One Step Above Garbage

curbz

They painted the curbs here yellow, and now it’s the second or third best spot in the city that you don’t get kicked out of. Paint more stuff yellow.

Can’t remember the last time a montage got me as psyched as “Faces,” the new one from Ben Chadourne, featuring the Blobys, Bobby Worrest, Hjalte, etc. These videos have a remarkable way of making Paris look like the funnest place in the world (which it probably is), even in the winter. The Rod Stewart is also perfect.

“As tennis’ stars age, will aping skateboarding provide an elixir of youthful advertising audiences or will tennis’ wealthy overlords catch onto the notion that a sizable bulk of pro shoes and contract dollars are tied up in veteran pros whose salad grinding days of filming feature length video parts may lie years in the past?” — Boil the Ocean re: skateboarding’s current infatuation with tennis. Frozen in Carbonite also tackled this subject four years ago following Gino’s Mcenroe commercial et al.

Kingpin interviewed Nick Von Werssowetz about his new company, Hotel Blue and the evolution of LurkNYC. Part 3 of Lurk’s “Mean Streets” series is also now live.

The Bunt has a tell-all interview with Darren Harper. Daniel Kim is my fave skater too.

Whoa is this the first wear test video to feature the Le Bain hot tub? Is that even the Le Bain hot tub? Ripped Laces x Canal Wheels give the Brad Cromer Huf pro model a try.

Given that 2016 marks the twenty-year anniversary of everything from Welcome to Hell, to E.E. 3 to Mouse, SMLTalk has a retrospective of all the seminal 1996 videos in two parts. Also kinda hard to disagree that Tincan Folklore was a precursor to a lot of the shit going on in videos today, even moreso than its exalted predecessor.

After the demise of Love, the Sabotage boys took a southern trip hitting a string of the few remaining plazas left in the U.S: Pulaski, Raleigh Courthouse, Legislative (safe to say this is probably the best spot in the country at this point?), Blackbox, etc.

The 917 team dropped a midwest tour video in anticipation of their Nike collab.

“Pure Moods” is a new half New York / half S.F. montage from Waylon Bone.

NY Skateboarding posted part three of their Huf interview, which discusses the rebirth of Metropolitan Wheels, the Marc Johnson v.s. Choc beef, etc.

Um, Ghetto Child Wheels is making a comeback, with almost the same team. And the god Peter Smolik already left the rebooted Menace before the reboot even got to booting in order pursue his own skateboard business venture. Godspeed to the god.

Quote of the Week
Pryce Holmes: “I probably spend $30,000 a year on booze.”
Ben Blundell: “I’ve never made over ten.”

Summer Friends

sjkickflipchrome

Dunno why there’s been so many B&W headline images lately ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Scan via Chromeball

#TBT that time Daniel Kim ruined the BBQ.

“You have to create all new levels of skateboarding that never existed before.”

Speaking of all new levels of skateboarding, Tiago was in town for Street League and these two clips of him skating Seaport and the L.E.S. Park got brought up in at least four conversations this weekend. #SOTY.

Put a formal Twitter inquiry regarding the inventor of the noseslide earlier this summer (the consensus was Gonz.) Mackenzie Eisenhour discusses it in this TWS piece regarding the origins of the noseblunt: “Even prior to the noseblunt, Mark is also credited with adapting the noseslide to ledges and handrails on the streets, after seeing photos of Neil Blender innovating nose stalls on ramps.”

Some more footage of Antonio Durao skating Harlem, presumably from the same day that he did the line that was #1 on the QS Top 10 last week :)

Given as how they’ve been dominating all forms of culture since Switch Mike started blasting So Far Gone in any and all of his BMWs and Herschel became the new Jansport, it should come as no surprise that the most enjoyable skateboard podcast also comes from Canada. Season two of the Bunt is now running, and starts off with cult hero, Spencer Hamilton. Expedition-1 talk, non-alcoholic beers, etc.

Lindsey Robertson and the Media Bias Against Heelflippers: A Case Study.

