The Video of the Week, and probably the homie video of the year, without a doubt goes to Shep Dawgs Vol. 4. With the perfect soundtrack to keep the good vibes and gnarly sessions going, the loads of footage gathered in this true full length video starts off strong and never lets up. It's crazy because quite a few parts could have been the ender, but AJ Zavala (part featured above) puts his name on the radar with some nutty handrail variations and all around ripping. Definitely worth getting the DVD, the Shep Dawgs prove that there's nothing quite like feeding off the energy of each other and skating with the homies.
Cory Kennedy and Bert Wootton had their parts in Rat Poison released by The Skateboard Mag and boy are they awesome! Cory never ceases to amaze in whatever he's trying, be it some dork around trick, some crazy handrail, or a super tech ledge trick (or even making a line out of two varial flips), and Bert strings together some of the trickiest lines (the one at 2:00 is too good) while making everything look like it's nothing. X Games Real Street is bound to make your day better. Even with some arguably strange competitiveness forced by the X Games overlords, these 16 mini parts from your favorite skaters are always worth it. Tom Karangelov's Out of Sync part for Thunder Trucks has a couple of minutes of fast and gnarly skating, never slowing down since his Cold War part.
There's lots of rad London shredding in Innocence & Experience from Hold Tight London Andrew Cannon's latest part for Theeve Trucks is super clean and full of good vibes. Vince Duran has a Surprise Spring Cleaning, which is definitely not as throwaway as it sounds. His fakie ollie and variations with it is for sure one of the best in the game right now. Jon Holland's part for The Cinematographer Project with the Sk8mafia squad was re-released through Transworld this past week and worth a few views if you haven't seen it on the full DVD already.
Some dudes are just natural at skateboarding. Taylor Smith aka T-Spliff is definitely one of them. Now I always love some raw, uncut, behind the scenes footage, so 16 minutes of Taylor getting gnarly without even showing it is just priceless. His make-everything-look-easy style is too enjoyable and the fact that he hits up some of the scariest rails is the reason why he needs to be looked out for this year and years to come. I first learned about him through his WTF part, which was a sick first big part for him, and his Shep Dawgs 3 part (where most of these BTS clips are from) solidified my liking for him. Just look at the 14 minute mark in the uncut clips: Taylor boardslides a super sketchy high rail like it's nothing, and throws in a downhill kickflip because he's got it like that. Then, in prime Shep Dawg fashion, he figures the sketchy boardslide isn't enough, so he kickflips into it and rolls away without flinching once again. Seeing raw skate talent like this never gets old.
Also from this week, in keeping with the "Random Teams" theme, sml Wheels released an awesome 13 minute compilation of their whole team from the past year, including some footage I haven't seen before. sml is another one of those pretty stacked teams so this half-length video is something to get psyched on.
Now I already expressed how Luan's part in Chronicles was a bit disappointing and I think I finally know why. The hype for the video was so big that I was expecting some totally stunning NBDs from Luan (kind of like Shane pulled out), but in actuality he shredded in his usual precise fashion, but without anything completely mindblowing. Luan's new Strike and Destroy part, on the other hand, was described to be a short trip to Brazil to film in the area and came out without crazy anticipation. Couple that with the fact that Luan didn't skate lightly at all and this part is in my opinion much more exciting and entertaining than his Chronicles part. From the not-seen-too-frequently Brazilian streets to Luan's flawless style to his well-picked tricks, and especially to his downhill lines, this part has all the right ingredients to be very tasteful.
In other skate news from the past week:
-John Gardner and Nik Stain both released heavy East Coast video parts for Skate Jawn. Thrasher was totally right in seeing the similarities between John and Zered Bassett...
-One of my new favorite contests in skateboarding, The Berrics and Matix's 2UP contest is amazing so far.
-Brandon Nguyen kills it in his Video Check Out.
-Andrew Norris skates with a solid style and makes some difficult spots look easy in his Mag Minute.
-The lineup alone for Outliers is enough to be stoked on, but the trailer made it all official with Marius Syvanen unexpectedly filling in the last spot.
