Rusell Foisey/A Dangerous Guy

Number two in what I hope is a series of other people doing my “job” here at Skate and Annoy. Local favorite among commentators, JakeandAnnoy interviews Rusell Foisey, a dangerous guy. Let’s see… Russ has been featured here in a Shot of the Week and he rides for Old Man Army. Also, this interview is a bit out of date. Jake gave it to me a little bit before Black September, AKA the Great Skate and Annoy Server Meltdown of 2009. It was probably late before that happened, and then like so many other things from that couple of months, it fell through the cracks. Honestly, I think Jake’s glowing review of another recent interview was his way of saying WTF? Where’s the piece I did for you? Well here it is Jake… Now let’s talk about all the out of focus pictures you gave me and lack of photo credits. But not this photo from Dan Hughes. Anyone heard from that guy since he got married?

Rusell Foisey/A Dangerous Guy
Interview by Jakeandannoy.

13 years ago I met this lanky 14 year old kid with with a big shit-eating grin who even in clumsy beginings, had commitment akin to addiction and sporadic style on a skateboard. We progressed in opposite directions over the years. But damn, he skates like you want to skate- charging, fast, insane, and clean.

Then he got locked up when he got pulled over in Nogales, Mexico, with a trunk full of methenphetamene, guns and the mutilated corpses of two 16 year old prostitutes. He would escape custody briefly only to wander the desert and into the hands of American Boarder Patrol. He awaited his day in court, only to have his butthole hammered into purple roadkill by horny inmates in the intermittence.

He would argue that he understood Mexico as an opposite land-a sanctuary for criminal activity if you will-and also that the prostitutes were runaways so no one could really miss them. After many appeals the death sentence was final and he hadn’t even seen the new Metalocolypse episodes and they made them 30 minutes now, rad! On a very sad tuesday he said his final words to his mother, his victims, and the Arizona sunset. And then ended up shredding at all the Old Man Army crews’ pool parties and BBQ’s and became a strong part in that crew, pushing foward, the local precedent of original skateboarding for the lifers, in a scortching hot-ass state with too much boarder patrol.

JnA: Tell the readers who you is and where you be.

RF: Uhhhhh..I is Russell Foisy and I be in Waddell, Arizona.

JnA: Congratulations on Cash, your new baby boy.

RF: Thank you.

JnA: Um…alot of pressure?

RF: The baby?

JnA: Yeah.

RF: Naw man, he’s easy. He’s cake. Couldn’t ask for a better baby.

JnA: So you just got back from an OMA road trip what was that about?

RF: Well, a about six of us decided to head up to the Tim Brauch Memorial contest in San Jose(CA) so we all packed into Jean’s(Rusen) van to skate the contest.

JnA: And who else went?

RF: Was Brian Bullis, Boise Tom, Mark Partain, Mike(Furst), Larry Martin and his son,Tyler, Wrex Cook…and his girlfriend, Kim.

JnA: See any cool shit?

RF: Grandmasters.(division) Cab. Fuckin crazy how good he is. Clean. Hosoi…Crazy…I know he placed in the top 3, Cab got first. Mark(Partian) took 4th. I didn’t see Lance Mountain and Duane Peters, he was injured. Ben! Dude, Ben Schroeder and some kid from Anti-Hero fucked eachother up, Ben got a black eye!

JnA: Like a brawl? Ben-

RF: No. at the vagabond pool this dude from antihereo was dropping in on the other side of the deep and Ben just rolled in the shallow, and they smacked into eachother in the deep. He got his rib broke I think. Ben got a big ol shiner. They both got fucked up.

JnA: Who was the kid?

RF: Uhhhh..I don’t know he skates for Anti-hero..

JnA: What, like that’s his Cherokee name? “Skates-for-Anti-Hero”? Like “Pushes Mongo”? “Yellowfeather-skates-too-slow”?

RF: No.

JnA: How’d you do in the contest?

RF: 35th of 40, overall.

JnA: So is OMA paying all the bills and putting the bling your neck?

RF: Ahh..haha, naw I think you got us confused with something else. Naw, we’re all doing it for fun. It’s not for profit or just to gain fame.

JnA: So then…you’re like..”working class”?

RF: Heh,heh,heh…ahh….hahaha..

JnA: Wheres the xtreme dollars? You gotta do endorsements, double pits to chesty and so on.

RF: Weeell…Ja-

JnA: Shorty cant eat no boards dawg!

RF: Jack Daniels-thats the big one…but I don’t think they sponsor skateboarding.

JnA: They don’t sponsor at all do they? Unless..beating your wife is a sport.

RF: They sponsor NASCAR.

JnA: Look, you gotta network at these contests,man. T-moble, Hot pockets, Nike, ollie pop, all that shit homie! Im gunna call Shecks and have him hook you up, I got connections.

RF: Uh, huh.

JnA: What are you riding on now?

