HUCK magazine The Rivers Cuomo Issue (Digital Edition)

Rivers Cuomo - Cory Lopez Werner Herzog - Slavoj Žižek Chad Muska - Rwanda Bikes

£3.95 | issue 26 May/June 2011 Rivers Cuomo by Ariel Zambelich

insight51.com/art/knittaplease/

WWW.INSIGHT51.COM

photos:Mike Piscitelli

insight51.com/surf/jamaican-team/

C H A D M U S K A B Y G R E G FUNN E L L

THE SMALL STORIES

T he B i g S tories

14 W ee z er L a n e 18 B arrier K u lt 20 T u n e - Y ar d s 22 Q u eremos 24 A d ria n B u c ha n 26 E sra ’ a A l S ha f ei 28 H yro Da H ero J oy c e R o c ha d e O li v eira 30

32 R i v ers C u omo 42 S lav oj Ž ižek 48 A l p i n e T weets 50 Cha d M u ska 54 Fi n e skate art 58 C O R Y L O P E Z 64 Nyjah H u sto n 68 R wa n d a B ikes 74 Cr u iser d e c ks 76 R amallah S p ee d

10 HUCK

E NDN O T E S 84 W er n er H er z o g 86 K n ow H o p e 88 L ooki n g S i d eways 90 Gi u lia n o Ce d ro n i 92 M u sta f ah A b d u la z i z 94 T he B oat 98 S o u r c es

NEW YORK 7TH TO 28TH OF APRIL 2011

BERLIN 17TH OF JUNE TO 7TH OF JULY 2011 presents

facebook.com/dcshoes.europe

RIVERS CUOMO BY ARIEL ZAMBELICH

Publisher Vince Medeiros

Creative Director Rob Longworth

Managing Director Danny Miller

Editor Andrea Kurland

Designer Angus MacPherson

Commercial Director Dean Faulkner

Associate Editor Shelley Jones

Design INTERN STUART GOUGH

Advertising Sales Executive Becks Scurlock

Online Editor Ed Andrews

Words Jenny Charlesworth, BRYAN DERBALLA, Kevin Duffell, Gavin Edwards, Tetsuhiko Endo, Polly Fields, Werner Herzog, Know Hope, Karl Koch, MadeUp Collective, Ana Angélica Soares, Erin Spens, Sam Sweetman, Antonia Windsor, Steve Yates

Editorial Director Matt Bochenski

Published by The Church of London 8-9 Rivington Place London, EC2A 3BA +44 (0) 207-729-3675

Global Editor Jamie Brisick Latin America Editor Giuliano Cedroni European Correspondent Melanie Schönthier Snow Correspondent Zoe Oksanen Translations Markus Grahlmann EDITORIAL INTERNS GILES BIDDER, DANIELLE RICHARDSON

12 HUCK

Images Mustafah Abdulaziz, Cole Barash, Jasmin Brutus, Jonathan Cherry, Bryan Derballa, Dylan Doubt, Greg Funnell, Ricardo Gomes, Christopher Gray, TOM GREENHILL, Liz & Max Haarala Hamilton, ALEX HILL, Karl Koch, Milomir Kovacevic, Guy Martin, Agatha A. Nitecka, GUY PITCHON, Mark Rubenstein, LIZ SEABROOK, Sahara Shrestha, We Buy Your Kids, JOE WILSON, Ariel Zambelich

info@thechurchoflondon.com Distributed worldwide by COMAG. Printed by Buxton Press.

Digital Director Alex Capes Junior Digital Designer Evan Lelliott Special Projects Steph Pomphrey Marketing & Distribution Manager Anna Hopson

The articles appearing within this publication reflect the opinions of their respective authors and not necessarily those of the publishers or editorial team.

This publication is made with paper from sustainable sources.

Huck is published six times a year.

Account Manager Liz Haycroft Publishing Assistant Hannah El-Boghdady

© TCOLondon 2011

neWeracap.com/FlaGbearerS

© 2011 NEW ERA CAP CO., INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Stevie WilliamS, Skater, Founder dGk

1

2

6

A

6 B

C

6

13 11

12

18 20

17 16 14 HUCK

19

4 3

5

10

7 9

8

Presented by Karl Koch If Rivers Cuomo is the face of Weezer, Karl Koch is their back-bone. Here, the webmaster, historian, archivist, roadie, buddy and unofficial fifth member of the band takes us on a trip down memory lane.

14

15 22

21

24

23

25

15

01. WEEZER'S First review: Weezer’s very first review was not

14. Club Dump flyer: Back in the early days, Weezer played really

a good start. “Another band that was trying far too hard to prove

classy venues like Club Dump, which was a dump but a lot of fun, too.

something or other was Weezer. This band was probably the most

Later Johnny Depp bought it and millions were spent to make it safe for

blatant Nirvana-wannabe I’ve seen yet.” Nice!

trendsetters to do ecstasy in, as The Viper Room.

02. Pat Finn: This is our friend Pat Finn, who’s kinda responsible for

15. weezer – THROUGH Spike'S EYES: Spike took some of the

many of the guys meeting each other back in the day, wearing the first-

coolest photos of the band ever, at Sound City Studios in Van Nuys.

ever Weezer shirt. We made twenty of those shirts. So if you ever see

These look more like those sessions felt than our colour videotapes

one on eBay, you should probably bid.

from the same time.

03. Brian's audition tape: Here’s Brian Bell’s audition tape, which

16. NO.1 FANS: Here we are in Pasadena with Mykel and Carli, our dearly

he fed-exed to New York from LA so Rivers could listen and confirm

departed fan club leaders (front row). They organised a fan gathering

Brian could sing – Brian joined the band during the making of ‘The Blue

at the house of these cool sisters (Jackie and Kristy, flanking me, Rivers

Album’.

and Brian), and all the fans there had no idea we were going to crash their party.

04. Brian. STOKED. on A bed: This is the first picture of Brian as a member of Weezer, in New York. Look how happy that guy is!

17. BOTTOM OF THE POLLS: Here’s the shot heard round the Weezer world – second worst album in the Rolling Stone critics poll. At least

05. Rivers moving shit: Rivers moving Weezer T-shirts and equip-

Bush’s album was ranked even worse.

ment, mid-tour 1994. He doesn’t do that now, because he’s too busy running around in the audience during the show. Also we never know

18. Set list MASH-UPS: I was usually in charge of getting the set lists

where the equipment is until we arrive at the venue now.

on stage each night, and after hundreds of shows, things got weirder and weirder, as I tried to make the guys laugh during their set. The titles got

06a. 'THE BLUE ALBUM' TAKE ONE: We tried to come up with a cover

so strange after a while they would literally be looking down at the list

for ‘The Blue Album’. This was never gonna make it – a toilet was just

between songs and then to each other, wondering if anyone could figure

not the Weezer look...

out which song was next.

06b. 'THE BLUE ALBUM' TAKE TWO: But surprisingly, gang signs didn’t

19. No Doubt: Rivers looking, well, hungry as we relax at Zion National

work either...

Park with No Doubt on a day off in the summer tour, 1997. Gwen is mugging with Sophie Mueller, who directed the ‘Say It Ain't So’ video,

06c. 'THE BLUE ALBUM' TAKE THREE: Now we’re getting somewhere.

and was about to direct for No Doubt. Later we went on an inner-tube river ride with No Doubt. Sadly no pictures!

07. Weezer doodles: We had to come up with a logo too – none of these made it.

20. make-a-wish blake: During the recording of Pinkerton, Weezer granted a Make-A-Wish wish to a cool little kid named Blake who had a

08. Rivers CUOMO – THE ART DIRECTOR: This was Rivers’ idea of

very bad disease and didn’t have a lot of time left. Here’s Rivers and Brian

what ‘The Blue Album’ should look like. Which is pretty much how it

teaching him how to play ‘Undone’ and ‘Buddy Holly’. They all jammed

turned out.

together later, it was awesome. We were sad to see Blake go, as we knew we’d probably not see him again. But he was stoked.

09. The Feelies VS. Beach Boys: When it came out everyone said we were ripping off The Feelies – but we were like, ‘Who are The

21. RIVERS CUOMO – THE ARTIST: Here’s a rare example of Rivers’

Feelies?’ What we were really ripping off was Rivers’ budget-line Beach

artwork. This was one of the first few Weezer shows (and flyers) from

Boys cassette. (We were glad to learn about The Feelies, by the way –

spring 1992. Rivers drew the little stick figure family in front of the flag,

good band.)

and I remember him saying it looked so sad to him. A key to the true Weezer.

10. The van ad: To tour, we had to get a van – enter The Enforcer, later known as Betsy due to catastrophic breakdowns. We paid five grand for

22. Karl – The Curator: Karl, The Curator, 1997. Photo by Parry Gripp

Betsy from a guy in Fontana who looked exactly like Muammar Gaddafi.

of Nerf Herder.

11. Live montage: On tour with Live, late 1994 – a nice trick of the

23. thai NERVES: Here’s Rivers looking quite nervous in Thailand, as

camera makes it look like Ed Kowalczyk is kissing Matt’s head. Everybody

everywhere we went there were many army dudes with big guns standing

liked Ed, but we are glad he didn’t try to kiss us.

around. Like the one in the background.

12. Weezer amp: Here’s Rivers’ Marshall 30th Anniversary Amp.

24. Dinosaur FUN: By contrast, here’s Rivers in a much more relaxed

Bought after borrowing the same model from The Cranberries on Dave

state, in Utah, riding a dinosaur.

Letterman in ’95. The day I figured out the ‘r’ in ‘Marshall’ became a cursive ‘z’ when upside down was a great day.

25. Karl's sketch of rivers: Here’s a drawing I did of Rivers in February 1995 while we were on our first tour in Europe. He looks a bit

13. Spike Jonze and HIS hat: At Sound City Studios in Van Nuys,

forlorn there, but it was sort of a forlorn tour.

making Pinkerton. Spike Jonze came to photograph the band wearing a safari hat, because Spike is always on a safari, in search of cool things.

16 HUCK

Archive images courtesy of Karl Koch.

SPRING SUMMER COLLECTION 2011

franklinandmarshall.com

17

NO FACES, NO NAMES Something dark is stirring up skateboarding. And it’s coming to a barrier near you.

Text Jenny Charlesworth & Photography Dylan Doubt

Rumours of a masked man skating Jersey barriers in British Columbia,

the skateboarding world, the avant-garde, conceptual aesthetic certainly

Canada, didn’t take long to circulate. The storied figure – calling himself

is. Almost Skateboards pro Chris Haslam thinks DMODW is breathing

Deer Man of Dark Woods (DMODW) – emerged from his lair in the depths

new life into the sport. “The only thing Deerman seems to care about is

of the West Coast rainforest, people said, to bomb through Vancouver’s

being the purest form of skateboarder he can be,” says Chris. “I would

back alleys in search of the perfect skate spot.

never have thought that someone skating the same shit all the time would

But what the hell was everyone talking about? And who is this balaclava-wearing bandit? Well, DMODW is the faceless face of the

make skateboarding somewhat refreshing to watch. His skating speaks for itself.”

Barrier Kult (BA.KU), a hardcore contingent of skateboarders who adhere

As BA.KU’s prominence continues to grow internationally – in part due

to a cryptic doctrine that, at its heart, rejects the star culture of today’s

to collaborations with Emerica, Heroin Skateboards, Momentum, Bones

skateboard community and shifts the focus back to the sport itself.

