Rudy Johnson shares his thoughts on Michael Jackson’s death last week.
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Category: Skateboarding
Wheels wheels wheels, that’s all you needed to get the girls in the glory days, now you need an iPhone, tight ass jeans, mixed with a nice checked shirt and be a bass player in a band. We can all buy the phone and the jeans but the band thing always passed me by, I guess the only band, if you could call it that was a group of skateboarders hanging out in town with one guitar between them. That was my band. And every great band needs the right equipment so I have been rolling Think’s 52mm Ready Rider wheels for the last 3 weeks and boy do they roll.
First up THINK have combined the bearings into the wheel, I guess this is skateboarding’s way of addressing the global economic crisis and in times of watching your wallet so I suppose it makes sense to throw in the bearings as part of the deal. This would be attractive to any parent making the purchase at the shop. It’s not like Dad or Mum are going to know or care about Swiss bearings or other branded bearings that could fill their shoes but hey, these come ready to roll, which to be fair is great. I never liked having to take old bearings out and put them into new wheels, but that’s because I am lazy. So lazy in fact I once ate my dinner in the shower as I was running late. (Hotdogs, just one handed eating).
However, I am not too lazy to test these wheels and anyone that has skated the bank at Mile End knows you need plenty of speed and slide to clear the small bowl at the base of it. These boys passed with flying colours. Blunt slides and tails slides didn’t flat spot them and I was very surprised as these tricks are a real test of any wheel.
Next test was drinking 8 pints in the Metropolitan pub with the crew, then skating to the Arts Club as fast a possible over the best and worst terrain throwing in power slides and hitting stones, Again these wheels came out tops unlike Ken who decided to keep hitting the floor as hard and as fast as possible. He said someone put something in his drink, I said yes, vodka! This is no easy ride and would welcome anyone to join us on the late night mission. I will however put this out there though; there’s five free pints to anyone that can beat Laurie Sherman to the Arts Club on a skateboard, fuck it…..would be hard on a bike.
Overall these Think wheels and bearings are top stone. 9/10 as they are white, fast and still not flat spotted and always get you to the club on time.
More at Think Skateboards.
Harry
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Fantasy Factory vs The Berrics
Check out this T.C Mixtape with footage of Rob Dyrdek, Stevie Williams, Josh Kalis and many more skating MTV’s Fantasy Factory and The Berrics. London needs a warehouse like this now, who’s up for it? Send messages to us if you are genuinely wanting to be involved.
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Slammers & Hammers Vol.3
Once upon a time down South, the 6.57 crew got shat on a by a bird and ollied the BBC set. Watch the latest Slammers n Hammers edit from Portsmouth and Southampton here.
The Berrics are back in the mix with their 2nd flatground Battle at Eric Koston and Steve Berra’s skate park. The comp has kicked off with a close match between Mike Vallely and Chris Cole going head to head. Watch the pre match interview with those 2 below and click here to watch that duel and also the latest game of SKATE with Real’s Dennis Busenitz and Zero’s Jamie Thomas.
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Irish skate scene update
Rumours of an event in Dublin with DC are rife on the Scag blog and Bogginzine’s War Of The Shamrock 2009 event has been edited with skating from various heads in Belfast. Also look out for the 2nd Annual Skateboard Championships on August 22nd at Limerick’s Mount Kennett Skatepark with qualifying heats planned all over the country. Click here for the flyer and discussions and watch these freshly posted videos below.
Look out for the Hot Knees show Storyboards on Setanta Sports 2 on Tuesday’s at 6pm for plenty of skate events and much more. Watch this week’s feature documenting our very own Crossfire Gap Jam from Meanwhile 2 last year.
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Crossfire Go Skateboarding Day 2009
21st June 2009
This year we decided to hook up with Volcom for a low key session at Harlow’s concrete park for this year’s Go Skateboarding Day. Advertised only on our Twitter page we had a perfect amount of people in the park for a naturally amazing session.
Whilst Boots and co kept the street side of things sewn up, Aaron Sweeney only stopped for no less than 3 minutes to eat one of Kevin Parrott’s BBQ bangers and cracked out every nook and cranny.
