Category Archives: Full Parts

Full parts from individual skaters. typically from a full length video.

“Obviously, I’m not in my right mind…” – Fred Gall in Timecode

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Alien Workshop knew exactly how to package and present teenage Fred Gall and his part in Timecode is a brilliant mess that set the template for his next couple decades of parts. Black Sabbath, locomotives, beanies over the eyes, heaved flatground 360 flips and large drops into embankments will all become standards. While the spots might not be as crusty as future episodes, the aesthetic of the part is grimy enough.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUBiit-Wlv0&w=560&h=315]

The clips are often dark and filmed terribly, sometimes the result of LSD on both the skater and filmer’s part. The footage was pieced together from several years of clips scattered from various sources but the product is cohesive. Fred is blurred but powerful, having graduated from the crisp bright ledges of Love Park to the dimly lit nighttime streets of cities nationwide. Freddy ollies onto parked cars, nearly gets clipped while bombing hills in SF, and utterly destroys Hubba Hideout. Only one of his three Brooklyn Banks tricks is your typical over-the-wall affair. The opening line is mostly just ollies and pushing in Philadelphia’s Underground and it fucking rules!
Listen to Fred talk about the tricks he filmed that got lost (at around 12:55)… tricks that couldn’t be replicated without psychedelics. I’ll be referencing this Bobshirt interview a lot, to be sure.

When I asked Fred what the greatest trick of his career was, he responded: “The tricks I did on the Hubba Hideout were really important. So I guess maybe the switch crook was my favorite.“

As mentioned by Fred, it would be neat to see these tricks filmed clean and from multiple angles, but the way it is feels like an authentic reflection of Fred’s skating at the time: rugged, raw, and without pretension. It fits well.

Overall, Timecode presents a team in flux. The Workshop was wisely transitioning from its opening line-up of fading Florida bruisers and no-name laser-flippers to a team built around a still respected Dyrdek with Freddy, Josh Kalis, and the bright but brief flame of Lennie Kirk. This lineup would last another year before Joe Custrucci would take control and thing would enter their next phase. By 1999, Fred would star as the DNA brand continuity for that most successful Workshop spin-off, Habitat.

Bonus Fred:
Fred had just a handful guest tricks in Dan Wolfe‘s 1996 masterpiece, Underachievers: Eastern Exposure 3. They were mostly slow-mo jams in the almost entirely slow-mo (and even the non-slow-mo was pretty slow) minute long part of (1 of 3 Ams) Jerry Fisher.

It is a real shame we didn’t get more of this era of Freddy being filmed by Wolfe. What we did get was the legendary Love Park ledge gap to flat rail 50-50. A trick that was great at the time and later revealed to be executed on a borrowed board not long after Fred had smoked crack from the first time. Moves like this, for better or worse, helped cement Fred’s status as a reckless party animal, a prophecy that would self-fulfill again and again throughout his career.

Bonus Bonus Fred:
Although released in 1994, I group Fred’s peppering of footage in Thrasher’s Feats video with the Timecode era (plus, the last post already had so many bonuses). It is a real treat to get to see some extra San Francisco Gall.

Bonus Bonus Bonus Fred:
Somebody uploaded some footage of the jump ramp at the Love Park contest in 1994. The backside flip in Feats was from this, and here is an obscene (in a good way) switch pop shove from that day. There is even more footage from this contest in 411 #9. Fred tied for 2nd place with Ricky.

Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus Fred:
We’re all pining for more Fred footage from the 95-97 years: that sweet post-Philly Timecode era before he tied his hair up. Here’s some random demo in Australia from 1996:

Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus Fred:
I found another frame from this dope-ass 1995 session of Fred skating the Underground in Philly by Ryan Gee. Hell yes. This and lots of other amazing East Coast skate history prints are available from Gee here.

Tune in next time when Freddy rolls one pant leg up and helps launch Habitat, a team that he is still professional for to this day.

