Cooler content
Plus: Luis Mora "owns" Lakai, the Professional Skateboarding League, some Jimmy McDonald appreciation, and more.
The definitive weekly ranking and analysis of all the skateboarding and other things online that I cannot stop consuming and how it makes me feel, personally.
Cooler content
Rank: Hmm
Mood: 🏕️
If you want to put out an effective promotional video for your brand as it looks to speak to a new market, in this case, skateboarders, it's a savvy move to enlist the help of Thrasher Magazine and wrangle some of the best skateboarders on this planet to go on a camping trip in the Pacific Northwest. To watch the likes of Grant Taylor, Silas Baxter-Neal, Curren Caples, Louis Lopez, Lady Meek, Jordan Thackery, Simon Bannerot, Samarria Brevard, Ronnie Sandoval, Gus Gordon, Hugo Boserup, Raney Beres, and Cody Chapman perform incredible feats of skateboarding next to or onto a Yeti product, in theory, gives Yeti the air of "getting it."
Some inconspicuous product placement.
For this cause, A Summer Adventure Video with Yeti is quality work. Indistinguishable from any other Thrasher big-skatepark-tour edit — this one is also edited by the skilled hand of Rye Beres — it gives us the types of stunts we expect: Grant Taylor floating and flying in the way only he can, Simon Bannerot going bigger and bigger, Lady Meek planting hands on the peaks of imposing transitions, Jordan Thackery displaying an immense depth of creative ability in deep and shallow ends.
It has everything a passively consuming audience could ask for. There's even Geoff Rowley, who doesn't appear to have logged any skate footage but does provide ample voice-over. Toward the end, he describes this camping trip, bought and paid for by Yeti, a brand that makes products ideal for camping, as similar to the ones he and his friends would go on as kids — just boards, sleeping bags, and skateparks.
Using the marketability, the cultural veneer of skateboarding, to launder a brand and its wares is not new in this space. Skateboarding exists in and of itself as a means to sell products, so this shouldn't be a surprise. That a vibrant culture developed along with it is a nice side effect. There's a vast and varied history of outside brands glomming onto the sport in hopes of tapping its essence. Energy drinks do it. Omar Hassan was once sponsored by Ford. Tony Hawk has endorsed almost every product and brand that has ever existed.
This one does feel a bit strange, though. I'd argue that it's not solely because of the naked endorsement of a non-skateboarding-related company by skateboarding's most significant cultural institution and media hub because, as stated above, that's nothing new — Transworld used to run ads for the United States Army. What does make it feel off is what it portends. This is a good video. Made with the best skateboarders. For a company that makes coolers.
Why is such effort being put into something like this? Does that speak to the state of what's left of skateboarding media and the career opportunities of the sponsored skateboarder where an invoicing opportunity of this calibre can't be passed up? Is it another sign that our cultural understanding of endemic brands, which were once signifiers of merit and meaning in skate culture, has been upended, and any brand name is not just fine but as infinitely interchangeable as a nameplate on an office door?
What also needs to be asked: does it matter? As an audience, we're getting excellent "content." The skateboarders in the video, one assumes (hopes), are getting paid. At the very least, they are getting coverage. And again, is this not how things have always worked to some degree? It's the same names beside different logos. The vital, inescapable cycle of skateboarding as product promotion spins 'round.
"This is Dana White stuff"
Rank: -2
Mood: 🤦
"Alright, I want to talk about the takeover," Mikey Taylor says to Mike Mo Capaldi on an episode of his Life with Mikey YouTube show. "Is this going to disrupt skateboarding?" Mikey Taylor asks. "This thing has the potential of being astronomical," Mikey Taylor claims. "This is Dana White stuff," Mikey Taylor gushes.
Mikey Taylor is talking about Capaldi's latest venture, the Professional Skateboarding League (PSL), which is having its first exhibition event this Saturday. During the interview, it's not made entirely clear what the PSL is or how it functions, but subsequent PSL videos explain that it will be a "team competition down a set of stairs." Essentially, a game of S.K.A.T.E. where three teams of two skaters trade offensive and defensive positions over several rounds, accrue points for tricks set that their opponent misses, and the team with the most points at the end wins.
