Keon Ex Vandals

I first met Keon at a legal wall in the Bronx. While we were painting, I noticed he was wearing Half Cabs. I told him those were my favorite skate shoes. "You're a skateboarder?" he asked me. I said yeah. He put his can down and took out his phone and showed me a picture of a dude skating a pool and said, "that's me in 1977." It was then that I realized I had my next subject for this project. 

What did you get into first: skating or graffiti?

I got into skateboarding first. A bunch of the kids on my block skated, but none of them wrote graffiti. This was on Church Avenue in Flatbush, Brooklyn. And remember, Brooklyn back then was a different place, as was the whole city. Neighborhoods were either all white, all black, or all Puerto Rican. That's it. And there weren't many skateboarders at all. At that point my hair was long and I wanted to be one of the Dogtown boys. Skateboarder magazine had just come out, and we'd see pictures of guys skating banks and so on, but we didn't have that here in the city; that wasn't our landscape. So my friends and I would look for different types of terrain to get radical. We found little waterfall pools in front of buildings in Brooklyn that had banked walls to keep the water in. So we skated those and would eventually get chased out by the doorman. Brooklyn College also had all-brick banked flower gardens that we would skate.   

 

Keon in Kings Plaza, Brooklyn 1977

Then I went to high school on 74th Street in Manhattan. That's where I met Andy Kessler, who was such a little rowdy and wiry dude, as well as a great skater. I also met Puppethead at that time, and Billy Gately who would vic all the Upper East Side kids who had just gotten new FibreFlex boards. We'd skate around the conservatory lake and hills in Central Park, and also all the pools in Riverdale. We were always getting chased out, but it was just about the fun of skating around with a pack of kids. We were like a posse of kids skateboarding. We were like the Dogtown kids of the east coast.   

Then in about 1979, '80, a couple of skateparks were built on Long Island. One in Northport and one in Farmingdale. I would skate these parks with my cousin, Tim. There was another place in Huntington, Long Island, which was an old warehouse that was turned into a skatepark. 

 

I ended up getting on this guy Bernie's skate team. Bernie made a prototype skateboard called RHI, started a team, and had a tryout at the Farmingdale skatepark. It was just S runs, no vertical. Tim and I made the team. Bernie took us to an expo at the New York Coliseum on 57th Street and Columbus Circle, where we met some of the California teams. This was a huge thing for me because I idolized these people. I met Russ Howell (the 360 king), Steve Shipp, and Curt Lindgren. Curt, who was on the Free Former team and who invented the kickflip (originally the "Curt flip"), and I connected, so he asked his agent if he could come to Brooklyn with me. Curt ended up sleeping over my house and skating our spots in Brooklyn. This was like having a rockstar sleepover. I was in such awe of this guy. 

Then there was Amyer's pool. My friend Luke Moore, who was a surfer/skater, was a caretaker for a mansion in South Hampton, Long Island, owned by an old lady named Mrs. Amyer. She had an emptied kidney-shaped pool in her backyard. We had the place all to ourselves. Glen E. Friedman came out to Amyer's with us and shot photos of Luke, which got into Skateboarder Magazine. And in 1981, I won the Blizzard Skateboard Contest in Central Park, both in freestyle and slalom.    

Keon shredding Amyer's pool.

 

How did you get into graffiti?

There was this kid in my neighborhood named Bill Hartung who would do bubble letters on the bottom of his skateboards. Everything was "Cat." Bill would write, "Cool Cat," Crazy Cat," "Top Cat." So I wanted my name on the bottom of a skateboard, and Bill gave me Crazy something, And I was just in awe of the bubble letter artwork he did. And this was on an old Roller Derby wood deck with metal wheels, before the clay wheel had come out. That was about 1974 or '75. I was also seeing bubble letters from All 1, Comet, Cliff, CA (Captain America) on the trains, which reminded me of Bill's skateboards. So between seeing what was on the trains and on Bill's skateboards, that's pretty much what got me into graffiti. 

I'm an Ex Vandal now, but in my neighborhood (Flatbush, Brooklyn), they were the premier group back then in my very segregated-black, white, Puerto Rican-neighborhood. They were young teenage black kids. That's who I used to see up: Scooter, Daddy Cool, Wicked Gary (who was one of the presidents), Savage, DINO NOD, Pinto. These were kids who had tags all over my neighborhood. I never knew any of the Ex Vandals back then except for The Block and Savage. And it was almost like looking at things that were threatening to a certain point. With all the markings on the wall, and being a white kid in an all-black neighborhood, it was a scary time and a scary place. But I liked the graffiti tags. It's funny, because now, as I'm 40 years older and not really writing graffiti other than on legal walls, the Ex Vandals put me in their group to further their name.  

