📝 Intro + Interview by Greg Navarro
📷 Photography by Greg Navarro, Thomas Goldman & Cooper Qua
Cooper Qua is from Albany, New York and is the youngest team rider on Quasi Skateboards. His debut video part for the company is in their latest video, Hard Reset. I sat down with Cooper at Tompkins to chat about the future of Quasi and to hear about his dream of becoming a pro skateboarder as a teenager from Upstate New York.
There is a social media manager rolling in his grave somewhere at the thought of dropping the season’s marquee skate video on a Sunday night, but if people only did things that made sense, we probably wouldn’t be starting skate companies in the first place ❤️
EC Melodi, the half-New York / half-Atlanta outfit that originally started putting out routine full-lengths back in 2019, was always good for at least one sizable project a year. Then, a hiatus began after Break Your Legs over two years ago — even if the secondhand pain of that boardslide sack on the bench remained seared into the imagination (see #16.)
You can always tell the difference when a crew locks in for the video. There is a subtle shift in the end goal: it transforms from “the video comes out when we have enough clips” to “the video comes out when it feels done.” Think the multi-year hiatus away from full-lengths before Bronze’s It’s Time, or the long crumb-trail of Insta edits before John’s Vid.
Wasting Time feels like that new arrival video for Melodi.
The first Back To The Banks contest since the big banks reopened, and the first in ~seventeen~ years, is going down this Saturday at 1 P.M. until 5:30. $10k in prizes, five obstacle zones. Presented by Wip Energy, Labor, Tenant, Spitfire & Grand. Flyer here.
It is actually crazy how contemporary Jason Byoun’s skating from ten-ish years ago looks in 2025. Nick Von Werssowetz A.K.A. Lurk NYC uploaded a seven-minute A-roll remix of all the clips he filmed of Jason from 2013 to 2018. Not sure whose S.O.T.Y. from 2013 – 2018 we’re handing to Jason, but it’s gotta be someone’s. (For further viewing from the era: Jason’s Life Is Goodie part is blessed too …except he doesn’t say that anymore because it means “b less.”)
With the world’s population of skateboarders rapidly approaching one billion, skate videos now, more than ever, are exercises in personnel management. Who gets their shine and for how long before we scroll to a “Pop The Balloon” video?
And skate shops — even moreso than the mega-teams housed under footwear giants — have to toe the line between the kids on team skating eight days a week, the O.G. who’s going for that last big score, the grom who you throw in to be encouraging, and the recovering maniac who’s been skating since the 80s that insists he’s gonna come out and get a clip before deadline. Before you know it, your video is four hours long.