Capaldi explains that this should take the subjectivity out of the results, something he believes holds competitive skateboarding back from reaching a wider audience unfamiliar with the sport. Mikey Taylor compares it to "UFC," where he says the results are always objective — you either get knocked out or submitted. That ignores the fact that all modern MMA uses some sort of judging criteria, with most organizations, including the UFC, adhering to a version of boxing's 10-point must system. Subjective and controversial judges' decisions happen all of the time.
This is nitpicky but important because Mikey Taylor continues to shower Capaldi with off-base MMA-related praise, telling him if outside audiences find interest in the PSL, success will follow, and "You're the next Dana White."
"Maybe," says Mike Mo, before clarifying amidst some nervous laughter, "I'm a lot different." One assumes he makes this qualifier due to White's close political affiliations with Donald Trump and his history of scandals, including being captured on video slapping his wife. His own mother wrote a book about how he's a "vindictive tyrant" and once called him "not a good person."
But, Mikey Taylor's co-host says, his "Business acumen is out of this world." Again, not accurate. That's only true when it comes to the UFC. The rest of White's resume is littered with failures, flagging ventures, and empty promises, from the contemptible Power Slap to the oft-talked-about but never-materialized Zuffa Boxing. It's also important to note that while White's impact is very real, the UFC only became what it did with the help of the Fertitta brothers, Las Vegas casino magnates and White's childhood friends who footed the bill to purchase the company in the early 2000s — that along with the historic mistreatment and underpaying of the athletes who make the sport what it is and have contributed to the organization's monster profits.
Mikey Taylor using Capaldi to make a loose comparison of the PSL to the UFC is also wrong. The PSL's closest relative in that field is the long-defunct International Fight League, an MMA promotion that distinguished itself by having different teams of fighters compete against one another. The IFL failed in totality.
While the accuracy of these details may not seem relevant in the grand scheme of a podcast where a group of dudes are just yucking it up, it shows that Mikey Taylor has no reservations about saying anything about everything, no matter how incorrect or offputting it is — including hyping up one of the most morally bankrupt public figures of our day in White.
At the end of the episode, he and his co-host go into cringe-inducing detail about how wild it is that their private equity firm, Commune Capital, does deals worth tens of millions of dollars. That is wild — this attention-starved business ghoul is the jamoke you want to trust with your money?
Anyway, apologies for going long on a Mikey Taylor video; my doofus tolerance is at an all-time low. That aside, I'm a fan of competitive skateboarding and hope the PSL exhibition goes well. Can a game of S.K.A.T.E. down a set of stairs make for a compelling broadcast? We'll find out. Also, according to Capaldi, there will be a fantasy app for PSL. If that goes well, you know sports betting is on its way. What's the over-under on P-Rod hittin' a switch hardflip? Kickflip-roastbeef?
Refill the flare
Rank: ?
Mood: 🥛
"I OWN LAKAI" reads the title of Luis Mora's latest YouTube video. This is a bit misleading. As the popular YouTuber, filmmaker, and head of Erased Project and Aura Skateboards goes on to explain, he now has "ownership in" the ailing shoe brand, whose woes have been covered at excruciating length here in this newsletter.
In his video, Mora says that Roca had initially offered him the position of Lakai team manager, which he declined, countering with the idea that Lakai needs to be a "skater-owned thing" and run by somebody who "loves this and has passion for this and understands the vision." The deal they struck, according to Mora, gives him ownership in the company to "be able to help run" it.
It's unclear what size Mora's ownership stake is, whether it was given to him outright along with a salary, or what his position or title is within Lakai. I reached out to Mora for comment but did not hear back by the time of publication. It will be interesting to see if his deeper involvement has any effect on Lakai's brand, which suffered a severe blow in the aftermath of Roca's initial deal.
If it does in the positive, that could speak to a generational and cultural shift you can already see playing out anecdotally in the comments of Mora's Lakai-centric videos, where skaters, excited about the new content, exhibit a greater allegiance not only to the talents and personalities they've grown up watching on Instagram and YouTube over the "legacy" names who created the shoe company but to the brand as an abstraction separate from its history.
Comments on LAKAI IN TOKYO
Lakai's flare is just a vessel, a point of reference to stuff new meaning into. Depending on your vantage, that could look like a classic car with a modern restoration or a corpse strung up like a marionette.