How did you get your tag?

First I had Tex, then Mad Cal (which are my initials). Then some of the funky soul came out, and I got my name from an Eddie Kendricks song, "Keep On Truckin'". Keon, short for Keep On. 

Who did you look up to in skating?

Jay Adams was my favorite skateboarder. And of course all the Dogtown kids. I didn't really look up to them as much as I looked up to the palm trees and what it was out there (California) that we didn't have out here and always dreamed about. 

Who did you look up to in graffiti?

Comet-I loved his letter styles. All 1 and TJ 159. You know the show Welcome Back Kotter? Well, the train that passes through Midwood High School in the opening credits - any one of those guys on that train was my idol. I always wanted to write my name like they did, but I had parents, especially an Italian father, who I had to answer to. So I couldn't go out at two o'clock in the morning. Therefore, I was more of a street/truck tagger, rather than a train bomber. I had maybe four, at best, pieces on a train, which were all done with my friend Joust on the M train at the Sheepshead Bay/Kings Highway layup. I met Joust at a street fair on Cortelyou Road in Brooklyn. We were best friends - skate partners first, then graffiti partners. 

Joust & Keon tags rockin' at CBGB

What is it about these two subcultures, skating and graffiti, that they attract a lot of the same guys?

They were both about rebellion. I was a rebellious kid, and they were both ways to be different. It was a way of seeing yourself outside of the muckety muck. And these subcultures always coincided. For example, I worked as a skate guard at the Roxy Roller Disco from 1980 to '85, when they had a hip hop night. It was there/around that time that I saw the hip hop culture morph with the art culture and the graffiti culture. The same way skating morphed with graffiti. Skateboarding was always an underground culture, like graffiti. So the two of them had a lot in common, but nothing in common at the same time. They were just underground cultures. 

What I am really proud of in 2023, is that I was there in the beginning of the skating/graffiti/hip hop movement. I saw it all firsthand, and all of my friends either created it or were it. I would say because of me and my friends, as time went on (this is before 1980) skating became a little more popular here in the city. Back then it wasn't in the culture, but it started to arise, and you see what it is now. It's like how graffiti has morphed, skateboarding has morphed. 

Last question: will you hit my book?

Of course I'll hit your book.

Pope RUH

Pope is the first west coast skater/writer to be featured in this project. I’ve been following his skate career for over two decades, but it was only until I started following him on Instagram that I realized he also wrote. Last month, I noticed he was posting skate and graff pics in Brooklyn. So I cold DM’d him to see if he’d be down for an interview. After checking with a mutual friend of ours that I wasn’t a cop, he responded in the affirmative.  

Which did you get into first, skating or graffiti?

Skating.

PHOTO: @DERRICKGERLACH

How did you get into skating?

I was born in a city called Baldwin Park, and we moved out in ‘85 because the block was just getting too hot. So we moved a few cities over, which was a little more bourgeois. Then we saw some kid come down the block skating, and my older brother started skating with him. And when I turned seven I got my first board. So I just followed my brother and his friends around. They had a skate crew called Team Woody and they ripped. But around ‘87, when I hit Pipeline and all that, that’s when skating got real for me.

Who did you look up to in skating?

Quy Nguyen is number one. Quy is the dopest to me. Then in no particular order, I like Gino, Guy, Keenan, Koston, Caesar Singh. Puleo, who didn’t have to flip in or out, but was still dope as fuck-that’s hard to do. That’s hard to get away with, and he did it. Also Marcus McBride. And Richard Mulder, seeing what he did on the daily made me skate better. I owe a lot to Richard. As far as new dudes, of course Tiago, he’s a beast.

How did you get into graffiti?

Well, I always loved it. The first graffiti I remember seeing was when I was like 10 or 11 years old, and it was by this crew YGW, Youth Gone Wild. They had this huge roller at a Park N’ Ride on a huge cement wall right off the Fairplex exit. I was baffled like, “how the fuck did they do that?!” 

I remember going to LA and seeing Saber, and GKAE, who was probably the most up. I remember seeing the fire escapes, thinking that was the coolest shit ever. Then Fart and Barf came and crushed it. I would see Hilo and Okaer in the early ‘90s. I didn’t know them then, but now they’re my homies. Hilo actually went to my school and I’d sell him skateboards. Then one day I saw Hilo was in an art show, so I went to peep it. And the homie I was selling boards to was there and was like, “What’s up, what are you doing here?” I said I was here to see the Hilo stuff in the show, and he said, “yo, that’s me.” I was like, “shut the fuck up!” A few years later we started painting trains together, and he put me on his crew, STS.  

