Post 9/11 Skateboarding

September 11th 2001 was an important day in alot of peoples lives for many different reasons. For me it was sad that alot of people had lost family members, but the most direct impact it had on my life at thirteen years old, was the displacement of the skate community that I was involved in and around the World Trade Center. I remember the day it happened when I was in biology class and our teacher Mr. Scott, a bald gay man, with a southern drawl, was called out of the classroom. He came back in and said "Now I have some very sad news ya'll, there has been an accident at the World Trade Center, a plane ran into one of the towers." It sounded pretty unreal at the time. My friend PJ whose family lives two blocks away from the World Trade Center began to cry. It was pretty weird for me to think that his family might not be alive. I had been to their house many times.

In 2001 I had just started skating and was obsessed with it. I skated no matter what, if it was raining I had a board to ride in the rain. If it was night time and I couldn't leave my neighborhood I would skate in front of our apartment building for hours. The only problem with that is that there wasn't much good stuff to skate in the neighborhood at the time. When PJ first took me to Battery Park City is when my mind first opened up to a different kind of skating. In my neighborhood I was used to only skating flatground. In Battery Park City there were stairs, rails, ledges, I thought I was in heaven. I started going there without PJ and began to meet other skaters.

I met a kid one day while skating in Battery Park City and he told me he was leaving Battery Park City cause it sucked, and that he was going to the Brooklyn Banks. I wish I could remember this kid's name or face, but I don't. When I got to the Banks I was amazed. A skatespot that looks like it were made for skating. Banks that flowed like waves, a nine stair with a skater made handrail, some dope ledges. There were so many skaters doing so many tricks I didn't even know the name of. I started going there every weekend. I began to meet more and more skaters and it was with them that I started getting shown other spots in the neighborhood. One of them was the World Trade Center.

The World Trade Center was an awesome skatespot. You could skate the benches in the street and never get kicked out. If you went in the actual plaza you would get kicked out pretty fast. The security guards never tried to take your board, but they were adamant about us not skating there. There was so much stuff there that I just can't seem to find photos of. There was a perfect manual pad that went from low to high, a ledge over a 5 stair(the one Luis smacked his face on trying to 5050 grind), and these perfect marble benches right in front of the towers.

After the tragic events that took place on 9/11, downtown became a no mans land for a long time. I remember not going down there for a month out of fear, even though my mom worked 5 blocks from the World Trade Center. When I finally went back that far downtown it was so different. The cops had taped off the Brooklyn Banks making them temporarily unskateable. I remember going to the other spots and not seeing other skaters for a couple months. The air down there was horrible and it felt dismal. It was like all the energy in that part of city went down with those two towers.

6 months later, it was spring and people returned to skating downtown, but it didn't feel the same anymore. Cops were checking your bags constantly getting off the train, security was heightened at every building so you were getting kicked out all the time, it had changed so much. Eventually I met a skater named Ben Nazario who took me to Thompkins Square park where I would start skating everyday, and still do skate at constantly.

Twelfth and A/King of Spring

The King Of Spring contest, held annually uptown on 12th St and Ave A is my favorite skateboard competition for a few reasons. For one, it is organized every year by Billy Rohan one of the city's foremost skateboard enthusiasts/activists(Who was once awarded the title of NY1's New Yorker of the Week). I've known Billy since I was thirteen and have always thought of him as one of the city's best skateboarders and eccentric individuals. Ever since I've know Billy he's been skating his heart out and trying to use his connections to get parks built for skateboarders in New York City.

Before Billy moved here from Florida we had 2 skateparks, Riverside Skatepark and Owl's Head Skatepark. Both of these skateparks, are in my opinion, horrible and completely outdated. Riverside Skatepark has been here since the 1980's and is rusty, with nails sticking out in various ramps and obstacles. Owl's Head only has large obstacles built for someone who has been skating for at least a couple years, and has no obstacles built for a beginner skater looking to learn. Ever since Billy moved here in 2000, we have had 6 new skateparks added to our city. Among my favorites are the Tribeca park, Astoria Park, and the Open Roads park on 12th st. and Ave A.

