Are Photo Dumps lazy content? Maybe, but I’ll try to give you some goods in the captions to make it worth your while. Or feel free to throw extra questions in the comments section, we can do some sort of AMA type shit.

I always try to shoot at least one photo for each video we put out, sometimes it becomes the Youtube Thumbnail, other times it’s just to try to preserve the memories. These moments are going fast, and it’s easy to forget all the work we’ve had the privilege of doing. Sounds corny but it’s true.

These photos were taken all over the place, I’ll explain more down there, so join me as we approach November and pumpkin spice everything is now flooding the shelves of your local supermarket.

Our Latvia trip was the highlight of the summer. We were treated to several homemade feasts from Madars’ family while we were there, and fun fact, upon arriving his brother [rocking the crocodile hunter hat and Harley Davidson gear] offered me a Moonshine shot that was made in their garden. He was hilarious. A true man’s man who was super stoked on American classic culture. I couldn’t help but wish he was holding a can of Monster Energy the whole time. It would have really complimented the ensemble.

Channelling our inner Ed Templeton here with this picture of two random Latvian teens. We asked these girls who their favorite skater is and they said Tony Hawk, which must mean one thing: Not much skate content makes it to Latvia. If only they knew about the younger heartthrobs like Ville Wester and Kevin Rodriguez.

Back in the US, here’s Lil Dre slinging autographs on an Adidas tour in upstate New York. I honestly didn’t know Lil Dre was as popular as he was until I saw him being asked to sign the most stuff on the tour, second only to Daewon (Nora was up there too). I think it’s because besides being a good skater, Dre also pushes his TikTok and rap career, both of which bring in a broader demographic. I dunno, you tell me? I’m old.

After watching this years New York Fashion Week highlights I learned one thing. Any object can function as a handbag. Here are the Fancy Lad boys demonstrating this concept perfectly on the recent Upstate Adidas Tour. Granted tires are a little heavy, but tote bags are so 2022. I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see what the next Fancy Lad fashion choice is.

This is Monica Torres, one of Asics’ newest riders. Before she made enough money just from skating, she worked at the B*rrics as a janitor. Fucking hell, that deserves props. A bit of a teaser here- we filmed a Secret Hobbies about her love of “herping”. We’ll let you guess what the hell that is down in the comments, or you can wait till the video drops later this week.

From the outside, skaters appear to mostly hang with their teams and sponsors, but on the inside of the California bubble, that’s not always the case. I constantly see the oddest assortments of people hanging out, like WWF wrestlers broing down backstage after an event. One night I witnessed P-Rod, Atiba, Aiden Mackey and Nuge run into Manchild and several Lakai / Girl heads. Instead of the situation turning into a weird cool guy thing everyone bought beers and played foosball together.

We filmed our second installment of our Secret Hobbies series with Eli Reed. Although at this point it’s no secret that Eli is a massive fan of dancehall, we can’t get enough of this dude just dancing his ass off with not a care in the world. We could all use a little bit of his courage, and I don’t know about you but I haven’t been able to move my hips like Eli since high school. While he uses that advanced mobility to tandem gyrate with girls, I would use the mobility to squat down and fix my leaky faucet. I know I know, I’m daydreaming over here.

There’s nothing like following a lead down to the bitter end, and what better excuse to do so than with Satan. Yes, that big fiery beast. It’s a shame we never got real “hard” proof out of the Devils Playground, but we couldn’t help but investigate such a ridiculous premise. We want to do more stuff like this where we go down wormholes, so if you have anything you’d like us to investigate, I.E. I died for 15 minutes and lived, I can solve a Rubik’s cube using mind control, please holler in the comments.

We’ve been shooting with Nic Mosher recently, one of the original guys behind Channel 5 aka All Gas No Breaks. Nic is a really good skater, and has an appetite to shoot gonzo / doc style stuff that reminds me of some of Harmony Korine’s work. We came up with the idea for Metal Ramp Kids late at the bar one night, and he went to shoot the pilot solo. It kinda flew under the radar because Youtube put restrictions on viewing it (18+) but I think the next episode should be unrestricted and do the rounds.

In the first installment of Metal Ramp Kids we learned that there are not a lot of things scarier than a table of shit-talking teenagers. They have this ability to make jokes that can send a person spiraling. How the hell did they know I have a troubled relationship with my father? Why am I crying? No, I don’t want to hit your OD pearled spliff, I don’t care that it’s mainly tobacco.

We went to Girl HQ to shoot this little intro for Derick Glancy’s part we premiered. The idea was to show him as a normal 9-5 guy, but he works at Girl Skateboards, so the content was a bit better than if he sold refrigerators or something. We wanted his part to stand out, and seeing that there’s so much content on IG, we thought a bit of background and storytelling would help you give a shit.

It will never not be funny to me that a group of guys left their former company Plan B and ended up birthing Girl. It’s such an obvious joke, one that has probably been made a million times, but who cares? Here’s Rick Howard showing off the first ever Girl shirt, infamously worn to announce their departure at the Back to the City Contest in ’93.

Photos by: Ian Michna
Captions by: Ian Michna, Ben Komins and Wilson Lucas
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