“That shit flat-out stuck” – Fred Gall in Philadelphia

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And then, in 1994, it all came together.
Rather than simply crossing Newark Bay into New York City to skate, young Fred Gall started heading down into the city of Philadelphia. There, amongst the abundant stairs and ledges of such storied spots as City Hall, Muni, and Love Park, he thrived. Surrounded and elevated by a close cast of friends built around the Sub Zero skate shop that included Sergei Trudnowski, Matt Reason, Jerry Fisher, Eric Ruwadi, and mayor Ricky Oyola, Fred put himself in the vanguard with his switch-stance ledge skills, inebriated proficiencies, and slouching style. Amongst the constant training that was aggressively skating from spot to spot and an adherence to the unwritten code including pushing with your back foot when skating switch, Fred emerged as the skater to watch.

Fortunately for those wanting to watch, this entire scene was diligently documented by lensman Dan Wolfe and released throughout the year by way of several VHS videos. Let’s check them out.
Please note that a lot of the footage from these three videos has been sliced and reedited into both the Eastern Exposure Zero video as well as Fred’s easter egg part hidden within the Inhabitants DVD.

First up we have Freddy’s Rookies section from 411 video magazine issue # 8. To announce his ascent into the pro rankings for Alien Workshop, Fred gives a sampling of what he at the time would be known for: Lots of switch and nollie ledge tricks around Philly, with an occasional handrail thrown in there. The part, like the Digable Planets song it is set to, is meandering and leisurely with a lot of casual lines. Not a bad thing, especially when you have an appreciation for the rarity of quality non-mongo switch pushes happening at the time. This part exudes “East Coast”ness with its spots and its pacing, which is significant considering how California-centric the whole skateboarding industry was at the time.
The highlight of the part would be the City Hall line that features a nollie noseslide down a hubba, a 180 into a switch nosegrind on one of those amazing granite benches, and then a pedestrian buzzing switch 360 flip. This part also has Freddy giggling during his brief interview overdub and Jerry Fisher snuggling in bed with a cat, which is adorable. Not a legendary part, but a great overview of his talents and probably the most seen part released that year as the others were in much more regional (although now much more celebrated) videos.

Next up we take a look at Fred’s footage from Wolfe’s fabled Eastern Exposure 2 video. While the video is a smorgasbord of spots and skaters and Fred does have a trick here or there in other parts, the bulk of his tricks are grouped together between Serge and Reason in the Philadelphia section. Clocking at just a little over a minute, the footage, with only one exception, was filmed entirely at Philly’s Love Park and City Hall and scored by a frantic John Coltrane saxophone solo. With just a handful of sessions documented Fred again manhandles the area. The complete ambidextrous nature of the skating with fluidity and grace from both stances was novel for the time. We also get treated to some stair skating with Fred’s always solid but underutilized heelflip and a monster straight nollie.

This photo ended up as the cover of Thrasher’s On the Road video.

My favorite clip of Eastern Exposure 2 is Fred’s opening line on the upper plaza at Love: backside flip, switch 5-0 180 out, the hairpin turn pushes, nollie nose slide, and then the only fakie 360 flip the Fred ever committed to video. That sequence with the front foot shuffle after landing the bs flip, two switch pushes, badass ledge trick and then Fred tucking his hair behind his ear while cutting the tight turn and heading back towards the camera has all the subtleties that make this just so emblematic of Fred Gall at this time. This is how every young skater on the East Coast, including me, wanted to skate.

I thought I had every scrap of Fred’s skating memorized from this time period, but, for the life of me I could not locate a single instance of a switch 50-50 grind. No photos neither. This seemed odd, as a switch 50 on a handrail in City Hall was famous enough to get mentioned specifically in Fred Gall’s amazing Chrome Ball interview. When I had the opportunity to speak to Freddy about the missing trick, he immediate pointed me in the right direction: “Its in Thrasher: On The Road. You will find that there. I have kinda a little part in there.“

And so he does, and there it is, along with some other Philly bits you might enjoy.