 I like the idea of this contest so much is because they don't allow professional or amateur skateboarders to compete in it. It is all kids who don't get paid to skate for a living, most are willing to put themselves in harm's way just to win enough money for a Metrocard to get back home. In competitions like the Maloof Money Cup or Street League the prize can be as much as a million dollars. Sure this is nice for professional skaters looking to buy new homes and expensive cars, but what about the kids who do this just for fun? I think they deserve a chance to make a little money and get some exposure to the competitive side of skateboarding.

I'm most fond of this competition because it is held where I grew up, Alphabet City. Growing up skateboarding in Alphabet City, I was always often called "Tony Hawk" and "White boy." Now that it has become more acceptable to see skaters of all nationalities, this doesn't happen to often anymore. To see skaters of all different races of colors get together and skate on 12th st and Ave A , the block I grew up on, makes me proud. I highly suggest you all attend this years King of Spring Contest, once the date is announced on the Open Roads Nyc Website, and say whatsup to Billy Rohan, a true skateboard advocate.

Scharpp

Heres a link to a short skate video I made. Enjoy. The Language for the music is kinda vulgar, so cover your ears or something, if that kinda stuff bothers you.

Luis Tolentino

This is my good friend Luis Tolentino murdering it in Queens, his stomping grounds. I've always been a fan of the way Luis skates, fast and stylish. In this video he ollies a trash can then a set of stairs. It is pretty amazing.

I first met Luis ten years ago at the the old seaport spot downtown. Here is a video where the first trick Anthony Pappalardo does is at the spot, I couldn't find and image of the spot. I remember he always friendly to me which was uncommon for New York skaters in the late 90's when everyone thought they were so tough. Luis and I went to skate the benches at the World trade center one summer day. He tried to 5050 the ledge over the stairs and fell on his face. We went to Burger King after that and I bought him a slushy for his new shiner. Every time I see him he still doesn't forget that slushy. That is why Luis Tolentino will always be the man.

Shoe Review

When Converse announced two years ago that it would be doing another line of skate shoes, I was excited. For starters, Chuck Taylors are one of my favorite sneakers to wear when I'm not skating. Simple and clean, these are a shoe that will remain classics forever. I was also excited when I heard that Anthony Pappalardo would be on the team. He has been a favorite of mine ever since the Photosynthesis days, and no matter how little coverage he gets, I will always respect his accomplishments in skateboarding.

The shoes Converse make for skating tend to just be improvements upon shoes, like the Chuck Taylors, which became the CTS OX. Anthony Pappalardo's pro shoe, is just a padded version of the Converse One Stars, that Guy Mariano brought to fame in his part in Girl's classic video, Mouse. The Converse style can be described as simple and timeless. There is never anything unnecessary and the colors are always simple.

The shoes I am reviewing are the Converse CTS OX. I was lucky enough to get a free pair from a friend who gets packages from a Converse sales rep. I got these shoes three weeks ago on that first beautiful weekend, and have been using them every time I skate. I normally wear a size 11 but in the Converse skate shoe line I have to wear a size 10.5. The reason for this being, once they begin to wear in, they become extremely loose, and a size 11 starts to feel very uncomfortable. The padding in these shoes make it possible to skate off stairs and gaps, but at the same time allow you to feel your board. My only complaint with these shoes, would be that they take a few days of breaking in. In other skate shoes like the Nike Dunks, I find myself at ease as soon as I put them on. I would give the CTS OX an 8 out of 10 and would recommend them to anybody looking for a comfortable and stylish skate shoe.