2005 is when I really started painting on things. That’s when I met my homie, Keyps OCP. Going to downtown LA, the first building you see, he had a hang-over, with Okaer. “Keyps Okaer,” it was like a landmark. I met him at a party one night, he asked if I wrote. I was like, “nah, not really.” Then he asked if I had a car, and I was like, “yeah.” He goes, “I got paint, money… You down to drive around? I’ll show you what we do.” So he took me on my first mission, and I was hooked after that. It was like skating – you gotta scope out the spot and all that. 

How did you get your tag?

My mom is Catholic and she named me after the Pope. My name in Arabic is “Hona Bulis.” So at first I wrote “Hana,” but then I switched it to “Pope.” I just thought it worked. 

RUNNIN' UP HARD ON THOSE BROOKLYN ROOFTOPS

Who did you look up to in graff?

Honestly, the dudes I’m homies with now. Like Okaer, who skates, too. And Hilo, who I used to sell skateboards to at the skatepark. He’s OG – he used to do walkouts back in the late ‘90s before people were really doing that. Then there’s GKAE, who had fire escapes on lock. Fire escapes are like the Lockwood table of graff for me. I love fire escapes, and GKAE had ‘em smashed in LA. I wasn’t really writing when he was active, but I was definitely influenced by GKAE. Then the combo of Fart and Barf, just seeing that tag team, that was cool to me. Reakt is a big influence, too. He’s the dude who got me in RUH. Of course without the homie, Keyps, I wouldn’t be writing.

OKAER, REAKT, HILO, KEYPS

What is it about these two subcultures that they attract the same people? 

It’s the same kind of mission. You drive all the way to LA and you got 15 minutes to get your trick. Graff is the same thing. You get on a rooftop and you might have an hour, or you might only have ten minutes, and you try to pull something off that looks dope and get away with it. Like with skating, if you can get a trick before you get the boot, it’s the same kind of feeling. So I got the same feeling from graffiti that I got from skating, which I wasn’t able to do anymore because I was injured. It kind of filled a void for me. Then I just fell in love with it. 

In skating, skatepark clips are not cool. In graff, legal walls are not cool. So would you agree that skatepark footage is the equivalent of a legal wall?

Yeah, it’s the same. I don’t fuck with legals. You can sit there all day with your $18 can of paint and make something look cool. But if you go do it in the streets and deal with the elements, it might not look as dope, but I respect it more. Legals are like a skatepark trick; nobody wants to see a clip at a skatepark.

Back in the 80’s and 90’s, skating and graff weren’t accepted by the mainstream. Nowadays they are a lot more so. How do you think this warm welcome from the masses has changed these subcultures?

As far as skateboarding goes, it’s good. Think about how much a basketball player makes. Millions of dollars. Of course there’s a bigger fan base, but what we do is way fuckin’ harder. The most I ever got was $1,200 a month. And I’m like, “I’m out here killing myself for $1,200 a month and no medical insurance?” So in that way, the popularity is good. But now you got a bunch of cornballs doing it. I seen a dad and his kid skating down the street, dad pushing mongo, and my homie was like, “that’s so cool and so terrible at the same time.” 

For graff, it’s bringing all the toys out the woodwork. It’s terrible for graff. But some dudes are making money off of it. They have huge followings and they’re selling their art work and that’s cool. But it’s just bringing out too many toys. There’s too much terrible graffiti out there. I’m not saying I’m the best, but I respect the rules and I learned my history.

 

Last question: will you hit my book?

Oh yeah. 

Bobby Puleo

Bobby Puleo is no stranger to the skate world, and his knowledge of its culture runs deep. But what some skaters might not know is that Bobby is also no stranger to the world of graffiti, and his knowledge of this art form and its culture is just as impressive. We met up at his local coffee shop and spoke about how these two two subcultures have been interwoven throughout his life and career. 

Devs, in action.

What did you get into first: skating or graffiti?

Well, the first time I was exposed to graffiti was probably in the early ‘80s. My father drove a container truck, and one day he drove it to our house and had me and my brother come out to see it. Some graffiti writer had painted the container, and it looked almost as if it was a permission piece. Me and my brother just sat there and stared at it like it was the coolest thing. That made me think, “What is this?” So I was always curious about it.

In terms of writing graffiti, I never put a lot of energy into it. There was a point I was taking tons of marker tags, but not so much with paint, because by that point I was on my way to becoming a pro skater, so I spent more time skating. But I always had markers on me.