Wheels and Canada’s legendary Skull Skates as well as the development

“The Barrier Kult act as martyrs, sickened with the Black Death to

of their own official clothing line – the rogue crew is no longer in the

wipe out the skateboarder as personality,” says the ever-elusive DMODW,

shadows. Of course there’s a certain irony to their heightened profile,

who was a prominent West Coast skater before adopting the mysterious

given their devotion to anonymity, but any attention the BA.KU receive

alter ego. “The masks keep a pure militancy in stride as the cult members

fuels their mission to bring honour back to skateboarding’s sacred roots.

develop their mania for dark arts and concrete altar rituals like the

“Total pride,” confirms DMODW, “that is all I really ever wanted out of

ascension of the tailblock.”

skateboarding.”

This puzzling lexicon – where “militant tight transition knife” means

Cloaking yourself and reciting obscure ramblings is an elaborate way

skateboard, “altar” stands for barrier and “plague” is the Barrier Kult

to make a point, but it’s working in its own strange way. Some people

movement – adds to the league’s mystique. Despite this, or perhaps in

may fixate on the hidden identities, but most respect the veil of secrecy

spite of it, BA.KU chapters now operate in England, Hungary, Australia,

surrounding the BA.KU. After all, skating barriers is treacherous, and

Finland and Japan. The original faction has also expanded its ranks to

these self-effacing dudes sacrifice personal glory to help put the skate-

twelve, with mysterious characters like Beast of Gevaudan, Black Glove of

celebrity circus back in perspective.

Internal Combustion and Statue of the Black Crow all signing up.

While grinding Jersey barriers is not exactly a new phenomenon in

18 HUCK

thebarrierkult.blogspot.com

CREATIVE BRIEF

ATTENTION FILMMAKERS

SLAVOJ Žižek NEEDS YOU! Global capitalism is fast approaching its end times, says “the Elvis of cultural theory” Slavoj Žižek in his new book, Living in the End Times.

But from the ashes of the coming crisis, is there an opportunity for a new beginning?

To celebrate the launch of Living in the End Times in paperback, Verso Books and The Church of London are inviting filmmakers to submit short films inspired by Žižek’s theory.

The film − up to ONE minute in total − can take any format: animation, drama, documentary, stop-motion or other. And the

winner will be picked by Žižek himself!

The winning entry will screen before an open lecture by Žižek in London this year, and the winner will also receive a selection of Verso’s back catalogue, curated by the subversive publishers themselves.

For more on Žižek’s theory read the interview on page 42. Entries can be uploaded to a video-hosting website, like YouTube or Vimeo, with a link sent to zizekfilm@thechurchoflondon.com by June 30. Disclosure: Although filmmakers will retain ownership over their submissions, Verso Books and The Church Of London will have full permission to feature content across all their platforms. Slavoj Žižek is International Director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities. His latest book, Living in the End Times , is published by Verso – out now in hardback and in paperback from June. versobooks.com

19

20 HUCK

Swirled in Swahili Tune-Yards has no time for beat looters. What you borrow from Africa, you need to give back.

Text Steve Yates & Photography sahara shrestha

The Garbus family’s Connecticut household was split. The parents, a

(she was briefly a puppeteer), and took external classes in Swahili,

Jewish New Yorker who played the fiddle and a Kentucky-born classical

forearmed with the knowledge that Kenya was, however briefly, her

pianist, were obsessed with Appalachian folk music and played it

destiny. “When I got there, on a study-abroad programme, I found

professionally. Their daughter Merrill, however, was casting her eyes

myself in a community I hadn’t expected to be in. I always pictured

and ears across the oceans to Africa. “My uncle and aunt, who are both

myself jumping on these savannahs with coloured paint on my face – a

medical practitioners, spent a year [in Kenya],” she recalls. “I had this

complete fantasy of what Africa was gonna be. I was in Mombasa, which

very idealised notion of what Africa was. I was trapped in Connecticut

is Muslim. They trade with the Middle East and have done for thousands

in this very limited and unrealistic world and they had found this new

of years, so it’s more like that than the centre of Kenya. I studied music

freedom in a completely new part of the world. There was something

there, Tarabu, and got to work with a very well-known harmonium player

about that that was so appealing to me from the get-go.”

and got to play the fiddle, as well.”

As Tune-Yards, Merrill Garbus is making music that builds on

Now thirty-two and living in Oakland, Garbus’ star is in the ascendant.

her childhood crush. Her second album, Whokill, is a masterstroke:

Her Bird-Brains debut – recorded into a voice recorder at a cost of a

harnessing African influences to her own adventurous use of cheap

few hundred dollars – met with muted applause, but this time around

modern technology, specifically the loop pedal, she’s made a record

the album was properly, if still moderately, budgeted, and the sound

that is both accessible and way more innovative than anything emerging

clearer, more powerful. It’s her live show that remains the principal draw,

from more conventional indie dabblers in African highlife. She’s also

securing major festival slots and winning over influential fans, such

prepared to meet questions of cultural appropriation head on. “I’m into

as Sean Lennon and his mother Yoko Ono, to whom she’s sometimes

borrowing,” she says, between mouthfuls of mackerel risotto in the

compared. She featured in Yoko’s all-star gig in LA last year, appearing

Tufnell Park pub where we meet. “It’s a part of music, but whatever I do,

onstage alongside Rza (another fan) and Lady Gaga (“who I didn’t think

I want to keep it in this social context. You can’t just take African music,

was an actual human being before”) for the massed encore of ‘Give

put it in pop music and just say, [smug voice] ‘Yeah! The world is just

Peace A Chance’.

music, man.’ I hate that. Where did you get that music? Who recorded

There is a sense of political commitment running through her work.

it? Did they get money from it? What’s the relationship? I guess I find it

The new album addresses issues such as police murder (‘Doorstep’),

more complicated than many musicians portray it as.”

gangs (‘Gangsta’) and the response to the Haiti earthquake (‘Bizness’).

So is she at war with Vampire Weekend, who have successfully

But the overarching message is somewhat toned-down. Before its

parlayed that attitude into the upper reaches of indie stardom? After a

release, Merrill shortened the album’s title from Womenwhokill, not

long pause, she says, “You know what I do to not be in some kind of war

from cold feet, but rather an unwillingness to be too narrowly defined

with them? I don’t listen to their whole album. Sorry Vampire Weekend,

this early in her career. She says, “I changed my mind, based on the

but I haven’t. Yes, I do find it problematic. Musically, I find the [African-

reaction of some trusted cohorts. We could’ve got away with calling it

European trio] Very Best a lot more interesting. I think we are flawed

Womenwhokill, but you and I would’ve talked a lot more about women

beings, flawed as people existing in the world, polluting, exploiting

than I feel the need to. That was the argument. If you want to talk about,

other cultures, wearing clothing made in other countries where people

‘This is about women being empowered and we can kill too,’ for the rest

make pitiful amounts of money making it. We’re in this relationship the

of your life, then fine, call it that. When I really thought about it, I felt

whole time so I can’t crucify anyone else for being a certain way, but I

there was way more to this, about violence, about killing; there’s plenty

can be musically interested in something over something else.”

of that in there without it being a women’s issue.”

Garbus’ relationship with Kenya runs deep. She moved there after graduating from university, where she studied theatre and performance

Whokill is out now on 4AD, tune-yards.com.

21

We want it!

The folks of Rio are shouting out loud and bringing more bands to their marvellous shores.

Text Sam Sweetman & Illustration WE BUY YOUR KIDS

The people of Rio de Janeiro don’t call their home Cidade Maravilhosa

and found it wasn’t half as bad as they thought. In fact, they pitched in the

(The Marvellous City) for nothing. But in 2010, this marvellous urban

money themselves, booked the band, and made a deal with local venue

sprawl – famous for its thumping favelas and bumping blocos – was at its

Circo Voador.

lowest indie ebb. International bands of, say, The National’s calibre seldom

“Queremos works as a funding and delegation tool,” says Bori. “The

ventured to the city’s shores, leaving fans feeling decidedly unloved. But

amount required to cover the costs of bringing a band to Rio is raised

as so often is the case, out of the doldrums came a revolution – a radical

through social network mobilisation. A number of refundable tickets are

people-powered movement called Queremos.

sold on the website to whoever is interested in contributing.”

Queremos – literally meaning, ‘We want it!’ in Portuguese – is the

The guys behind Queremos may sound like shrewd businessmen, but

brainchild of a group of Cariocas (locals) from the worlds of journalism,

they aren’t out to make a profit. Once basic costs are covered, initial ticket

film, advertising and photography. Fed-up with Rio’s decaying concert

buyers – or “shareholders” – are eligible for anything from a partial to full

scene, the go-getting sextet – Bruno Natal, Tiago Lins, Felipe Continentino,

refund depending on box-office sales (in the case of sold-out shows for

Pedro Seiler, Pedro Garcia and Lucas Bori – came up with an idea that

Miike Snow and Belle and Sebastian, shareholders got to see the band for

would challenge the dynamic between musicians and their fans.

free). Fans get to have their say; bands get to play to a ravenous crowd.

Put simply, it goes something like this: fans buy refundable tickets

It’s a win-win scenario.

to see their favourite band perform, before any shows have even been

By demanding, ‘We want it!’ the group have managed to book Miike

confirmed. Once enough tickets are sold, the band gets booked. It’s a

Snow, Belle and Sebastian, Two Door Cinema Club, Vampire Weekend,

simple case of supply and demand; if the people want it bad enough, the

The National, Miami Horror, LCD Soundsystem (on their last-ever tour) and

band will come and deliver the goods.

Mayer Hawthorne, who calls the project, “one of the coolest things I've

So what kicked things off? “Queremos was born from necessity,” explains Lucas Bori. “In the last few years, all sorts of international bands

been a part of in my career,” and even followed up his performance with the simple tweet: ‘Best. Show. Ever.’

were coming to play in Brazil, but not Rio. The alleged reason was always

“I predict it will catch on in other countries and really revolutionise

the same: the audience’s lack of interest. Tired of waiting and certain that

the music-touring game,” he adds. “Everyone wins. Power to the people!”

there was a keen audience, we decided to act, rather than just complain.”

And act they did. After hearing that Swedish band Miike Snow were looking forward to visiting Rio but had yet to be offered a show, the

As we go to press, Jamie Lidell has been confirmed to play in May and the “mobilisation” to raise funds for many more bands is well underway.

This is happening.

locals, sick of missing gig after gig thanks to idiotic promoters, decided enough was enough. They looked into the cost of bringing the gig to Rio

22 HUCK

queremos.com.br

SMART ACE Think ASP surfers have nothing to say? Adrian Buchan is about to prove you wrong.

Text Tetsuhiko Endo & Photography Cole Barash

When a friend suggested I interview Adrian Buchan, I dismissed the idea.

Saxons, the disparity is pretty amazing,” he says. “I think indigenous/white

“He’s too boring,” were, I think, my exact words. I went on to say that he

relations are moving forward, but because the Aboriginal population in

was surfing’s version of a nine-to-fiver, grinding out heat wins instead of

Australia is so small, it’s a lot easier here for the media and politicians to

doing media-worthy things like inventing new moves or riding waves the

sweep things to the side.”

size of highrise apartment blocks. Even his sobriquet of “the smartest man

And it’s not just prejudice at home that boils his blood. He bristles

on the ASP World Tour,” I concluded, was “like calling him the best guitar

when I mention the stereotype of Brazilian surfers as overly aggressive

player at a one-armed man convention.”

small-wave specialists. “That opinion definitely exists among surfers and it

But I kept running into rumours about the guy that suggested he was

does kind of piss me off,” he says. “It’s an ignorant and easy view to take.

more than just another happy-go-lucky Aussie beach boy. Eventually, my

In the next [few] years the powers that be in terms of the nations that

curiosity got the better of me.

have dominated surfing are going to be put on notice from some of those

The man they call Ace is from the small town of Avoca, on the Central

emerging countries, like Brazil.”