Josh Kalis Epicly Later'd

I'm a week late on posting this but nonetheless, I need to post this. The Josh Kalis epicly laterd episodes on vbs.tv, vice magazine's television channel are some of the best pieces of media that I've had the pleasure of watching in 2011. Patrick Odell's cult skaeboard show called epicly laterd is as he calls it "a modest attempt at documenting all of skateboarding's history." He has covered high profile skateboarders like Dylan Reider, Guy Mariano, and Andrew Reynolds to name a few. The episodes follow skaters in their progression from children to adult professionals and everything that happened in their in life in between.

The Josh Kalis episodes are my favorite of the bunch so far. They start at his humble beginnings in Michigan and follow him from all the skate meccas he has lived in like; Barcelona, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, San Diego, and currently Los Angeles. These episodes are highly influential to me because they're about a skater who has been a complete workaholic his entire career. Rob Dyrdek put it best in one of the last episodes about Kalis when he says; "He's your favorite skater's favorite skater."

Palace Comes to New York

This past fall Palace Skateboards came to New York City. Palace skateboards began as a crew of skateboarders  from London who lived with each other in dirty skate houses and skated with each other. The original name of the crew is Palace Wayward Boys Choir. The crew began to garner a cult following with the clips they put on dontwatchthat.tv . The clips would contain footage, some new, some old, of skate clips and other comical things. The clips are an homage to simpler times in skateboarding when people like Stevie Williams and Josh Kalis filmed epic parts at Love Park in the late nineties and early two thousands. The clips often feature older hip hop found on classic radios shows like Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito's on WKCR radio from the early nineties. Eventually the following for PWBC became so immense that one of the members Lev Tanju turned an inside joke among friends into an international skateboard company.

The clip Palace Skateboards made from their fall trip to NYC is one of the best web clips I've seen in a long time. It's filmed on VHS and looks as if it were made in the early nineties. The music also sounds as if it were from the early nineties. They edited it to a classic freestyle by Fat Joe and Keith Nut that was used in Zoo York's Mixtape video from the early nineties. The skating is amazing and features Chewy Cannon, Olly Todd, Rory Milanes, and Lucien Clarke. I highly recommend this video.

Spring is on it's way

This is a short video I made containing footage from summer to fall of last year. It sums up my lifestyle pretty well and was fun to make. I hope you enjoy it.

An interview with the Snackman

Quartersnacks.com has been the first site I check of the day for the past five years. The content is quite regular and never lacks in creativity. I've been skateboarding with the creator of Quartersnacks Kosta since I was fourteen years old. When Kosta first started Quartersnacks my friends and I used it as a way to have someone film our skating. We would go out every weekend and on breaks from school, filming skate clips that Kosta would cleverly edit to commercial rap and occasional soul songs. Kosta's way of approaching editing and distributing content was far different than anything else at the time. There were other NYC skate websites at the time that around anymore like Bigapplenyc.com and Flipmodenyc.com, but the way they edited their footage wasn't as stylized as a Quartersnacks clip. Fast forward five years and Kosta has done projects for esteemed clients like Nike and the Queens Museum of Art, and has advertising banners bringing in revenue. All of us who grew up skating with Kosta are very proud of how far he has come. Hopefully this interview can shed some light on what Quartersnacks is about. It has changed from a locally made organic skate website to a highly respected website in the skate world.

When did you start Quartersnacks and how long have you been doing it for?

September of 2005. Been doing it for a little over five years.

What made you start a skateboarding website?

Strictly to have a hobby, I never considered making any money or connections with people off of it when I started it.

Were there many other skateboard related websites at the time you started Quartersnacks?

Yes, but there weren't many New York or Northeast based ones. And the few that were more locally based around those areas were not updated regularly.

If you had to describe your website to someone who knew nothing about it and the culture of the it content revolves around how would you describe it to them?

It's a New York website that is bound together by a common interest/love for skateboarding. Not that it isn't a skateboard website, but the location plays a large role in the direction of the content. There are tons of inside jokes and weird little references that resonate a lot more to people around here than people on the outside looking in.