How did you get your tag?

I started writing Devo in high school, around 1990. But once I started coming into Manhattan I saw another Devo, so I changed it to Devs. But then I saw Devs CM tags on the West side, so I started writing it with a ‘Z’ (Devz).

Who do you remember being up a lot in your early days of graff?

When I was a kid I used to drive from Clifton to Lyndhurst (NJ) and I’d see graffiti right outside the Lincoln Tunnel. Two tags that stood out were Tac and Era. Also Casio, and this other guy Panic took highway tags. I took the PATH train and would get off at 9th St & 6th Ave or World Trade Center, so I was predominantly on the West Side of Manhattan. I really liked Fort, he was one of the guys who crushed the Village and the West Side. Deal RFC was super crazy back then; I met Seno (KSA) and them down at the Banks; VFR and Sev were all over down by the Banks; Cbee was up; the JA/MQ beef was incredible to see; Dear and Kaz were up. The Banks was essentially a graffiti museum. Everyone knew to catch tags at The Banks because they would get in the magazines.

Who did you look up to in your early years of skating?

I started skating in ‘84/’85 and I got my first video around ‘86/’87, which was the NSA “Shut Up and Skate” contest in Houston. I saw “Future Primitive” right away, and all the Powell stuff was huge at the time. I’d see Mark Gonzales in the magazines, and he was the top of the crop in street skating. And of course you had Tommy and Natas right behind him. There was also Mike V. when Public Domain came out, and because I knew he was from NJ and skating in Manhattan. Those guys obviously. It wasn’t until “Shackle Me Not” came out that I was exposed to Matt Hensley and I became enamored by his technical abilities.

Your La Luz part had shots of graffiti; what was that about?

At the time I had a video camera, and I would just record shit. I would use my video camera almost like a still camera, and my idea was to capture certain tags and fill-ins and intersperse them with street shots. I edited the film to Fear “I Love Living in the City” and I cannot find the edit that I made. But I have all the original footage. It starts off with me coming out of a hatch on the bike ramp of the Manhattan Bridge, then it went into dudes pissing on the street and random city stuff. But I had captured a bunch of graff; Trip was going crazy; there’s a Dear fill-in; there’s some VFR stuff. So as we were editing La Luz, I put that stuff in. And you know what, if you watch “Future Primitive,” there’s a Sev fill-in at The Banks.

Sev fill-in at the Banks.

So would you say it was inspired by that? 

Yeah, you know, subconsciously. The subconscious mind is able to absorb a lot of stuff. It’s interesting how things get spit back into your consciousness.

What is it about these two subcultures that they attract the same person?

It has its own language. You have to be initiated into it. It’s performance based, so your ego has to be driven towards that life. It’s judgmental. You have to be open to criticism, and a lot of skaters and graffiti writers are highly critical of not only others, but also themselves. You hold court. It’s a culture, and with a culture comes a peanut gallery that you’re a part of. Also, spots, if you have that mindset. Some writers barge it, and some skaters just barge it. They’re both a grimier side of society, maybe not today but more so back then. I always say that in skating, you’re always a consumer, no matter how high you make it. If you make it as a pro, you’re still always a consumer of the culture, and sometimes the product. Graffiti is less commercialized.

Grey and Devs, blockbustin'.

Back in the ‘80s and ‘90s, skating and graff weren’t accepted by the mainstream. Nowadays they are a lot more so. How do you think this warm welcome from the masses has changed these subcultures?

Every time I see a train go by with an advertisement on the side panels, I think how crazy it is that it’s ok for a large company to pay the MTA to put their advertisement for something that might kill you across the side of a train. It’s just like what Stecyk said about skating, “Two hundred years of American technology has unwittingly created a massive cement playground of unlimited potential. But it was the minds of 11-year olds that could see that potential.” Same thing applies to space and advertising and the ability to catch an eyeball. These were kids that were doing it (young graffiti writers in the ‘70s and ‘80s), and they understood that the best place to advertise is right there across the side of a train.

You’re gonna get a guy like Nyjah Houston, when he’s skating he’s dressed like running back would dress at spring training. I’m not saying that’s a byproduct of it becoming more popular, but it’s just brought in more people. So with more people coming in, and more skateparks being built to accommodate those people, you’re going to get a more uniform culture. There’s going to be more clones of this type of skater, and they’re all gonna learn on the same objects, and there’s gonna be less style. The tricks, the environment, everything is becoming more similar, more homogeneous. It’s not necessarily a problem, it just depends on what you’ve been exposed to. A skateboarding trick is a skateboarding trick, skateboarding is skateboarding, it’s how you look at, it all comes down to your personal perception. You can look at it negatively and have it affect you. Like the Jason Jesse quote, “I love skateboarding so much I want it to die.” It can be positive or negative. There’s a certain melancholy to loving something so much. At the end of the day it comes down to the act of skateboarding and what you attach on to it is your own psychosis.

