UPDATE
This 1995 Thrasher interview reportedly
got Frank banned from the magazine.
Regardless of industry politics or some unfortunate involvement with a few unpopular skatepark designs (see the comment page, thanks Frank), these classic Foundation-era flicks speak for themselves.
Plus, as Matt Groening's former neighbor, he's supposedly the inspiration for Bart Simpson. Not bad.
Much has been made of the self-cheering in this part over the years... whatever, videos were full of that shit during this time period. If you're old enough, you know you were probably doing the same damn thing yourself back then.
In other news, special thanks to Jim T and Deluxe for their continued support of CBI.
31 comments:
Ripper but I always thought he was a kook when he went through that whole Garcia phase and supposedly he was bummed to be in the Big Brother "yellow" issue because he didn't want to be classified as an Asian skater.
Good skater for sure - always liked his part in the Sims video - but... actually, I can't think why he never registered that much on our radars.
Anyone remember why he was banned from Thrasher?
Yeah Hirata ripped!
How's it going with the Reynolds SOTY interview?
i'm a fan. his Foundation sections were excellent, and had a great BB interview, talking being called "Taquito Roll"...
He was banned from Thrasher because, when they when they profiled him in 1995, he wanted his girlfriend's poetry to appear alongside his interview. When it didn't, he blamed Phelps. Or something.
He had that one good SMA part... a more mature style post Powell, pre Foundation. I was suprised he was doing sw 360 flips in that one.
I've read about his skate park designs and how badly they suck. How hard can it be to design a park LOL
I like the frontside ollie photo at Happy Land.
I have always been misunderstood, that is why being a skateboarder was so appealing to me growing up. I was young and dumb, making mistakes in the public eye at my own expense. At one point I was praised for my talent and creativity, then condemed for poor dicisions made. Now I am humbled and constantly amused by people's vicious interpretations of my so called skate career. Thanks the motivation that keeps my fire burning.
The spot for the kickflip photo is right by my house and is insane. Some incredible street skating happened in Santa Rosa in the 90s...
People would still be running that frontside 360 these days for an ad or whatever...pretty incredible. Big ass physics wheels!
thanks guys.
stay up, xproskater. i wouldn't have spent the time digging up these scans and putting them out there again for people to see if I wasn't a fan. respect.
he always kinda reminded me of keanu reeves in 'my own private idaho'
ok. yeah that vista park sucked. skated it a couple times. but it was still kinda fun. and i've skated worse parks for sure. its been shut down since then because people refused to wear pads or something like that.
i hooked up on a couple street sesssions back in the day with frank; and he was cool to me. but i guess if you piss off the phelper, your days are numbered.
This is the first time I have decided to clearify the skatepark issue in a public forum. So listen, I worked as a skatepark design consultant for Purkiss-Rose. What that means is I was the middle man between the local skaters and the architect. We held public design meetings, usually 3-4. The locals actually designed and approved the final park layout before it was built. So, all the parks that "suck" as well as the really good ones(rarely mentioned) were designed by the skaters that attended the design meetings. More times than not the city would have budget cuts, and instead of re-designing the park to fit the new budget they would "chop" an entire section out of the design, resulting in a tranny to wall effect...super fucked! Since I was the "pro involved" they all became my designs and my responsibility. I quit that business when I saw that I had no control over the finished product and praised the work of design/build firms like dreamland. This has been a huge learning process about people, and the decisions I will make in the future.
I changed the wording of the post to reflect your comments, Frank.
Thanks for coming on here and clarifying. What you wrote definitely makes sense when taking into account all the factors that come into the making of these parks. Sucks it had to go down like that in addition to bringing your name so prominently into the mix with such fiascos.
Stay up holmes. Respect.
Thanks Chops, The Foundation days were magic for me. I appreciate your time and efforts. -Frank
I always really digged Frank's part in the Sheep Shoes video. Still trying to track down that Pink Floyd song.
Enjoying the photos/sequences here although man, I DO NOT miss video grabs anywhere in magazines. I remember a rad shot of Hirata doing a crooked grind up an inclined ledge (which was pretty original for its time) and the caption mentioning something to the effect of no one had any wax, so in a pinch they rubbed a plastic film canister on the ledge and it seemed to do the trick. I'll look around and see if I can find it to scan/send your way.
Thanks for all that you do.
jason bash
ohio
Frank,
As a kid who grew up in the middle of a cornfield in Minnesota, and skated in his basement as much as possible, I don't believe there is any such thing as a "bad" skatepark!!! Your skating was always phenomenal. I remember an old interview where you said you were building a tree house to live in. Did that ever go down?
