Unless you work in skateboarding, you might be asking yourself, what the fuck is Agenda?
Well, it’s basically a place where many industry people meet to check out new products, high five each other, place orders, swap business cards, smile…etc. All those business related activities that keep the skateboard industry alive, healthy and moving. This year we attended and did just that, along with plenty of random shit documented below.

Before heading to the show, I bothered Jeremy Klein [owner of Hookups] to come hang out for Korean food. Jeremy Klein is a Korean BBQ master and spends lots of time drinking Soju and eating at this one spot not too far from Long Beach (where the Agenda show is). Jeremy goes there so often, the waiter said that he “basically lives here” and he has his own designated spot and table. Here he is showing me the reissues he made of his old World Industries “Veggie” Deck, which are selling on his Instagram.

Here we are after ordering the fattiest meat the restaurant had, just so we could grill it up, pour some soju on it and get a little fireball going. Yes, this type of stuff still entertains me. It’s embarrassing. Anyway, looking at it now, I should have filmed a little cooking section with him, it would have been funny. I was also thinking about starting a Jenkem Cooking Show. Your favorite pro skater teaches you how to make their favorite meal. Whether that’s peanut butter and jelly, or homemade sushi, you get taught “the ways of the pros”. What do you guys think?

Fast forward to the next morning, where we are actually at the Agenda show. This is the Cliche booth, showing off all these legendary 90’s oldschool graphics. These were all original boards – a skateboard collector’s wet dream. If you play or used to play Magic The Gathering, it’s kinda like seeing an entire set of The Power 9 all together in one place. Al, the owner of Cliche had to be security and make sure to personally watch them, and return them to their owner (Marc Mckee) after the show.

Some closeups of the decks. All silkscreened, super vibrant colors and pretty looking. The appropriate comment here is, “They don’t make em’ like they used to!”

Along with the incredible decks, there were some original Marc McKee sketches around too, which were from the latest Cliche line. This is just paper and pencil.. and to see it in person, so raw was mindblowing. McKee is really a master. I wanted to steal one of these.

More Marc Mckee drawings. It doesn’t get much better than this.

Agenda isn’t just all business people. As you walk around you will bump into a professional skateboarder, or ten. I honestly felt bad asking P-Rod for a photo. As we walked up the aisle, the dude was swarmed by kids. Selfies, autographs, awkward solo pictures – everyone wanted to get their 2 cents in. You can hate on P-rod for being boring, riding for Target or praying in his hat (we love to too), but he definitely is a true “professional” and plays the part. He stopped and signed stuff for every kid that came by and didn’t get flustered or bummed on it at all.

Everyone knows that the 90s had the coolest, most shocking, sexy and interesting skateboard graphics. While many people try and capture that feeling again today with their graphics, I don’t think many successfully do it – it always comes off a bit too try hard. I do think this one worked though. An updated homage to Randy Colvin’s classic deck this is going to be a Sammy Winters’ pro model, and come in the black censorship bag like in the 90s. The funny thing is, the original version had one of the chicks shooting up heroin, but with the recent heroin epidemic in the US, Sammy didn’t feel comfortable putting his name on it and they actually switched the artwork around a bit.

As anyone that works in the skateboarding knows, Deluxe always goes above and beyond with everything they do. Whether it’s a handwritten note, making custom shit for your shop or giving you free product, all skate companies (and companies in general) should aspire to be more like Deluxe. It works because they actually care. At Agenda it’s no different, every year they construct a skate obstacle to build into their booth. One year it was a wallride and this year it was a red curb replica.

Real gets shit from some people for having boring graphics. Too much oval logo stuff, safe pro model graphics, etc… so I was psyched to see these 2 new graphics. The Chima Ferguson board is funny, weird and prime 90s Mattel nostalgia, and the 2 Chainz Ishod just rules because the graphic is badass. The board has two symmetrical tails which I recommend trying out too.

Rip N Dip has found the ultimate selling formula: cats, weed & aliens. The internet will keep cats “hot” forever, stoners are stupid and aliens will always be trendy among gamers and nerds. Congrats Ryan [owner of Rip N Dip], you have found the holy grail. Just remember me when you’re a big timer.

The new Dylan shoe has got everyone talking, but the new Dylan Promo was even a bigger point of controversy. The music, the chicks in the background, the smoking shots, it almost seems like a parody. But I guess he is just one of those guys who isn’t afraid to be psyched on himself, and it seems to be working.

Dan Rogers and Jeremy Klein go back, way before my time. Seeing them together is kinda like watching some old couple that pretends to hate each other. They both make fun of their jobs and nag for the first 10 to 15 minutes. Then they stop yelling, hug, kiss and discuss the old times, when 411VM was still around.

At the end of the show I had a chat with Tony Dasilva from Emerica, and somehow ended up talking about Tinder. I’m not sure exactly how we ended up there, but I thought it would be a good idea to go around and ask skaters and lurkers what “the secret” to hooking up on Tinder was. It was pretty much a fail (most people didn’t use it, or claimed they had never heard of it), but here’s a minute of footage we got bothering people. Thank you everyone for playing along and Agenda for making it another amazing show.

Tinder Video filmed by: Joe “Joeface” Monteleone
Tinder Video edited by: Alexis Castro
Words & Photos: James Lee & Ian Michna
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