Photo @DBAKES2011

In skating it’s not cool to film at skateparks. In graff it’s not cool to paint legal walls. So are legal walls the graff equivalent of skatepark footage?

Enough time has elapsed that it’s like, “If I’m going to see Gino skating a skatepark, give it to me.” Is VFR going to do a legal wall? I’ll take it. The thing is, they’ve earned the right. The thing about skating and graffiti is that it’s still skateboarding and it’s still graffiti. You’re looking at his letters, not necessarily the spot. But it depends what he does at the spot. A backside tailslide on a quarterpipe, for example, where the hell are you going to find a quarterpipe out in the wild? When graffiti was written on trains, it’s like, what’s the difference between the letters somebody puts on a train and a wall inside of a gallery. There are only certain tricks you can do on a quarterpipe, and if I’m going to watch Gino do it, I’m like, yeah I don’t care. And both subcultures had a similar trajectory: parks came in, parks went out; the gallery scene came in, and the gallery scene went out. Also, if you saw Hosoi on a vert ramp, you wouldn’t be like, “this is stupid,” your mind would be blown. And seeing a Sento piece in an art gallery, your mind would be blown.

Last question: will you hit my book?

Yeah!

 

 

 

Hour KRT

 

I first met Hour at Astor Place in the mid/late 90's. I remember him keeping to himself while skating really well. That’s what stood out most to me about him—he was a humble ripper, someone you rarely came across in the NYC skate scene of the 1990’s.

As usual with graffiti, I heard through the grapevine that he wrote ‘Hour’. So the next time I skated with him, I delicately broached the topic. Luckily he was receptive, and our friendship gained a new commonality.

When I started this project, it had been a few years since I last spoke to Hour. After searching for his info and getting in touch, I asked him if he was down for an interview. Luckily again, he was receptive.

 

What came first, skating or graffiti?

Graff came first. I started seeing guys in my neighborhood (Chelsea Projects) doing graffiti when I was young – specifically this family, the Marrero brothers. This kid name Baby Luis, who had a crazy rat tale/mullet, would walk around with a used JVC boombox, and his brother, Boobie, would be practicing burners in the back parking lot of my projects. So I’d go to school trying different designs on my Trapper Keeper. Then I got my hands on a Sharpie and started drawing on the bathroom stalls. It started from there and I kind of became addicted.

What year was that?

It had to be ’87 or ’88. You know at the time as a kid you go through different fads, but that one stuck with me. Everyone wanted to play video games; I’m thinking about how I’m going to see my name up somewhere.

How’d you get your tag?

I inherited it from this kid named Manny from my neighborhood who used to skate, too. He used to write Hour, and a lot of the KRT dudes used to hang out my neighborhood, specifically this guy Dock KRT, who looked like a Descendant from Azgard – he was diesel with a huge red beard, always wore 40 Below Timberlands, and used to drink Crazy Horse. So I always seen graff over there. I used to see Manny drawing in his blackbooks and I was like, “this kid’s good!” So he gave me a couple outlines and styles to practice. And me as a kid I was so happy that someone that understood the culture on a higher level than I did took a shining to me.

 

Hour after Hour

How did you get into skating?

There were kids in my neighborhood who skated, and I had a Variflex that my mom got me from Toys R Us which I used to knee board around the parking lot on, but I wasn’t that serious about it. But I was rollerblading at the time. And in 1995 I was at Union Square one day, and I had my rollerblades off and this kid Duke from Queens let me see his board. I was doing tic tacs and I remembered seeing some kid do what I now know is a slappy. I saw the sparks and thought it was so cool. So I kept ramming the board into the sidewalk trying to emulate the trick I saw. I probably tried it for four hours and my boy Duke is like, “Can I get my board back?” And I was like “Wait, I gotta do it.” Finally, as the sun was going down I was like, “I gotta do it.” So I went up to the curb, slapped my trucks onto the curb, and actually stood on the curb like a stall, and I was so happy, thinking, “I have arrived; this is it.” I sold my rollerblades and never looked back.

There were a handful of dudes that would take the time out and show the younger generation things, like this kid named Vince, who was homeless and would always sleep around Union Square.  He was nice, people slept, he had a real unorthodox, but clean, style on the board. I would do kickflips, but turn my body. So Vince took me over to this scaffolding on 14th St. where the Diesel store would end up, and he was like, “Hold on to the scaffolding and train your body to keep from turning.”

