February 26, 2010

Up North Trip

Headed to Lutsen with The Viking and Co. Shit is about to be hot.

Happy Weekend.

February 25, 2010

February 23, 2010

Video Art

Neophyte video artist Sam McGuire has a new production up on the Etnies blog, that, and this photo, which must have been taken shortly before he fell down a set of stairs.

Son of St. Paul, Jeremy Reeves, has an ESPN interview.

Chico is always a pleasure to watch, and Nesser agrees (in the video), and to balance The Berrics link out, there's this pantomime.

February 17, 2010

Girl Back That Thing Up So I Can Wax It Babe

-My girlfriend's car got stolen over the weekend. Aside from being just another unfortunate chapter in her life involving cars (I mean, she's been car-jacked before...), she handled it like a champ. As it happens, the car turned up Tuesday, the SPPD towed it to the impound lot, and as far as we could tell, upon inspection, nobody had shit or pissed in the car, or really touched anything else, aside from messing up the ignition and doing the totally passe act of stealing the radio. Aside from the indignity of having to pay to get her stolen car back, we've pretty much got a happy ending here. The weirdest thing is that the radio wasn't the only thing taken, as far as we can tell. I'd left a black beanie in the car, and I'm pretty sure the people that jacked the car took the radio and my hat.

-Jerboi Sam McGuire has a tour article in issue #73 of The Skateboard Mag. Always good times. Peep game. There's plenty of Minne photos in there as well from that one Nike tour too.

-The Timberwolves have traded for Darko Milicic. In the grand cosmic scheme of things this is appropriate.

-After a hard fought night at the skatepark, I'm really lamenting the advent of the bullshit "I'm not trying AT ALL 360 flip," displayed by far too many kids. Jackal blames Janoski but I just blame poor imitation. Kalis came to mind as a guy who knows that that trick should be done with a little bit of power, and upon returning home, I came upon this video about him living in Grand Rapids. Its a cool watch, and of course, at least one proper ass 360 flip is on display.

-The non-remix version of Kell's "Ignition" is growing on me.

February 16, 2010

GET OFF MY PLANE!

Get to Familia around seven or so to meet some dudes who will hopefully induce you to buy some shoes.

Aside from that, remember to buy condoms that actually fit you because I guess that's a problem nowadays, and with that in mind, be wary of product placement influences.

Sid Melvin skates the Thrasher park, and while that isn't all that notable on it's own, the frontside Losi grind down that hubba is. Plus I like that dude.

Call me a Kobe Bryant fan and read this CQ profile. I'd call the guy an insane genius for sure, and I also take issue with the statement within the profile saying that he recorded a rap album though never released it; what's this then? With that, I would also like to point out that I've personally held the album in question, on vinyl no less. Sam, you still have that?

Late Link: The New York Times with a chillingly interesting write-up on the Tea Party Movement.

Later Link: Quartersnacks calls Pappalardo the Starbury of skateboarding a little while ago. If he is going the way of Marbury, I'll need some bat-shit crazy quotes, and maybe a day in the life streaming video thing. For now its just an amusing comparison.

February 11, 2010

#451

The St. Cloud City Council just approved the location of a skate plaza. Read the comments on that article, get bummed out. More info on the skate plaza at St. Cloud Skate Plaza.

Having recently called myself a reformed liberal bomb thrower, I stumbled across an article that tries to explain why I was always so condescending.

Is Thadolo working on a new video part with a spring release target date? That'd be tight.

McGuire's latest endeavor? Brewing beer.

Is it just me, or is Hype Skateboards just a rehash of Popwar?

Demographics Fool

The above is a terribly sized screen grab of something that is at least somewhat interesting; what I had expected to be a banner ad for Hubba Wheels turned out to be an ad for upcoming shows on Comedy Central. While Sarah Silverman is as hot or hotter than any Hubba Girl has ever been (and I really don't know who that other dude is in the ad), it was still a strange surprise and juxtaposition of Thrasher's badass and goats and P-Stone-ass reputation.

I'm not naive, and, for full disclosure, I do work for The Skateboard Mag, which doesn't take any non-skateboarding advertising dollars. I don't fault High Speed Productions; according to Plat Pal and now Madison Avenue ad guy, Neal Erickson, Thrasher is one of those coveted magazines that has a lock on the 18-35 male demographic. I don't fault Comedy Central or it's parent company Viacom; hell, they know how to enchant us (me and others) with the adventures of Snookie, The Situation and Co., but I just don't get how someone decided that that banner ad would look "right" on top of what is supposed to be the most core skateboarding magazine's website.