Coast of Australia. He has the easy smile of a kid raised in the super-

This contemplative sensibility seeps into the words Adrian pens, both

suburbs of the Lucky Country. But good teeth and likeability don’t win

for surf magazines and the personal blog he plans to launch this year. But

surf contests – details do. “I can get stressed out if I know I’m not doing all

he’s just as philosophical about his competitive career – a livelihood that,

those little things that will prepare me to compete,” he says. “I get irritable.”

to a layman, can seem to hang on whether or not the right wave comes

It’s hard to imagine him irritable, but beneath his simpatico demeanor

your way. “I believe you make your own luck,” he says. “There was always

is a meticulous mind that delights in confounding those who subscribe to

a decision that you made, or something you didn’t pay attention to in your

surfer-dude stereotypes. Buchan is fascinating in his unexpectedness. On

preparation, that could have put you in a better position or given you that

one hand, he enjoys nothing more than watching the cricket with a cooler

extra bit of luck.”

of beer and some “mates”. On the other, he wrote a children’s book

This isn’t bland optimism or deluded self-belief, it’s gambling logic

called Macka’s Barrel into the Dreamtime which addresses themes of a

and like anyone who gambles for a living and still has a shirt on his back,

disappearing environment and white/Aboriginal relations in Australia.

Buchan is neither boring nor dumb. If you prefer that stereotype, as I did,

“If you compare [Aborigines’] health statistics with those of Anglo-

24 HUCK

he’ll very quickly prove you wrong; he’s already dealing his next hand.

Filters out the glare of sun, snow and 24k gold medals.

Shaun White Signature Series Holbrook ™ with 24k Iridium lens

Š2011 Oakley, Inc. 01727 795791 oakley.co.uk

26 HUCK

Battle of the Few Digital activist Esra’a Al Shafei is helping Middle East minorities reclaim their voice.

Interview Andrea Kurland & Illustration christopher gray

Esra’a Al Shafei has spent every day for the past five years hooked-up

that you’re changing it for the better? So I think if you change people’s

to the blogosphere. But unlike the narcissistic masses, for whom bowel

minds, you change the structure bottom-up.

movements and breakfast are considered news, the twenty-four-year-old Bahraini activist is driven by a force greater than her self. In 2006, she set

Do you think prejudice is becoming less entrenched? This is what I’m

up MideastYouth.com so that the dissident voices emerging across her

hoping for. The sad thing is that you don’t see enough people talking

region could find solace and support. Offshoot websites soon followed

about these things. A lot of people out there just join the masses; they

– addressing everything from Kurdish and migrant worker rights to the

are not really fans of going against the wave. You see where the wave is

imprisonment of young Egyptian blogger Kareem Amer – but even these

heading and you just swim with it, because that’s what’s easy. A lot of

disparate passion projects couldn’t shake Esra’a from her mission to help

people don’t know what Kurdish communities are facing even in their

oppressed minorities, everywhere, find a way to be heard. Then came

neighbouring countries. To me, that’s terrible because the mainstream is

CrowdVoice.org – a user-powered service that tracks voices of protest

not focusing on it. That’s why we rely on creative media to spread these

around the world. The mission may be far from complete, but the woman

messages.

driving it is still sat behind a screen, day after day, paddling tirelessly against the tide.

What can the international community do to lift the veil on minority rights abuses? The best thing international communities can do is amplify

The world seems to have just woken up to voices of protest across the

the voices that are being expressed throughout the region and not just

Middle East, but did you see the civil unrest coming years ago? I knew

look at what the majority wants. They can do that by not romanticising

there was going to be change, but the change that we’ve witnessed, and

things. Even when you pitch a story to international media, they say, ‘Well,

its speed, was unprecedented. A couple of years ago, there were people

the Kurds – no one’s really talking about them right now,’ even though

on the streets demanding their rights every month. Bloggers were being

Kurdish people are being executed and imprisoned on a daily basis in Syria

arrested at insane rates. The water was always boiling; it was just a matter

and Oman.

of time before that stage would explode.

What do you make of media outlets that dub the uprisings a ‘Twitter The international media has been focused on mass civil unrest, but

Revolution’? I think the internet is a tool; it isn’t necessarily something

there doesn’t seem to be much of a spotlight on minority rights. Do you

that drives these changes to take place. Twitter and Facebook were very

feel people understand the prejudice that exists? If you just talk about

important tools in getting the message across. […] But it’s very easy to

‘human’ rights, the majority are going to be the most outspoken ones,

write a headline that says, ‘Young, tech-savvy people against oppressors!’

the majority are going to get their demands met – Arabs and Muslims,

because that’s what people like to read. They don’t realise that there are a

primarily. Then you get the Kurdish people or the Bahá’ís who aren’t just

lot of people creating racist Twitter feeds and Facebook groups, spreading

discriminated by the government, so even regime changes aren’t going

nothing but hate and propaganda against minorities. Why do they focus on

to do much for their cause. They’re still going to have a tremendous

Facebook and Twitter as the reasons why these revolutions happen, when

amount of oppression from society itself, especially in areas that are very

on a daily basis people are being attacked and their causes ignored? In the

religious, where tolerating another faith is out of the question. You can’t

last year, our website has been hacked seven times by anti-Kurdish groups

have human rights if you don’t have minority rights.

leaving racist comments. We lost traffic because our site was down. They’re preventing our message from being heard, preventing us from telling these

Do you think you’re fighting a different battle to the one presented

stories, preventing Kurdish people from expressing their own demands.

by the world’s press? Definitely. The international media tends to

And that’s not very much to ask for – recognition of [your] own existence.

romanticise the situation: ‘Look! It’s young, tech-savvy people against oppressors!’ For me, it’s not that at all. Discrimination is in the actions I

What inspires you – what keeps you going? To be honest, it’s the hate

witness from my neighbours – people that have nothing to do with the

mail. Every time we’re criticised, I realise how important the struggle we’re

government but are, in a way, oppressors. My friend in Egypt is calling

fighting is.

for a thought revolution; if we can measure our success by the amount of perceptions we are able to change, that’s much more worthy than

mideastyouth.com

changing a government. Plus, who knows if you replace the government

crowdvoice.org

27

Find Your Sound Somewhere between rap and punk rock, Hyro Da Hero is forging his own path.

Text Shelley Jones & Photography Angus Macpherson

“Rap music was my first love,” says twenty-three-year-old Hyro Fenton as

message is this high-school over-achiever eager to express? “For

we cross a car park in Shoreditch, east London. “I discovered punk rock

everybody to be positive,” says Hyro, grinning. “And to wake up. Stop

[later] when I started looking into black history. I discovered Bad Brains

being controlled! TV, reality shows and all that, they’re put out to dumb

and Fishbone. […] But I noticed it’s all the same attitude. We all share that

us down. The more we feed into it, the dumber we get. And the powers-

hate against authority. It’s the same vibe.”

that-be can control us. So we have to break out of the mould, stop being

The Houston-born rapper, who spits under the epithet Hyro Da Hero,

zombies.”

has been transatlantic for a couple of weeks, touring with Welsh hardcore

With guidance from Chino Moreno (Deftones) and Ross Robinson

rockers The Blackout, on whose single ‘Higher and Higher’ he recently

(music producer who discovered Slipknot, Korn, Glassjaw and Limp

featured. He’s all country grammar with a Texas twang and speaks in

Bizkit), Hyro and his all-star band – including former members of At

sound bites, the likes of which colour his new album, Birth, School, Work,

The Drive-In and Blood Brothers – are ready for audiences of all kinds,

Death – a comment on the oppressive cycle of modern life.

whether they’re playing to metal-lovers at Download Festival this summer

“Hip hop gravitated more into electric beat-making,” continues Hyro,

or supporting Wu-Tang Clan at their Edinburgh date in June.

“but I just love live music. ‘Cause as hard as I scream, the band can

For Hyro, voices are tools, and he’s using his to carve a new niche.

match that same intensity. And that’s what I love about rock. I love being

“Music is the greatest thing ever. It influences moods, it can change your

introduced to new music all the time.”

life,” he says, passionately. “I don’t want people to go to a show and be

Described as ‘Nas fronting Rage Against The Machine’, Hyro is

inspired for one moment and then go home and go back to the same shit.

pushing a new hybrid of hip hop/punk rock/rap that is uniting both sides

[…] We’re stuck in this repetitive process. We don’t even know what we’re

of music’s countercultural coin. “[Hip hop] is kinda scared to gravitate

searching for. People want fame, then they get it and don’t even like it.

towards new things, and it’s scared of guitars, too,” says Hyro, who looks

Everybody’s somebody else because we watch TV and try to be other

to the late 2pac for inspiration. “But I’m bringing it another way, because

people. All we are is a product of our environment. But you gotta break

the person I am, I’m from the street, I talk country. […] Hip hop can grab a

off and do your own thing. You can’t look up to a person forever; you have

hold of this. And rock can relate, too.”

to become your own leader.”

Truth is, Hyro doesn’t give a shit about prescribed notions of ‘cool’, preferring to let the emotion in his music dictate the sound. But what

28 HUCK

hyrodahero.com

18 EXTRA HOURS TO GO TO THE BEACH

TO GET THERE

WWW. PROTEST.EU

29

Bra(zilian) Girl Rio local Joyce Rocha de Oliveira is heading for something bigger than big.

Text Ana Angélica Soares & Photography Ricardo Gomes

“What do you think is easier Joyce – looking after a kid or surfing a big wave?”

Breaks. She says she first got the taste for big waves watching her dad

“For sure, surfing a big wave,” she responds without hesitation. The

surf: “My dad never wanted to catch small waves, if I wanted to get in the

question may seem a strange one, but it makes complete sense when

water with him, it had to be big!” She admits that, at the time, she always

you know a little about this teenager’s life – a girl who, at just fifteen, is

felt scared, but it didn’t last long. “I was always very proud,” she says. “I

holding her own among the surfers of Arpoador, Rio de Janeiro.

still got in the water even if I was scared, just to show I could do it.” In

Joyce Rocha de Oliveira is the daughter of Rogerio, a surf teacher

Joyce’s words, she was “hungry for waves”.

in Arpoador, where fellow Carioca (local) Maya Gabeira learned to surf.

To be a ‘Bra Girl’ is to be a daredevil, more courageous than most of the

But Joyce isn’t from the beachfront. Like her father she was born and

boys she knows. “Sometimes we get together and organise a bit of a ‘surf

raised in the favela of Cantagalo, the hillside community that looks down

off’, but when it comes to it, no one turns up,” says Joyce, laughing. But

on the expensive apartment blocks of Ipanema and Copacabana in the

the subject of boys begins and ends there. In front of her dad, Rogerio, she

South Zone of Rio. In the favela, a lot of fifteen-year-old girls already have

asks, “Can we skip this part?” And naturally, the answer is yes. So we talk

children or are pregnant. “Right now three of my friends are expecting,”

about Maya Gabeira, who gave Joyce the board she’s riding today. “Man,

says Joyce. The challenge for Joyce is to not become a mother too early,

this woman is pure courage. She’s my inspiration,” she says, eyes lighting

to study and get good grades, go to university one day, and still find time

up. Maya, who learned to surf with Joyce’s dad in 2003, is today a famous

to go out at the weekends. Maybe this is why she doesn’t feel scared

big-wave rider and four-times consecutive winner of the Billabong Global

when faced with a huge wave. “That nervous feeling in my stomach has

Big Wave Award. This year she will be going for her fifth.

passed,” she says, but admits she also says a little prayer. “I always cross myself,” she adds.