I got my first actual board, a Zoo board, with my own money from Supreme. It was a blue True East board with a movie theater on it. My boy Manny just had a baby, so I didn’t know many people skating at that time, so I just skated with random kids. And then I met Akira at Union Square. There’s this kid looking like Method Man with crazy braids and an upside down visor, and pow! He just ollies the handrail! And I was like “Who is this dude?” We just started talking, and then me and that dude were inseparable from then on.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BDEcDg1t2vq/?igshid=1t8pblfr8ig2h

Video: Bryan Chin

So how did you start getting boards from Zoo?

Around 1996, me and Akira were skating the jersey divider in front of Union Square, and I was learning blunt slides and wallies on it. Eli Gesner from Zoo York was there that night, wearing a black Zoo hoodie and skating a Zoo tag board. He came up to us and asked how long we had been skating for. I was like, “I don’t know, a year and a half or something.” And he was like, “Wow, you guys progress quick!” Then he goes, “What are you doing tomorrow?” And I’m thinking, “Who is this old dude?” Eli said, “I work for Zoo. I want you guys to come by.”

So the next day, we were so excited we didn’t even go to school. We went to the office in the afternoon, and I remember getting out of the elevator and it smelling like incense. We got introduced to a couple people, then Eli took us to a locker with mad boards and he was like, “Which one do you like?” I picked a Peter Bici with the Albanian flag. And it was over after that. Now we’re going to Zoo to get boards.

Switching back to graff, who did you look up to in the early days?

Well, growing up in Chelsea and living near the High Line, what always stood out the most was Cost and Revs. I remember asking my mom, “What’s Cost and Revs?” And she’s like, “I don’t know.” But definitely Cost and Revs. Definitely JA, seeing him everywhere. This dude Doms KOC, who I ended up running into later in life. He used to bomb with Pona and they had the Westside Highway on lock. Definitely Trip KRT, JDone, Spot, Slash, SN, Giz, Skuf, Nato, Bruz. These were real prolific dudes.

 

How did you get down with KRT?

The area I grew up in was definitely a hub, because all the trains passed through and all the clubs were there, so different graffiti writers would always come through. I remember one day JA was hanging out, and there was a bunch of black, juicy tags on the back of all the benches that said, “JA 5×7 JA 5×7 JA 5×7” on all the benches. And I was like, “What’s five times seven mean?” And JA says, “Five by seven. That’s the size of jail cell, shorty. You don’t ever want to go there.” I was like, “Alright. I’ll see y’all later.” But anyway, this kid Acer used to do a lot of burners in my neighborhood, and I would come out because they would have the radio playing and they’d be drinking and partying. Doc KRT would be hanging out, too.

Doc ended up getting locked up, and Acer had been writing to him in prison. Acer told Doc that I was doing my thing with graffiti, so Doc gave me the pass to keep the Chelsea chapter alive. Next thing I know, Net hooks me with Cost through Instagram, and he starts commenting on my flicks saying he likes that I’m stirring things up the way it’s supposed to be done. But once I threw up that KRT on the wall, it was on.

 

KRT crew, reppin'

Who did you look up to in skating?

I’d have to say, my first and all-time hero is definitely Harold Hunter. But the funny thing is, I met his brother, Ron, first through rollerblading. So around the time I gave up rollerblading, I see Harold with a skateboard, but I thought it was Ron. And I was like, “What’s up, Ron?” And Harold’s like, “Nah, yo, you must be thinking of my brother.”  Now I start seeing features change and he’s like, “I’m Harold. I skateboard, I don’t rollerblade. What’s your name little man?” I’m like, “Anthony.” And he goes, “What’s up Anthony? You gonna skate or what?” This was when I started hanging out at Astor Place, and I’d sit in front of the Starbucks and watch dudes play skate. People like Chris Keefe, Ryan Hickey, Huf, Keenan, Matt and Mike Bell, Ivan, Javier, the list goes on. I was like, “This is amazing.” Steven Cales would skate in Timberlands. I remember one night, there was something wrong with my board, so I was sitting on the curb watching Huf and Keenan playing like 40 games of SKATE. When they finished, Keenan was like, “Yo shorty why aren’t you skating?” I was like, “I just started and I’m not that good yet.” He was like, “Let me see your board.” He looks at my board and tests the tail for pop, and he was like, “Nah, man you can’t be skating around on this.” Pops his board up and looks at it, and he’s like, “Here yo, this is yours.” I’ll never forget, it was a Chico Brenes board with a little gorilla on it playing the drum, it had black and silver Spitfires classics with Venture highs. I was so happy and he just walks off toward 3rd Ave. So Keenan is right there with Harold. Just raw talent, and I studied his style and all his videos.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BDEc5ict2hW/?igshid=g8z22vkoe89n

Video: Bryan Chin

What do you think it is about these two subcultures, graff and skating, that attracts the same type of dude?