If Meza were to ask Phelps about the ad placement, I wouldn't expect Phelps to know who Sarah Silverman is, let alone, quite possibly, to know what Comedy Central is. Adderall and hellrides do take their toll. It's unfortunate that there is such a disconnect between High Speed Productions' direction and the "public" direction of Phelps, even if he is editor in chief only in name. I've grown to like the dude more and more over the years; he's an insufferable skate nerd/expert, and while all signs point to Burnett actually being the man in charge (read the comments), I just end up wondering who within High Speed decided this was a good idea.

All of this, of course, exists in a realm outside of the shitty economy, and thus, whatever keeps Thrasher going, is alright by us.

February 10, 2010

The Big Who Dat In The Sky

Pretty much the only thing you need to know, in case you didn't check my MSM-TSM blog yesterday (and I totally understand if you didn't check it because its never updated), is that you need to carve ten minutes or so out of your day and watch Film School, a short piece by Wiskate president and all around internet homie, Josh Ellis.

Maybe its taken the dolly-shot and the HD format and the decade of hammers that just ended for me to fully appreciate the awesomeness that is Super 8 footage and Film Shcool, or maybe its just that it's the dead of winter and the snow drifts are higher than I can remember in recent memory; whatever it is (and it could just be clips of Pizzy with a whole ton of hair), I'm super hyped on that clip, and you should be too. All in all, TSM commenter and for all I know, skateboard cinema expert, scott g. puts it best; in regards to Film School, he says, "this clip is so rad. coolest thing i seen in a while." Preach scott g., preach.

Otherwise, don't kill yourself shoveling, get used to not parking on the even side of the street until April, and for elucidation of the title of this post, I learned on the Slate sports podcast that a high ranking member of the New Orleans Catholic Diocese referred to God as, well, the name of this post.

Also, my video part from Weekend Warriors was just linked up on a Greek online magazine site. You see that Jackal? Coverage.

February 8, 2010

Banning Since '04

Longtime readers are without a doubt familiar with our practice of banning people and entities from this website, most recently John Edwards got da cut, as Lisa "Left Eye" Lopez (RIP) used to say. With a little help from The Wayback Machine, I dug up the first time I banned an entity; on April 30th, 2004, the Denver Nuggets were given the strike, though later, they were given amnesty, and reinstated. I believe the Sacramento Kings were banned that season too, later reinstated, though that didn't help former King, Anthony Peeler, who, after being banned from Platinumseagulls.com, went on to play only 40 more games as an NBA player (It should be noted that Peeler was given a double ban, once as a King, then singled out for elbowing Kevin Garnett in the Western Conference Semi-finals). We've got power folks.

Also mentioned in the throwback post pictured above is Post22, a website which has been around for a really long time, long enough in fact, to release an issue 20 video. Link via Mostly Skateboarding.

The still above from the video linked previously got me thinking, and it's apropos since Post22 vids have long featured some serious shit done in Timberland boots: what's the greatest trick ever done on video in a pair of Tims?

Two tricks come to mind, both captured in 411 while it was still on VHS, but having done my searching on the Youtube and whatnot, both my memory and the quality of the video are failing me, so correct me where necessary.

First, and now I'm not so sure, but I was, I could have sworn that Ali Boulala switch crooked Hubba in a pair of boots, but, as noted, the quality is shit and that ad at the bottom obscures things. I can tell that he was skating in shades in 1998 or so, a good decade before that was hot, so that's cool.

The other trick that came to mind was from the The White Natas, aka Chris Franzen as named by Clyde Singleton; in this part he frontside nollie heelflips a table off flat, and I could have sworn that many years ago when it was an opener in 411 that he was wearing a pair of boots, but again, the quality of the video is screwing me over, let alone all the glitches that I subjected you to if you watched that pretty ballz out part.

So, I guess I went and contradicted myself more than a couple of times with that whole skating in Tims thing. One thing that I do know is that the grand old Flip Industry Section from some teenage issue of 411 wasn't on Youtube last time I checked, and now it is, and I also do in fact know that Tom Penny's line is still one of the better skateboarding acts caught on film (yes, actual film), and that it probably happened more than 15 years ago. View below, feel old.

Style Cramp

Head Skate Nerd In Charge, Aaron Meza, has an interview at 48Blocks.

John Lindsay lives over at the Familia blog.

Scroll down a little bit and behold Dennis' latest move in crushing the coverage meter. Burnett knows thy name. Perhaps stranger than D wearing Fallens, because at least there's a logical explanation for that, is this photo of Wilkins with Bill Walton. One dude is tall, the other is taller.