How has the website changed over the course of the years?

I used to update it whenever I was in the mood to do so, which sometimes wouldn't be for whole weeks at a time. Over the past year, I have began to actually work updates into a schedule. Having a reputation for updating regularly is the way you build your visitors, so I kind of figured if I kept my old routine of only updating 5 or 6 times a month, the amount of visitors would remain stagnant. I've also tried to make the content a bit broader to attract a wider range of visitors, not just people able to understand the content within a hundred mile radius.

How do you go about getting content for the site aside from the skate clips you make and articles you write?

Just general ideas floating around the internet, conversations with friends, etc. Skateboarding is so big now that there is always something going on. It's just a matter of navigating through everything and finding things you can actually write an insightful 300-500 words about.

How many hits do you average per day?

4000-5000.

Have you been approached to do any projects because of Quartersnacks? If so who where they for and what did they involve?

I did a project with Nike that basically involved skating around New York with their sponsored riders to spots that frequently appear in the videos on the website, and then writing daily wrap-up entries with photos and a video of the day to accompany them. That eventually turned into having a colorway of a Nike shoe inspired by the website. I did a project with the Queens Museum of Art that involved consulting a curator on major skate spots throughout New York so she could map them out on Robert Moses' 1964 World's Fair scale model of New York City for a special exhibit. Several smaller magazines have also approached me to do New York centric writing for certain articles as well. Plus, being able to make a website is a good skill in 2011, and a lot of friends have referred me to their friends to make a website since they are impressed with the work I have done with mine.

How do you approach advertising?

I mostly haven't had to do any of the approaching myself. When I first started running banner ads, I talked to a few friends with smaller companies and offered them free ad space since I liked what their companies were doing and knew they could use some help in spreading the word. Once larger companies saw that I had began running ads, they approached me themselves.

Where do you see the website in five years?

I have no clue. I haven't been working full-time or going to school for eight months, so I've had the time to work on the website. If I begin working 40 hours a week, it's going to be tough to keep the same sort of consistency I had, so I'll have to use my time as it pertains to the website more wisely. I also want to expand the content so it appeals to a wider range of people, without really letting it lose it's local feel, so that's the main thing I wish to accomplish in the next year or so.

Quartersnacks does New York Fashion Week

The brutal nature of an East Coast winter will cause most New York City skaters to gravitate toward places of warmth that serve alcohol and have beautiful women. This winter has been no different. With all the blizzards we've had and brutal nights of excruciatingly low temperatures it is safe to say that we've needed to find other ways to occupy ourselves. Starting last week we had New York Fashion Week to immerse ourselves in. Some might ridicule this as being uncharacteristic of skaters but that is simply wrong. With fun parties like the Purple Magazine Party at the Boom Boom Room it is safe to say that the winter has become less painful. I did not go because I was not up to it but as evidenced above on The Cobra Snake the Quartersnacks team was in full effect. From what I hear of it drinks were drank, celebrities were sighted, and good times were had.

Guest of a Guest covered the event here. The post is primarily picture heavy but based upon the scarcity of text and choice of photographic subjects it is safe to say that the fashion of the party attendees was the focus. The overall attitude of guest a guest it seems is to let the reader feel as if they have attended a party themselves. Between recounts of the night from friends and photos on Purple Diary and Guest of a Guest, it feels like I was there. Guest of a guest does a good job at covering parties by using photographs as a way of conveying the general mood of the evening. In some cases the provocative nature of the photos may lead you to believe that you missed a night of debauchery, the photos of the Purple Magazine party seemed relatively tame.