Tao did a rad remix of the Nike SB FRI.day video with the CPH fam.

The early 2000s nostalgia continues. Is the Pace Ledge due for a comeback?!

Glad the news about the Berlin benches getting removed ended up being a false alarm. A replica of that should be mandatory for every U.S. city with over six skaters. My second favorite skate spot on this planet.

Kingpin interviewed Ian from Jenkem about the Jenkem book. Available here.

NY Skateboarding posted up part two of their interview with Keith Hufnagel. A good bit of Brooklyn Banks talk in there. Aaannnddd there’s a new Crail Cocuh with Huf and Carroll. Good bit of Embarcadero talk in that one.

Um, no. New Jersey is actually the best. John Cozz’s HYD part.

Quote of the Week: “It’s literally harder to get into a bar than it is to get married.” — Rob Harris

Enjoy that school year everyone ;)

Forgot to Set the Clock Back…

lotties

Late start today :(

Longtime QS-affiliate and the only person to ever hardflip a double-set in a Quartersnacks video, Michael Gigliotti, opened up a skate shop in West Hollywood called Lottie’s Skateshop. 144 S. Flores Street Los Angeles, CA 90048. Follow them on IG via @lottiesskateshop. Only shop in L.A. that carries Palace innit ;)

The #tfreport heard around the world: The day Tompkins had a Cali table, in summary.

I love how Bobshirt interviews do away with any temptation to prod at controversy or shittalking. The new 20-minute one with Wenning, where he reveals leaving Habitat to be one of the biggest mistakes of his life, is as earnest of an interview as you could ever get with a pro from that era. He also volunteers some um, interesting information about the governor of New Jersey and his vices of choice.

“This is true no matter how much the skateplaza resembles a real plaza – it’s the community that makes a park important, not the design” — Christian Kerr has a rad essay on the present and future of skateboarding in public spaces over on Jenkem, which includes some good quotes from Ocean Howell. ANYWAY, who has a trip planned to Denmark this summer?

Europe’s Most Productive Crew™ — “Whimsical Seasons” from Hungary’s Rios Crew.

SMLTalk with an abbreviated history of camera beams.

In the spirit of this shitshow of an election year, Boil the Ocean offers both liberal and conservative readings of the knife-wielding intro from Strobeck’s latest.

Quick B-roll (“B” for based) montage with the Bronze dudes from Connor Peterson.

An interview with Lucas Puig about his D.I.Y. spot, Dalavas.

Hjalte & bros with a pre Polar premiere session at the Nike Garage.

Stresscase, a VHS-tinged LurkNYC San Francisco video.

Best mob flip, 2k16.

A California-heavy Diamond Days #87.

Updated the spots page for the first time in maybe half-a-decade. Not much by way of new locations (e.g. if you wanted to know where that curb from all the iPhone videos is, now you know…), and nothing will be a surprise to anyone who lives here. Mostly cleaned up some dead locations, updated photos (some pics were over ten years old), and added a Google Maps guide along with the text links that includes parks and shops. If you’re from Europe and planning a trip here this summer, you’re welcome — you now owe anyone you see in a QS shirt a beer. If you run some shitty spotfinder app, don’t steal everything like you bums usually do.

QS Sports Desk Play of the Week: This is what Knicks fans have left to cling to ;)

Quote of the Week:

daniel

Behind the Fence

tino

Tino. Scan via Science Versus Life. Slow news week last week, but guess what? It’s going to be sixty degrees all this week, and it’s going to start getting dark after 7 P.M. starting Sunday :)

If you have even $10 you can spare and acknowledge that skateboarding is a really cool thing that more people across the world should do to be happy, please support the construction of the Addis Abbaba skatepark in Ethiopia. It’s going to help people’s lives a lot more than that six-pack you were otherwise gonna buy with it ♥

Wow, there’s already a hill bomb clip crazier than Gerwer down the Bullitt hill.

T or F? — This is the second best nollie back heel ever done.

