Emails From Crazy People

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I lied

So no edited pictures, but if you want some content, go check out Quartersnacks, they just put up a bunch of links to various clips. The Nolan Lee one is worth a peep, for sure. I decided last night to dig into a project I had on the back burner for too long. While it is too early to talk about it, expect some things in the future.

I realized that I forgot to add a couple brands to the poll, Hopps and Shut. I know there are more, but most of them are not really players right now. I had to recreate the poll since it wouldn't let me edit it since people already took it. If you took it before, answer again. Thanks.

Rain = time for legs to rest

So I haven't been blogging much lately, but I think that correlates to the fact that I have been skating a lot more (almost every day). I have recently been skating a lot with the Acapulco Gold guys. I have been filming as well as getting some footage myself. My barrier clip is still in process, albeit a very slow process. Justin White (of Popills/New Thirsty fame) is making a summer clip right now, which I am also kinda involved with. It is to be called Obscure Hawaii. Anyway, this all means that content is on the way, though I don't have much for now. I guess I do have photos that I need to edit, however. I just have been pretty lazy about that. Maybe I just haven't had much time...in fact, I will go edit some today and post some later or tomorrow.

Oh yeah, new poll to the right. What is your favorite NYC based skateboard company? Am I forgetting any?

Rain on the Rain Check.

Since it rained on the real Go Skateboard Day in NYC, it was pushed back a week and went down this past Saturday. We started off with the festivities at the Manhattan Bridge Skatepark but once the kids took off toward the Williamsburg Bridge to go to KCDC, we went the other way and skated some spots until we got rained out. We took cover in front of some office building with an overhang and skated flat until the rain stopped and dried up enough to skate one last spot. I put together a clip using a CCR Mashup that my homie DJ Dirty Digits put together very recently.

"I like using your camera because there is no pressure." - Jeremy

Last week I went with some homies (Budi, Beav, & Jeremy) to Philadelphia. The trip was a long time coming and canceled on occasion but we finally had solid plans. We kinda knew that it was going to rain but I didn't care since there was always a chance that it would stop. Well...it didn't. It pretty much rained the whole time. We decided to go to FDR first since it was covered and may be our best bet for a rain spot. For those of you that do not know, FDR is a skatepark built entirely by skaters under an overpass, similar to Burnside in Portland, OR. A lot of the park was wet, however. The miniramp was mostly wet, though slippery in a lot of places, one bowl was mostly dry and there were some parts of the main park that were kinda dry. Anyway, there is the footage that we got (we didn't intend to make a clip, Jeremy and myself just filmed some random stuff while there).



I brought my LX3 too but all I shot were a few photos of some graffiti in the park:


Fat <3 Poop


I took your mom's virginity (and she had you!)


Nice juxtaposition.


Totally not for straight women...

Zoo York "State of Mind" Premiere & Review

It has been a long time coming but last night the Zoo York "State of Mind" video finally premiered at Sunshine Cinema in NYC. There wasn't open admission because of limited seating and only 3 showings, so it wasn't the madhouse the Alien premiere was. I was able to make it into the 10:15 showing, running into anyone that is someone in the process (as seen in photos below). I'll just jump into my review of the video right now, though.

After having been properly teased with the last two Zoo York promos (Ellis Island and Welcome to Zoo York), both of which had very different teams and both of which were incredible, I had high expectations going into this. After all, when was the last full length Zoo video? EST 4.0? Either way, the bar was set pretty high...and they ollied it [insert reference to Brandon Westgate and Matt Miller's pop here]. The filming was on point, with the exception of some shaky camera work here and there (mostly in Kevin Taylor and Matt Miller's parts). R.B. Umali has filming down to a science and with his HD set up was able to get right in the action better than most filmers. There were minimal artsy/lifestyle shots and it was straight to the point skateboarding for a solid hour. I don't like to compare completely different videos, but since everyone else is making the comparisons, I might as well give my take on how it ranks up to the Alien Workshop Mind Field video. With the videos being on different ends of the skate video spectrum, I can't say which is better, but I can definitely say that the Zoo video hyped me up to skate the most. Perhaps it was all the familiar NYC spots, perhaps it was the east coast skaters, perhaps it was relatable skating. Whatever it was, I wish I brought my board with me to the premiere so that I could have cruised around after. I will definitely watch it often once I pick it up on DVD June 19th when it hits the shops. Now to jump into the skater's parts...