Plat Pal and now essayist, Pat Cook explains how to puke in a van full of people. That's kind of an enviable crew to be sure.

Pfanner Pfriday on a Monday; Philmer Phil was unavailable for comment.

The Flowtrash blog linked earlier is actually updated. Can they fill the void left by the premature departure of Cherryonaspoon.com? They should, since its the same dudes doing it. See you on the sledding hill.

February 5, 2010

Sweet Sorrow and the Morning After Pill

I put up some random photo just so I could be done with this.

Rumor has it that Summit Boardshop is taking up the mantle of Al John's and is evidently trying to open a store in the newly renovated Calhoun Square. Sources say a lease may have already been signed. This makes one wonder whether Uptown can support three stores selling skateboards, um, again, as it did in the late 90's. On that front, one time retailer of skateboards and extremely large pants, Lava Lounge, has gone out of business. Will Styles was unavailable for comment.

As of this writing, there are some unconfirmed rumors afoot; jumps from sinking ships, sound-checks, etc. will be forthcoming.

The Jackal came through with a Dennis in California sighting. Dan would like to point out, "the Fallen shirt and flannel with an In & Out stain on it."

A late congratulations to former-Fobia rider Willie Swanson upon his engagement; the dude switch nosegrinded the Ham Plaza ledge in Hatebreeders and now he engineers retractable roofs on stadiums. Respect.

Finally, and we all should have seen it coming, jergirl and Plat Pal from day one, Extreme Ash is moving to Austin, Texas, over the weekend. Its no surprise that she finally figured out that Minneapolis was just way too small to contain that bubbly, outsize personality, and now she's moving from the Land of 10,000 Lakes to the Land of 10,000 people who are in a band AND they DJ too.

Ash, a one time Zumiez employee and potential member of the College Republican National Committee, broke from her old ways by quickly rising through the ranks at the Maplewood Fobia, eventually becoming manager, and when she started dating liberal bomb-thrower, um, me. She became a staple at all local video premieres, and gained a cult following for her t-shirt modeling in the IOTA catalog. Quitting the skateboard retail industry to focus on other aspects of the retail industry and her college schooling, Ash bounced around the Twincities. Eventually she settled in Northeast Minneapolis, took up blogging, and as I will make clear a second time, she decided to break up with her no-longer bomb throwing boyfriend. From there, she took up a space in the moral gray area, taking a job with Big Tobacco, and evidently she was in a band for a second; I never got the band thing. Her job with the BT ended up leading her to meeting her current boyfriend, a young man from Austin, Texas, and while his political persuasion is unknown at this time, sources report he's the real deal. As of October, Extreme found yet another new job, this time though, it was just following her heart.

False sentiment and tongue in cheekiness aside, good luck kid. Don't get pregnant and have to move back in with your parents.

Happy weekend.

February 3, 2010

Bangkok, Russian Cialis, Scandal.

Nesser's new ad is hot fire, no? Being super late posting it? Not so hot.

This is kind of like that Sheffey and Fabry thing, except its from Slate and it involves people involved in team sports and a lot less ass kicking.

As an addendum to the above, Sheffey's Top Five from Crailtap, from who knows how long ago. His favorite city is Bangkok; that's an interesting one.

Though he doesn't quite deserve a banning, John Edwards sure is a fuckin' scumbag. Here's Salon's archive of Edwards posts, so you can catch up on his affair, lovechild, sextape, and the fact that people are saying he beat his wife. Game change! Maybe he is banned. John Edwards. Done.

At the risk of becoming a soapbox for penis enlargement pills and Russian cialis, I changed the comment setting back so you lazy asses who couldn't bother to login to comment can once again comment without having to login to anything. I guess I missed hearing from you guys.

February 2, 2010

We're Talking About Gyroscopes.

As Filler approaches 4000 views, it seems that one of the biggest Oscar snubs will be Todd Brown and his turn as Ian Steig; even a mention in the latest issue of Thrasher would not sway the fickle and aging Academy. Its hard to say how this expose affected the nomination thinking.

Now I undersand why I was run into by a remote controlled car on heelies. We are in a recession.

After years of denial, its in print. You know, sort of.

Apocalypse is on Hardflip.

The film Meyer has been dreading all his life.

Sherman kind of pulls a Berra and talks into the camera.

Rahm Emmanuel, real talker.

There's a Flow Trash website now and they're seriously building some hype with that esoteric-ass first post.

Will Mike and Rick let him live this down?

I'm working on an interview right now and said interviewee is rumored to have made out with a country pop star at one reality skate star's home. I'll let you know.