Much like the previously-unheralded Lurkers 2 Vimeo upload, and due to the fact that there is nearly a foot of snow outside, we should probably tell you that Coda’s Self-Titled (from 2007) video is online in full, just barely making it to three hundred views.
Upon release, this video sent tons of kids to Google Earth, searching for pixelated views of spots in the less-friendly portions of the Bronx and Brooklyn, and onto a two-hour A train ride out to Rockaway so they could skate in the middle of the projects. “Classic” New York videos barely had any outer borough footage, and we’ve gone on about how Static 2 and Mosiac had an influence in changing that (along with white people and their natural tendency to do weird things like skate into walls because they’re mad at their parents or something), but this video brought New York spot-seeking to a whole new level. Every part is solid, and unlike most videos today, there’s no bad pacing or annoying music in it. Aside from Lady Gaga, Creedence is the only unanimously QS-approved white people music, so there are plenty of great things about the video. It’s always been a personal favorite around here.
The quality isn’t the best, but what can you do?
Coda coincidentally has a new site up, so be sure to give it a browse once you’re done watching this and your umpteenth personal screening of the Daewon part. Speaking of which, Daewon should hire the Coda dudes to take him around to spots in New York, now that would be a great video part. There’s the real king of “abstract spots,” don’t ever forget that. Why he hasn’t gone the more Puleo direction and tried to get more “urban” with it is anyone’s guess, but realistically, it probably has to do with the weather.
Happy New Year. Best wishes on learning new tricks and staying in good health throughout 2011. How long did it take for you to hear “Hard in the Paint” or “B.M.F.” in 2011? Three seconds? What about “Teenage Dream” or “California Girls?”
Ted Barrow wrote a very sincere memoir on The Fish and what it means to many people. “Though it is tempting, you can’t blame the bar for making you an alcoholic.”
Might be late on this one, but here is Taji’s interview with Ryan Sheckler. As much as you may waste your time hating him, after the recently discussed backside flip down the Chinatown skatepark double-set and the kickflip back tail on Water Street, I wouldn’t be mad at watching an all New York Flip Cam clip like he mentioned in the interview. He’ll probably set a launch ramp up to that sculpture on 48th and Sixth Avenue like the first Tony Hawk game or something.
Sam Diaz threw together this homie cam clip that features a better angle of Shawn Powers’ TF-revitalizing kickflip over the box, and Kerel doing what he does best by figuring out a completely insane way of skating Chase. Give him a few sheets of plywood and he’ll find five new ways to skate every spot.
If you pay attention to the internet, you may have heard something about Already Been Done, a new monthly web publication kickstarted by Josh Friedberg and Robert Brink, with contributions from Dave Carnie, Eric Swisher from The Chrome Ball Incident, RB Umali, and several others. There’s a “1-4-11″ date on the website, which I’m assuming means the release for the first full issue, but a whole bunch of content is already on there. Dave Carnie, one of the most important people to ever relay skateboarding within the printed word, and his feature on a photo of Jason Dill with another man’s hand cupping his balls (plus the subsequent “thing” it turned into) has given me higher expectations for the entire project than anything involving words and skateboarding in recent memory. I sometimes get the impression that older dudes take that “No homo” thing a bit too seriously, as if the person saying it is genuinely concerned with being perceived as a homosexual after saying something along the lines of “Yo, my wheel fell off, can you give me a nut?” to another man at a skateshop and failing to proceed with a “No homo.” It’s juvenile and dumb as hell, sure, but it’s in the same vein as “That’s what she said,” and not some sort of step below gay bashing, or actual concern over being thought as gay, which is what a lot of older people tend to make it sound like. But they came up in a different era, and we can only speak for ourselves and those we know, so maybe they have an equally valid point. Either way, the article itself is great. As is all of the other content on their site.
Loosely related since he is in fact responsible for bringing “No Homo” into popular use, it’s amazing that there are people out there who still don’t like Cam’ron. Look at what this dude spends his time doing. Unless you’re too good for LCD entertainment, or one of those people worried about what “is ruining hip-hop,” it’s impossible to not be amused. “My floor’s dancing! My. Fucking. Floors…DANCE!”
