WS Bluebox

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I’ve been playing guitar, mostly electric, since I was 11 years old. Every once in a while, I look for something new to try. It turns out that the very day that I looked at 3 string blues sticks at L&M would be the day I would hear about Cigar Box Guitars and Craig Williams. I knew I didn’t buy the blues stick for a reason! Craig was that reason! I ordered a box right way which turned into a budding musical friendship and inspired the following interview. Also note that 17000 of the Alan Lomax recordings are now available online.

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The Grind

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The two-word term simply known as ‘The Grind’ has become synonymous with long days searching for terrain, swinging the shovel and chucking oneself in the pursuit of building snowboarding video parts. Given the constraints of a single winter season window, the necessity to go out day after day and take advantage of everything Mother Nature has to offer is the rule, thus creating a five-month ritual of many days on, few days off.

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India: Real Streets

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I can’t stop picking my nose. I try to keep my finger out of there, but if I leave it alone for three minutes it just fills up with the city’s residue all over again. I’ve been in massive developing cities before: Lima, Mexico City, Shenzhen, Hanoi…but this? This is crazy. This is New Delhi.

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Five Months of Memories

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In the digital age, it’s easier than ever to relive the past. A simple swipe through your iPhone’s photo album will replace whatever dusty memory may (or may not) exist in your mind, providing mega pixels to reinforce the fact that, Yes, that did actually happen. With winter meeting a lackluster conclusion in Eastern Canada this past week (as anyone working in “the industry” will attest, this was one of our worst seasons in recent history), my pocket-sized memory reinforcer provided evidence that my 2011/12 snowboard experience wasn’t entirely bad. Honest. And here are a few of the photos to prove it.

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Doing It Themselves

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Dylan Rieder – Boneless – El Paso, TX.

This past January a bunch of my friends and I embarked on a little journey down to El Paso, TX (and back). It was a skate mission with the intention of filming tricks for Russell Houghten’s part in Transworld’s “The Cinematographer’s Project“.

While we were street skating around El Paso, (which by the way feels like being in another country) we kept hearing about these city workers that were building transitions into new ditches around the city. Pretty epic dudes if you ask me. Ditches are already pretty god damn good for skating, but when you add some really nice transitions to a few objects you really get somewhere.  Read more

Cheap Film, Expensive Camera

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I’ve been on the road since October of 2011, only to come back recently from Barcelona Spain where I spent a month with a group of guys from the DC Canada Skate team shooting an article for SBC Skateboard magazine.

While on this long stint away from home I spent lots of time shooting with 35mm film on a couple different cameras, documenting the people I was with and places I’ve travelled to. Las Vegas, Toronto, Niagara, Canton OH, Los Angeles and Barcelona where some of the places I called home during this long stint. I didn’t always having the luxury of a Pro Camera Shop close-by to buy the type of film that I’m used to shooting. Even though this can really be a drag, I wasn’t going to let it to stop me from shooting film. Instead I started buying “consumer” marketed film at stores like Souvenir shops, Walgreens, Walmart, Target and pretty much anywhere that had 35mm film available.  Read more

Legend Status: Mike Basich

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After my last post about finding the value of snowboarding’s legends I wanted to get in touch with some of the riders who have reemerged in the spotlight to see why they’ve stuck around and why their experience is important to the future of the sport. By chance I ended up spending two weeks with Mike Basich in Japan this February. It was my first time there and close to his 50th. After 25-years in the game Mikey’s done some shit. Most noticeably he started the outerwear brand, 241, built a secret backcountry zone in Tahoe complete with snowcat and off-the-grid hand-built cabin, made his own documentary, pioneered the action self-portrait, did the most ridiculous heli drop-in to date (eat your heart out Travis Rice), and, at 39, still throws down laid-out backies over 40-foot road gaps. We chatted about where he’s at, what he’s learned, and his role in helping the next generation of pros through his position at Flow. Read more

Transition. Part Three: Fuck it, I’m going swimming.

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Around the time I became a convert to small cameras, I started scuba diving a lot. Obviously the two things would eventually meet and I’d get hooked on shooting underwater photos. I was torn because underwater photography is probably the most expensive form of photography I can think of, and it’s also incredibly difficult and prone to disaster. The thing about taking electronics a hundred feet underwater is that, well, they get flooded and ruined. A lot.

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Behind The Scenes With Ryan and Rowley

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Just after Christmas I had a chance to visit photographer (and fellow Bneeth blogger) Ryan Allan at his place in Oceanside California—just outside of San Deigo. I got to skate around his local park a bit and he let me sit down and chat in front of my camera about some of his favourite photos, his influences, his approach to shooting and more.

It was a good excuse to pick the brain of someone much more talented than myself. And Ryan, thanks for letting some tall Canadian poke through your stuff. Read more

ON SHITCANNING

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Mikey Scott has been harassing me for a column like a loan shark who’s owed money. Which is funny, cause normally that’s my job—harassing assholes who owe me words. To be honest, I’ve been struggling with this whole blog business. I have a problem saying “no” to new projects I think are worthwhile and interesting, even though I absolutely know that I don’t have the time and/or brainpower to fully commit to them. I’ve got five skate mags, four snow mags, two fashion mags and now a new travel/surf mag to get off the ground, plus two huge skate events, so I really shouldn’t be telling Mike that “the column’s in the mail” so to speak. Cause it’s not. It’s sitting in a “to do” pile that’s 10 feet high that has become self-aware. I also suspect it’s plotting to kill me. Read more