Kevin Reimer (the fast skateboard man) is involved with Powell Peralta (the skateboard company).
I have nothing to say about that, apart from nice one and good luck.
Looking through the Powell range of boards you see just that, a range of skateboards. Now this in itself should not be unusual but the tragedy that I see is that it is. If we be really crude and divide the skateboarding world up into "mainstream" and "longboarding", you get this.
"mainstream"
- shoes. shoes with peoples names.
- skateboards. skateboards that all look the same, save for whoever's name is slapped on it.
- videos with the mandatory throwing around of boards-really, really funny.
and so on. a culture of "this is skateboarding", please buy these products, care about these pros because we said so. Too much to do with selling names and fashion, not skateboarding.
"longboarding"
- loads of different boards
- less "care about this person because we said so" and more "look what they are doing"
- more empahsis on you and doing what you want
And the REAL tragedy here, is that "longboarding" is just a term for this way of skateboarding. This way of skateboarding- fun, whatever you want to do, whatever board, that is proper skateboarding! "Mainstream" is bollocks! We say longboarding because it seems so radically different to how mainstream skate culture is, the difference is hard to process without using a seperate term, and the sadness of that is that people think it isnt skateboarding. I'll tell you what isn't skateboarding- reams of boards, and shoes, and apparel, and shit that you are supposed to buy because it has somebodies name on it.
So frankly I don't give a toss if "mainstream" skate companies want to follow Powell and get in on the "longboarding" thing, because that is saying "we want to make stuff that people are enjoying riding". Granted most will do it seeking profit but why not? Money is really nice. And you lot get the skateboards.
But what I do not want to see, as I am seeing lately, is this "names" thing crossing over from "mainstream" culture to this thing that is actually skateboarding. Give somebody respect if they have earnt it, if they have done something cool. Please avoid this thing whereby people put their name in front of their skating. I mean if you catch some footage of somebody and post it up somewhere and title it "Derp Derper does this" than cool, but please stop spamming the fuck out of yourselves to everybody, and assuming people should care.
The thing I like about skateboarding is that I can leave everything in my mind at the door. Skateboarder first, skating first, "Hi I'm Will" if you really want to know. Not MY NAME IS THIS, WATCH THIS, LOOK AT ME. The people in skateboarding that I respect havent got to say a word, but when they do, it's worth saying.
to summarise
- nice one mr reimer
- your name doesn't matter half as much as you think
- yeah skateboarding
- yeah skateboard companies making skateboards that are cool
Bye