RF: Old Man Army, Squidboard. Indy 169’s, 64′ Bowl Bombers and some Flip bearings I got four years ago. Still rollin’. Fast too.

JnA: You were a street skater… mostly. And then you progressed in whole other direction.

RF: Sure. When you met me that’s what I did, I threw myself down stairs and shit. But yeah, I moved to Santa Barbara for awhile and when I didn’t know anybody Scott Powers was cool and gracious enough to let me skate the “Wilderness Pool” like 3 times a week. Then Mike Gretzky gave me an old, Powell..pool-shaped board it went on from there. I just think why skate a normal popsicle shape when there are all these other, better shaped boards out there.

JnA: Then you really just went in a different direction. Is that- do you miss the bangers? Like rails and shit? Street footage?

RF: No, not really. Street skating is cool, but I like skating fast, slash grinds, floating big airs. I’d rather be continously moving than:trick-stop, trick-stop.

JnA: Are you the youngest on OMA?

RF: Yeah. By like, 10 years haha.

JnA: I’m not asking how old you are but-

RF: I ain’t a chick, you can ask how old I am. 27.

JnA: Well..I’ll be the judge of that… little lady. Tell me about your first sponsor.

RF: Ed and Kari(Ryan), who ran “Drop In”(skate shop), found some good reason to gve me a sponsorship and hook me up with boards and I was honored.

JnA: You knew I was gunna bring this shit up, and frankly I could barely wait, I wanted to make it the opening question… Who’s targe’ t girl?

RF: Ohhh no. I don’t like this interview anymore. (long pause) Well, someone-I’m not gunna name names-maybe doing this interview right now…

JnA: That’s pretty much saying my name.

RF: …uh, okay-saw it fit to bring home this girl at like eleven at night. Hanging out in front of a closed “Target” with a bag in tote. And she was eager to get in the car-“oh yeah, lets give this girl a ride-that makes sense. Good idea.

JnA: As I remember you were not nervous about bringing her home. You got nervous after we brought her home. Why?

RF: Well, no, I think the roles are reversed here. At least, I remember you being nervous too. We couldn’t find that party so we just brought her back to the apartment. And she scared away all our guests. It was empty in like, twenty minutes. She had that, uh, “tote” with her and uh, just started pulling out her stolen merchandise and using our hangers to hang them up on like, our lamps and shit. I really knew things went south when you, Jake, come running out in a lil’ bathroom towel going; “Oh fuck, this bitch is freaking me out, she just pushed me down in the shower”!

JnA: (me laughing) At one point all our electronics of value were missing (2 x-boxs, 1dvd player), then I found them. Do you remember where I found them?

RF: Naw.

JnA: I found them in your closet.

RF: (Laughing)

JnA: You hid them in your closet when she went to my room. That’s how sketchy you thought that she was. And keep in mind we were both drunk.

JnA: Whats your side of the Sammy Baptista altercation?

RF: Oh,that was a long time ago. Okay, a party over at a buddy-Elizar’s- house, kegs, mini-ramp and uh, alot of the local skate scene over there that night. Y’know, “Shorty’s”, they’re all in Santa Barbara. Pretty much the skate scene. I’ts not like I recognized anyone though. I don’t follow skateboarding or street skaters and like, I don’t know any of em’. And I walk by this guy and a girl talking and I said hey, are you having a good time?! And the girl smiles and says,”no everythings fine, we’re good”. and dude with her, who I didn’t know was Sammy Baptista shoots me a look like he wants to sock me. I was just like, stubborn,. I stood there, I was like, you don’t know me. I went upstairs and then came back down and on my way back out said hi to his girl. He didn’t like that. Anyway, party goes on and I got drunk and annoying and probably did start to run my mouth…and then when I was leaving I hear him talking behind me and he basicly just blindsided me and him and his homies kicked the hell outta me. Hahahaha, He (Sammy) did hit me hard. I like, fell into trashcans. It was kinda funny thinking back….but I was blackout drunk and it was pretty fucked up like, just comming to and being like, a bunch of guys were seriously fucking stomping on me. Hard.

JnA: OKay so thats it. Anyone you want to thank or closing words?

RF: All of the OMA crew- Brian Bullis, Mike Furst, Jean Russin-first time ever woman in the Masters Division- that girl’s my hero man. -At Lake Cunningham-man she kills it. She rips. Wrex, everyone that was on the trip, Mark Partian he can be a grumpy pain in the ass but he’s rad. Chuck for finishing the video-where’s it at, bitch?heh,heh Just the local commmunity and all the geezers that rip.

JnA: By the way sorry, You’ll have to wait on that shirt I promised. Randy said he needs to at least sell one of those SnA shirts before he just starts “giving them away”.

EDITOR’s NOTE: YES I KNOW THERE ARE FOUR PEOPLE OUT THERE THAT I OWE SHIRTS TOO… INCLUDING JAKE!