Video Review: Fuck Yinz – Volume 2

A few weeks back, the crew at One Up Skateshop in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania sent over Fuck Yinz Volume 2, their 30-minute promo video from earlier this year. The DVD-R came wrapped in a size small digi-camo tank top with their logo on it. The G-Man, who once received a medium tee from Vinny Raffa only to respond with “You don’t have a 2X?” lamented it was not a few sizes larger.

One Up is the only skate shop in Pittsburgh, and it is run by a friendly, tight knit crew, that has always been accommodating with sharing spots and skating around with us whenever we would make the six-hour drive out there. It’s the sort of shop that every city should have. Their video has parts from several names that have began receiving more coverage in recent history (Kyle Nicholson, Zach Funk, Austin Kanfoush, Nick Panza), plus a whole bunch of lesser-known dudes who still shred just as hard (Dan Peindl, Grem Trails, Rob Dumas, Bill Cunningham, Justin Funk, and others.)

Pittsburgh is somewhat of a gateway from the northeast into the midwest. Yet, in comparison to the major east coast cities, or even closer midwestern counterparts like Cincinnati and Cleveland, it has not received much burn throughout the history of skateboarding. What makes Fuck Yinz interesting is how insular Pittsburgh skating is. Skateboarding on a larger scale has unfortunately ignored the city, so it responds back by disregarding what is going on in skateboarding itself. There aren’t any trends guiding the tricks — they skate high ledges because there are no low ones, rough spots because there aren’t many smooth ones, and wear Steelers jerseys because that is where they are from, not because they’re trying “to be hip-hop.” The internet loves to play up “cellar door / abstract spot skating” as a skater’s self-aware foray into being “artsy.” That narrative stops making sense when you have a scene left to make do with spots that only fit such a description, and it shouldn’t be much of an issue when you have dudes ollieing over waist high fences into cobblestone banks. Nobody is trying to be Puleo or Pappalardo; everyone’s skating is shaped by the city and not pro video parts.

It is easy to grab most local crew videos these days and play “Guess who this kid’s favorite skater is” with every part, but you’d have a hard time doing it here. For a city without the most accommodating skate spots, Pittsburgh has bred a wide array of styles, none of which have a clear lineage to the pros who kids coming up today mold their skating after.

With a 90% rap soundtrack, featuring lots of Dipset, a more socially conscious moment off this website’s favorite rap record, and the most prone-to-make-you-punch-someone Three 6 Mafia song ever recorded, this video will get any person stuck skating a city with shitty ground and imperfect spots hyped. It might be hard to obtain a physical copy, but you can try your luck via the shop’s Facebook page. One Up is currently working on a full-length video to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the shop in 2013. Hopefully, by then, a few of these guys are hooked up properly, otherwise skateboarding will just look stupid for ignoring this place again.

Be sure to check out the crew’s Tumblr, FuckYinz.Tumblr.com for more video updates.