I can't really remember the order in which the skaters appeared so I will just do it in whichever order. I am also going to try not to reveal too many tricks since most of the skate world has not seen this yet. Brandon Westgate opened the video with fast, powerful skating akin to A.V.E. or Omar Salazaar or Dennis Busenitz. He charges things and pops higher than guys a foot taller than he is. This is represented in his olling up Fish Gap and lipsliding Pyramid Ledges from the bottom of the stairs up (yes, it really happened). Oh yeah, he also grinded up Blubba (Black Hubba)! His kickflips are some of the best out right now. My favorite part is almost a draw between him and Ron Deily. While Ron doesn't skate as powerful, I appreciated the effort that it looked like he put into making a well-rounded part. He had a nice mix of technical/creative/stylish tricks throughout his part and skated some fun looking spots. He even gave me a scare with the no comply off a parking block over some spiked fence. Imagine falling short and landing on the spikes! Matt Miller on the other hand was a bit boring to watch for the most part due to his lack of speed and creativity, though he kinda made up for it with his barrage of backside noseblunt slides: kickflip backside noseblunt, switch flip bs noseblunt, and hardflip bs noseblunt! Plus, he has some ups and I am still baffled by his tre flip off the bump over the poles by the Battery Tunnel in Manhattan! Worst part of the video goes to Chaz Ortiz, however. The blatant Gatorade product placement was weak (unless they helped fund the video, then I am all for it), but what made the part the worst was the fact that he obviously didn't try very hard to make it. He did all his safe tricks and didn't even attempt to get creative throughout the part. His saving grace was the fact that he is really good at jumping down handrails. He pulled a super long backside smith grind down a big rail that impressed me, but I think he either was lazy or is just too young to know how to make a memorable part. Forrest Kirby (F.O.R.E.), however, exceeded my expectations. With his lack of coverage over the past couple years, I figured that he would pull a Scott Johnston on us or something, but I was very wrong. His part was one of the best. From his switch back smiths to his manuals to his wallrides to his wallrides to manuals to his backside 180 fakie nosegrind revert on the ghetto banks in Miami to his frontside feeble grind to fakie on the FDR barrier under the Manhattan Bridge, he came back strong. Aaron Suski went the other way, unfortunately. I was kind of disappointed in his part. Perhaps I had unrealistic expectations of him, but due to his performance in the last Zoo York promo, I figured that he was going to have the best part in the full length. He did have some incredible tricks, but most of those were already exposed in the magazines and it seems like there was quite a bit of filler. I am not going to write him off though. It was still a good part and I am hoping that most of his good stuff will be in the Emerica video (coming out later this year). Kevin Taylor's part started off strong, but it was so short that I felt blue balled when it suddenly ended. When was his last full part? The last Aethestics video? Or did he have a part in Minority Report? Either way, he is too good to not put out more footage. Anthony Shetler may look like Ben Affleck, but there is no way you will ever see Ben Affleck jumping down anything a fraction of the size of the stuff Shetler jumps down, even as the Daredevil. His kickflip from the top of the brick bank-flat-bank into the second bank was bananas, not to mention his super long tailslide across the huge ditch bank as his ender. Overall, his part was kind of forgettable, but it was good nonetheless. As always, Donny Barley met my expectations. His skating is always consistently good. While he had some whatever tricks in his part, most of it was fast, powerful skating. Plus, he has quick pops for days! Eli Reed had the second to last part, rightfully so. It is obvious that he worked hard to make it. He has amazing switch pop and gets technical with his manuals, flatground, and ledge maneuvers. His switch kickflip into the courthouse bank to drop in Manhattan is arguably the best trick done there. I couldn't imagine taking that drop switch! The curtains went to Zared Bassett. After F.O.R.E., he has been on the team the next longest and has gone through a few versions of the Zoo York team. He has almost come to symbolize the Zoo York brand. I noticed that he tried to blur the lines between what was regular and what was switch in this part. Whereas most people do amazing regular tricks and mediocre switch tricks in their parts, all of Zared's tricks were amazing, switch or not. This also includes his bangers. He isn't afraid to go big backwards. He deserved the last part by far and his part was a great way to end the video.