Loved that you titled the post "Orange Crush." Well played, sir, well played. I always remember the interview with him in TWS where he talked about being on the set of Hook and how Robin Williams smelled funny. Good stuff.
Mike Q., I too can relate to being adaptive (as a street skater)to any skate terrain. Growing up in the non-skatepark era made for a more creative outlook and appreciation for anything skate-able. The ingredients that go into a contemporary park design were infact generated by the imaginations of the skatepark have-nots. As old age creeps up, those real nice, smooth flow-parks feel pretty damn nice! I think it was the old timers who actually begain the movement towards a homogenized park design. Kinda like an easy par 3 pitch and putt golf courses, fun and not too challenging.
Oh, and as far as the tree house, like my life it is a work in progress. -F.H.
Frank,
I second that emotion sir. I lost all my skills (which were not that great to begin with) after I left my little town of Tracy, MN to go to college. But the friendships I have made due to skateboarding have lasted since I was 15 (I am 29 now...ugh).
Everything we did was homemade; pallets for manual pads, homemade mini-ramps; when I worked at a skateshop that I managed for ten years, I couldn't believe all the bitching from kids about how the local parks here in Sioux Falls, SD sucked. So what!! My crew was excited when the city repaved one of my buddies streets! Shit, we sessioned the train tracks in town, back in 1996.
As far as the tree house, I completely understand. I am getting my graduate degree, and all the plans you make do not mean shit; it is ultimately your ability to make the had that you have been dealt count, in whatever you are doing. Thank you for the response; I must say 14 years ago I would never have imagined that a skateboard blog could get me into contact with a skater I respected so much. Thank you Chops, for this blog.
Sincerely,
A washed up old Farmer-Kid Skater
AKA Mike Quinlivan
Yeah I met Frank during the summer of 95 in memphis at the Toy Machine/Foundation demo..he was supercool to me and my friend, we were 14 at the time and enjoyed franks words of wisdom.....
yo chops i have a book that spike jonze and some other dude made back in the day it my favorite skate book from florida , its about learning to skate and all the basics but it has mad sick scans of frank and a bunch of other pros would you be interested in using the pics? if so i would be happy to scan them to you i jus dunno if thats cool since i didn't make the book and all and thanks for all the sick posts keep killing it out there
i liked his part in life of leisure. it was a good opener. and he had some part somewhere that the song said "hirata, hirata, hirata, hirata..." over and over and over. which was miserable. if it was life of leisure, just understand that i am a hypocrite and don't care.
The dude apparently turned down an offer to be a part of the original Plan B team.
I skated with this guy once on a trip to SoCal. Dude was super chill and even humble when we finally asked him who he was. We had the Sheep video and thought it was him. He did 360flips to 5.0 grinds the whole day.
I've always looked down on the Phelper for his "cool-guy" attitude towards FH. Superlame.
Keep roll'n Frank!
Shout-out to Frank from a 26 yr old life long skater born and raised in Morro Bay, Ca. We grew up knowing you went to Morro Bay High School and you lived in Los Osos and I was always stoked to see ads and video clips in the early 2000s with you, like the fs 180 switch crook at that euro hubba. Etched into my mind for life. Me and my buddies got a local skate blog Jazzpush.blogspot.com where we try to give local rippers coverage and we love digging up local rippers from the past, especially old local photos and video. Drop me a line if you have any stories, photos or videos to share. Thanks. Bart. bbodrian@gmail.com Love CBI too. Thanks
Hello Frank, I was/am a huge fan of yours. I remember getting the infamous Curious George everslick as a birthday present when I was 12. Lucky for me my dad didn't look too closely at the deck I chose (I don't think I did either for that matter). I learned to do backside heel-flips on it, which where the first fliptrick I learned. I learned who you were out of curiosity a short while later and as I say became a fan since that time. I met Steve Olson at a demo in British Columbia and was bummed that you weren't there as you were my favorite skater at that time. Are you and Steve still friends? If not what happened? I've always been curious.
Yes! For some reason that photo always stood out to me... I've remembered it and the caption about the film canister so vividly... I stil have an etching of that shot i did in middleschool from back when!
@xproskater Not sure if you will ever actually see this but you were a huge inspiration for me. It was the whole package of style, personality, everything. My art has taken me further than my skating but You and Jeremy Wray and Templeton were all great role models for me. Without needing to open Youtube I can vividly remember so many tricks you landed with perfect style and music. That fakie tre into the marble bank, that switchtre-bringback, that primo slide with the slideout in the rain, all amazing. <3 -@buffalotomholt
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