I don’t like Jamie Thomas, I’ve heard rumors about some unethical practices, and I don’t appreciate the fact that had a big marketing campaign and skate video with the same name as my skateboard company. So I am biased. What about you?
From ESPN:
New Balance is the latest mainstream brand to throw its hat into the skateboard footwear market.
Based out of Boston, Mass., New Balance is strongly positioned in running and other traditional categories, but has not succeeded in their previous attempts to enter the skate market with the hi-top V74 and the V45 low-top sneaker, released in 2010. Their new entry into skateboarding is called New Balance Numeric or NB#.
New Balance, looking for a strong skate company to help ease their way into the market, will be manufactured and distributed by Black Box distribution of Carlsbad, Calif. Owned by professional skateboarder Jamie Thomas, Black Box currently distributes board brands Zero, Slave and Mystery, along with Insight Apparel and Fallen Footwear
I swear I recently saw an episode of SNL or Portlandia where they equated New Balance shows with senior citizens. When I think of New Balance I think of nylon running shoes. Way to jump on the bandwagon at the very last possible moment.
I get emails all the time from companies trying to extol the virtues of featuring their ads as editorial content. Sometimes they’re just fishing, sometimes there are actual cash rewards implied, usually from car companies or the like. Sometimes I find myself on the recipient list for PR that I’m pretty sure I never signed up for, as was the case with an announcement for this new Osiris commercial. I’m not sure why I clicked through on this one, but I was pleasantly surprised. This is a good advert, just wait for the punchline. Osiris Shoes “This never gets old” after the jump. I wear a size 13 (in uh, Vans) by the way…
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This is old news, but it’s still funny. It’s the Macho Taildrop crew with a video celebrating the Man Wolf éS shoe. The product may be dead but the dub step lives on.
- I can’t remember how I found this.
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The folks (volks) at Made for Skate recently had a display in The Skateboard Museum called Metal Battle in celebration of a Nike SB collab styled after the oldest school Roller Derby skateboards. Dig the inserts on these. The design for the show flyer was lifted from this poster, which was also on display. It’s a vintage 60′s silkscreened poster advertisement for a body shop. I’d place it at 1965-66 if I had to guess. So why was the the show called the Metal Battle? To celebrate they brought out some vintage steel wheeled death traps and had a session. Video after the jump.
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Mike V is making the nostalgia rounds lately. First he ditched his own company to team up with Powell again, and now he’s going back to Airwalk. I had completely forgotten (more likely failed to register in the the first place) that he ever rode for Airwalk. They’re re-releasing the Enigma. as well as releasing some new versions of old classics reworked by Vallely. You can hear him wax poetic about returning to the Airwalk roster after the jump. I think Airwalk has changed ownership at least twice since he left.
[Source: Artist Direct] - Thanks to Tito for the tip.
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Yo Gabba Gabba heads have a fondness for skateboarding, and now they have Vans shoes too. They are expensive, but cool. Too bad they don’t make them in adult sizes. ANohter thing sorely missing, the Gabbas all have models, but there’s no DJ Lance Rock shoes! Killer video after the jump.
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Sounds like an adult film of dubious nature, but its two commercials for shoes by Sketchers, the Airwalk of the new millennium. Ok, that’s not fair to Airwalk. There was another Sketchers Z-Strap commercial a year or so ago. Anyway, animated ninjas and sparkly girls shoes make me want to skate.
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Here’s a pretty cool ad from Converse. It looks much better larger, on Ads of the World. Never actually seen it in a magazine. This isn’t even an add for Converse Skateboarding. Anybody that skates has probably worn Chuck Taylors at one point or another.
Lakai commercial featuring Mike Carroll’s Hangover Flip. I’m intrigued as to how they filmed this. Either a camera on some sort of mount that could be rotated fast and smoothly enough to keep up with the rotating board, or maybe a super high resolution camera with the footage cropped and rotated so the edges don’t show. My guess it the latter. I can’t imagine how you could flip the camera and zoom that precisely at the same time.
- Thanks to Mike Buckley for the tip
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Remember, this ramp is modular and portable. Looks fun as hell, especially when you skate as well as the guys in the video coverage from SoCal Skateparks. Check out those results too. There were some big names in there, but none of them made the top three. Kowalski power! The old Chuck Taylors’s used to be staple because they were cheap, but they were pretty useless in the long run. The best thing they had going was the price. They used to cost about $20 in the 80′s, which seemed about right. Somehow they cost $55 or more now! However… Converse Skateboarding has some shoes that look like they might be worth checking out – beefed up versions with styling reminiscent of the old CT’s, plus a cool looking mid-top too. What’s the point? Oh yeah, watch the video.