After the credits there was a friends and family section with some footage from a lot of Zoo York alum and others. R.B. directed everyone (21+) to Max Fish where the bonus was to be playing. After walking over with Bryan Chin, Peter Sarne, and Rodney Torres, the place was so crowded that we only made it about half way in before deciding to turn back and hang outside. They were projecting stuff on the wall but there was no way to see it from where we were. Below are some photos from last night. While I wasn't able to get photos of everyone there, think of this as a sample and let your imagination run wild with who was there (most likely they were).


Look, even your favorite skaters like Alex Olson and Charles Lamb had to wait in line.


Peter Sarne and Bryan Chin of Offical New York.


Luis Tolentino on his way out of the screening before ours.




Me (Eby), Peter Sarne, and Bryan Chin.


I totally could have bootlegged it in HD with my camera, but I didn't.






Rodney Torres, Bryan Chin, Peter Sarne.


Keith Denley


Max Fish, crowded with your favorite professional skateboarders.


Rodney Torres, Big White!, Josh Kalis, Kevin Taylor, ?


Famous Star & Straps: Felix Arguelles, Andrew "I hardflipped Wallenberg" Pott, Luis Tolentino.


The man that made the video: R.B. Umali!


I ran into one of my former co-workers: Hafeez Raji.


The guy responsible for the last Chapman video: Jeremy "I can't stand still for a photo" Cohen.


O.G. NYC ripper Lamont Macintosh, Jeremy Cohen, Bryan Chin, Peter Sarne.


Hubba Wheels mastermind: Tony Vitello (aka L Ron Hubba)!


Jason (aka Negative...psst, he is the opposite of negative).


German Nieves, Bryan Chin, Peter Sarne.

Good Morning America(n Idiot)

Today I woke up at 5am and made it over to Central Park's Summerstage for the free Green Day concert for Good Morning America. For 6am, there were a lot of kids there. Perhaps this generation is caffeinated into oblivion, or perhaps "free" means a lot more to them in this recession, but when I was their age you would be hard pressed to find more than a hand full of kids willing to wake up that early, even for a concert. I am not a huge fan of Green Day, however, I used to love their music during the Dookie and Nimrod eras. Perhaps it was because I was younger then and now those tunes still hold a fond place in my heart, but it was worth making the trek out for a chance to hear them. What I got instead was songs from the last two albums, the newest of which (21st Century Breakdown) is a chart topper at the moment. While I wouldn't call their new material bad, it is not something that I would go out of my way to listen to...yet on this fine morning, I did. There was plenty of downtime for the Good Morning America segments, but Green Day did give a 4 song "sound check." That would have been been great, but they ended up playing all those same songs again later. If anything, they could have at least given the older people in the crowd some of their older jams for the sound check. Well, let me get into some of the photos:


As I pointed out on Twitter, at least half the people in attendance were holding up some sort of recording device for most of the performances. This ranged from cellphone cameras, to digital cameras, to video cameras (which were forbidden, but nobody was checking at the entrance).


This guy was recording the who entire thing. I saw him playing with his phone while recording with the other hand a few times, but I don't think he actually looked at the concert except through the video camera even once.




They brought up this little girl to dance to one of the songs. I could hear the jealous hissing of the teenyboppers around me. Though there were lot of "awws" too.


If that last one didn't make the girls in the crowd jealous enough, they brought up this girl to sing a full verse. I heard the catty comments the whole way out the park after that one.



Overall, Green Day performed their songs well and were great with audience participation. All too often you see successful bands/musicians that completely ignore the audience and it was good to seem them staying in tune to the crowd. The audience on the other hand could use some work. After seeing the pictures I posted, you may call me a hypocrite, but people need to chill out with the recording devices. It is fine to take some photos here and there but when you are trying too hard to capture the moment digitally, you are failing to enjoy the moment in real-time. I will leave you with a little snippet of the crowd singing.

The Skateboard Industry Needs To Change

"By skateboarders, for skateboarders." Sound familiar? This seems to have been the motto of all the "core" skateboard companies in the industry for year. "Don't buy from those guys, they are run by suits, they don't care about skateboarding. We are better because we are skateboarders." These claims are nonsense, yet rebellious youth looking to skateboarding for a members-only social club continue to buy into it. Actually, I shouldn't be so generous with the older crowd, the 20, 30, 40+ somethings are also guilty of falling for this illogical propaganda the skateboard industry has spewed for decades too. Let's have a look into what makes up the industry and determine how the "core" companies rank up:

• Many of these companies tout the fact they were started by and run by former professional skateboarders. That is all well and good until you consider the tiny minority of pro skaters who have gone to college or even graduated high school.
• Progress is taboo. While innovation on a skateboard is encouraged, innovation in business practices, technology, and marketing is passed off as fads and selling out, while the status quo is held in high regard. If it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?
• The industry likes to stay within the industry with very few tie ins with outside companies, events, and people. It is very incestuous, in other words.