Joyce is the leader of a select group, the ‘Bra Girls’ of Cantagalo, in

And as Maya prepares to return to her source – for the Billabong Pro Rio 2011, which takes place in Barra da Tijuca and Arpoador in May – her successor’s future looks just as big.

which she surfs along with two friends, Natalia and Camila. Since she was a child, she always wanted to be a big-wave surfer, a desire she revealed

Rio Breaks, a documentary film about the surfing kids of Arpoador, is in

at the age of eleven when she was featured in the documentary Rio

cinemas now and available on DVD at riobreaks.com.

30 HUCK

© 2011 adidas AG. adidas, the Trefoil, and the 3-Stripes mark are registered trademarks of the adidas Group. Silhouette Int. Schmied AG, adidas Global Licensee. © 2011 adidas AG. Le nom adidas, le logo trèfle et la marque aux 3 Bandes sont des marques deposées par le Groupe adidas.

santiago

Cool, classic and elegant, these are not for those seeking anonymity behind shades.

adidas.com/originalseyewear

The Tw e e t Life of Rivers Cuomo

34 HUCK

A s f r o n t m a n o f W e e z e r, R i v e r s C u o m o h a s penned enough power pop anthems to put a poet laureate to shame. But behind the lyrical sorcery is just a regular dad in specs – a guy who would sooner take a vow of silence than yabber on about himself.

U n l e s s h e ’ s o n Tw i t t e r, t h a t i s , i n w h i c h c a s e the weirdness flows freely from his head.

Interview Gavin Edwards Photography Ariel Zambelich

wkward and difficult.” That’s Rivers Cuomo, lead singer of Weezer, telling me about a pair of flippers he recently wore with a wetsuit. Asked if that meant the flippers were autobiographical, he laughs heartily and says, “I guess so.”

I’ve known Rivers for seventeen years. We met in 1994, when I was an editor at Details (an American men’s magazine) and Weezer were enjoying the first flash of success with ‘Undone – The Sweater Song’, an anthem that laid out the band’s template: loud guitars, catchy melodies, and lyrics that seemed inscrutable (“If you want to destroy my sweater / Pull this thread as I walk away”) but on closer inspection, were emotional and revealing. I edited two articles he wrote for the magazine about life on the road. (Sample excerpt: “‘How many emotional outbursts are we allowed?’ asks Pat, our drummer, on the shuttle to another terminal. I give him my estimation: one major irrational outburst per 250,000 records sold. Although this means we haven’t even earned our first outburst yet, Pat says he’s going to go ahead and freak out now.”) I learned that Rivers was sly and quick-witted, but also shy and awkward. Raised on an ashram, he sometimes seemed unfamiliar with the conventions of human interaction. Onstage in those early days, he usually let bassist Matt Sharp do any necessary bantering with the crowd.

Since then, Weezer have released eight more albums and sold ten million records worldwide. I’ve stayed in touch with Rivers by interviewing him periodically (albeit with long breaks, such as the five years he put Weezer on hiatus so he could attend Harvard). Whenever we see each other now, neither of us can believe that we’re still in our respective lines of work – journalism and rock, respectively – let alone talking to each other, again.

I haven’t been around for some of his blackest days – like 1998-1999, which he largely spent alone in an apartment with the windows covered, compulsively writing songs – but over the years, I’ve gradually seen him become more comfortable in his own skin.

35

At 9am on a Monday morning, I meet Rivers at a recording studio on the

Where did all my weird thoughts go before I had twitter? 8 April 2010

west side of Los Angeles, California. “Where are Weezer recording today?” he asks the receptionist, who doesn’t recognise him – understandably, since in

“Every day, a really weird thought comes to my mind and I put it out there

his specs and chinos, he looks more like an engineer than the lead singer of a

– and now I have this long list of weird thoughts. I must have been thinking

band. Before we start our interview, he sends a few emails and complains that

them all along, but there was never any reason to write them down. I

he is constantly putting together sentences with words in the wrong order.

actually go back through my tweets to look for lyric ideas. A fair amount of

While Rivers once oscillated between celibacy and the aggressive pursuit

songs in the last couple years started on Twitter.

of groupies, he is now married (to Kyoko Ito, a Japanese native who he met

“‘Smart Girls’ on Hurley was originally called ‘Where Did All These

at one of his shows in Boston) and has a young daughter; at age forty, his

Hot Girls Come From’. That was a tweet. I didn’t give any context for it,

life is happier and more balanced. But he still has lots of unusual thoughts

but I was talking about girls tweeting at me – where were they when I was

and obsessions bouncing around his skull, as revealed by his Twitter account.

single? And a line in ‘Runaway’: “Is it us making love in the Milky Way?”

Since July 2009, he’s posted over 1,200 tweets, from “Caught my wife looking

– that comes from a tweet where I asked if the Milky Way made anyone

at nudie pictures of dogs and horses online” to “The reason for my massive,

else sad.”

continued success? I have no ego.”

In an indicator of the collapse of the music industry, Cuomo has 542,063

Has anyone you’ve ever had sex with died? 8 January 2010

Twitter followers on the day of our interview – a number about five times greater than the sales of Weezer’s 2010 album, Hurley. Although many

“One of my girlfriends had just died from cancer. This is a girl I was going

of his tweets are deliberately cryptic, Cuomo is happy to explain them at

out with around 1995; she had a daughter just a year older than mine.

lengths greater than 140 characters. (I've preserved the original spelling and

Death is so strange. It’s just a mystery. I composed another tweet around

punctuation of his tweets.) “I’ve been wondering when someone was going to

that time and never posted it because it was too bitter. I have a whole list

use my tweets for an interview,” he says, settling onto a couch. But he has one

of tweets that I held back for various reasons. One of the lists is too dark,

warning before we start: “I don’t know what the point of Twitter is.”

too negative, too jaded, too cynical, that sort of thing.”

Rivers goes to his weekly soccer practice before heading to the studio.

36 HUCK

Veggie burger technology has come a long way. 6 November 2009

“When it comes to soccer, I’m pure fan. It’s been valuable – learning what it’s like to be a fan again helps me as a performer. I’m thinking of a World

“That’s true. And life in general for vegetarians has gotten a lot better

Cup game in 2002: the US upset the mighty Portugal 3-2. It was a really

since I was a kid. Growing up vegetarian in upstate Connecticut, it was

surprising and wonderful win for the team. Me and my friends, we were

definitely inconvenient with the options limited. So I’m happy for my

freaking out in the stands, just coming out of our skin. Before the players

daughter’s sake.”

walked off the field, Frankie Hejduk, who was the right back, took off his shirt and came over to us and went, “Aarrrrrr!” [Screams, grimaces,

Playing soccer at Robbie Williams’s house! 7 May 2010

pumps fists in air] It meant so much to me like, ‘Yes! That’s how I feel!

He feels it too!’ Ever since then, I’ve done that with the Weezer crowd

“Around the age of thirty-two, I had pretty much hung up my boots and

whenever I walk offstage.”

resigned myself to getting fat and dying. But when I was about thirtyeight, I got invited to play in a celebrity soccer match. And I saw that my

My soccer trainer had to cancel today so if anyone wants

favourite player, Landon Donovan, was going to be in it too. As out of

to kick the ball around please meet me at Clover Park at

shape as I was, I had to do it. So I got back into it and from there I started

9:45am. 5 April 2011

playing in a weekly Sunday match and exercising a lot again and it’s been wonderful for me. It’s mostly British guys that I play with, and Robbie’s

“This really interesting guy showed up, named Jesse. Turned out he’s

associated with them. And sometimes during the week we go up to his

a professional poker player. So he was telling me all about that and

house to play. It’s not a full pitch; it’s about five on five. I played soccer

we kicked around for a while and then he asked me what my trainer usually

with him yesterday – he’s an amazing player.”

did and said he would play that role for me. So I got a good workout.”

So excited for World Cup! What’s the best pro-US place to watch on the west side? Who’s got a bitchin’ TV? 7 June 2010

Most of the times I’ve been successful it’s because I’ve been completely misunderstood. 14 April 2010

“Every day, a really weird thought comes to my mind and I put it out there – and now I have this long list of w e i r d t h o u g h t s .”

37

“There’s one music-industry apocalypse after another and it doesn’t feel like it affects us. We’re loathsome vermin crawling around u n d e r n e a t h a l l t h e r u b b l e . W e ’ l l b e h e r e f o r e v e r.”

“From the very beginning, I thought we were a serious, emotional,

If I say I have a “scientific” approach to songwriting, people

powerful band in the tradition of Nirvana. And the first meeting with

get bummed. If I say I have an “experimental” approach

the record company after turning in the album, they said, ‘Well, you

to songwriting people get excited. Yet, in my mind, the two

do understand that people are going to think you’re funny, right?

words mean exactly the same thing. 24 October 2009

They’re going to think this is a silly, jokey type of band – because that’s what you are.’ And I was deeply insulted and shocked.

“I love working in an experimental way where you’re trying things

“But then that was what the reaction was. No one took us to be

out and you’re not attached to the result, but just trying to see what

the next Nirvana. If I had set out to do a fun band, I don’t think it

happens, hopefully making some kind of gradual progress. That

would be what it was. When I try to be really serious, other people

mode of working is distasteful to some rock fans. You realise that

think it’s funny and somehow that works. On Pinkerton, I tried to

there’s some stuff you just can’t talk about with your audience

make sure nobody would think it was funny. And it didn’t seem to

because they have their own ideas about what an artist is. So I’ve

resonate – as immediately, anyway, or on as big a scale.

had to learn to choose my words carefully.

“The Memories Tour last year was a real revelation to me.

“I don’t pretend to understand our audience at all. We’re talking

Playing the Pinkerton songs on the second night and seeing every

about hundreds of thousands of people; it’s so hard to generalise.

person out of five thousand people singing every single word – it

Our top ten songs on iTunes are totally different than what you’d

was so gratifying and vindicating. The only time I imagined that

see the top ten songs voted on our website. If we’re playing a state

kind of response was before Pinkerton came out and then I got a

fair in Ohio, that’s going to be different from doing an in-store for

cold dose of reality when it came out. At that point I couldn’t have

super-hardcore fans, and that’s going to be different from playing

imagined that this would happen. But it’s incredible: such a feeling

the Reading Festival in the UK, where ‘The Blue Album’ wasn’t that

of family with these fans, and chills all over my body.”

successful. I just try to adapt to each situation and create the most pandemonium.”

