February 3, 2009

Twincities Skateboarding Apocrypha: The Fobia Promo

Remembrance of things once forgotten. The Fobia Promo was always one of those VHS tapes that you HAD to pop in anytime you saw it on your homie's shelf, and then one or two days later, you always forgot it existed, simply because the last time you viewed it was the third time that you'd ever viewed it, and the previous times were years apart; Twincities Skateboarding Apocrypha*.

To wit: this promo is more than ten years old, owe it to the time stamp during Caz Helmstetter's section, the zooming in with a wide-angle lens, the wide angle lens itself, or the gritty blown-out black and whiteness of the pre-ultra-technicolor-VX-1000ness of it all. What it comes down to is that this promo is a great testament to how much things have changed and how much they have stayed the same.

Point in case, one knows to a certainty that everyone featured is still skating; assuming that Billy Kahn is still on board. Drop-ins galor, and it should be noted that his indoor park foote is from a skatepark that was erected in one of the ice rinks at the SLP Rec Center, the location of the coveted Rec Center Ledges, and much later, SLP Skatepark. That setup was there for one summer only, and I skated it the day I finished my sophomore year in highschool; perspective.

Olu shows up for a couple of tricks, and strangely, looks not much different than he does today, though I doubt that he'd vault that stack to sidewalk nowadays; knees man. Rada shows up next and does a buttery line where the filmer cannot keep his hype to himself. That kickflip fakie on the Kaufmann Bank is as legit today as it's ever been.

Caz shows up next but he's been discussed; Todd pops up afterwards and gives credence to the phrase "Bratrud's Last Stand," and the search for the drop-in of doom continues. ZED Lives comes after Todd and it shows that his proclivity for jumping off shit and making it look rad was fully enacted long before you** even started skateboarding.

And then there's...Stephen Nesser? The one and only time I take it. The pop-shuvit is intact, and one wonders about a Basilica vs. inward heelflip re-match. Then Clint, still a raw, insane genius on a skateboard; the footage at the Minneapolis Armory is still amazing.

The video rounds out with Peder Mewis and Mike Haugen***. For full disclosure, and since I've seen the promo probably less than ten times now, I must say that both properly ripped; Mewis repped a caballerial stalefish and Mike "Now on Fobia" Haugen repped numerous varials and a noseblunt, all on the old vert ramp at the Lair. Time makes the heart grow fonder, really, and/or appreciate vert skating. Or maybe it's not time, it's age.

Hit up the Lair on a random Wednesday night and you might just see five of the dudes in this promo skating the bowl. Beyond that, it's amazing that another five of them have traveled the entire world due to skateboarding. Without getting too sentimental, booya for the Twincities skate scene.

*Shouts to Boil the Ocean; having jacked the footnote steez and for getting the word apocrypha stuck in my head; "hidden things" indeed.

**Whatever.

***Who has seen Haugen's TV ad for his family's construction business? Yup, I have.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is great. Was this pre-hatebreeders?

Anonymous said...

i remember billy khan's picture on the front page of the star tribune around this time doing something down the fed 4.

Anonymous said...

yo! post up hate breeders! a few years ago i dropped that vhs on the floor and it was unrepairable. needless to say i was pretty fucking bummed.

Anonymous said...

Kudos, That was a breath of fresh air.

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