It is a little hard to verify the facts, but apparently Antarctica has already been ripped on a skateboard..?
A certain Mike Sutton , brother of Bob Sutton, set sail for the extreme conditions of the planet’s southern-most tip and prevailed to skate about. Does this mean that no continent has been left unshredded?
If you’ve got a scrap of fact stranger than fiction, you know where to send it.
Shadow Law have signed to Siege Of Amida Records.
In addition to grabbing a new home, the band will be releasing a split with American group The Red Death.
The label has been busy of late, signing Dead Beyond Buried, Clone The Fragile, Diskreet, Rose Funeral and more.
Stones Throw will team up with [adult swim] again with a new Chrome Children record.
Chrome Children Vol. 2 will feature artists such as Four Tet, Oh No and Percee P and is available for free download on the Stones Throw site from today, for a month. In other label news, the next Stones Throw Podcast will be a “Thank You Jay Dee” show, going live in February.
February 10th will mark one year since the great Jay Dee died, and to celebrate the life and works of the man, a number of tribute shows are being put on across the globe.
The London event is happening on February 4th at Cargo. Performing will be The Extended Players [reppin’ from Shortee Blitz, Mr Thing and Harry Love], Benji B, Marc Mac and DJ Spin Doctor. It’s free but any donations made will go to the J Dilla foundation, so get along and give generously.
The Locust have released the first track from their upcoming album.
The song, titled We Have Reached An Official Verdict: Nobody Gives A Shit, can be found on their myspace site. The album, New Erections, is to be released via Anti-/Epitaph in March.
Click the link below to hear the new track.
Modest Mouse’s new album’s tracklist has been announced.
The group’s new record, which follows up Good News For People Who Love Bad News, will be called We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank and will be released in March on Epic. The tracklisting for the record is as follows:
March Into the Sea
Dashboard
Fire It Up
Florida
Parting of the Sensory
Missed the Boat
We’ve Got Everything
Fly Trapped in a Jar
Education
Little Motel
Steam Engenius
Spitting Venom
People As Places As People
Invisible
Goldfinger have reportedly put the final touches to a song and an album is in the pipeline.
The album is set for a late summer release, though this is more of a hope than anything concrete. It will be the follow up to Disconnection Notice and will be released on Side One Dummy, who they signed with last year. Drummer Darrin Pfeiffer, who has his own label – High 4 Records, will be releasing the debut from Crush Luther in February.
Low Life Records have made a new signing for the new year.
The UK hip hop label have announced that they have signed Dubbledge. The rapper, who first came to prominence as an affiliate of the Foreign Beggars crew and who released his ever-popular record Fist Of Jah, has been snapped up along with his upcoming album The Richest Man In Babylon.
The album is due for release this year.
Adidas have done it, Nike tried, failed and tried again, and now it is Reebok‘s turn to take on the skateboard industry in a bid to shoe the culture.
Essentially, skateboarders have used the aforementioned companies’ product, but admitting the fact is a different kettle of fish all together. Adidas have the Stan Smith, Nike the Dunk, and Reebok the Workout Lo and if the shoe fits wear it!
Reebok came to the table with a clever marketing strategy by focusing their attention on one key player of Skateboarding’s strongest currents: Stevie Williams, street skater supreme. Not only did Reebok incorporate Stevie into their vamped up ‘I am’ campaign, they also decided to co-brand a line of skate shoes with Stevie’s Dirty Ghetto Kid company, DGK. It has been gathering speed over the last couple of years, and finally the finished product is ready to hit European shores. Naturally, Crossfire saw what was coming and test rode a pair of Reebok alias RBK Workout Lo DGK Int’s.
Straight away these kicks look ‘gangsta’. No kippered, slim trim, space boot design here- Purely aesthetic genius blending a classic shoe and a contemporary social identity. The gum sole, flash white uppers and metal tipped laces will have the local hoods green in envy. The pair I got to test was made of leather, but I know that suede models are also available.
Personally, I don’t like leather skate shoes because it takes a good few hours of griptape abrasion before friction starts to result in board control. This case was no exception as I battled it out with frontside nollies and switch backside 180’s and managed a total of 3cm levitation. My usual pop at these tricks has me floating somewhere around the 30cm mark (Chill and check me out!). Once the leather was broken in and scraped, board control regained full momentum and I was off the ground in no time.