Rivers blinks, genuinely moved by the memories. We talk

Sang “west side story” at this morning’s lesson...now

about his third solo album, due this year: like the first two, it’s a

munching microwave pizza, sipping green tea, writing

collection of his demos, this time centered on 1995’s Pinkerton

hooks…..a good day in the hood. 2 April 2009

(and the abandoned rock opera that preceded it, Songs from the Black Hole). He tells me that Alone III: The Pinkerton Years

“[Smiles] Boy, that does sound good. I love my voice lessons so

will be accompanied by a book called The Pinkerton Diaries,

much. From eighth grade on, I was all about the music department

which will include various original documents by Rivers,

in school. I was there several hours every day: barbershop quartet,

including the two articles he wrote for Details. He’s delayed its

madrigal singers, jazz band, chorus, voice lessons, music theory,

release because the band’s former manager, Pat Magnarella,

and then I was in the regional choir and all-state choir. I have so

found some original documents that Rivers wants to include,

many memories from high school, just sitting by my teacher at the

including a letter Rivers wrote to a federal court in 1996 when

piano as we’re singing mostly Broadway stuff or classical art songs.

the Pinkerton detective agency sued to stop the album’s release;

“So I’ve been working with this voice coach. We try to work on

Rivers explained that the name came from the opera Madame

technique, but very quickly it just turns into singing Oklahoma!

Butterfly. I tell him that I’d be happy to check my files to see if I

and West Side Story. I just put up a video of me singing ‘There’s No

have any documents from him that he may want to include. “If

Business Like Show Business’ on my YouTube channel. I’ve always

it’s not too much trouble,” he says skeptically. “I just don’t think

delighted in challenging our audience with styles from elsewhere.”

that I would have faxed you directly.”

Weezer is the cockroach of the music world. 12 October 2009

We hear drums and guitars leaking through the wall: in the studio next door, the other members of Weezer are working on a one-off new-wave cover that may appear in a major

“There’s one music-industry apocalypse after another and it

animated film later this year. This session doesn’t mark the

doesn’t feel like it affects us. We’re loathsome vermin crawling

beginning of an album: Rivers has completed lots of demos, but

around underneath all the rubble. We’ll be here forever.”

is unlikely to turn them into an album this year. “We’re confused and unsure, as happens to artists,” Rivers says. “We put out a lot

How can I make myself more attractive to young, Hispanic

of material recently – it may just be time for us to incubate.” Rivers

females? 16 November 2009

flashes a smile and leans back on the couch.

“Weezer was trying to figure out how to branch out into different formats and reach different audiences, so I went to Kiss-FM, which

And now for 45 days of Vipassana meditation.

is the top-40 station in LA. Even in 2005, when ‘Beverly Hills’ was

27 January 2010

doing really well, it never got added to that station, so I went and talked to those people. They’re really cool, and fans of all kinds of

“You wake up in the morning and start meditating. You basically

music. And they explained to me, ‘Look, the people who listen to

meditate until the evening and then you go to sleep. There’s no

top-40 radio here are young, Hispanic females.’ I noticed a part

talking, there’s no reading or writing. They start out with ten-day

of my mind was thinking, ‘Is there anything we can do to change

courses, but I went to twenty or thirty, and now forty-five days once

that?’ And I was just amused – whenever I catch myself thinking

a year. That’s as much as my family can tolerate and that’s as much

something that’s absurd, I tweet it.”

as I’m capable of doing at this point.

39

“You’re totally pampered when you’re there. They cook and

So glad 2 have been in Japan in these first weeks after

clean for you. When I say ‘they’ I mean the people who have

the earthquake. Much love 2 the Japanese people + 2 my

volunteered to serve for that course. And sometimes I’ve done

Japanese friends fans + family. 28 March 2011

that – that’s very rewarding, to watch people go into the deepest, darkest parts of their mind and really struggle. And then they

“The earthquake didn’t affect my family on a physical level in any

come out with big smiles on their faces.”

way. We got there a day or two after it happened, and we were 650 miles from the reactor in Fukushima. I could sense that my wife

Nighttimes reading Sherlock Holmes or knitting by my wife

was shaken up, but it was very hard to get a read on everybody

in bed couldn’t be cozier. 22 October 2009

because they’re all Japanese and they’re so stoic. And because I don’t understand Japanese very well I didn’t know what they

“I got into Sherlock Holmes because my wife’s really into murder

were talking about all the time, especially when they’re talking

mysteries, so I wanted for us to have something in common. I

about nuclear reactors. I don’t know that vocabulary. But I could

really am a homebody. I like having a wife and a kid and coming

tell that they were stressed and sad. I was glad I could be there for

home every day for dinner and doing home-ec tasks. Before my

my wife and her parents.

spring meditation course of 2010, I was knitting and doing clay

“I was surprised to see how much the Japanese fans were

sculptures and whittling – and since that course, I haven’t touched

reaching out to me and how they were asking for help and

any of that stuff. When I came out of that course, my capacity for

encouragement in very emotional, almost desperate terms. I

work was greatly increased and I found that I no longer had any

also have a Japanese Twitter account – my first motivation was just

free time because I was working.

to practise my Japanese, but I got to know the fans there better that

“I didn’t have any special talent at whittling or knitting, but I did really enjoy the process. Now with clay, I do have an unusual

way. I would offer just a few words of encouragement – it didn’t feel like I was doing anything, but it seems like it meant a lot to them.”

knack for making heads. Because I have an almost-four-year-old daughter who’s always working with Play-Doh, I’m always making

Bicycles must have blown people’s minds when they were

human heads. They’re creepy, like a dried human head that would

first invented. 25 March 2011

be in a tribe of cannibals.”

“I was appreciating the technology of the bicycle: I can get from

I would never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever

place to place so fast with these crazy wheels and chains and

ever ever ever ever ever cheat on my wife. Not in a million

pedals. People just must have freaked out when they first got on

billion years. 8 October 2009

them. I can’t drive in Japan, and neither can my wife. We ride bicycles everywhere. There’s no hot-rod culture there, though. In

“I had been posting or tweeting things that were kind of flirtatious

America, if teenage boys were all riding bicycles, they’d want to

or seemed to express sexual attraction for people online. It would

have the coolest or the fastest one. Everyone in Japan, whether

be a very unusual man that doesn’t have those fleeting, random

you’re a little girl or a teenage boy or an old lady, they all ride

sensations of attraction, even when he’s married. Most guys don’t

the same three-speed bicycle with the basket on the front and a

express it in a public forum like that, but as an artist I wanted to

little bell and a little headlight. And they all bicycle around, so

experiment with it. But then I realised I had better make it clear

civilised. So I’m riding around on one of these bicycles and still I

that I’m just saying these things for fun.”

have the instinct of an American boy, which is to try to jump the curb or go really fast, just generally be a jerk.”

I felt terrible leaving my daughter in the park with her aunt, wearing my track suit and sunglasses, talking on

I will survive because I only show a facsimile of a mimeo

my blackberry, walking away she screamed and pleaded

of a xerox of a composite sketch of myself. 13 October 2009

“Daddy! Daddy!”. I was sure that all the other fathers were thinking “What an awful parent he is.” But I had

“Uh, I’m not sure what that means.”

an Australian phoner to do. 8 October 2009 “I’ve gotten good at avoiding those kinds of situations but there

Rivers laughs, maybe because it’s funny not to understand

are times when I think I am doing the best thing at the moment

your own thoughts, or maybe because a comment about

but it looks bad. I’m finding out that most parents do understand

maintaining one’s privacy shouldn’t be explicated, and his body

because they’ve all been there themselves.”

unstiffens. We’ve been talking for well over our allotted hour, and we can hear the rest of Weezer labour on their new-wave cover.

I thought I was creative until I had to make up a story for my

I apologise to Rivers for keeping him from the studio, and he

3 year old every night. 30 June 2010

shrugs. “Sounds like they’re doing fine without me,” he says, and slips out the door.

“‘Make up a story, make up a story!’ – I run out of ideas. Now I ask

Later that day, I look through my files and find a handwritten

her for prompts and collaboration – that helps a lot. She’s really

fax Rivers sent me back in 1994, from a budget hotel in Portland,

into these Jack and Annie books, so I usually work with those

Oregon, answering a final round of my editorial queries. It begins,

characters now. Recently, she has a sadistic bent and she’s taking

“The shit you requested” and ends, “Feel free to fax or call me to

over the story a bit more: ‘No, Jack is sick and his parents aren’t

see if we can drag this thing out any more. Love, Rivers.” And

coming to help him.’ And I say, ‘Yeah, but then Grandma comes

there’s a final flourish: a smiley face

and she saves him.’ She’ll say, ‘No.’ She doesn’t want it to have a happy ending.”

40 HUCK

Ivo Schneiter Photos: Dominic Zimmermann

Visit us t @ Brigh 9 July 7 — 2011 5 room 15

www.zimtstern.com

42 HUCK

Ž i ž e k Riffing About the End T i m e s Rock star philosopher and critical theorist Slavoj Žižek t a k e s o n h y p o c r i s y, c h e a p Hollywood Marxism and the final crisis of capitalism.

Interview Vince Medeiros Photography Mustafah Abdulaziz

43

Or take ecology. Let’s think about the recent catastrophe in Japan. I don’t think that long-term you can deal with threats of such catastrophes through market [solutions]. I think a much larger scope – international cooperation, whatever – will be needed. Biogenetics is the same thing: somebody has to regulate it – it absolutely cannot be the market. Not to mention intellectual property. […] I don’t think that socalled intellectual property really fits the institution of private property in the long term. The logic is totally different. [Take] a glass of water: if I drink it, you will not drink it and vice-versa.

That’s private property. [But] intellectual property says that the more it circulates, the richer it grows, as if it were almost in its nature communist. […]

So my point is a very simple one: all these elements concern communism, but not communism in the sense of a solution. Communism is for me the name of a problem, the problem of commons – the commons of nature, the commons of knowledge which we should share, the commons of the e’s run for president in his native Slovenia, has a soft spot for

common space from which no one should be excluded. […] We

Jacques Lacan, and has been hailed as the ‘Elvis of cultural

are approaching a certain point where things will not be able

theory’. With grand gestures, penetrating ideas and an art-

to go on as they’ve done till now.

iculate, super cool Balkan voice, Slavoj Žižek has a larger-thanlife presence.

Let me counter your pessimism a bit. How about Wikileaks

In his new book, Living in the End Times, Žižek prophesises

– does it not signal the early stages of a radical shift in the

the final crisis of capitalism, criticises the hypocrisy of West-

public’s access to information? I am basically for Wikileaks.

ern racial “tolerance” and points to a challenging future with

But I think it’s a field of battle. Some people – maybe even

no easy solutions. We spoke for almost an hour and a half

[Julian] Assange himself – tried to re-inscribe it into this

about all manner of issues, from Wikileaks and ideology to

old liberal myth of free flow of information, investigative

the benefits of skateboarding and his dream of remaking Star

journalism, etc. But I think it’s something more. This idea of

Wars with Darth Vader as an enlightenment ruler fighting

just throwing the documents out disrupts the very way power

"reactionary feudals like the Jedis”.

is functioning today. There is a more radical dimension. Now,

What follows are some of the highlights.

I am not saying there will be great consequences. But I think that, yes, it is an important field of study.