They’re both raw and rebellious. And they’re both tribalistic and family oriented. Graffiti you got your crew. Skating you got your crew. And a lot of skaters and writers I know didn’t want to conform to a format that’s so predictive, so they find these niches and tribes of people that feel the same way. That’s why I think graffiti and skating go so well together. They’re both stress relief, expression relief, and overall escapism.

In skating it’s not cool to film at skateparks. In graff it’s not cool to paint legal walls. So are legal walls the graff equivalent of skatepark footage?

That just sounds like people trying to point the finger because they’re not representing and they’re not doing anything for themselves. What people fail to realize is all elements are elements. I don’t knock nobody for doing legal walls. That’s been going on since Lee and Zephyr. You gotta branch out. You can’t just keep running from the police. Who the fuck wants to keep running from the police all the time? Not me! Sometimes I want to be able to set up my cans and convey my thoughts onto this canvas or truck or legal wall or whatever.

In regards to skatepark footage in a video part; it could be freezing outside! I can understand how people want to see certain things, but at the same time, if you want to see something, you gotta be the creator of it. I’m not gonna sit here and throw stones in a glass house, I’m gonna be the one who’s creative and do something cool. But there are so many people that want to talk smack. Perform! That’s it.

 

Back in the 80’s and 90’s, skating and graff weren’t accepted by the mainstream. Nowadays they are a lot more so. How do you think this warm welcome from the masses has changed these subcultures?

I think it’s beautiful. I can’t be jaded in my more adult years because I’ve seen the game change so much. It’s just another cycle. If people want to do murals and legal walls, get money! People try to hate, but check the scoreboards!

 

Like he said, check the scoreboard.

Any shout outs?

Akira, KRT crew, Cost, Net, Claudia, Earsnot, Mom and sister, Amy, RIP Harold Hunter, RIP Keenan Milton.

 

 

 

 

 

 

FCEE GAS

 

FCEE has been skating and writing in NYC for four decades. He bombs while riding his board, and his tag has roots in skating–FCEE fits the bill perfectly for this project. We sat down for this interview at the end of 2019; now we are in a new year and a new decade, and I am certain FCEE is going to continue to maintain a steady presence in both scenes for a fifth decade. 

FCEE at the Martinez Gallery

 

What came first: skating or graffiti?

Writing, at a very young age; like ’82. These guys known as the Majestic 5 (dj crew) used to hang out at my stepmom’s house in Corona. This guy Hec had his jacket done up and I was stoked on that. I was always doodling and everyone was into graff. I was always into art; all my grades were fucked up except for art. At age five I was drawing on my mom’s walls at home, and she was like, “Chill!” So she put paper on the wall and I’d draw on the paper. But even before that, I lived on Long Island for a short period of time in a town called Massapequa Park; I was there for 2nd and 3rd grade, I think. There was this kid Steve, he was into drawing airplanes and shit, and he was also into writing. He didn’t really bomb, but he was into it. And that’s where I picked it up. But I didn’t get a name until like ’82 or ’83.

How’d you get your tag?

I started off writing “Kid” because every called me “kid.” There was this dude “Mega” aka “Mr. Cleen” and he was like you can’t write Kid because there’s Kid 56, and Kid this and that. So in like ’84, I’m starting to push around on the board. I was back in Flushing and looking for people to skate with. I ran into a lot of guys from 165 Park, on Kissena Blvd: Mace, None, Swave, Sumar, and Nom, and half of them skated.  By ’85/’86 I was skating at the Banks. There was this kid from Jersey who I used to skate with there. He was always rockin’ a tube sock on his head and he had this whole flower power thing going on. He got hit by a car going over the wall and ending up dying from his injuries. He was known as Flower Child. So in memory of him, I was like, “I’m gonna rock FC.”

By ’87/’88 I had compiled enough sketches and practice. Two kids in my neighborhood that I was skating with took up writing: Both and LM. Both was going to a school in LIC where you had the SPORTS crew. Smith threw him down with AW. Vamp started writing in ’89. I met my boy Docs and he was skating and into punk and hardcore. So we became bombing partners, hitting everything on our boards. Between the four of us, we started a crew called ESP – Even Skaters Paint. By 1990, the machine is well oiled, and we were skating, going to shows, and bombing at night.