The Angriest New Yorker Alive

Oh Bobby, just when we thought you were gone you posted an interview on your site that had every skater derailing you in message boards, defending you in car rides to skateparks, and questioning your sanity over beers at our local pubs. Bobby Puleo for those who do not know him is something of a cult skater, a skater's skater if you will. His parts in videos like Static 2, La Luz, and Infamous were a cause for a mass migration of "artistically inclined" skaters to move New York City and attend SVA in hopes to recreate some of the magic in his video parts. Puleo's selective spot choices are what make him the legend he is, not his skating. Dont get me wron Puleo is very a talented skater but what make his parts so rewatchable is that you wish you knew where half the spots are. Compare the aesthetics of a Puleo part to that of a less creative skater like Mikey Taylor and it becomes clear his vision is unique.

The recent interview that surfaced on Puleo's website opened up the public's eyes to some of his ideas on the state of the skate world today. The first thing to notice is that it is an interview being conducted by a friend for Puleo's own website. The ethics involved in this kind of journalism are questionable at best. Aside from this misstep the interview is highly informative as to the workings of this angry man's brain. Because he no longer makes money from skating Puleo has become quite embittered with the state of things in the skate world. "I basically make no money from skateboarding these days. Isn't that insane?" To Puleo I ask, when is enough enough? He has made  money in skating certainly and whether or not he saved enough from the checks from the big companies he rode for like Enjoi and Ipath is his concern, not the public's. People these days tend to think that because they have a talent they should be compensated for it, what if that talent isn't unique anymore? Ten years ago Bobby Puleo was the only skater skating the way he did. Now there are plenty skaters that are younger than Puleo like Jack Sabback, Anthony Pappalardo, and Jake Johnson emulating his technique and pushing it to further limits.

Puleo seems upset at the recent mass migrations of skaters to New York City. Ten years ago when he was more relevant, this wasn't much of an issue because there was not much skateboard media coverage of New York. "You also have this new trend of fully established California types that are moving to and coming to NY and filming on shit here that has just been through the goddamn ringer as far as one uppers and spot rapers and they think that that style of doing things makes them legitimate. That shit is corny. Go find your own shit in your own city." This statement has some truth to it as well as some misplaced hate. It's wrong to be angry at people for coming to skate in New York, but it is not wrong to be angry at skaters coming here going through the same old spots and unloading their bag of tricks like its something new. To come New York and skate as tourist is fine, that shouldn't be discouraged, but come here with no appreciation for the people skating here 365 days of the year and you'll get no respect.

We should not put Puleo in to the grave for this hate filled interview, we should await some new footage from him that will hopefully remind us why we came to love him and defend his insanity. Puleo will for every be remembered as the man who made New York City his playground and scoured every inch of the five boroughs to bring the world spots it had never seen. His vision is that of a genius and it will never be forgotten.

Thrasher Magazine's King of the Road 2010

 Nike King of The Road 2010
There are some who would argue that skateboarding is a sport, but if you ever become a dedicated skater you'll know it's a creative art form. Thrasher Magazine's King of The Road competition is all about creativity. Sure, there are challenges you have to complete in order to win the competition, but King of the Road is unlike any other competition you will find.  Episodes are released on Thrasher Magazines website several times a week, updating you on the teams progress. In a regular "team sport" the challenge might be to pass a baton or score a bucket. In this competition teams drive across America completing challenges in different cities. Some of the challenges this year are three skaters ollieng a triple set of stairs, recording a rap record in Houston, Texas , and getting a makeover to look like Corey Duffel, a skater known for his punk rock attire.

The teams this year are Nike Sb, Converse, Circa, and Etnies. Each of the teams are packed to the brim with talented skaters like Eric Koston, Ryan Sheckler, and David Gravette to name a few. The current episode of King of The Road 2010 has the Nike Sb team skating in Colorado Springs. In one of the challenges the team is to form a drum circle and find their spirit animal. Obscure challenges like these give this competition a fun feeling you find on skate trips with friends. After the challenge the team goes on to do hard skate tricks like ollieing over the chain in to the famous Broadmoor ditch. The next episode is Converse in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It should be interesting to see what Angel Ramirez has to offer all their unique spots.