Skate Video Saturday

By Rob Meronek

I’m on the injured reserve list right now. What else to do besides watch skate videos? I picked up six new ones in the Shop today. I know a lot of you don’t have the time or loot to be watching over a hundred bucks worth of skate videos so I wrote a little bit about each one so you can figure out the ones you should check out.

I picked this video first because I wanted to see Nick Trapasso’s part.

Notes:

• Comes with a companion booklet of photos.
• Matt Bennett starts it off. I first met Matt way back in 2003 at the Damn Am at Volcom. I’m like, “you’re who?” and denied him entry in the contest. Oops. I took this photo of him that would later become the trick named after him, the Bennett Grind. Matt’s come a long way in three years. He did a Bennett Grind down the Hollywood High rail in his part.
• Austin Stephens is up next. Ever seen a feeble grind backside shuv out on an upledge? Austin’s a ledge champ.
• Every time I see Josh Harmony at a contest, he’s always destroying the largest obstacle. He ends his part no different with some big ass rail jumping. The Tootie Fruitie jam he used is a welcome upbeat change to the emo-ish stuff used in the video so far. Josh skates as burly as he looks.
• Ed Templeton is still ripping. I guess if you haven’t sunk to drinking six nights a week you can still kill it when you’re that age. He shared a song/part with Billy Marks who’s probably saving a lot of stuff for the Fallen Video.
• Next up is The Butcher with a pretty tech part pair up with the king sized ollies you’re used to seeing from him. The band for his song is almost locked in for the Skatepark of Tampa 14 Year Anniversary Party. Yep, it’s gonna be a barn burner. More on that coming soon.
• Extra mellow island time margarita sippin’ tunes go with Nick Trapasso’s part. Stuff like a backside big spin to frontside bluntslide to fakie on a ledge to end a long line, gigantic switch flips, and a big flip down a five flat five double set make his part far from mellow. I’m a big fan of Nick.
• Much of the tricks in the video you’ve seen in the mags already. You can see footage of Johnny Layton’s switch 360 flip down the Carlsbad gap that was in Thrasher. Johnny’s got the last part.
• Keep watching the credits for plenty of demo and tour footage.
• Bonus features: Trailers, Heavy Flow Day, Ashley Macomber’s Art Video, Kick in the Teeth Tour, Billy’s Balls (don’t play beer pong with Billy unless you want to get wasted), Friends, Cheryl Dunn’s Creative Life Store Trailer, and Barr Music Video.

I heard Pharell (Skateboard P) can’t even ollie, but I picked up this one next just mainly out of curiosity on the level of skating and to hear some hip hop to change it up from a huge emo dose from Suffer the Joy.

First, I went on the Ice Cream website and they’re selling Ice Cream t-shirts for $92 - yikes. Maybe that’s why TK is shirtless through most of the video.

The video opens up with what seems to be about a solid ten minutes of chill footage. Looks like they’re having a great time, but I didn’t want to pay for an MTV reality show. When skating finally started, it was Jacob Walder with the first part. Clipse has a new album out and Jacob used a track in his opening part. Not a bad part for a little kid. He switch varial heelflipped the big four. Another five or ten of reality show chill footage and I had to hit the chapter forward button a few times. Maybe it’s because I’m 80 years older than everyone else. When I finally stopped I was on Kevin Booker’s part hearing some Slim Thug. He’s good – big switch flips, nollie half cab flips (one down big four), and a good switch hard flip. After that was a bunch more chill footage mixed with random skate footage so I just looked for Terry Kennedy’s part. He’s doing some damn hard tricks with that crazy style. He fakie 5-0’d the Wilshire 10 – whoa. You can also see footage of stuff you’ve already seen in the mags like that gap frontside nosegrind on the two flat eight rail.

Bias is the reason for picking this next one. I traveled through Europe under all kinds of substance influence with P-Stone, the producer of this video. P-Stone is one of the best travel companions there is. He doesn’t sleep much, he’s down for anything at anytime whether it be skating, some random ass bar, or getting in some trouble on a new adventure to nowhere.

Notes:

• Preston’s videos aren’t really organized into parts. They’re more like a documentary of all the skating and selected antics that go down while he’s traveling the world with whatever team he’s on tour with filming.
• The video opens up with a lot of concrete park stuff. You can see footage of Tony Trujillo and Chris Senn going over that fullpipe gap (Chris Senn’s Transworld Cover).
• Kyle Berard has a full part’s worth of ripping street and pool footage. He just turned 22 a few days ago. Kyle is the only person to win both Tampa Am and Tampa Pro.
• There’s plenty of Dylan Rieder footage – hell yeah.
• Adam Dyet and Lizard King have a part together in here also. You didn’t know Dyet had those pool and tranny skills. Footage of this huge backside noseblunt slide is in there. Dyet is also a damn good travel companion.
• There’s plenty more footage from Angel Ramirez, Emmanuel Guzman, Darren Navarrette, Omar Hassan, David Gravette, Dan Drehobl, Chet Childress, and more.
• Self promotion alert: You know how in some videos there’s that dude that’s just way too proud to be puffin on a baseball bat? Damn, I’m that dude in this one. It was Amsterdam, though. Good excuse. Keep watching the credits to see my crappy old man line in Prague when I was with P-Stone. You can also see footage from Danny Way’s bomb drop in from the Hard Rock Hotel guitar.
• Bonus footage includes Australia Extras, AmsterDamn Am, Bad $h!t in Prague, Cayman Islands, Dan Drehobl Extras, Kyle Berard Extras, New Zealand, and Perkins Takes Some Big Hits.

Ok, I only made it through three videos. I’m going out for the night. Watch for the other three tomorrow.