#TRENDWATCH2016 — switch heelflip indy grabs and nosegrind body varials! Jk. Although J.B. Gillett already has a strong Quartersnacks Line of the Year Contender *and* a Noseslide of the Year frontrunner, based off the latest Dalavas clip.

Jesse got a clip in Hjalte’s angel wings.

A field guide to skateboarding long distances by one of the guys who skated from Boston to New York and from New York to Philadelphia.

The trash can in the state bird of the East Village. Dick Rizzo and Josh Wilson skate some garbage at 12th & A (still a box!) and Tompkins.

An interview with Marcus from Skate Jawn.

DGK fam Connor Champion, John Shanahan, Dylan Sourbeer, Will Mazarri, and The World’s Best Dressed Skateboarder™ 2016, Daniel Kim, at the Nike SB Garage.

Have we been bad friends to Brandon Biebel? Why are we realizing this only now? SMLTalk asks the question we should have been asking three weeks ago about the 2015 I.G.S.O.T.Y. (Lucas technically won in our reader’s choice awards, but given this site’s readership, Lucas would probably win a vote for best vert skater.)

Genny and Jason Byoun cruising on some diamond-plate Soho spots :)

Boil the Ocean re: the sudden surge in high technology skate products.

Some goofy throwaways from Cooper Winterson.

Prince didn’t let Triple Six Mafia into his party the night they won an Oscar.

QS Sports Desk Play of the Week: Can’t wait til the Knicks sign Lance Stephenson in six years. Should hopefully be the same season as J.R’s pre-retirement return tour.

Quote of the Week: “I deadass had a dream about Rob Campbell last night.” — E.J.

Rest in Peace Fresh

‘If you can’t be the sun be a star; It isn’t by size that you win or fail — Be the best of whatever you are’

king

#interesting: How Stevie Wonder & Gil Scott-Heron campaigned to turn MLK Day into a holiday.

Snacks hid inside the mattress

Um, what?

#TRENDWATCH2016: Prop street skating hehehe ;)

New edition of Lurk NYC’s “NY Times” series, featuring a bunch of Cee-Lo extras.

No thinktank in #modern #skateboarding has changed the way people skate via Instagram as much as the Blobys have. They’re like the French New Wave of skateboard Instagram dude. After a Vince-based IG mix a few weeks back, someone put together a full, fifteen minute mix of all [most?] of their IG videos.

“Whether he knew it or not, a Bowie song in a skate video was more than just another song in the credits ━ you had to fucking earn that song.” Can’t say another artist’s passing has ever resulted in such an outpour of reflection from skate media outlets.

New Pete Eldridge footage! New J.B. Gillet footage! The Cliché team in Paris, unfortunately sans Lucas. Despite having seen that Créteil brick bank spot in videos for two-plus decades, there hasn’t been really much footage of people skating it like a halfpipe (way harder than it looks tbh.) All the footage is super fun :)

Is it even fair to have Antonio in All City Showdown anymore? You probably caught the “Best of” on Thrasher already, but holy hell, that line at the Williamsburg monument. Also here’s some bonus footy why not? Antonio heavy warm up at Gardner via Dre.

The city of Philadelphia is pathetic.

Quick, sorta legible bit of the Jake Johnson interview from the GX1000 article in the new Thrasher. x3 on the whole only switch tricks in 2015 down Hooters rail thing.

Behind the scenes of Jenkem’s Tim O’Connor Show, how New Jersey gives you #perspective, and the increasing ubiquity of the skateboard podcast.

Have a suspicion that Tiago Lemos’ secret is a bit more sophisticated than “rice, beans and lots of acai,” since half the skaters with jobs in New York live off that stuff…

[Fucking Awesome + Hockey] x the early 2000s ON Video Magazine.

Gigliotti is skating in Cali dude. Shout out 235 E. 5th Street.

New Cell Jawn video from the Brooklyn Nike park.

QS Sports Desk Play of the Week: Can’t wait for that Spurs-Warriors WCF.

Quote of the Week: “Damn, did Sierra Fellers fall off?” — E.J.