Can you break down the thesis of Living in the End Times for us? The book is very simple. We are approaching a whole series

What’s important about it? What is important is not to

of critical points, and the question is: can the global liberal

reduce it to this ideology of free flow of information – the right

democratic system – the capitalist system – deal with them

to know. It’s not a new case of all this Hollywood stuff, movies

or not? There are a series of problems: social problems, new

like All the President’s Men, The Pelican Brief. […] My God, The

areas of apartheid, ecological problems, and then the problem

Pelican Brief, what does it mean? A top company connected

of what to do with biogenetics, intellectual property and so

with the president, part of the same plot and corruption –

on. In the long term, I think they are a threat in the sense

what can be more critical? Ideology comes when you suggest

that the existing system cannot deal with them. If we don’t do

what a great country the United States is when two ordinary

something we are approaching some kind of catastrophe.

journalists can overthrow the entire system. I don’t like this

I’m not saying it’s a kind of immediate catastrophe – I

moralisation that comes with these movies. You know, we are

mean, I didn’t like the movie 2012. But, for example, take

full of anti-capitalism today, maybe even too much […] but

new forms of apartheid: worldwide, there is a clear tendency

they always [focus] on personal corruption, greed. […] We

[for] some kind of limitation of democracy. Look at these

should move from this simple moralistic anti-capitalism to

new emerging Eastern powers – Singapore, China and so on.

more fundamental questions such as why people are pushed

They combine a capitalism that is even more productive and

to act like that. I am not a naïve humanist. I agree with Bertolt

dynamic than our Western capitalism with a social system that

Brecht: people are evil – you cannot change people. But you

is definitely not democratic – it’s authoritarian, more or less,

can maybe change the system so that people are not pushed

and it seems to function perfectly. I think this is a long-term

into doing evil things. It’s a very modest view.

tendency. Till now, the marriage of capitalism and democracy

44 HUCK

was maybe the best argument for capitalism: sooner or later,

What about the student protests in London, what’s their

after years of dictatorship like in Chile, Spain, South Korea,

meaning? It’s not just privatisation of higher education, what

when things started moving, capitalism generated the demand

worries me [is this trend] that says, if you want to study this

for democracy. I claim this era is out. Capitalism will be less

abstract, useless knowledge it should be your private stuff.

and less able to provide and guarantee the human rights and

What society needs is useful knowledge; experts to meet

freedoms that we have known until now.

social needs. […] So that, for example, when you have a crisis,

precisely like the demonstrations in London, you can call

thing – deconstructing from within; the charm of fascism,

psychologists who tell you how people in demonstrations

overidentifying with it and making it ridiculous. […]

behave… you know, useful knowledge.

But listen, I am generally a kind of retarded guy. For

We need a more radical thinking. We need thinking which

example, when Harry Potter exploded, with my best inten-

problematises problems themselves. Thinking is not to say,

tions I tried to read the novels. But I couldn't. Sorry, I found

‘We have a problem, help us fix it.’ Thinking is to see how we

them boring.

perceive the problem. Often the way we perceive a problem already in a way mystifies the problem. One example: when

What about the films? Were you able to watch them? A little

you mix ecology with this New Age bullshit – you know, ‘We’re

bit better for me. But of course, like my small son, I have the

raping Mother Earth, Mother Earth is taking revenge,’ blah,

usual identification with the bad guy. Voldemort is my hero,

blah, blah – all that New Age bullshit means catastrophe to

of course. My dream is [for him to] take over and introduce a

ecology if we approach it in this New Age way.

kind of people’s democracy dictatorship, like a soft Stalinism.

And here I like movies. […] I simply use movies as the most

Incidentally – this is my old dream, of course I will never

subtle registration of where we stand ideologically. Take this

get the money – [but I would love to] remake Star Wars,

year’s Oscars: the two big winners, The King’s Speech and

with the emperor and Darth Vader as kind of progressive,

Black Swan. It’s very interesting how they fit sexual difference

enlightenment, absolutist rulers fighting reactionary feudals

and the problem of subjectivity today. What’s the problem of

like the Jedis in a slightly totalitarian, leftist way, to change

The King’s Speech? The king here is a subject who stutters,

the perspective, you know?

it’s clear why – because he finds it hard to identify

While we’re still talking

with

about

his

symbolic

title.

Like, ‘My God, am I really a king? Can I be a king?’

Which is I think quite a healthy attitude, you know?

It’s a sad story for me. The king is much wiser in the beginning; his stuttering means he knows that to be a king you need to believe in your kingness, which is

madness,

you

know?

So he’s rendered slowly stupid enough to believe that he can be a king. The other one is even worse. A really simplistic analysis, of course, but Black Swan, I think, is a deeply react-

" Yo u c a n n o t change people.

But you can maybe change the system so that people are not pushed into doing e v i l t h i n g s ."

ionary film. The under-

film,

Slavoj,

Apocalypse Now is being re-released – what’s its relevance today? The reason I like the film is that it confirms my theory of so-called

inherent

tran-

sgression. What is Kurtz, Marlon Brando? He is the excess of the system itself – what the military system pushes you to do. He just went

too

much

to

the

end. It’s as if the military establishment has to fight its own excesses.

A

bit

like

Afghanistan

and Iraq. Yes, absolutely!

Those prisons where they

lying premise is that a

were tortured, Abu Ghraib

man, played by Vincent Cassell, the director of the ballet,

– this is what always fascinates me: the obscene underside

can combine the ruthless total dedication to his profession

of institutions. For example, the Catholic Church, oops, you

with normal private life, but a woman has to choose. If you

have all these priests committing paedophilia. It is clear by

identify too much with your mission of being a perfect artist,

the sheer numbers that there must be something in the logic

you are punished with death. This is a radically anti-feminist

of the institutions pushing them to do it. And I think it’s

idea; that a woman and her radical dedication to her art

the same in all these military excesses of the United States.

can’t go together. It’s a beautiful film, nicely shot, blah, blah

This is all linked to this old culture in military communities,

– but maybe they could have got slightly better music than

these hidden rituals of initiations where you are symbolically

that Tchaikovsky bullshit. I’m here this conservative Eur-

humiliated. And this is also my personal experience when I

opean high modernist. Tchaikovsky is out for me, no? It’s

served in the army. [...] I went to serve the army in the naïve

popular music.

hope that I would find a body of order and discipline. But it’s not that – you have superficial discipline, but just beneath the

On the topic of music, Slavoj, what do you like? I love classical

surface are all the obscene rituals, dirty jokes. It’s really a field

music; I’m a mega Wagnerian – Wagner, Shönberg, Mozart,

of hidden obscenities.

Schubert, Schumann. I listen for hours every day. I work to loud music. […] Of the latest music, I like bands like the

You often refer to Jacques Lacan’s theory of the Real – the

German one, Rammstein. I disagree with those who think they

idea that there is a natural state traumatically lost to us by

are some kind of proto-fascist band. They do this wonderful

our development of language. How do you apply that to

45

your analysis of the world? What is crucial for me is not to

vitality and act like a vampire to suck vitality from a lower-class

fetishise the Real into a kind of monstrous reality. It’s the

guy. Once they replenish their energy, he can fuck off.

inherent obstacle which, at the same time, sustains the system.

This is why I greatly appreciate movies. I appreciate very much

So Titanic is a vampire film?! Yeah! Absolutely! Cameron

Robert Altman’s Short Cuts. I think it is totally vulgar and wrong

appears to be progressive, but the mythical coordinates of his

to read it in the traditional leftist way, as a portrait of middle-

universe are reactionary.

class despair and a critique of suburban alienation. The form You mentioned Kipling earlier, and in my reading of your book, I thought it was really interesting how you broke down the word ‘tolerance’ – how it’s used in Western Europe to

"The notion of tolerance effectively functions, in highly developed countries, almost as i t s o p p o s i t e ."

suggest some kind of pinnacle of human civilisation. Can you explain? What makes me suspicious is this automatic translation of racism and sexism into a problem of tolerance.

It buys perfectly into today’s depoliticisation of politics. You remember when Mel Gibson had an anti-Semitic outburst in front of a policeman when he was drunk? It was reported in the media that the deal he made with the Jewish community was that he would regularly visit a psychiatrist to cure him of this anti-Semitic tendency. This is horrible for me; how instead of a problem of economy, legal system, rights and racism, it becomes a psychological problem, like, ‘Why don’t I tolerate the Other?

What deep traumas do I have in myself?’ Look at Martin Luther King – he never used tolerance. He never said, ‘We blacks, we want more tolerance.’ Tolerance is how racism and sexism are perceived in our post-political universe.

Also, the notion of tolerance suggests that I should merely put up with my neighbour instead of embracing the radical Other… Yeah! That’s another point. The notion of tolerance effectively functions, in highly developed countries, almost as its opposite. Tolerance means don’t harass me. Don’t harass me means don’t come too close to me. Tolerance means precisely: I don’t tolerate your proximity.

One final question: what do you make of skateboarding and surfing, which are perhaps closer to a purely aesthetic expression than to your traditional mainstream sport. Do they

of the film itself – this matrix of eight or nine stories, parallel

mean anything to you? Skateboarding, I think this is a great

lines, contingent encounters – is about stumbling on something

thing. […] I remember those kung fu films – did you notice the

that could be a catastrophe but also something happy. The

heroes were always working class? Rich people can have guards

very ontology of the film – this vision of reality – is much more

and arms, so they can afford to be lazy and consume; poor

optimistic than the standard story. I think it’s wrong to read it

people have only their bodies and self-discipline. This is what I

as Hollywood Marxism.

am for. I agree with my German friend Peter Sloterdijk: he came

This is why I am so opposed to James Cameron. […] It’s

up with the idea that this is one of the hopes, these perfectionist

almost embarrassing to see Avatar or Titanic, you know, all

disciplines, [like] a skateboarding guy who makes a mission out

the rich are bad, sympathy with the lower class, the natives on

of [his] self-discipline. This is absolutely a positive thing.

the planet and so on, no? But at an implicit level, you get a very reactionary need sustaining this. In both movies that need is best

Thanks so much, Slavoj. You have the Orwellian freedom to do

articulated by the ultimate imperialist writer, Rudyard Kipling.

whatever you want with what I said. You are the boss. Rewrite

Avatar is The Man Who Would Be King – the miserable crippled

it, make me say the opposite, I love it. As a journalist, don’t you

guy who is nonetheless good enough to save the natives and

hate guys who you interview, these fanatics who then write to

marry their princess and so on. This is the ultimate White Man’s

you and say, ‘You changed one word there and you didn’t get it

dream. And Titanic is Captains Courageous. It’s really the story

and ruined everything,’ and so on, no?

of a spoiled upper-class girl who has a moment of crisis and then uses Leonardo DiCaprio to restore her ego. Literally, he paints

Slavoj Žižek is International Director of the Birkbeck Institute for

her portrait, then he can fuck off – he can leave. When Leonardo

the Humanities. His book, Living in the End Times, is published

DiCaprio is freezing in water, she notices that he’s dead, and

by Verso and out now in hardback and in paperback from June.

starts to shout, ‘I will never let you go,’ but while she is shouting

versobooks.com

this, she is pushing him away. It’s not even a love story. Again, Captains Courageous: upper classes lose their life, passion,

46 HUCK

For the full transcript of this interview, visit huckmagazine.com.

47

ALPINE NOTES IN THE AGE OF TWITTER Text Vince Medeiros

As traditional storytelling collapses under the weight of Twitter-esque, bite-sized information, how does a magazine cover the O’Neill Evolution – one of the world’s biggest snowboarding events? Here’s an experiment.

RANDOM THOUGHT ONE

The halfpipe is like this perfect oblong

crater

carved

into

the

In light of Wikileaks, Twitter and the like,

hard-packed snow. All manner

editorialisation is dying a slow but well-

of

deserved death. Direct journalism, you see, is a

leaves

powerful thing: it leaps over ideological filters

commentator

and editors’ choices, and throws us headfirst

perplexed. Note to self: need a

into the hard wall of language where we sniff

tricks coach bad!

contortion

off

most,

the

including Dave

coping witty

Mailman,

the Real – dark, daunting, awesome – before

Camera on steel cables whizzes up and

bouncing back into everyday fiction.

