My Favorite Skate Video Parts
There are so many great video parts that have been created throughout the years. It's amazing to witness skateboarding's progression and how insane things are getting these days. I would like to share my favorite video parts that have stuck with me since I first started skateboarding in 2001.
Frankie Hill - Propaganda (1990)
It wasn't until after college that I started digging into skateboarding's roots. Powell Peralta, H-Street and Santa Cruz Skateboards were putting out some quality skate videos during the late-80s/early-90s. Tommy Guerrero's "Future Primitive S.F." part influenced many upcoming street skaters. Competitive skate park scenes began to fizzle out and the streets started to take over. Pioneers began to mark legendary territory for the rest of us scope out and enjoy. Although his skating career was short-lived (due to a knee injury), Frankie Hill earned his spot as a legendary skater. His style was noticeably "hesh.” Fast skating, sloppy landings, caveman boardslides, hucked ollies, speed checks.... The standout reason why I chose this part was because of the epic mute/japan grab, down the dirt mountain gap. The shot of the run up, the hang time (the dude's floating!) and the stokage whistle at the end makes this my favorite sequence in a skate video.
Mark Gonzales - Video Days (1991)
Who doesn't love The Gonz? Video Days is one of the greatest skate videos of all time. This is where skating on film really started to see a shift. Spike Jonze and the Blind team began to use line-filming to their advantage. Gonz's video part shows how longer clips can reveal more style and creative flow. It is a joy to watch Mark gracefully carve and manual down the street, with Coltrane's "Traneing In" playing. His indy grab down Wallenburg was the first recorded trick at that spot, alongside the boardslide down the Santa Monica double kink. The super stylish frontside boardslide in the parking garage is really cool to see. Mark's skating and personality always reminds me to skate for fun and leave some room for creative flow while skating at a skatepark or anywhere else.
Guy Mariano - Mouse (1996)
Guy Mariano had the sickest style in the mid-late 90s. There is something really special about this part. Herbie Hancock's "Watermelon Man", the switch big flip, the pushes toward the front tail on the fence, the endlessly re-playable switch mid-line turnaround, the switch pop shove-it crooked grind, the small wheels and baggy clothes...it's the coolest part ever. His skateboard repertoire is stacked at such a high level here; it's no wonder why this video part is considered one of the greatest ever made. Guy has an incredible amount of skill and style riding switch. Every time I watch his part, I have a tough time deciphering if he is goofy or regular footed. The filming is fantastic and I believe it captures the west coast style in a definitive way. The clips that are collected here are all gold and the song is just.. tasty. I love this part and I have some memories of me skating through South Bay area schools with this song running through my head. This is the video that will always get me hyped and ready to go out and skate.
Jason Dill - Mosaic (2003)
I love Dill, man. The early-mid 00's is where I really started to pay attention to skateboarding. As a kid, Kerry Getz was my favorite skater, mostly because my friends and I got to meet him and skate the AWS/Habitat training facility for a day. I still enjoy Kerry's part in Mosaic, but Jason Dill's part always stands out in my mind. The "Whose Line is it Anyway?" voice-dubbing improv in the beginning is hilarious! A good song was chosen for the part (Spoon's "The Way We Get By"). I particularly enjoy the fact that he's really only skating and filming at 2 spots (the DIY foundation plaza in Los Angeles and Paral-lel in Barcelona). It's a different pace when compared to other professional parts that have multiple clips from 10+ locations. It's really enjoyable just to watch him skate around and take his time between tricks. His fakie flip, fake front shuv and front crook line is really sick. His flick on the fakie flip looks really good on film and he had a front crook pinch before "the pinch" was a cool thing to do. Mosaic, Inhabitants and Mind Field were some of my favorite videos growing up. I love skateboarding and I hope that I will be able to get back on my board soon.
Honorable Mention:
Heath Kirchart - Mind Field (2009)
Song: "Speedway" - Morrissey
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZdsdeY5N40
