Oct 24, 2006

the old SK8>BMX cliche.

There seems to be a maturation timeline for any given youth movement, and skating has a whole decade on bmx. Their creative figures are older, their participant base is far larger, their image is established and marketable, and the money at stake is huge. (As a side note, Dig has always been a powerful reference point for the progression of bmx culture, something I'm proud to be associated with and to show people, and I'm immensely pleased that it is finally taking root on the shelves of American bookstores. As a teenager, stumbling across a new issue once a year was a charge of adrenaline, and never failed to cement a little part of my otherwise nebulous bmx identity.)

I learned something new about myself when I saw, for the first time, maybe 1999, the Zero video Misled Youth. Jamie Thomas's part expressed something that I'd always felt but never articulated. Baba O'Reilly became my secret internal soundtrack, not that my feebles and manuals were worthy. I pedalled fast and pumped hard. Here it is on Googlevideo. Jaime's part starts at 11:20.

Some time later I stumbled on Tiltmode: Man Down, and had my internal soundtrack altered once again. This video is practically the opposite of anything done by Zero. No slo-mo, no metal, no angry/angsty punk. The video is instead upbeat, happy, and playful. Whereas I was used to seeing antics in Roadfools and in the credits of bike videos, these guys pulled off their silliness without affectation. Not sure if it's true, but that's what I thought then. The video is longer than it needs to be. I would always just watch the first fifteen minutes and then go ride. I'd be so fired up, I could hardly stand to wait any longer. Tiltmode.

I still love both, and I keep both the Who and Aha on my ipod now, but there's a lot of other stuff on there, too.