Teenawgiteh boys rs!!! sticke

THE O’NEILL AIR-FILLED BATON SITS ERECT, a phallus of branded might and event badassness,

announcing

yet

another

assault of snowboarding picaresque up in the hills of Davos, Switzerland.

The

night

previous,

two

distinctly

unwhite young men were barred from

UNDER THE FEEBLE, SICKLY JANUARY SUN,

entering the throbbing discotheque du

the alpine creek that separates town from

the ear-ringed, 100-kilo-plus bouncer.

hill splashes gently, pebbles underneath,

Could this alpine enclave for the rich

and then snakes right, left, straight and

harbour folk partial to bigotry of the

left again as a big Swatch upside-down

skin? Hard to tell. The club, it must be

smile looks on from over the bridge

said, seemed fully packed.

jour. “Racists!” bellowed one of them at

where the event is set to begin.

down diagonally across the halfpipe.

Evolution is as much for the crowds on hand as it is a media spectacle, via broadband and airwaves, beamed across the world.

COKE, IN ITS INTERPLANETARY UBIQUITY, PROVIDES SNOWBOARD RACKS.

Jamie Anderson fills the massive screen at the bottom of the hill. It’s lunchtime and she leads the slopestyle final.

The Jackobshorn gondola slides silently up into mountain heaven. It snowed last night. Powder awaits.

RANDOM THOUGHT TWO The masters of the universe – CEOs,

politicians and assorted transnational puppeteers – have yet to arrive in Davos for the World Economic Forum, taking place in this frozen placid hideaway in

A RED TRAIN CLICKETY CLACKETIES BY, BOUND FOR THE VALLEY BELOW.

48 HUCK

less than a month’s time. Come to think of it, it’s all quite fitting: the top of a

One run later and Sarka Pancochova now leads.

mountain, away from the serfs, makes perfect sense. For now, though, it’s O’Neill, Swatch, HUCK, as well as the mostly teenage contortionists running the show.

BITTE NUR PET-GETRÄNKEFLASCHEN…

30 minutes ago

Heineken in sub-zero temps under frenetic lights – nice!

Seb Toots in second.

HELICOPTER CAM HOVERS OVERHEAD TO DOCUMENT.

1 hour ago

Heineken part two.

1 hour ago

Awaiting men’s slopestyle final. Feeling a tad cold.

1 hour ago

29 minutes ago

iPod goes megatron – crowd goes wild.

22 minutes ago

Only gets him a sixth place finish though – no podium.

21 minutes ago

camaraderie for the cameras or true

Fifteen mins to finals.

Drinking, surfing the web.

buddyism of the slopes? The latter, I

1 hour ago

14 minutes ago

Pizza arrives just as final gets underway.

Shit.

Eric Willet nails it and moves into second place.

1 hour ago

9 minutes ago

Awesome lights. They astonish as if you were a kid. Augment the radness of the acrobatics on hand.

Throw in a few drinks and it’s magic.

Seppe’s final run…

BS 1260… nails it.

At the end, they hi-five and hug. Faux

suspect. So cool.

JAMIE ANDERSON. Beautiful smile on the big screen. Perfect

ID

S BOUNC E

ON GIANT

YE

AH!!!

K

run. Overtakes Sarka to take first place.

58 minutes ago

Robot camera’s still flying.

57 minutes ago

Seppe Smits from Belgium ruling.

7 minutes ago

Moves into third.

4 minutes ago

O’Neill rider Seb Toots goes awesome!!!

3 minutes ago

And moves into…

2 minutes ago

First place!!!!

BO

.

UNCER

57 minutes ago

1 minute ago

Kids bounce, riders ride, Mailman speaks.

result, throws up all kinds of questions.

Cab 1250 landed flawlessly – Mark McMorris from Canada killing it.

Has

36 minutes ago

RANDOM THOUGHT THREE

The

focus

on

branded

experience,

marketing pillar of consumption as end the

fetishised

commodity

won

after all? Yes, by the looks of things.

But how boring would it all be without the

metaphysical

properties

of

the

branded jacket, logo-ed shoe or stickered snowboard?

94.77 points! Yeah, McMorris jumps into first place.

34 minutes ago

Techno beats fade away in the background as I leave the hill and disappear back into town

01 K E L L Y C L A R K 02 C I L K A S A D A R 03 K J E R S T I B U A A S

Bring on the metadata!

Final runs now.

01 S E B T O U T A N T 02 M A R K M C M O R R I S 03 E R I C W I L L E T

2 hours ago

29 minutes ago

01 C H R I S T I A N H A L L E R 02 I O U R I P O D L A D T C H I K O V 03 J A N S C H E R R E R

2 hours ago

01 J A M I E A N D E R S O N 02 S A R K A P A N C O C H O V A 03 E N N I R U K A J Ä R V I

nighttime sky, is all about the spectacle.

Some pizza left – might have another slice.

HALFPIPE MEN

The men’s final, under the way-below-zero

A crescent moon looks on from up above.

HALFPIPE WOMEN

Lights!

The final countdown

SLOPESTYLE MEN

Evolution duly logo-ed under its wing.

SLOPESTYLE WOMEN

similar bird of prey, with the words O’Neill

A CODA: OH YEAH, SOME RESULTS, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

This year’s ice sculpture: an eagle, or

49

The Hustler Chad Muska may have dipped his toes in Hollywood hot tubs, but the freewheelin’ hustler holds on to his modest roots with a love for skateboarding that is unshakeable. Fresh from a well-received a r t s h o w, w i t h a n e w S u p r a S k y t o p sneaker in the pipeline, the trendsetting skate star takes time out to discuss the origins of a style.

Te x t Shelley Jones Photography Greg Funnell

50 HUCK

51

52 HUCK

Chad Muska is popping open a Coca Cola. “I’m not drinking at the moment,”

From developing sneaks with C1rca in the early noughties, to designing

he says, although nobody asks. “I want to be in control of everything in my

decks for Element mid-decade through to his prolific relationship with

life and I don’t want anything in my life to be in control of me.”

Supra and Kr3w these days, the multi-faceted tastemaker has signed his

The polymorphous skateboarder is in London to launch a One Dis-

name in the corner of every type of canvas. But is there any continuity in

tribution pop-up shop in the basement of Slam City Skates, the late eighties’

his multipartite approach? “Yeah, it’s all the exact same thing!” he chirps,

home of Rough Trade Records. He cuts an alien figure against the corporate

enthusiastically. “Whether I’m doing a trick on a skateboard, drawing a

tower blocks and grey intersections that make up Soho’s backstreets.

picture, editing a video, producing a beat, designing a shoe or making a

There’s something California coded deep and it manifests in the long dirty-

T-shirt graphic, it’s the same energy and same feeling I get in my head.

blond locks poking out of his backwards cap. But California is not where

One inspires the other. It’s all the same shit to me. […] The common

Chad’s story started, thirty-three years ago.

thread is just creativity and manifesting ideas and not talking about what

“I’ve grown up all over the place,” he says, thinking back. “I was born in Ohio, grew up in New Jersey, Philadelphia… my parents were crazy, that’s

you’re going to do, but just doing it. Talk less, do more. I’m inspired by people who have that same work ethic, that same mentality.”

probably the best way to put it. I was in twelve different schools by the time I

Settled in New York now with his girlfriend – Louis Vuitton model and

was in sixth grade.” Constantly breaking up and getting back together again,

Chanel ambassador Vanessa Traina – and experimenting with art in a big

Chad’s parents ragtagged across the states, finally settling, separately, in

loft studio downtown, Chad seems content. It’s a far cry from a few years

Phoenix, Arizona, and Las Vegas, Nevada, when Chad was eleven or twelve. “I

ago, when his California-industry love story went up in flames. After years

first started skateboarding in Phoenix, at this big empty pool at the back of a

at the front of the pro skate world, Chad retreated into the seductive LA

vacant house,” says Chad. “I was riding BMX but every once in a while I’d try

Hills, only re-surfacing, sporadically, in the tabloid media because of a fleeting romance with Paris Hilton.

to grab someone’s board and ride, then basically [crash and] eat shit in the pool.

“I had some things going on with

[…] After my bike was stolen, this guy

C1rca and started to feel a bitterness

gave me his old board and it just clicked.

From then on it was straight forward, no looking back.”

At some

fourteen,

after

graffiti-related

getting trouble

into with

the authorities, Chad ran away to California. He explains: “It was either stay [in Phoenix], work a shitty job and do community service, or catch a ride with these girls to San Diego, and that sounded like a better plan at the time.”

Happily, the freewheelin’ dude found somewhere to call home. “In the ninetysomethings, California was a dream come true. It was heaven,” he says. “I was broke, I was homeless, I had nothing and I was just happy. I loved it. Nothing mattered because the beach was there and this energy of skateboarding was just kind of starting up again.”

“ Ta l k l e s s , do more. I’m inspired by people who have that same work ethic, that s a m e m e n t a l i t y.”

with

the

industry,”

admits

Chad,

looking back. “But I never stopped skating during that time; I just kind of took off and did my own thing for a while. I was a little wrapped up in the Hollywood scene and partying and stuff like that and I needed to separate myself from the industry for a while in order to appreciate it again. But skateboarding is me, you know, it’s in me forever. The longer I was away from it, the stronger I felt it pulling me back – just wanting to be a part of it again so much. No matter what else I was doing in the world, it didn’t feel right [without skateboarding] and I needed to be back in the skate industry somehow and contribute. I feel like I have a lot to contribute still and hopefully for many years to come, whether it’s on or off my

San Diego stoked Chad’s hustle. Ed

skateboard. I just love this industry and

Templeton soon hooked him and go-

want to be a part of it for as long as it accepts these ideas I have.”

big charger Jamie Thomas up with Toy Machine and their vibrations shook up skateboarding for the next decade.

Truth is the skateboarding industry welcomed him back with open

When Shorty’s went big in the late nineties, Chad was the poster boy and

arms. In a world where “you can go to any skatepark, anywhere, and find

many attribute Shorty’s distinctly urban, hip hop style to the profound Muska

a twelve or thirteen-year-old kid who’s better than any pro”, heritage

influence. Style is something Chad sets, but he insists it’s not a conscious

becomes increasingly important, and those with solid skateboarding roots

thing. “I never feel pressure, I just feel a need,” he says, laughing and swatting

become even more relevant – touchstones for a new cultural language.

the comment away like a fly. “I just like to manifest ideas and see them

Chad sinks the last few bubbles of pop and tosses the can in the

happen. […] If you try something absolutely crazy ten times, and one of those

bin. He’s “a horrible drunk” apparently – “an exaggerated, over-the-top

times hits, it’s worth more than a thousand mediocre ideas, because it’s going

version” – and with plans to branch out into the fashion industry at some

to stand out, it’s going to be a movement and something new. […] The coolest

point, a bright art career ahead and “another video part, maybe the last”

thing about skateboarding is individuality and I don’t ever want to see that

to skate, he’s going to have to pull together a united front.

lost in the industry.”

But the place he’ll always feel most centred is square in the middle

And style, according to Chad, is not determined by the ice around your

of his skateboard. “Skating is the one thing that’s different from the rest,

neck. He explains: “I’ve always been into style, my whole life. When I was dead

it’s almost like the backbone of everything,” he says. “I think I’ll skate

broke, I used to go into thrift stores and get weird, extra-large, size-forty pants

forever. I’ll probably wheel my wheelchair to the skatepark and yell at kids

and cut them up or do stuff to them, whatever, anything. I used to get shoes,

or something. […] Without skateboarding I would probably be dead, in

and paint them, and put fat laces in them, it was just taking whatever I had

jail, or working some fucked-up job. If I had stayed in the situation I was

and putting some flare to it, that’s always been fun for me to do. And I guess I

dealt, I wouldn’t be where I’m at today, and I owe it all to skateboarding,

still love to do it.”

for sure.”