Enjoy this photo blog and footage by Alan Christensen from the day and get yourself over to Harlow for a sesh as they have an amazing set up there and the locals are cool as fuck. You can often keep up to date with those guys at the local Harlow blog looked after by photographer Rob Galpin who hooked us up with the sequences below. Thanks to all who turned up to celebrate this annual sesh, we will see you next year for more of the same. – Zac
Harrison had 2 reasons to sit down and check out the Sunday times…Firstly, this was his 3rd day on the raz, secondly he had a gnarly date with Rolf Harris.
Everyone thought that Koston had turned up as a special guest but it was Brewster’s Croc’s that gave it away. Check out Horse in the background, ultimate in rock and roll hunk.
Parrott and Denise had the bangers on lock, they even had onions on the side, no pissing around at Volcom towers..
Nicolson’s savaged ribs didn’t get BBQ’ed….rest up son.
The woofer had his eye on Parrott’s bangers whilst Sweeney didn’t stop.
Great day all round, enjoy the footage by Alan Christensen featuring Boots, Aaron Sweeney, Simon Skipp, Harry and Horsey.
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Spot Check: Mile End Skate Park
East London
Photos and text by Philip Procter
Video edit by Alan Christensen
East London has always been a bit light on skateparks and almost a decade in the making, Mile End finally gets it due. The park is an all cement, marble smooth creation, courtesy of a fantastic design and build by the boys at Gravity. The emphasis is on pushing skaters to be more creative with some slightly different, and updated takes on world famous skatespots.
There is a wedge block not too dissimilar to the black marble banks/block combo in Barca and will definitely be a major hit at the park. The rest of the street section flows well and is mainly block based with a few rails, not quite sure why there is a small rainbow rail blocking off one of the smaller blocks, but I guess someone asked for it?!
The bowl follows suit with the rest of the parks challenging feel, once you drop in there is no stopping! It starts around 4 feet deep and rolls down to the deep end of around 8 feet at its deepest. The bowl connects straight back in to the street course leaving a few options of gaps in and out of the bowl. I cant see too many skaters getting tricks in there straight away, but I’m sure once the locals get a handle on the hectic nature of it, they will rule all the mellower skate spots.
Linking all the lines of the park together in the corner of the park is a 4 feet high flatbank bank, with Koston block on the top. Plenty of room here for drifting ollies and flips too – the angles are perfect, and the block waxy. One of the other more video influenced obstacles is the toblerone block/bank – tight bank with a short platform just like you’ve seen in all the Cliché videos. Adjoining this is a tight 2.5 ft deep dish making it a bit of a gap to slide over, that has attracted many locals to start working lines from bowl to bank and vice-versa and opening my eyes to a few lines that aren’t immediately apparent. It’s a great idea and also a challenge which most parks need.
The vibe of the park is different to a lot of other skateparks, there isn’t really one point of focus, so people are spread out and it feels more like a street spot than a planned park. I think there are an awful lot of skaters from East London who simply haven’t met each other yet, and this park will serve to bring that side of London together.
On the whole, the park’s a pretty good use of the space, certainly something for everyone in there. Adjoining the park are a couple of large brick arches, naturally home to graffiti, but it would be nice to think that they would house a mini ramp at somepoint, as it’s all that’s really missing here. Could you imagine a mini in one of them and a stage in the other? Mmmmn.
Finding the park is pretty simple, turn left out of Mile End tube station and turn left on to Burdette Road and take a nice walk through the park (littered with skate spots itself) and pass the stadium and cut between the footie pitches and it’s next to the Go Kart tracks on St Paul’s Way – enjoy!
This edit by Alan Christensen features skating from Ken James, John Tanner, Simon Skipp, Nigel Davies, Harrison, 2P, Laurie Sherman and James Gardner.
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Kanights – behind the lens
Legendary skate photographer and Skate Daily honcho Bryce Kanights features in this recent documentary series for Nemo. Check out part 1 of 3 clips below with Bruce and Kevin Kowalski hitting up a pool in Portland for a Powell photoshoot.
Bryce Kanights- Part 1 of 3 from Nemo Design on Vimeo.