The pinnacle of Fred Gall’s amazing year was the final part of the Sub Zero shop video Real Life. While the other part of 1994 may have sampled the goods, this is the footage feast. Set to the unlikely soundtrack of the flute-filled summertime Canned Heat jam Going Up the Country, Real Life has Freddy savoring all that Philly splendor. Sticky handrails, those amazing Afro Banks lip tricks, a pair of street gaps, and well curated lines at all the notable plazas in the City of Brotherly Love.

This part features two incredibly pleasing heelflips: the quick footed up the bench to over the trashcan at Muni that would get homaged 19 years later by Habitat teammate Mark Suciu, and the mammoth Pulaski planter gap to end the part.

Memorably, Real Life gives us some bonus credits scenes of an intoxicated Fred and Ricky clowning around the late night streets of Philly after, apparently, about 8 beers. Just to be clear here, that’s a drunk 15 year old Fred Gall nollie frontside 180 to switch 5-0 grind a ledge in the dark, and it is amazing.

Photo by Kelly Ryan

After 1994, Fred would slip off the video radar for a bit, traveling here and there with Alien Workshop, dropping out of school, dropping acid, shooting photos in SF for Slap magazine, and enjoying the life of a pro skater while not generally worrying about capturing every session on camera.

Bonus Fred:
A pair sweet tricks including one of my favorites, the bs 180 to switch bs 5-0 on that SF ledge-rail, from the Chaos section of 411 #9.

photo in SLAP by Diggity

Bonus Bonus Fred:
Fred also had a Fine Tuning segment in 411 #9. While the literally phoned-in trick tip is worthless (as they always were back then), the footage of the straight-on backside noseblunt slide at Love is priceless.

Bonus Bonus Bonus Fred:
Fred also had a trick tip in 411 #7 from early 94. It’s at 35:30…
Whoops – looks like music copyrights got this thing taken down from Youtube. You can watch 411 #7 on the Transworld site for the moment.

Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus Fred:
Youtube user Skate Video Vault uploaded Sub Zero Real Life in its entirety, but somehow Fred’s part has the skate noise but no music. While I happen to love the Canned Heat track, it is interesting to see this part without music:

Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus Fred:
Fred did a lot in 1994, so much so that some of the bonus bits will be grouped with the next episode. Or, as is the case here, I’l just keep updating this page with more bonuses. With that in mind, Fred won the Love Park contest in the “Sponsored” division (he wasn’t pro yet at the time) in the winter of 93/94. He talks about selling weed at this contest in his Bobshirt interview (around 5:00), and you can find the 411 #6 contest footage here (around 23:50).

My Hat is a Helmet – Fred Gall’s early Tracker videos

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Young Fred Gall

When one looks at the skateboarding career of Fred Gall, if we consider him to be in the final chapters of the epic right now (and I hope to god we don’t), there is a poetic completeness to the how it begins and ends. In a public life on video that will span 3 decades; a life full of adventure, bondo, beers, and beanies, the whole wild ride is bookended with an onslaught of lip tricks on wooden ramps at Granny’s house. It feels right that Fred made it through alive and by some miracle is safely back home,  skateboarding in Sewaren, New Jersey.
In fact, Fred recently confirmed with us that the parking block he brought to Granny’s yard over 30 years ago, which we saw again in Fred’s Epicly Later’d episode from 2007, is still at the house. Against all odds, a couple of poor choices, some amazing luck mixed with some real tragedy, Fred is here with us, skating nearly every day, and apparently working on a couple new video parts for release later this year.

But let’s start towards the beginning.
By the time Fred Gall was 11 years old he was already well on the road towards skateboarding success. Despite living in the East Coast, he had already attracted a sponsorship from Alva skateboards (which would then rebrand as New School), as well as affiliated truck manufacturer Tracker. By the time Fred is 13 years of age he has had parts in no less than 4 videos.

Fred’s part starts at 30:20.

Lil’ Fred’s footage from the 1991 New School video Minus One is mostly just a smattering of park miniramp tricks and recordings from a pair of plywood contests in some dilapidated lot. But we also get treated to a couple of street tricks including a decent curb cut backside 360 ollie.

