'm wrong, I figure as long as $lave is around and Girl/Chocolate skate videos will never completely die or ... slack.

P.S. and now Zero is starting to film for "Cold War" will this be only pro parts with am montages ?

what other pro ...

... can wear a visor beanie and not look like a complete tool ? Only Tom Penny, only Penny.

Little things

Little junk people have pointed out to me or I have noticed myself.
-Rowley is probably the only skater in the world that can properly scoop impossibles and switch impossibles
-Out of the three Lewis Marnell parts I have watched (Nike's NBTT, Almost welcome part, Volcom Let's Live) the only handrail trick I've seen him do is sw flip fs board on a rightly sized 10ish set (I didn't stair count just estimating)
-In the intro of Alien Workshop's Mind Field the song is Amazing Grace a classic Christian hymn, at the part of the song where the lyrics go "was blind but now I see" they switch to the b&w clip of the three blind people with sunglasses and walking sticks
-Josh Kalis' part in the mentioned Mind Field could have been better had his song not rapped about the dollar menu at Mcdonald's, he still has the sickest fakie tre I've ever seen
-If you push enter or play at the beginning of Fred Gall's part in Inhabitants you'll see a bunch of old footage from his Eastern Exposure days with Dan Wolfe, who knew he could inward heel so well?
-If you push enter or play at the beginning of Jamie Thomas, Billy Marks, and Chris Cole's part in Ride the Sky you'll see alternate edits and another Billy's balls video
-Ride the Sky could have been called Left Foot Forward (notice a team of all regular skaters, is Jamie Thomas racists toward goofy footers? or does he just not like to think whether a person is going switch or regular when he sees a trick?)
-If you slow mo the beginning of Jason Dill's part in Mind Field he or someone drew a bunch of Nazi symbols on a few of the tabloids, could this mean something deep? Is Dill trying to subliminally brainwash skaters? I think he probably just wanted to screw with people, make em' think he's even weirder than we already think he is

expect more pointless posts like this in the future haha

A helping hand

After watching Habitat Mosaic, Habitats section from Photosynthesis, Inhabitants and hugging some trees, two skaters stick out in my mind. I like the way Tim O' Connor rides his toy machine, and Ed Selego rips equally as hard in a different sort of way. In case you didn't know and are too lazy to Youtube search the either, ole Tim seems to be the connoisseur of varial flips (nollie and otherwise) and some crazy alley oop grind variations (trick in, trick out, or just the grind in general). In his older days he seemed to like hopping down stuff a bit more than now, although I remember raising my eyebrows about a year ago after he bigflipped down a sizeable set in Europe in some Adidas promo that I believe Lem Villian (villian villemum I dunno) also carcass tossed down. Selego totally changed up the way he skated from Mosaic to Inhabitants, from killing every massive hubba and crazy rail to doing proper nollie cab back tails and tasty nollies over bump to bars, I like both parts equally as much, Ed can skate whatever he wants, I'll like it either way. Sad thing is in these past three parts neither "pro" has put out a whole lot of footage. Maybe that was their goal, to leave the viewer wanting more and stopping while they are ahead (a lesson Marc Johnson or maybe Ty Evans should take to heart), but to me a minute of footage to a minute half of footage just doesn't cut it when you are a skating for a paycheck. With this new Habitat offering supposedly coming out in the summer months, my help might be a little too late but it never hurts to try. So I'm thinking very conservatively here, with the average turn around time between videos being at best 3 years, I'm thinking the least amount of trickage a person can get away with and still seem like their part isn't too short would have to be about 25 clips (came up with the number after counting Richard Angelides section from Transworld's First Love). Knowing that Timmy boy has a knack for rolling his ankles I should probably give him a little bit of grace but let's just run the numbers shall we. 25 clips that's about two a month for a year. But it doesn't have to be if you have 2 years to film, then that could be as little as 1 clip a month. Is that so hard to do ? Just go out and skate whenever you want then on one Saturday or Sunday every month just get one clip. That's all , just one clip. Can't be that hard to do, neither skater is in the movie industry like Berra or Dyrdek, so there really isn't much of an excuse. 3 years one clip a month 36 clips, throwaway a third because it was filmed wrong, you hate the way you landed it whatever and you still have a solid 24, 25 clips. Hopefully this new video will come out with full parts from both and will have totally shut me up. Thing is I'm not hating on the way they skate, quite the opposite. Both skate fast, have lots of pop, a great style and an eye for the right trick at the right spot. Just hope they have more footage next time, shred on.

how i see it...

I like to hate on skating as much as the next guy if not more, but there are some things that I deem off limits as far as hate goes. The first being the "that rail is too small" argument. We've all seen it, stick your fisheye up close to some little elementary school sized rail that was meant for 3 foot tall children and bam! Pros go to town on the thing. Examples, jake johnson sw flip bs tail in short ends, justin eldridge's part in yeah right! (pretty much the whole part on that one rail), wieger van weanagngngngngnngngnging in Nothing but the Truth with the heelflip fs nose, fs krook 180, the list goes on and on. Now the reason I don't believe this argument has much basis if any at all is that I can't do any of those tricks and the person hating usually cannot either. In my mind if I ever sw flip back tail even a little joker rail at the park, heck even a toys r us flatbar that wobbles I would probably be the happiest person alive. Not to mention any of those tricks in question would certainly stand up as ledge tricks in lines, so to be able to throw it down something that is 3 inches wide and slanted downward is note worthy in my mind. Also I would rather see that as filler footy than some fs tailslide on whatever crummy looking bank spot, which yes I can do and yes I can find atleast 20 people at my park alone that could also do that.

Hate item #2, so and so did this and so and so only did that. Let's use Heath Kircharts Mind Field ender gap as the item in question. He kickflips it and backside flips it. After that the flood gates blow open and every person from Zero to Powell runs a train on the thing. Hardflip, Shuv it, Tre flip, etc. Now in my mind I think that once a spot as been determined skateable it makes everyone else realize that it is possible. We all have that one friend who'll be the first to try something and after him we all decide to go for it (in most cases haha). To me it's like Heath set off the spot and without him no one else would have thought to even skate it like that. So in my mind no one has really "showed" him up, not to mention who are we to judge which trick is harder etc. And if you think anyone has one upped Kirchart I simply will reply he is still the only person to gap that thing to fakie (bs flip and bs heel).

Cause I can...

If you're wondering where I got the title for the blog click on Mike's RepThePep part then turn your speakers up. Mike has the most "one liners" of anyone I've ever met. Example when watching Thrasher's newest video Prevent this Tradegy Ethan Fowler's part came on and Mike immediately refers to the dude as "father time" (long hair / beard). I can't watch that part without laughing now. This blog is about nothing, probably me either telling you what I like about skateboarding or something related to skateboarding, I'll try to keep it as positive as possible. There are a million I hate skateboarding and it was better in the 90's blogs out there so I'll try to do something a little different.

Mike's Part: http://www.blip.tv/file/1223749
( Mike hated that we talked about him so he'll probably hate that I even metioned him now, my bad Mike haha)