In the days when Blades was the only shop in New York City with a re-threader (and would occasionally charge you by the minute to use it…), some chick that was working there begrudgingly instructed me to “Stop skating in the rain” so the threads wouldn’t deplete from rust when she handed it over, without charging their notorious per-minute usage fee. She had obviously never seen Questionable, and will probably never see this clip of Shawn Powers skating in the rain, which is enough to inspire anyone to go skate before the streets are even completely dry from the thawing snow. Filmed by Jimmy Marketti.
By some strange stroke of fate, Peter has concocted a video project to aid us through the first half of winter, and tallied up 2010 as the third straight year in a row of making some of the finest local multimedia available. Longer than Sognar, but shorter than Trife, Caviar has parts from Bill Piece, Pedro Garboza, and others that were largely missed from the preceding project, in addition to keeping the crew’s traditional roster (McFeely, Shawn Powers, Kevin, etc.) This may be the second time this year that Flipmode has fallen victim to video pirates, as this video seems to have been ripped from a video cassette that was originally a collage of taped evangelical daytime TV shows, Larry Johnson’s four-point play, and scenes from New Jack City. The locations in the video only fuel the fact that there are still tons of spots left in New York, all you have to do is look harder, or employ San Franciscan approaches to hillside spot discovery before you start complaining about how everything is gone. It has been a really good year for local videos.
(The video offers some ominous hints at the Billy Lynch disappearance mystery, but no clear solutions. What is it with Long Island and the perpetual vanishing of its skateboard-riding residents?)
Features Rob Gonyon, Shawn Powers, Pedro Garboza, Kevin Tierney, Bill Pierce, Luis Tolentino, Patrick Murray, Joseph Delgado, Danny Falla, Jamel Marshall, Dylan James, Mike Burch, Amadeus Estrada, Xavier Veal, Derick Ziemkiewicz, Phil Rodriguez, and Billy McFeely.
By the looks of it, some old Fujianese woman whose english vocabulary stops at the phrase, “DVD! DVD!” snuck into the headquarters of New York City’s finest skateboard media institution, and filmed Peter’s latest project off his computer screen with a JVC Handycam while he was making Hot Pockets in the kitchen. It’s like the skateboard equivalent of the Wolverine leak from 2009.
It features all of the hood legends you would expect to see in a Flipmode project, including a McFeely ender, and some footage of B. Lynch before he violated parole and went back to jail. Has cameos from El Toro himself, Jake Johnson, and a few others. The aesthetic seems to have strayed away from illuminati related imagery and seems to focus more on that the dark underbelly of cultural liberation that came to light in the early-to-mid-1970s, proceeding the enthusiasm and free love of the swinging sixties. Or something like that. It might’ve been made while sitting in a pow-wow with guitars and dropping acid, that’s all I’m saying.
You can buy it from the African guys down on Canal Street or up on 125th. If you don’t have the time to do that, click below, it’s embedded after the jump.
Continuing with the previous How to Make It in America off-shoot spot, this one is a bit more on-the-surface, targeted to people who don’t know who Sean Sheffey is, with a bit less insider skate-related anecdotes. The cast of interviewees is amazing. It contains Freddy, Gino, Quim, Luis Tolentino, Jake Johnson and Rob Campbell, which are about a solid 40% of the only people who matter in skateboarding altogether. Seeing Gino skate through Wall Street and do backside 5050s on the Helmsley building black benches is enough to make anyone wish it wasn’t raining outside right now. Jake’s section is also pretty great, even though the wider-in-scope nature of the doc doesn’t really allow it to dwell in specifics of his situation. Seeing him skate over a sewer cap and do wallrides over a cone is great though. Oh, and Brengar is labeled as an “iconoclast,” which is a debate in and of itself. Pappalardo uses his screentime as a means through which to justify his avant-garde approach to professional skateboarding over the past half-decade. Knowing that he was Danny Weiss’ favorite skater was probably a bit too much to handle back in 2005 and the pressure finally won the battle.
Overall greatest quote: “Don’t do drugs.” – Fred Gall.
Solid viewing for a rainy Monday. (I don’t think you need an account to watch it.)