The Brotherhood (1991) appears to have been filmed in a single afternoon and features all the crud camera handling, early 90s post-punk skate music, giant pants, and late shoves you would expect from the era. Fred is presented quite literally as a “12 & Under” child and the B-roll of him playing in Gymboree reinforces that image. This is just acorn footage. But there are glimpses of the mighty oak he is to become in that short-stair 360 flip and even some switch ledge action.

The companion piece to Brotherhood, also from 1991, is Tracker’s Stacked. I’m honestly not sure which video was released first between these two Tracker vids and the New School part.

Similarly filmed in a day or two, Stacked gives us a sampling of young Fred’s transition skills. From Granny’s driveway to the Brick Town skatepark, this part is actually quite clairvoyant. Noseblunt backside reverts? Backside 360 ollies? Quarter to quarter frontside ollies? We will be seeing these tricks again. A lot.

The final slice of Freddy’s prehistory is from Tracker’s 1992 Disturbed video. With just 40 seconds of footage from Fred’s California adventure, we can see the first blooms of unmissable Gall. The switch skills. The slouch! And that backside 50-50 attempt on a handrail was gnarly.
By the time Disturbed was being filmed, Fred had been recruited by Dyrdek as the first non-inaugural member of the Alien Workshop team. The switch frontside 180 down the smaller Carlsbad gap was featured in his TWS checkout. He was on Spitfire and was just starting to make pilgrimages down to Philadelphia where he would start to push the boundaries of switch ledge skating, the impact of a shop video, and how many beers one can drink before having late-night Wawa hoagies.

KellyRyan_LovePark
photo by Kelly Ryan

But wait, according to Fred, somewhere out there is a missing New School video part. Fred told me, “I know what song I skated to, but I haven’t seen the video in like 20 years probably. I skated to the Magical Mystery Tour. You know, the Beatles. And it was all footage from when I went to the Atlanta finals and they just had a camcorder. They filmed me skating the gas station across the street.” I still haven’t found that video on the internet.
Any help out there, people?

Bonus Fred:
Here is a tiny bit of young Gall from a Sub Zero contest in Woodbury, NJ as featured in the rare Eastern Exposure 1 video from 1993 (starting at 9:21):

You might have to watch this video on Youtube.

Bonus Bonus Fred:
Joe Hiddleson, who was there, man, has posted some raw footage he and Dan Wolfe captured of the 93 Sub Zero contest. Joe’s instagram is chock full o early 90s East Coast treasure.

Young Fred is at 3:40

Mason Silva. Mason.

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I don’t typically feel the need to jump in to point out a video that is up presently. More often I want to spend my blog writing efforts on celebrating the parts of yore and those that might have slipped through the cracks in the internet age. But, holy hell, that recent Mason Silva part for Nike SB is just on another level of monstrousness.

Kids that come up through the Element camp are guaranteed talented from the get-go, but increasingly the top of the crop is quick to move elsewhere for fear that they’ll forever be high-fiving Chad Tim Tim in the shadow of Nyjah and reissued Bam boards. Peacing out since Peace is Tyson Peterson, Evan Smith, Nassim Guammaz, Greyson Fletcher apparently, and perhaps the skater with the most to gain, Mason Silva. After floating for a bit, he is now comfortably in the stable Real/Spitfire family, getting decent checks from Nike SB, and completely taking things up a significant notch with his video output in 2020.

Every trick in this part is huge. Just take a moment to analyze any trick in the video and it dawns on you just how incomprehensible nearly all these tricks at these spots are.
How about that 4 trick line around 1:00 which should serve as a breather after a just humongous and stylish bump to bar hardflip. A huge crooked grind on the top of a bench back, landed perfectly, frontside tailslide launched to fakie on the next bench back, a quickie switch 360flip, and then a straight-on fakie ollie to switch manual and let’s just 180 out of that for good measure. And that is one of the less memorable clips in this video.

