Tossed Upon Waves Of Chain Link, A Cosmic Fencing Match

And so it is that Joey O’Brien and Chris Mulhern delivered unto the people this week another blessing, in the form of a video for erstwhile collaborationists Alien Workshop and Thrasher, resounding with authority and some pomp. There can be no doubt about the Philadelphia-scene journeyman’s noseblunts, no second guessing his masteries of the frontside 5-0 backside 180 out or the 180 switch k-grind. With the ringing song it could credibly slot into the final section of a full-length vid of your choosing; has the time come for another Alien Workshop feature? Have nearly 15 years truly passed since the last go-round or is a new carbon rod required to measure the company’s current iteration? Do you remember ‘Bunker Down’?

A whiff of finality and persistent question marks also wafted through Philadelphia’s Municipal Plaza this week as stretches of chain-link fence materialized across a swatch of the tiles, an ominous sign for Joey O’Brien, the rest of the Philly heads and all others who remember similar portents popping up ahead of the overhaul and later plowing under of Love Park, and before that City Hall’s plaza. The nigh-bottomless well of online speculatories is a-flow and various artists’ renderings have been digitally bandied about, but for now all that seems clear is the reminder that skateboarders are at best unpaying tenants and squatters in these spaces — disused and oftentimes overtly avoided tho they may be. 

Whether shock troops of gentrification or community builders who carve out an accepted niche, the colonization of a plaza-type spot brings with it a familiar rhythm, patterns of movement and use and behaviours that can over time lull a body into a sense of propriety, or earned localism that sometimes can seem to extend beyond the skateboarding sphere. That is, until the fences go up and the excavators begin to crawl, the C-block torn out, the onramp-adjacent bricking torn asunder and transformed into valuable keepsakes that can be packed and shipped for internet electronic commerce. 

Can it be different? Incredibly, an apparent ‘yeah’ emanates this week from one of the most costliest real estate markets in the U.S., New York City, where 5Boro impresario turned municipal fixer Steve Rodriguez announced this week that the legendary Brooklyn Banks would soon begin reopening — not just a go to skate, but refurbished, including the incredible prospect of the small banks’ return. An alliance of civic workers, local skaters, residents, and Tony Hawk’s Skatepark Project seem over the course of the past decade-plus to have successfully argued the case that skaters have and should continue to hold some stake in the overpass-shadowed nook of the city, which plenty had given up for dead years ago. It is a rare and savoursome piece of good news after a stretch that felt like a lot of losses have piled up, and a signal victory for the idea that skating’s cultivation of these places can amount to some type of real world equity building, at least in some cases. 

If the Brooklyn Banks can be safely slotted into skateboarding’s ‘win column,’ where does that leave the cosmic scorecard, following the preservations of Southbank and Stalin Plaza, and the demolishments of the Philly plazas and Venice pit? Given EMB’s recent renaissance, should it be taken out of the L column?  Could DIY spot builders assert a form of squatter’s rights under adverse possession law to ward off encroachsome bulldozers and warbling dump trucks, laden with bad vibes? If possession is nine-tenths of the law how come there aren’t more residential deeds handed over to hardworking poltergeists? 

1. Joey O’Brien – ‘[untitled] 005’

Marathon man Joey O’Brien has been the torch-bearer for long-distance Oyola lines through downtown Philadelphia since he linked the Love Park ledges with the underground parking ramp in ‘Sabotage4,’ and deep thinkers could probably draw some similarities to what has seemed like years of toil through flow arrangements that up to this year hadn’t elevated him the same as Love/Muni alumni like Kevin Bilyeu, Jahmir Brown and the incomparable Jamal Smith. Joey O’Brien came into 2021 with a presumed Adidas hookup and no discernible/official deck deal, served notice with an Alien 2.0 vid and then proceeded to blow the doors off last summer with a nearly 10-minute footage barrage supervised by the impeccable Chris Mulhern. It was pretty much relentless — whereas other dudes may get a clip on a given rail or ledge, Joey O’Brien does three or four, skating construction sides and dodging snow piles, seeming able to backside flip out of anything. At Philadelphia’s Municipal Services Building, one of the single most heavily mined spots over the past five years or so, he finds eye-popping new stuff to do, bigspinning on the angled bannister and popping a tile to jump over the back of the big handrail, with nigh-incomprehensible twists on the benches, like the backside 180 to frontside nosegrind. Beyond the Muni orbit he covers all bases — on the bumps to bars, flying a backside 180 onto a black-diamond cellar door; he’s got shove-it nosegrinds both ways on the rails, a frontside version of the ‘Suciu grind’ and a leap of faith gap to nosegrind. The year’s work for Joey O’Brien winds down with a richly deserved pro board and a Skater of the Year ‘contender’ nod from Thrasher, and he seems on the cusp of putting out another video.