 

How did you get into skating?

The first time I got on a board was ’84. I moved around a lot growing up. I lived between Queens and Florida. I was in school in Fort Lauderdale, and made friends with dudes that skated there. This one dude in my neighborhood had a Lester Kasia with OJII’s. I said, “This board is really cool.” And he was like, “You want to borrow it? I’m leaving town for a little while.” I’d skate it around, and my dad was like, “Whose skateboard is that?” I was like, “It’s this dude’s from over here.” And he was like, “You really want a skateboard?” I was like, “Yeah!’ So he got me a Variflex, which wasn’t what I wanted, but whatever. I used to write to Madrid and G&S, you know, “send a dollar/get stickers.” After a while I started learning more about what was good and what wasn’t, and ended up getting my own stick. I got a Mark Gonzales street deck, my first official joint.

Photo: Ryan Zimmerman (@ZIMS78)

 

Who did you look up to in graff in your early days?

At age five, I’d go with my mom to Delancey so she could shop. NYC was dirty and scary, and the train rides were ridiculous – flying through tunnels, lights going out, doors swinging open. But the one thing I enjoyed on these missions with my mom was watching the trains go by. It was just colors flooding and letters dancing. From then, I was infected, but I didn’t know it. I was infiltrated subliminally. There’s too many inspirations to list. But here’s a quick list: Dondi and Lee; I’d have to say Old English, as far as bombing; Serve FBA; and to top it off, IZ, I really liked how clean and simple his shit was; and I can’t leave Seen out – his shit was killin’ it!

 

Who did you look up to in skating?

I was mostly interested in street. But before the street chapter, I really liked Tom Groholski and Lance. As for the street division, I liked Tommy Guerrero, Danny Sargent, and Mark Gonzales. But I can go on and on, we’d be here for hours.

What do you think it is about these two subcultures, graff and skating, that attracts the same type of dude?

There aren’t many things that give you that feeling of adrenaline on the cheap. For example, drag racing and snowboarding cost a lot of money. I was snowboarding for a period of time and I saw my funds being depleted. But with skating, I can just step out my door and I’m skating. Bombing, I would always rack my paint. Plus, I was always fishing through yard sales and flea markets and I’d get a bucket here or an old can there. I never slept on anything. But I’d say they are both a cheap adrenaline rush.

 

FC & SP

Back in the 80’s and 90’s, skating and graff weren’t accepted by the mainstream. Nowadays they are a lot more so. How do you think this warm welcome from the masses has changed these subcultures?

Vandalism will never be accepted. Street art is accepted. If you produce something that makes people stop and look, yeah that’s accepted. And I can understand why.

As for skating, in NYC in the 80’s, there were maybe 100 skaters per borough, and skating wasn’t accepted. We were always getting into beefs with neighbors because of the noise. So we took it to Manhattan. ‘88 through ‘90, I never got chased for skating in front of a building. You could skate anywhere you wanted. It wasn’t until the population of skating tripled that these spots started getting decimated. That was like ‘91,/’92. So they start posting up security guards with dogs and whatever. So by ’93, I was hating on the skate scene. The concaves changed and wheel sizes changed. So I amassed whatever I could and skated until about late ‘93, but by then I was fed up with it. But I always kept pushing. I didn’t skate to rip; it was for transportation or to go bombing.

 

Photo: Ryan Zimmerman (@ZIMS78)

In skating it’s not cool to film at skateparks. In graff it’s not cool to paint legal walls. So are legal walls the graff equivalent of skatepark footage?

I do both, in both scenes. At my age, I find it convenient to find all my spots in one. Like Astoria Park and Maloof. But if I’m gonna film, I want it in an urban environment where you have that risk factor. In a skatepark, you don’t have that risk factor of other shit happening, like dogs chasing you or getting into a fight with some dude whose shin you just hit with your board. There are no cops or security. I give more respect to whoever is out there doing the on-the-edge or illegal shit, but to each his own. I’ve seen skatepark footage that has blown my mind. I give respect across the board. If you get up out of bed and do something, I respect you for it. But I don’t expect writers my age to go out and bomb trains anymore because we have something to lose. When they (the authorities) see how old you are, they’re like, “We’re gonna throw the book at this guy!” You’re looking at possibly a year in jail, and if they don’t hit you with time, they’re hitting you with fines. If you have a kid or a family, you’re kind of fucked. But one way or another, I gotta go out and cause wreck!

Last question: Will you hit my book?

Absolutely!