Now if we look at other industries that are doing much better, such as the basketball market, it is obvious what skateboarding is doing wrong. The NBA may hire a few former pro basketball players, but they hire them for announcer and commentator gigs, not to run the business units. They hire people that were educated and have experience in those respective fields. The NBA and the respective teams pull in a lot of money. You know why? It's because they get people excited about the sport and grow the audience for it. Skateboarding may be at 11 million participants now, but that is no thanks to the industry. That can be attributed to pop culture and ESPN. I didn't see Lupe Fiasco or Pharrell throwing out skate product that the industry gave them at their concerts. The industry, on the contrary, shunned them for being "posers" (excuse the middle school terminology).

I have met countless skateboarders that get upset when they see a non-skateboarder wearing skateboarding brands. I have been explaining for years to these people that the more people that buy from the industry, the more it can grow, the more pro skaters there can be, and the more progress can come out of it. Since when did you see a basketball player getting mad at some kid that didn't play basketball for wearing a Kobe Bryant jersey or some Jordans? Again, this is the fault of the leaders in skateboarding, those in the industry influencing these kids because they are scared about losing control.

There may be some companies that are more open and trying to make a change, and there are some that are trying to use new media, but these are unqualified skateboarders with no business doing it. Don't get me wrong, it would be great to have skateboarders working in these role, but there are plenty of skateboarders who have worked in much more progressive industries and have gone to college that are much more qualified than washed up ex-pro skaters that should be in there. With the recent growth of the industry and the relatively stability it has, skateboarding has a lot of potential...but there needs to be a change. Something has to give. But with the next generation having learned from the previous, it seems like that may not happen for a long time.

If you can make it here...

Here is the footage I shot from the event last weekend. I didn't know everyone's name, so I just put the first thing that came to mind.



In other news, Hopps just put its second pro on the team (the first being Jahmal Williams, of course). Nope, not allowed to say yet, but it is the graphic on the left:



Apparently the intro is to happen on 48 Blocks, but I might have gotten myself into a little trouble saying that on Twitter since they didn't know about it yet. No harm done though...I think. I am stoked on the new pro though. Seems like good things are in store for Hopps!

McRad Mike Mo graphics to the sounds of JR blasting from the speakers

Just to clear something up from a couple posts back...because sarcasm can be lost in the world wide webs we weave: I was kidding about Jereme Roger's music. I do like it in novelty, same as Lil' Wayne, but just as Lil' Wayne, it holds no legitimacy. I find humor in that which had no humorous intentions. I could hate on it like most people, but I find it rude not to clap at the Special Olympics. After all, they are giving it their best. JR and Lil' Wayne may be disillusioned, but at least they are trying. I mean, look at how many people buy Lil' Wayne albums. They are even letting the lil' guy play with a guitar and attempt some form of rock. Kanye West is also a bit disillusioned, but at least he has talent. I find amusement in his arrogance as well. After all, when have you met a rational person that has achieved the success of those people? Think about it...

Speaking of success, the 17 year old switch flipper, Mike Mo Capaldi, was turned pro in 2008 and has some interesting graphics (most notable, the Beavis and Butthead one that I need to find for my collection). Crailtap recently had a contest to design a graphic for him, which would be available next season. This is the one that won:


Here are my submissions:


The Big Cheese Lotto tickets should look familiar from this.


Apparently Poltergeist was filmed in Simi Valley, where Mike Mo is from.



Honey, I Blew Up The Kid was filmed in Simi Valley too. I did one version with Megan Baltimore's (one of the owners of Girl) dog, Chick, and the other with the Crailtap friendly goat.



Since Mike Mo plays basketball and is a fan of Michael Jordan, I decided to do a couple Jordan inspired graphics.


As I am a fan of ASCII (text) art, I did a graphic as such. I put this together as reference material:

And this is what the ASCII graphic looks like up close:


In other news, I went to the McRad show at the Autumn Bowl the other night and filmed some of the skating, so I will post a clip when I finish editing it. Chuck Treece doesn't just know how to ride on a skateboard and calls himself a skater, he actually skates. He was skating the whole night (when not performing). Props!