After Tyshawn Jones And Tom Snape, Who Will Pen The Switch Inward Heelflip’s Next Chapter In 2020?

Ten more
–Dom Henry, ‘Cottonopolis’ — an artist working mainly in the medium of switch nosegrinds and fakie frontside noseslides
–Tiago Lemos, ‘Encore’ — nollie over the back, as the fella says, hits different
–Tyler Bledsoe, ‘Huf 003’ — backside tailslide drop down to backside noseblunt, what is the world coming to
–Brian Peacock, ‘Fellas’ — like a swishies-dripped Gustav Tonnesen, frontside flip switch manual to switch frontside flip back
–Kauwe Cossa, ‘Chrystie Chapter 1’ — sterling command of the switch backside heelflip
–Nick Matthews, ‘Pavement’ — young in the city with Pupecki grind fakie flips out on lock
–Yaje Popson, ‘Untitled 004’ — a top 10 Muni line contender
–Wilton Souza, ‘Your World Don’t Stop’ — beating on the Brazilian blocks
–Miles Silvas, ‘PLA x Thrasher’ — a mirror line with shock value
–Nick Michel, ‘Lotties Must Be Stopped’ — the year’s most fearless frontside half-cab

4. Gustav Tønnesen — ‘Reverb’

The easygoing freedom radiating off Gustav Tønnesen’s otherworldly tricks arises partly from his and Sour’s congenial, blissful separate-ness from the California pro-circuit rat race. He generally seems unconcerned, and it’s probably a contributor to rather than detractor from Sour’s assorted successes and achievements since the Sweet split. The askew ‘spot’ choosings and bottomless skill reservoir regularly exhibited in the ‘Sour Solution’ entires can leave one wondering what a Gustav Tønnesen part could look like given the ‘big-budget’ treatment and an indulgence toward more-standard video part trick choices, and Adidas’ late-arriving ‘Reverb’ vid offers one version — there’s a nollie 270 fronside noseslide into a bank, a switch crooked grind in a line, a switch hardflip over a gap, all typically feather-light and unhurried, but it’s not long before he’s wallriding out of a backside noseblunt slide and finding all types of things to do with a corrugated metal vent thing. Inevitably, he is drawn to Max Palmer’s angle-ironed cage-bank and the Rector Street bench’s final hours before boosting a switch kickflip off a few angled bricks and up a four-foot euro gap, as it was foretold. An actual magician.

Psychic Fluids, Astral Forces And Further Fruits From 2018’s Video Cornucopia

Nate Pezzillo — ’Untitled 003’
A monster going up and over Muni’s cylinders — and squeezes a shove-it Suski from Love Park’s shriveling husk

Marcello Campanello — ’Mode’
Fakie boss in the Borroughs, with the cab kickflip backside tailslide

Austyn Gillette — ’Radiant Cure’
Switch shove-it rewinds with extra savoir faire

Charlie Cassidy — ’NY Archive’
Glass slicer boardslide and that backside noseblunt — skates like a Philly dude

Corey Glick — ’Souvenir’
Helping put Foundation into the conversation again with gusto, a fakie flip switch backside smith grind and a will not to clip on that last, scary jump

Shintaro Hongo — ’Pick Up’
The thought of rural Japanese spots is a trip — ferocious backside flip and bluntslides

Jake Johnson — ’Purple’
A glimpse of the master in his Penny period

Kyle Wilson — ’YS Video’
The float on the switch heelflip

Brian Delatorre — ’Purple’
GX OG, at home nollieing backside over a tremendous bar, or reclining in a backside smith grind

John Shanahan — ’Street Sweeper’
This year bringing back the fakie pop shove and tic-tacs, and with a pro deck in the works, revealing at last what lies beneath the Flexfits

1. Lucien Clarke – “This Time Tomorrow”

As far as young bros on the come-up in 2010, this Lucien Clarke dude’s got it all — form, cool looking locales, those snapback hats with the different colored brims that took over Britain a year or two back, the accent, backside noseblunt slides on command, etc etc. There is a leisurely air to the lengthy lines he skates that promise a lifestyle behind solidly latched doors among woodgrain and glasses of brown liquor, if you could hang out there in a baggy sweatshirt and said hats with the colourful brims. The cliffhanger frontside shove-it over the crunchy hubba and the nollie backside flip shortly thereafter are highlights with heaps of night filming and switch backside kickflips. Bouncy older rap song and he’s on the Palace board company, this was my favorite part all year.