Speed. Power. Style. Trick variety. Decent spot selection. This video requires multiple viewings, several rewinds, and maybe even a pause here and there to give a proper look at just how damn steep the bank is.

The only criticisms would be the camera angle on that last ollie, which just seemed so much more monumental on the Thrasher cover, the video being titled “Mason” (which utilizes a titling concept that should’ve been retired with Dylan), and the song selection. I could see where some folks might like the Roxy Music track, but I feel like Mason’s skating is strictly hardcore.

Josh Kalis – worldwide in Mind Field

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For the designation of true lifetime ambassador for street skating, consider the nomination of Josh Kalis. Slice out any portion of his storied three decade career and you see a man who is 100% about it. Be it a baggie-pantsed kid 360 flipping gaps for cigarettes, or a baggie-pantsed young father bringing his infant daughter to Love Park with him, or a baggy-pantsed 42 year old man landing his first Thrasher cover; It is obvious he bleeds skating. Inspiring those who would go on to become legends as well as successful contemporary emulators, recreating classic clips over garbage cans for the nostalgia crowd, building and skating his own granite ledge in his garage during quarantine (and shaping the obstacle like one of those small street-level sidewalk steps); Kalis does not let you down.

Unassumingly, he has slowly inched his way up from pro status, past legend, and into the hallowed halls of GOATyness. He somehow got rich yet never sold out. He hasn’t really changed up his kit yet never seems to be dated. His reputation is one of both extreme loyalty yet genuflecting to no man or corporate entity.

Case in point, Josh filmed and released this excellent Mind Field part for Alien Workshop as he was more or less quitting the team. In a video that featured phoned-in parts from two professionals who literally owned their own training facilities, Josh had plenty cause to go half-hearted for Mind Field. He was already way ahead of his AWS colleagues in term of productivity with the release of Kalis In Mono in 2006 (the precursor to the current solo internet part routine we are in today, which is another notch in the Kalis belt). Why risk injury to promote your team when all signs are pointing towards a shift towards the younger recruits? As we all know, despite a solid part in the TWS Cinematographer Project video, Josh was the canary in the coal mine when he left the Workshop.

Yet Josh Kalis delivered in Mind Field on a global scale. With all the 360flip variations, complete ambidexterity, and not even a hint that any trick was completed in any other style than that which was intended. The fact that this part is perhaps regarded as routine rather than exemplary is both a testament to Mind Field as a video overall as well as Josh Kalis’ rock solid repertoire of video parts.

Wait’ll you see your fucking legs, dude!

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For a good 15 year stretch from 1990 to about 2005, Kris Markovich was a footage monster, dropping full parts nearly annually as he traversed the sponsorship countryside in search of a stable home he could never really find nor build himself. As expected as one approaches the age of 50, Kris might not be releasing full parts with consistency these days, but apparently his chops are still pretty sharp.

Let’s dig into one of my favorite parts of all time, Kris’ ender in Prime’s Fight Fire With Fire from 1994.

At the time, this part just blew the doors off of the perception that Kris was basically good for some big ollies, fast grinds, and long flowing locks but not much else. There are still several servings of big sets on the menu (the San Diego double set fakie ollie stands out), but the real treat is Kris’ expanded bag of tech tricks that conformed seamlessly into his powerful style.

The opening flatgound inward heelflip is just textbook. The backside 180 to nosegrind on a handrail was very advanced for the time. The constant lines confirmed his rock solid , sure footed consistency. Manual tricks tossed in there for flavor, and some quick-footed pre or post hammer extras keep it unrelenting.

But we all know what we came here for… The greatest 360 flip ever.

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#weskremer

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By all accounts, Wes Kremer should be washed up by now. A whole bunch of the prerequisites for a long-tail coast to quasi-retirement are present in his career thus far:

  • Being marketed as a hardcore stoner.
  • Being a hardcore stoner.
  • Having already summited the mountaintop with his 2014 SOTY award (probably the last skater to authentically have won it by just skating and not “campaigning”).
  • Being treated as the face (or even mascot) of both his board and shoe company and having a guest trick in every other skater under that sponsor’s parts.
  • Being really good at manuals and other low impact ‘dork’ tricks.
  • Being incredibly well liked by everybody in the industry.

