First Music Post!

Because skating has informed and shaped most of my musical knowledge for the last ten years, I figured it was about time to make a little post tying the two together. I'm going to give a sorta-kinda list of some of my favorite video parts because of the song and the skater.


1. Heath Kirchart, Sight Unseen: Skate culture has since logged this as one of the stand-out parts of the last decade, and for good reason. The skating is essential Kirchart: powerful, clean, efficient, and straight-up gnarly. Not too many guys could pull off Moody Blues, but the song's dramatic nature fits Heath's quiet storm of annihilation pretty wonderfully and brings a new dimension to the part.

2. Anthony Pappalardo, Mosaic: This list wouldn't be complete without the mention of Dinosaur Jr. and Alien Workshop. Although I feel the graphics of Alien have deteriorated since I fell in love with them when I was a little grommet, their video sense remains intact. Not only does "Forget the Swan" fit Popps' skating wonderfully, but the second segment of his part features easily my favorite cut of skate video history: Anthony Pappalardo's switch ollie off the handicap ramp just as J Mascis' guitar kicks in. Every time I watch that clip I'm instantly reminded of why I love skateboarding. If that sounds weird, whatever. It's true.

3. Rob Welsh, Ryde Or Die Vol. 1: Let me start this off by saying I'm still pissed that Aesthetics got shitcanned. Not sure what exactly happened, but it sucks how poorly a few of those skaters were treated by Zoo York afterward. Anyway, this was probably the first Rob Welsh footage I'd ever seen and I was blown away by his style and finesse. On top of this, the song, "I Declare War" by Shyheim, was a huge dose of gangster-ass hip-hop at a time when the only hip-hop album I owned was probably Dilated Peoples. Still a perennial favorite of mine.

Alright, that's all I got for now. There are tons more, but I think this thing is running a little long as it is. Thanks if you actually read this.

HD Worries

So my first official post will be about something that's been bothering me recently in skate video trends. I'm not too sure how I feel about this whole "HD revolution" going on right now. I'm not saying I don't want better video quality, but it seems like at the moment the depth-of-field and framerate capabilities of these cameras are taking over and turning fairly simple skate shots into long, drawn-out ordeals that sort of overdramatize the whole thing. Take "Fully Flared" for example. As much as I was impressed by the whole thing, I was sort of disappointed by one of the parts that I was personally most excited for: Anthony Pappalardo's. I always thought Popps was a great fit for Lakai, and I wasn't so much disappointed by the skating itself but more by how poorly it seemed to fit into the video. I've heard that a lot of his footage never made it into the vid, which would explain his departure from Lakai quickly after the video's release. It just seems like Ty Evans chose this whole uber-BIG aesthetic for the video, and in this case chose the aesthetic over the skater. I know the video had to be big, but if you're the editor you gotta make room for a skater who's been with the squad since pretty much day one. As far as HD itself, I think it's also just that time where all these guys have gone out and gotten this new equipment and don't quite know what to do with it, so they just keep doing the same boring slow-mo dolly shots over and over. I guess that's OK, but for now I'd rather watch 8mm and 16mm art footage, or, fuck it, digi-cam footage! I'll end this post with some bonus Bill Strobeck footage that I'm sure everyone's seen already, but it's still got a few Popps tricks that shoulda made it into the video.

Put it in yer brain.

Uhh, yeah, I think I'm interesting enough to have a blog. Don't you?