Tag Archive: 70’s
Saturday Starrs #11: 1978 Pepsi Commercial
This 1978 Pepsi commercial has everything; street skating (well, sidewalks), a dog on a longboard, hockey helmets, gorilla gips, flyouts, freestyle, soft volleyball kneepads, skateparks and more. Watch the video, courtesy of skate and surf film historian Scott Starr, after the jump.
Wheel Packaging part 2
I forgot this one when I made the Wheel Packaging post the other day. It’s Banzai Products wheels. The corresponding check boxes are all blank, so it’s impossible to tell which ones these are. It’s curious that Banzai Products repackaged another companies trucks (ACS) and sold them. ACS stands for American Cycle Systems, by the way, and were still seen advertised in the early issues of Thrasher, if my memory serves correctly. Getting back to it, these NOS Banzai wheels sold for $47 on eBay. Banzai also made a wicked aluminum board too. It’s funny how in the U.S., anything Japanese was considered exotic in the 30’s, evil in the 40’s, cheap and crappy in the 50’s and 60’s, and then Radical in the 70’s and 80’s.
Wheel packaging heyday
I’m a sucker for vintage skateboards, and also vintage packaging. I love how 70’s era skateboard parts were packaged with hang cards and shrink wrapped, made for hanging from those pegs, like you could go to hardware store and pick up some riser pads, trucks and wheels. I got caught up in the moment last month, so I had to let these two items go.
Friday T&A on S&A: Female Athletes
As seen on the Berrics. This is a poster for an adult film from 1979 titled Female Athletes. The folks at the Berrics have not “seen the ‘film’ and have no plans to,” but they did appropriate the image for a t-shirt. Come on. If you are going to rip off the poster, at least watch the movie, or don’t pretend to be so demure about the whole thing, Here at S&A, we’ve got no such hangups. I found the whole thing online and skimmed it for skateboarding scenes, but saw none. I had to skim it, the damn thing is 80 minutes long, and that’s way to long for an adult film. Although you have to admire how they at least try to be like a real film, with a story line, acting and all. Nice original soundtrack too. – Thanks to Mike Estes for the tip.
Ultra Flex Primo Alley Cat
Ultra Flex. I’ve never heard of this company before, but they made skateboards and Primo brand wheels. The parent company was actually Special Products, a division of something called I.I.I., located in San Diego. I couldn’t find anything definite for them via google. They must have spent some cash on this brochure though. In the 70’s you couldn’t get a 1000 full color brocures for $100. First you had to have a photo shoot in a studio. The you had to pay for professional film developing, type setting, ad layout, and mechanical color separations. Plus there was stat camera graphic work too, none of this scanning and resizing in Photoshop, and then emailing a PDF. It was all done mechanically, and this would have been expensive. UPDATE: Added pictures of an old Ultra Flex board.
Return of Saturday Starrs – Hard Waves, Soft Wheels 1977
All hail the return of Saturday Starrs, as well you should. Scott Starr is the ultimate skateboard film historian. He covers the surfing world too, but that’s not for me to judge. Here’s another piece of history that would most likely had been lost to the ages were it not for Scott’s diligence. It’s the opening sequence from a 1977 East Coast skateboarding and surfing film titled Hard Waves, Soft Wheels. Scott’s YouTube channels keep getting shut down, and so a lot of the embedded videos stop working. I’ve gone back and re-populated the ones that he’s uploaded again, in case you are in the mood. It’s like the third or fourth time that I’ve had to do this. We’ll see how long it lasts again. Awesome period piece music in this sequence. UPDATE: I had the wrong video embedded, but it’s fixed now. If you are jonesing for that Captain Kangaroo appearance, it’s over here.
The Carvells: Part 2, and Magnum Bonum
In the dark days leading up to the apocalypse of Skate and Annoy’s web meltdown I featured the Carvells video for L.A. Run. Well, of course that led me to do some further investigating on the internet, and by “investigating,” I obviously meant draining my Paypal account by having a record shipped from the U.K.. In the meantime, House of Neil uncovered a contemporary (at the time) cover of L.A. Run by the Swedish band Magnum Bonum. And yes, it’s in Swedish.
eBay Watch: September 2009
Another month has flown by and here we have another installment of Baywatch. There’s lost more goodies this month, and hopefully some that you have never seen before. The longer I do this the less inclined I am to keep on featuring the same decks from the same companies, high ticket items though they might be. There’s only so many ways to describe a Hawk birdclaw without it being repetitive, so I’ll choose something else instead. It might not be as iconic, or go for as much money, but that’s not what this column is about. It’s not a price guide, more a sampling of what I find interesting, and hopefully you do too. So, variety is the key for me at the moment.
Park-Pro, exclusively at Kmart.
The Park-Pro, not to be confused with Ken Park and one of the most unlikely re-issues. I thought I had a YouTube video with Ken Park giving a parking lot demo in the 80’s, but I can’t find it. Oh well. At least you can still get a quality skateboard product from Kmart. I’m actually digging that die cut grip tape. Maybe I should try to bring that back.
The Carvells L.A. Run
The Carvelles had a bunch of skateboard songs on their 1977 LP Skateboard Rampage. In fact, out of ten songs, only two are missing the word “skateboard” from the title. Two of those are on the very good This Is Skateboard Music collection. This song, L.A. Run isn’t on that collection. All Music doesn’t have an entry for the Carvells, but they appear to be a vehicle for a guy named Alan Carvell, who had a UK hit in the 60’s and sang backups and harmonies for many well known acts in the 70’s and 80s. This video is a 1977 appearance from Top of the Pops. Check out the stage for assorted skateboard props, a ringer in the audience, and gratuitous stock footage from the U.K.. Who are those guys? The Benji Board team has been suggested, since they are skating U.K. spots. Check it out after the jump. – Thanks to Eric Shea for the tip.











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