Wes Kremer would be well within precedent to never jump down a flight of stairs again. A new part from him could easily just be a bunch of wall rides and a few low-risk pole jams paired with some slow-motion footage of blowing reefer smoke at the camera and dropping Sk8Mafia hand signs.

But instead, Wes delivers the goods, on 4/20/2020 no less, in the ironically titled #weskremer part. Here are some of my favorite tidbits:

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The opening line that terminates with this ridiculous flatground slam shuts down any notions of solemnity or gravitas for the upcoming part. This is Wes. We’re gonna have fun.

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What the hell his this red thing Wes is popping 360s on? It looks like some type of kiddie climbing gym apparatus in the middle of a sandbox.

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A sunny day. An empty plaza. A shiftied out switch wallie over a bench.

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Wes is not is uptight and neither is Baker-made hardflip. The hand drag ads a little bit of unpretentiousness and makes this trick stand out.

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Jam the cannonball. A great example of a ‘dork’ trick that, upon closer inspection, is fucking gnarly.

wes Kremer switch shove
The big gap pop shove is such a good looking and underutilized trick. This one is switch. The twilight sky is just the icing on the cake.

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Switch stance frontside tailslide impossible. And this wasn’t even the ender.

Honestly, one could GIF just about any trick in this video and just get lost in the hypnotic flow of Wes. His whole oeuvre is chock full of tasty treats, so dig in.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vqtj1hv4Ubc]

Dakota Servold – Green peaks

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 [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1B9cKDpa8Wo]

In the world of professional sports, the kinds of sports with championships and agents and assistant general managers studying statistical evidence, people pay a lot of attention to the correlation between age and peak performance. When there are millions of dollars on the line it is good to know what effectiveness might be expected for your dollar. And, outside of injuries, some typical patterns emerge.

For straight-up athleticism, the decline typically begins around age 26. While experience, wisdom, and a mature attitude towards training and health can extend the peak until perhaps age 30, barring the introduction of performance enhancing drugs, an athlete’s 30s are basically a battle to slow down the decline and stay viable. By the 40s you are just holding on, seeing how long you can even compete, much less dominate.

We skateboarders like to consider ourselves different – perhaps more artists than athletes. With a few ridiculed exceptions, professional skateboarders don’t “train” during the “offseason”, they don’t have “coaches”, they rarely are provided “healthcare”, they are often “intoxicated”, heck, most of them aren’t even getting paid a “living wage”. Yet, athletes they are and the peak performance pattern still holds up.

Pre-pubescent kids can show amazing talent but are yet to develop the strength and style of an adult body. The late teen / early 20s set are going crazy, touring for months straight, leaping down big sets straight out of the van, recovering quickly from injuries, smoking spliffs and drinking beers, literally while skating. But this is where many start to fall off. Some descents are caused by a decline in ability, some from injury, some just lose interest and explore the possibilities to get paid for more lucrative talents, but mostly, and sadly, so many great careers fall off from a decline of skateboard riding effort. Lifestyle casualties.

With the exception of Dustin Dollin, one typically needs to sober up (or at least get that shit under control) or already have accumulated enough brand-name popularity to get paid through the long tail of the late 30s and early 40s decline in productivity. Big street rails give way to waxed indoor park ledges. Impact gets substituted for smooth style, unique spots, and wise trick selection. Check out the blossoming fine-art career that is enough to keep that name on a board for a couple more seasons. They might not have a part in the new full length but they are performing an acoustic set during the premiere.

Knowing this pattern, one would think more skateboarders, or at least team managers, would do their best to squeeze out the greatest quantities of heavy tricks while the getting is good. To clock as much footage as possible before back pain, a spiraling chemical dependency, and/or the need to feed your family pushes you out of the spotlight.

