From Tanner’s puffy coats and dreadlocks of yesteryear, to the absurdist impersonation of Redman and Method Man by Phil and Henrik, skiing has long pillaged elements of African American culture. In fact, freeskiing would not be where it is today, with corporate sponsorships and ever-growing youth appeal, if hip hop culture hadn’t been around to lend an element of edginess that had been so completely lacking from skiing forever decades. You don’t go from v-neck sweaters and twister/spreads to the youth-culture posterchild of Target, Red Bull, Mountain Dew, Verizon, and anybody else with a product to sell without borrowing some cool from black kids.
Archive
For the brain hurricane category
Have we reached the end of the independent super edit? As the wild west of edit releases took over on the internet in the past five years or so, there has always been a few super edits that inspire awe, influence style, and get a shit-ton of views. I’m thinking of Wallisch’s Superunknown a few years back, or the BAD edit from last year. All in all, this year seems a bit quieter.
Is it because edits have been commodified and organized into webisodes (Nipwitz, B&E, Traveling Circus, the Wallisch one I’ve never watched)? Or can we blame those who seek to organize the format like internet television (looking at you Inspired)? Continue reading this entry »
The Death of the Drop-In Ramp
Fuck that noise!
Remember when film crews used to have to roll up to urban spots with a giant wooden drop-in ramp that looked like it was built by a blind middle schooler with rusty nails and a brick and stood out like a lighthouse for cops looking to bust the ill sesh going down? Now anyone who wants to hit the 12-stair behind the gym only has to have their buddies pull a giant rubber band until it’s taut and ready to nail your filmer in the kidney to get enough speed for nearly any kind of urban Amped 2 stunt. The Banshee Bungee was admittedly a pretty genius idea, and like any trend except afterbang and tall tees, pro crews are already on the way to rendering it obsolete – now you can buy a wakeboard winch, pour some 87 in there, and actually go uphill. The war to make skiing irrelevant to itself rages on, with gravity its newest victim.
Last week, on an unseasonably warm February day, I was standing in my backyard watching my dog run around. My neighbor came outside and started up the usual tiny talk about the warm weather. The backyard, which had been snow-covered pretty continuously since Christmas, was a muddy mess. Looking at the brownish, melted remnants, he made the comment that I’ve come to expect every year, “So, I guess it was a pretty short ski season for you, huh?” I smiled, and knowing that he wasn’t going to understand or even care about my answer, I just said, “No, they have much more snow up there.”
Through a lifetime of ski media consumption, I’ve found that there’s an ironclad equation (skateboarding this year = snowboarding next year = skiing in 2 years) that explains everything you’d ever want to know. But lately my faith in the formula has been shaken. I’ve been left with a burning question: If snowboarding is moving away from the “epic” in favor of tech shred, minimal setups, minimal helicopters, less slo-mo, and rock n’ roll in the place of Imperial March atmospherics…then what the hell are freeskiing’s Big Two watching and emulating two years later?
A season or two ago, Willie Born, a 13-year-old stunted freeskier from Minnesota, became skiing’s most famous grom when Sammy Carlson decided to make him his protégé. Before we knew it, the young darling of one of the sport’s biggest park skiers was on all of his sponsors’ programs, and was getting so much play on Newschoolers that Tanner Hall was probably venting to his trainer during physical therapy. Why this one child with a 720 grab was chosen among all others, and what the FDA would say about a 13-year old with an energy drink sponsor, are both mysteries, but safe to say that young Willie’s name will become a household name faster than a plethora of more talented and slightly older high school talents.
It’s SIA week! For those of you who are unfamiliar, SIA is a tradeshow that is overrun with companies hocking bedazzled helmets and furry boots, but tucked away in a corner of the rat maze of booths are all of the fine companies you actually care about.
Armada Dude #1: Sooo we’re, like, brainstorming, right? And I’m like, dude, so remember when we were a relevant company with funny lo-fi ads? We should recapture that with a totally sweet slogan like “Get Wild.” It’s just so hip, kids will totally identify with it. Kids love to get wild.
Armada Dude #2: Totally sweet idea, bro! And you know what else we should do?
Dude 1: What holmes?
Dude 2: Spend a bunch of money on a completely un-ironic, literal translation of “Like a Lion” and shoot Tanner Hall standing next to, like…a lion!
Dude 1: Let’s GET WILD!
Like most teenagers at the time, I did some rollerblading in the 90’s. I’m probably not going to shock you when I say that getting aggressive on a pair of skates was pretty damn popular at one time, and then it faded into an oblivion only skiboarding can relate to. I’m no roller historian, but it’s safe to say that the sport experienced a textbook bubble effect. Before it had any culture, history, or underground foundation, it was featured in every cheesy Disney movie and junk food commercial. Knee-and-elbow-padded rebels terrorized the populace and brought radical fun wherever they went. When Bob and Betty Customer got tired of the extremeness, rollerblading got put out on its ass.
There’s nothing like blasting your AC for 24 straight hours to make you think, “What happened to that Boone summer skate-ski idea?” Boone made a thread about it awhile back that we can’t find anymore. Then there was some (not so serious) discussion of a prototype that would be somewhere between the cross country rollerskis that already exist and a simple freestyle inline skate. I could dismiss the idea as completely without a purpose, market, or a shred of coolness…but I’m exactly nerdy enough to think it’d be fun for a day.
We promise to tirelessly pursue the answer to this question and never allow ourselves to think: “Who really cares?” So expect an answer to this most pressing question by the end of the day. In the meantime, Photoshop (or just Paint) your own dream prototype and throw it on our FB. There might be a t-shirt in it for ya (unless you’re from Australia)!