Now, normally when a big shoe company re-releases a ‘skate’ version of a successful predecessor, the major differences lie in the padding. I’ve tried a pair of OG Workout Lo’s on, and honestly I don’t find all that much extra padding with it’s modern counterpart, the Workout Lo DGK Int’s. I would have thought Stevie wanted a fat tongue on his shoes at least… The padding isn’t the root to the problem though.
The real risk is in the ankle support. Most modern skate shoes understand the importance of heel support and apply collar design and padded tongues to prevent pain. However, these shoes don’t, so once the footwear is broken in a bit, your foot has a tendency to slip and suffer. Luckily, the sole is flat and wide in the fore-foot and heel areas, so this minimises proper ankle tweakage. Phew!
Actually, the soles to these skate shoes are probably the best thing they have going for them. I rode these shoes for a month, solid and the sole hardly budged. Even the side where ollies afflict irreparable damage was virtually unscathed. Add to this the fact that they’re made in solid gum and you’re gripping good like you’re feeling good. If only as much chemical compound had been put into the uppers.
The stitching and thickness of the leather on the Workout Lo DGK Int’s really isn’t sufficient for someone rubbing sandpaper against them on a daily basis. After a month, holes had appeared and I knew that they would grow rapidly. The biggest surprise though in rigidity came from the laces! Everyone knows that skate shoe laces are the first things to pop, and there is no cure for this hindrance. (At least until lace-savers become fashionable again…) Reebok have found the perfect placement for their lace hoops so as to prevent thread shred and keep the shoe together.
So, my conclusion on Reebok’s seminal attempt to produce a contemporary skate shoe runs as follows: Top score in design and style. Why risk creating something new when the classic model worked?
Another top score goes to the sole compound, because tougher than this is rare. However, a poor score for the leather and ankle support. I reckon a baby blue pair in suede and gum will have a few major skate shoe designers in awe.
7/10
Ralph L-D
15.01.07
Death Cab For Cutie’s guitarist is to put out a solo album.
Chris Walla will be releasing a solo album this Autumn and reports are saying that he will play every instrument on the album with except the drums which will be taken up by Nathan Good and Jason McGerr from Death Cab.
Kingston Peel
21.01.07
Local hardcore shows can often double as endurance tests, thanks to the presence of a tiny minority of meatheads who hurl themselves around with little regard for their fellow punters’ safety.
That said, Nervous Wreck don’t help the situation tonight; their generic, uninspiring hardcore attack offering little incentive for mass crowd participation. In contrast, Sheffield crew The Legacy are smarter, tighter and sounding more impressive with every show they play; and with the release of their debut full-length ‘Solitude’ imminent, 2007 could well be their year.
Gallows, of course, could probably tell you a thing or two about the weight of expectations; but being dubbed ‘the best UK punk band since 1977′ doesn’t seem to have fazed Frank Carter and co any. “Thanks for coming out to see five scruffy kids from Watford,’ he declares, before the blast of sonic warfare that is ‘In The Belly Of A Shark’ incites utter pandemonium in the crowd.
However, the fact is that Gallows are so much more than just the sum of their parts. On one level, they’re a deeply sinister and unsettling band; evident in Frank’s deranged howl, darkly metaphorical lyrics, and the sheer chaos of the Gallows live experience. On another level, they’re triumphant underdogs; having attained the aforementioned recognition with no major label support, and flying in the face of current musical trends with a truly incendiary hybrid of hardcore fury and dissonant rock n’ roll swagger.
Whichever way you look at it, there’s a sense of danger and unpredictability surrounding this band that has been sorely lacking in punk rock of late. By the time ‘Orchestra Of Wolves’ is brought to its feedback-drenched finale, the front-of-stage area is a tangled mess of cables and flailing bodies, with Frank almost buried under the masses attempting to share his microphone. It’s sonic and physical wreckage united as one, and you get the impression that Gallows wouldn’t have it any other way. Whatever lies ahead for these guys, you’d be well advised to join them for the ride.
Alex Gosman
Photo courtesy of www.jmophoto.co.uk