Dakota Servold gets it. After 6 or 7 years of being a workhorse pro for a board company that apparently doesn’t pay much, as well as riding the peaks and troughs of the clothing sponsor rollercoaster, Dakota left it all on the field for his new show sponsor, Emerica. Not that he phoned it in for the past three Foundation videos, but Green is something else.

As discussed in his Nine Club podcast interview and then again in his recent Thrasher Magazine interview, Dakota wised up, took his job seriously, and pushed his limitations. Longtime Servold friend, Emerica TM, and Green filmer Tim Cisilino concurs, “… we sort of just wanted to make it happen for each of us together. We both agreed that people who work hard get rewarded so we both were working our asses off to be the best we could be.”

And it shows. The backside 180 ender would be evidence enough, but you can pull nearly any trick from the part and behold something special. The endless front blunt rail. The ollie over the Chase sign. The man-ledge version of the ramp rail ollie to curb grind. The solid frontside 50-50 transfer to backside tailslide on the kinked rail. That improbable kick flip up the loading dock. These tricks hit hard and fast, but none feel like filler. And as a fan of both normal stance skating and non-pinched handrail grinds, I have no complaints.

What I like best about this narrative is the lack of a rock bottom. As far as I know, Dakota’s career wasn’t in jeopardy from his drinking and lack of productivity. He hadn’t wrecked a car or got dropped by key sponsors or blown out his knee and couldn’t skate or gotten hooked on heroin or anything that dire. He isn’t even claiming alcoholism or lifetime sobriety. He simply made a choice to give it his all. To look back on this well documented time with pride and not wonder how good he could have been ‘if only’… but to know… Very. Fucking. Good.

With all this concentration of peak performance, I was curious if Dakota had considered quitting smoking. Tim Cisilino: “Nah, he loves that too much.”

Big thanks to Tim for answering my rambling questions.

Everybody loves Pat Burke.

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Say what will you will about Virginia, but it has produced two things that have made this world a better place to live in… Gwar and Pat Burke. And while it is common enough to find a person who can’t or won’t appreciate the theatrical artistry that is Gwar, I am yet to have ever met a person (or even a person who has met a person) who doesn’t think Pat Burke is awesome. Everybody loves Pat.

There are several hits in the Big Pat-B discography that I indulge in regularly, with two freshies coming up in the past year to go along with his decade-overdue pro model. But the one that gets me grinning again and again is the 2013 stand alone gem that is Pat Burke & $lave.

[vimeo 217533369 w=640 h=469]

Pat Burke is like a muppet on a skateboard. Arms akimbo. Sweaty hair flopping. He falls like a bag of laundry and it feels like that next slam is coming at any second, probably when he is not even trying a trick. Pat isn’t graceful. Pat is sloppy and silly and unpretentious. But God DAMN he seems like he is having a lot of fun. And Pat is having fun, I am having fun.

Pat Burke & $lave hits all the notes for a feel good make-you-wanna-go-skate track. It’s got great driving music (Going Down by Freddy King), some decent slams, some tricks that got away (the frontside 360 ollie heelflip!, or the frontside flip in the rain), and his nollie backside flips are just magnificent.

So get loose and get down with Pat. I guarantee you’ll feel good after watching this part.

Pat Burke and $lave

 

Chris Joslin Prequels – Episode 2 – Ground Control

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The story up until now… Chris Joslin‘s amazing ability to flip his board down ungodly sized gaps is successfully kept under wraps by Plan B to then be unveiled in 2014’s True video. The part is amazing and distracts us completely from being ghosted by Danny Way, Colin McKay, and PJ Ladd (but good on Pat Duffy for actually riding a skateboard). However, with just a little digging in the crates, we discover that True wasn’t the first video part of Chris’ to be distributed via the world wide web. Witness entnies Welcome to the Team part from earlier and 2014, and then feast upon Chris’ section in the 2013 Bones Wheels’ New Ground video.

