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Gavin Hills on skateboarding in Ireland in 1989
Only the double act of Vernon-and-Gavin could have handled this for us. Gavin seldom got the chance to address his bigger themes head on in R.a.d, though he was always true to them whenever he could sneak them in. There is nobody else I would have trusted to attempt this — certainly not myself. Sheryl…
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Wurzel at original Meanwhile I
No idea who Krakatoa were, but that’s certainly Wurzel. I’m not entirely convinced that I have the location correctly identified as Meanwhile Gardens in its original form.
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Essjays Adverts and others Christmas 1989
Essjays and Cromer Sports were long-term advertisers. Essjay is still around (I believe and hope), but what of Cromer?
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Custom Riders, not just for Xmas
The advert that stands out for me in this lot is Custom Riders with their prophetic “we’re not just for Xmas” line. No, indeed: they’re still around 17 years later, when many others are history, like the magazine itself. But oh, what a different time that was. Simpler? More authentic? Or were we all just…
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Inter-skateboard prejudice?
The conluding page of this story about the meeting point between freestyle and streetstyle skateboarding includes the plea: “How’s the public going to accept us when most skaters won’t even accept a form of skating?” But who wanted to be accepted in the first place? The divisions within skateboarding are just as much about establishing…
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The freestyle end of things, 1989
This was the freestyle aspect of F.I.S.T in evidence: the type of thing which disappeared from view over the next few years. Hands involved, not just feet. Taking in the longer perspective, from the seventies onwards, that seems to have been one of the fundamental movements in skating. Hands gradually stopped being used to hold…
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Skate City Bromley Christmas 1989 advert
This was the Christmas issue, so advertisers splashed out on bigger-than-normal ads, or switched to colour. Bike City did both with this page which seems to have a touch of the M-Zone about it. The two shops were based relatively close to each other, on the southern fringes of London and must have been rivals…
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Freestyle In Street Terrain — skateboarding in transition
There’s too many laws in freestyle. The idea comes across that if you’re a freestyler you have to skate on your own. You don’t use banks. Some people think you shouldn’t do Ollie tricks. All these rules come across. Captions: Sam Lewis materialised from Southend, did Varial Inverts and lots of other things, made it…
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When freestyle vs streetstyle seemed like an issue
Chris Howell was a freestyler who organised events under the “F.I.S.T.” banner (Freestyle In Street Terrain). As the caption said: On banks (good), Kick-flip Ollie (good), on a freestyle board (could you hold on while I take a quick attitude check on that please?) This was a slightly uncomfortable period as people who had called…
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Fat Willy’s in R.a.d? Surely not…
Where did Fat Willy’s fit into all this? At the time their stickers seemed everywhere and therefore absolutely no part of the underground skate culture. Both this and the Boogie designs adverts may seem innocent enough now, but at the time they would have stood out like sore thumbs. That sounds very snotty, but at…