Jimmy McDonald appreciation
Rank: 1
Mood: 🧑🌾
Man, how good is Jimmy McDonald? The guy has been putting out top-tier, well-crafted video parts for nearly two decades. I couldn't even ballpark the number of times I watched his closing section in Chris Mulhern's Few & Far Between (2006). One of the main throughlines in his skating is how he makes such good use of a spot in approach and trick selection. Tasteful, considered choices.
Nineteen years after Few & Far Between, he's done it again in 5Boro Skateboard's latest, The 5Ball Video. There's not much else to say than what's already been said — besides that the man's also a copywriter, respect to an industry colleague — so let's just watch and appreciate ol' McDonald at work.
Earnestness in times of decay and despair
Rank: N/A
Mood: N/A
Things aren't great. Politically, socially, economically, environmentally — most of the -allys feel like dead ends. There isn't a panacea. No quick fix. It's taken generations' worth of bureaucratic decay, lobbyist action, corporate capture, political lip service, and consolidation of monied and powerful interests in service of a fetid political project to wind up here.
What is a person to do in the face of authoritarianism that is no longer rising, fascism that is not just roiling beneath the surface but is here now? Emboldened. That scoffs at the notion of showing mercy for the vulnerable in its care. This is not only true of the United States but it is breaking through in Canada, Europe, and other parts of the world, too. How do you have hope in times like this, when the demonstrations fall on deaf ears and the opposition leaders we should be able to look to are hapless fools, cowards, or both who don't care what happens to the rest of us as long as they get theirs?
Earlier this week, the journalist Robert Evans, while attempting to make sense of the moment, quoted George Miller via Mad Max: Fury Road: "Hope is a mistake. If you don't fix what's broken, you'll go crazy." While that might seem trite or gallingly earnest, there's something to it. Hope is nice, but hope without action means nothing. Evans points out that the far-right movements that have amassed this power got it because they kept trying and trying new things. It's not that their ideas are better or more popular; it's that they kept pushing them and going for it with confidence, no matter how cruel and absurd.
What are the new things those of us who'd rather live in a world not governed by soulless oligarchs and white nationalists can try? I have no great ideas myself right now, but others might, and as Evans writes:
We are in a time of enormous potential. Many new things are about to be tried and as awful and bloody as the fallout from some of them will be we all have no choice but to strap in and roll some dice of our own.
The present is ugly, the future unwritten. The only way we’ll make it a better one is if we embrace boldness, creativity and, perhaps, a little overconfidence of our own.
Something to consider: The Slow Impact schedule has dropped and it is glorious. I'll be a part of the "Does Skateboarding Need Journalism?" panel and my answer may surprise you.*
*Mmm, sure, why not?
Good thing: José Vadi is back in Alta.
José Vadi
Another good thing: Farran Golding is back with another "Favorite Spot" for Quartersnacks. Aaron Loreth and his West Park wall is a beautiful story of love and loss if there ever was one.
Aha! One more good thing: Brian Glenney recapped the year in skateboard academia for Skate Bylines.
Brian Glenney
Yes, that's right, another good thing. Deal with it: My pal Aaron Read released a new stand-up special this week. I caught one of the tapings; tis good stuff.
A Gifted Hater thing:
A couple of good video part things:
I've been writing about barriers again:
Cole Nowicki
Until next week… take the time to make yourself a nice meal. Whatever you've got, whatever you like, treat yourself. You've earned it.
Laser Quit Smoking Massage
NEWEST PRESS
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My new collection of essays is available now. I think you might like it. The Edmonton Journal thinks it's a "local book set to make a mark in 2024." The CBC called it "quirky yet insightful." lol.
Book cover by Hiller Goodspeed.
Right, Down + Circle
ECW PRESS
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I wrote a book about the history and cultural impact of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater that you can find at your local bookshop or order online now. I think you might like this one, too.
Here’s what Michael Christie, Giller Prize-nominated author of the novels Greenwood and If I Fall, If I Die, had to say about the thing.
“With incisive and heartfelt writing, Cole Nowicki unlocks the source code of the massively influential cultural phenomenon that is Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, and finds wonderful Easter-eggs of meaning within. Even non-skaters will be wowed by this examination of youth, community, risk, and authenticity and gain a new appreciation of skateboarding’s massive influence upon our larger culture. This is my new favorite book about skateboarding, which isn’t really about skateboarding — it’s about everything.”
Photo via The Palomino.
