Joe Cups screened a preview for Lurkers 3, in addition to the two previous installments at Bowery Stadium this past Friday. While the likelihood of this video eventually being finished varies depending on who you ask, it’s safe to say that its content and associated promotional materials will be kept off the internet at all costs. It should have parts from Ty Lyons, Matthew Mooney, Josh Velez, Taji Ameen, Ian Reid, Lurker Lou, and Charles Lamb (the three remaining original cast members.) If it happens, it will inevitably be a defining document for 2012, 2013, or 2020 in the same way Lurkers 1 & 2 remind us of what skateboarding in New York felt like in the early-and-mid-2000s. If you weren’t around for the golden age of the T.F., the closest you’re going to get is watching the first two Lurkers videos. The third one isn’t necessarily going to coincide with a golden era of any sort.
In turn, here is a seldom-seen preview for the second video of what may-or-may-not one day be a trilogy. (Spotted over at the Skate.ly library.) It features a more extensive roster list than what would end up in the final video, and a handful of other footage that was left out.
Given that the environment surrounding skateboard videos in 2010 typically shoots through a one-month cycle, in which the routine of them being premiered at some bar, uploaded to YouTube, released on DVD, deleted off YouTube, re-uploaded onto some sketchy eastern European video sharing site predominantly used for personality gauges of mailorder brides, and finishing their lifespan with a three page topic on Slap that usually dies out around the time some token asshole says “It’s kind of boring, I don’t get why everyone likes it so much,” it’s hard to maintain a longstanding presence, or even find something you may have missed from years before. The phenomenon is particularly pertinent to local videos, which went from their nineties/early-2000s existence of being passed around their respective regions on VHS dubs, to the complete opposite end of the spectrum, where every single twelve-year-old has a HD camera and desperately tries to make the defining document of their generation, right before the majority of their friends find out about cocaine and start filling out their art school applications.
Everyone knows that Mixtape is the best New York video (of the nineties, because “New York” videos don’t really exist anymore in the same way, unless you’re Flipmode.) Maybe if you’re more concerned with dat real hip-hop than with skateboarding, or are a Japanese person who doesn’t know who Eric Koston is, it’s your favorite video of all time. Choosing such a distinction as a clear-cut statement is more difficult for the 2000s, given that there are probably, like, a hundred New York skate videos that have been forgotten by this point. But unless you have personal allegiances, a safe top three would be Vicious Cycle, Flipmode 4, and Lurkers 2, probably the best time-capsule of what it was like to actually skate in New York during 2004, with the drives to Staten Island to pretend like you’re in California for a few hours, and the shift away from skating the Financial District with the recent loss of the little Banks.
Lurkers 2 has been uploaded to Vimeo for about two months now, and is teetering around one hundred views, which is only fuel to the suspicion that it is criminally under seen outside the immediate circle of Manhattan and North Brooklyn inhabiting skateboarders. Plus, it’s a good way to cap off August. The quality looks decent, not what you’d expect from the age of faux-HD Vimeo uploads, but you’ll live. Features full parts from Dharam Khalsa, Ted Barrow, Jason Dill, Ian Reid, Lurker Lou, and Charles Lamb. Has a riveting opener by Aaron Szott, and cameos from Quartersnacks team members, Matthew Mooney, Ty Lyons, and Pryce Holmes.
Here’s some things that have stood out on the internet over the past few days. Just some things to get through the rainy weekend… which I’m sure will be spent skating indoor…bars..
A while back, in my review of Lurkers 2, I mentioned how it’s probably the most accurate New York video in the past couple of years, seeing as how all the others tend to spend thier time in Barcelona instead of the TF. This was proceeded by a bunch of e-mails from geeks interested in seeing the video, which wasn’t the easiest thing to find if you weren’t on point with your IRC game. Well, instead of actually making more copies and giving them to me so that I could sell them, Sam decided to put the entire video on Youtube, so here it is, if you haven’t already seen it.
Lurkers 2 is quite possibly the most authentic New York video to come out in the past several years [excluding the N.Y. Revisited series]. While Vicious Cycle, the ABC video or the 5Boro video are all still dubbed as “New York videos,” no more than half of them are actually filmed on city streets. Not since the first few original Zoo York videos has it been common to see a video where over 90% of it is a daily documentation of the city’s people on their quest to be productive. That’s what you’re seeing here — except close to a decade down the line — the Astor sessions have been replaced by Union, the lines at Time-Life have been exchanged for a thirty-minute car ride to Staten Island and the flip tricks on the little banks are being done over the Flushing grate.
Serge Trudnowski: Word. Thanks for the shout out Matt. Yeah the olive oil thing was chill. Also, I perfected the art of delivering pizzas on a skateboard too.
Matt Reason: hey don’t forget that I suggested using oil, similar to the oils secreted from my funky ass dreadlocks, would enhance the flavor of pizza....
Ricky Oyola: Swagmaster…NO SHIT. Who do you think brought them to Europe.
swagmaster: yo ricky tomatoes r from south america
22 May 2012Considered it. Went with Grimaldi's b/c it usually has a longer line. RT @Ronniequest: @quartersnacks supreme would be lombardis if anything
22 May 2012Skate:Pizza Industry Equivalents - Dominoes:Deluxe, Pizza Hut:Girl, Little Caesars:NHS, Poppa John's:Kayo, Grimaldi's:Supreme, 2 Bros: Zoo
