THE CHROME BALL IS IN MY COURT.

Treated self for birthday...wanted something big and fun, roughly like an old Blind shape from days of old. I found that shape in a Black Label series, and Mike at Gravity hooked me up without selling the whole series to some board collector schmuck. The only problem is all the artwork is done by Neil Blender, and now I'm having a hard time thinking about fucking it up. Same reason I can't buy one of these beauties...

And it's Blender!

....couldn't resist.

HEP SNOW CATS

Alien sighting in the deep-end of Leavenworth years ago. If you live in Seattle and aren't familiar with Spacecraft, come out from under your rock. Conscientious consumerism at it's best. I just wish they made (made by scoped-out, legit suppliers in Bali, and elsewhere) more stuff. 

"THEY'RE DIGGING IN THE RIGHT PLACE!!!"

Super cool series online by Skateboarder Magazine, "Raiders of the Archives." They are short videos looking into the offices and/or archives (literally, shelves, boxes, walls) of great artists and photographers in the professional skateboard world. This post links to my favorite (though they are all great), that being Andy Jenkins, one of my favorite artists, whom I've posted about before. He gives the rare treat of showing some of the conceptual work that happens before a graphic or ad is made, including sketches and renderings from another one of my absolute favorites, Evan Hecox who does amazing graphics for Chocolate Skateboards.

Very inspiring series, and makes you want to dig into the vaults. (And get organized...)

JUST A LITTLE SOLITUDE...THAT'S ALL.

Andy Jenkins is a definite favorite of mine, and one of my earliest influences in the world of art. Any skateboarder who picked up a Transworld mag from the late 80's and early 90's must recall with delight Wrench Pilot. Not a lot of people can get away with drawing someone skateboarding without making it look, well, silly.
Anyway...not to pigeon-hole him either. His talents are far reaching, much further than Lettus Bee. Check out his site, and here's a good interview.

LEGALIZE IT.

Did this in 1993, high school. Seemed a cool idea at the time, because there was a lot of generic Legalize It hoopla going on to sell t-shirts and whatnot at Above The Belt, etc., and I thought this could be a counter to it. I thought it also kept me sort of separated categorically from my other straight edge friends.

The interesting thing about this is, because it got such a good overall response from people, I mailed it to myself, to budget-copy write it. I eventually forgot about it, until I saw a Think Skateboards hat with the exact same idea (it more resembled a curved one I did that looked more like a pot plant, I'll add it later if I can find it) embroidered on it. I was dumbstruck. It was so similar.How did this happen?

The copy write was buried somewhere for years.

But I wasn't alone, it didn't end there. My artist buddy Dan had also done up a very unique graphic, a half of a skateboard carved out of a tree stump. A nice drawing, which I believe Marley had done a quick-run graphic for. But, soon after, Think Skateboards came out with the exact same graphic. Dan hadn't secured a copy write. But still, even if we both had legit copy writes, I don't know if we were prepared at the time to go head to head with Greg Carroll.... 

 

 Thanks for sending it over, Dan. I can't find the Think versions so far.

UPDATE: (Found randomly on the interwebs)