But did Plan B, Sheckler’s etnies, and Bones brand Wheels really discover this kid? Following this thread even further back in time, we unearth the young Joslin gem that is his big part in the independent 2012 Ground Control video. Here lies the Powell Peralta flow-years footage of a prodigy finding his footing and taking is park-honed skills into the streets.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUI6YW70U7Q]

Somewhere there may exist a miniDV tapes loaded up with a fearless child jumping transitions to flat at the El Dorado park, but the story gets interesting when a just barely teenage Chris Joslin begins to hit the streets with the older Cerritos Ground Control crew in 2010.

The crew had been gathering footage for over a year and a full length independent video was starting to form. The concept that would become Ground Control the video, along with a proficient line-up (featuring future names like Mike Piwowar and Jason Park), was getting locked in. But then Chris started filming tricks. Filmer/editor Ilja Maran recollects, “Chris was always so successful on every filming mission (usually landing HUGE tricks in 5 tries or less) so before long it was pretty obvious he would have last part. It wasn’t even a matter of who would end the video with the biggest trick. It was always just Chris with a heavy ender that he would keep out-doing.”

Ground Control sees Chris as a fuzzy-headed yet already well-rounded street skater with a penchant for shoving out of ledge tricks and all the standard rail tricks on lock. His potential is obvious and local shops like Gallery and Mad Wax provided the stepping stones of sponsorship, as is the natural order of things. And while Chris might have had eyes on bigger fish in the board sponsor ocean than Powell, he was appreciative of what they provided.

For the most part, this isn’t ‘little kid’ footage, especially as we approach some of the really big tricks in the final two minutes of the part. The familiar ‘bolts’ landing on the big sets that Chris would soon be famous for emerges.

Ilja talks about the final tricks: “One of my favorite clips with Chris is obviously the ender at House of Drops. We went to shoot the tre-flip late one day and he stuck every try for almost 30 minutes but it got too dark before he could get the rollaway… We went back the following weekend and he was NOT getting close at all. Then, magically, after 5 or 6 tries he rolls away from the first stick. It was unbelievably easy for him. He seemed so non-chalant about the massive tre so I thought, why not keep going? I think I said “I got you on lunch if you sw frontside flip it”. And again, of course… Flips a few not close at all.. Then BOOM perfect catch, perfect stomp. Rolls away after the first stick. That was honestly the most stoked I’ve ever been on filming a clip and probably ever will be. Not only was it the ender of the video it was a HUGE surprise to everyone who was at the premiere. Everyone assumed the tre-flip was the ender of the video because the whole crew knew he tried it but the sw frontside flip was our secret surprise. Me and Chris went on a small side mission for that ender.”

A tightened edit of the Ground Control would go on to win the Berric’s Younited Nations 3 contest, earning the entire cast (along with always fun Distreeto crew from Mexico) a weeklong trip to skate the Berrics, which perhaps gave Joslin the last little push he needed before he dropped the perfect stomp into the skateboard consciousness.

I had to do a little digging to find the edit of their session, and you will be shocked at who got the ender. A little side note: why would the Berrics not be preserving their old video edits? Besides some of the earliest Joslin footage, that Josiah Gatlyn Recruits was one of the few repeatable park edit parts and all we have is some low-res youtube upload. Get it together, Steve.

Thanks to Ilja Maran for giving me the insider’s view into the emergence of a unique talent. The whole Ground Control video is solid and has a unique aesthetic with a consistent long lens panning style to interconnect every trick. It’s an unconventional vision that takes a bit of habituation for a viewer to settle into the flow of this filming and editing style, but I find it eventually creates a sense of rhythm to the video that unites all the parts. I’m also a fan of the use of long-lenses for big tricks, and it delivers that in spades.

As with most independent videos, Ground Control was a passion project for the friends . A lot of independent filmers sacrifice their bank accounts and their bodies just to celebrate their local scene so don’t let their work get forgotten. You can follow Ilja on the ‘gram at @dead.pixels or check out his youtube channel to see the latest skate edits. His professional film work reel is over at fineprintfilms.com.