53

a

f i n e r

l

i

n

For thes e galler s k at e b o y-worth arding a y fine a nd art a rtists, re one a nd the s ame thin g.

Interviews S helley Jones Photography Liz & Max Ha arala H

rt

and

always

skateboarding been

They’ve

been

hand-in-hand,

best

have

friends.

hanging ever

out, since

surfers took to sidewalks over fifty years ago. In fact, if art is the re-appropriation of raw materials to create something new, skateboarding is art in its purest form.

It’ll come as no surprise, then, that the following artists all take inspiration from the lowly board. What may surprise you, however, is that their work sits in grand, highbrow galleries next to the

amilton

Adrian Rubi-Dentzel Paris-based Adrian Rubi-Dentzel was born into a family of carousel builders that settled and expanded their craft in California. Now the thirtyyear-old craftsman creates bespoke, hand-made pieces of furniture and art like the Glass Slipper – a clear, illuminated skateboard created in collaboration with Solitary Arts – which challenge traditional modes of production.

impressionists of old and conceptualists of late.

So forget what you think you know

great, grand uncle brought the first carousel to the United

‘lowbrow’ counterparts. These fine artists,

States [from Germany] in the mid-nineteenth century. But

who just happen to be skateboarders, are

[surfing and skateboarding] are just part of me. I got my first

bucking

doodle

skateboard when I was six. It was a Tommy Guerrero deck

fundamental

and I started surfing around the same age. The Glass Slipper

relationship between bodies and space

project came from a friendship with Yong-Ki Chang and

– creating original works of sculpture,

Geoff McFetridge at Solitary Arts.

trend

‘skate

the to

art’

and

its

two-dimensional

explore

the

film and conceptual art as seen through a skateboarder’s unique eye.

54 HUCK

“I come from a long line of carousel builders. My great,

so-called

about

“I love that craftsmanship is so non-digital. I love the handson process because it’s so real; it’s unarguable. If you have a

As we move into an increasingly digital

block of wood and you have to get it to a certain shape, there’s

world, these agitators are asking questions

nothing you can do apart from carve it or sand it. There’s

about the ‘here and now’ and pulling us

something about that process that is very satisfying. Decorative

into a tangible space where manipulating

design can be interesting and really great, but I like to play with

the laws of physics, not paint or pixels,

the function of things and sort of twist them in a way that adds

creates the perfect line.

a new or different function to something familiar.”

e

Adrian Rubi-Dentzel 55

Raphaёl Zarka

Raphaёl Zarka Thirty-three-year-old Raphaёl Zarka is a Paris-based photographer and filmmaker.

For his latest video project, Species of Spaces in Skateboarding (2008) , Zarka took inspiration from skateboarding’s filmic archives, meshing together clips from famous skate videos to create a fastpaced montage that uses negative space to explore relationships of proximity.

time and space, and how a form has been used and interpreted in many ways through history.

I deal mainly with sculptural objects, but also photographs, films and writing. I prefer to discover things rather than invent them. I don’t believe in skate art, that’s a limitative concept; it is a form of ghettoisation to me.

“There is a quote by Robert Filliou [a Fluxus artist] that says, ‘Art is what makes life more interesting than art.’ I really can relate to that…

I think everything is virtually re-appropriable.

Naming is a form of appropriation. There is a sculpture in downtown San Francisco called

To b y Paterson Despite formally training as a painter, Glasgow-based Toby Paterson, now thirty-seven, has created many threedimensional projects, including a matrixlike pavilion in Potters Fields Park and a block-colour sculpture outside BBC Glasgow, which reference his obsession with minimalist architecture.

‘Transcendence’ – it’s a big thing made out of polished black marble. As it sits in the financial area, San Franciscans call it ‘Heart of the

“Skateboarding completely changed the way I look

“I don’t think in ‘themes’, but some issues [in my

Banker’. That is clearly re-appropriating the

at the world. It put me in positions and locations

art] deal with the migration of forms through

object, to me.”

I would never have ended up in. There’s a way of

56 HUCK

To b y P a t e r s o n

looking at things – at an angle, or thinking about them laterally – which fed directly into my interest in architecture. I spent a lot of time skating around buildings – usually vilified or rejected – and so I learnt about architectural theory and history by bumping into walls and falling down stairs.

“Being out and about and looking at everything inspires me. [In Glasgow] there are these contemporary ‘bombsites’ where old buildings from the sixties have been pulled down and then, because of the economic crisis, are never rebuilt.

These holes in the city are, for me, a perfect analogy of what the world is like. There’s a beauty in ruins.

Andrew Ranville Andrew Ranville started experimenting with sculpture after feeling frustrated with the one-dimensional limitations of analogue photography. He now creates site-specific installations like treehouses, ramps and platforms, usually out of reclaimed timber, that encourage viewers to mentally project themselves onto, into and around the impossible.

“I think, for me, the mutability of ideas

Andrew Ranville

this whole ‘hands-off ’ gallery etiquette, but I’m interested in frustrating the viewer to the point where they want to slide or climb on the exhibit.

I’m also interested in who has the [guts] to [do it].

“One of my pieces directly references a skateboard ramp, but it’s impossible to skate. It’s more to help people think about the possibilities of motion and potential rather than the actual prescribed action of a skateboard on a ramp.

“I usually recycle a sculpture into the next sculpture – the work I make is more transient that way; it exists in a certain place, at a certain time, temporarily. I’m also really interested in form versus function. Why can’t a large art installation be functional and still considered art? I’m kind of

and ideals is interesting, like, ‘We’ve solved it!’

tackling the core ideas of how your body moves

And then fifty years down the line, it’s not the

“I enjoy presenting people with a sculpture or

through space and relates to a giant curved

solution anymore.”

installation that questions interaction. There’s

surface, or a forest or a mountain.”

57

CORY LOPEZ

BY BRYAN DERBALLA To c e l e b r a t e t h e b e a u t y o f a l l t h i n g s q u o t i d i a n , w e s e n t B r o o k l y n - b a s e d p h o t o g r a p h e r B r y a n D e r b a l l a to New Zealand for the first stop of the O'Neill Cold Water Classic and tasked him with a single-minded mission: to shadow Cory Lopez everywhere he goes. This is surfing at its most intimate and best.

Name Cory Lopez

What gets your heart pumping? Big waves and

Age Thirty-four

the play-offs when my teams are in them.

Home Indian Rocks Beach, Florida

What is the one thing that you will never do?

What would you do with your life if the oceans

Bungee jump. Again.

What is happiness to you? Waves and family.

dried up? Look for water – then probably die

with everyone else.

What is your greatest fear? Going blind.

What’s the greatest lesson you’ve ever learned,

and from who? To treat everyone how you want to

Would you rather be too warm or too cold? Too

If you could right one wrong in the world, what

be treated. Not sure who taught me that – I think

warm. I hate the cold. I’m from Florida.

would it be? All the fighting in this world over

that’s just common knowledge.

‘religion’.

What do you want that you can’t have? For

What are your worst and best traits? My wife

Scottie to beam me wherever I want to go.

What is the meaning of life? Family and surfing.

says my best traits are that I’m good with

electronics and that I’m very current. My worst,

How would you describe yourself to a blind

Who or what were you in a previous life? Maybe

well, she says that I’m impatient, but I think

person? Tan with a big nose.

an eagle.

that’s only if I’m hungry or the waves are good.

What gets you up in the morning? When the

When is it okay to lie? Only to protect some-

What has been your greatest regret? Letting Paul

waves are good, the waves. Every other day,

one else.

Canning catch a wave to beat me in the final

it’s my kids.

seconds at Bells, thus losing the world title.

What is the worst thing someone could accuse you

Who or what inspires you? Surfing, I’d say.

of ? Taking the last cookie.

How do you keep your ego in check? My brother

Guys like Dane Reynolds, Kelly Slater, Occy.

and my friends have always kept me in check.

In life, my family inspires me to do better

What is the one thing about you most people don’t

and work harder.

know? That I’m a jock.

What qualities do you most like in people?

Kindness and sharing.

When were you last surprised? At a surprise

What do you miss the most when on the road?

birthday party for me and they got me so good,

Home cooking, family and the view out my

What qualities do you most despise in people?

it was sick.

backyard.

Bullies and greed.

When did you last let yourself go? Superbowl

What do you think about before you fall asleep?

What does the future look like? Good – if we all

this year was a blast.

Waves. Boats. Contests. Kids. Money.

get through 2012.

How much is enough? When I’m full.

If you could only keep three possessions, what would

What gets your blood boiling? Not much. I’m

they be? My truck, my house and my surfboard.

pretty mellow. I did chase down a car full of

If the world ended tomorrow, what would you

tourists, one time, that threw trash out of their

do today? I would go to the beach with my

Why do you surf ? Because it’s absolutely the best

car on my local beach.

entire family.

thing in the world.

58 HUCK

What does success look like to you? A new boat.

i.

ii.

iii.

59

iv.

vi.

60 HUCK

v.

vii.

viii.

ix.

61

APPENDIX T h i r t y - o n e h o u r s d o o r - t o - d o o r. I c l o c k e d i t . T h a t ’ s h o w l o n g i t t o o k m e t o g e t f r o m m y a p a r t m e n t in Brooklyn, NY, to the motor lodge in Gisborne, NZ. It was my second trip to New Zealand and it may possibly be my favourite country on the planet. I haven’t been everywhere, but I’ve seen pictures and nowhere appears as pleasant and idyllic as Aotearoa. HUCK could have asked me to shoot sewage treatment plants in rural New Zealand. I wouldn’t have cared so long as I was where I was.

F o r t u n a t e l y, m y a s s i g n m e n t w a s t o c a p t u r e v e t e r a n s u r f e r C o r y L o p e z ’ s e x p e r i e n c e a t t h e O ' N e i l l Cold Water Classic. It was a little tricky at first. I wanted to photograph everything, in and out o f t h e w a t e r. B u t I ’ m n o t a s u r f e r a n d C o r y w a s n ’ t s u r e w h a t t o m a k e o f m e a n d m y c o n s t a n t s h u t t e r c l i c k s . T h i n g s t u r n e d a r o u n d w h e n E r i c G e i s e l m a n a n d I s t a r t e d t o p l a y a g a m e o f S K AT E i n t h e parking lot. I don’t always bring my board on shoots, but I’m glad I did this time. All the surfers in their hotel rooms started to gather around. In mid-flip, I realised Cory was shooting me with his iPhone. He found me as interesting as I found him, if only for a moment. I wasn’t out to prove myself. I just wanted to put down the camera for a minute and relax. It’s those moments when I stop being a photographer and start being a human that make the biggest difference.

i. After watching Cory’s home team, The Orlando Magic, lose to

vi. After an afternoon of jumping off and sliding down

The Knicks followed by Carlito’s Way on The Movie Channel, the

waterfalls, Cory reviewed the footage on his iPhone. With two

restlessness at the motor lodge started setting in. Cory and Eric

GoPro cameras, multiple DSLRs and iPhones, no moment

Geiselman fought to be the first to shoot a rubber band into the

went undocumented, especially in a place as beautiful as New

light fixture, as seen on the wall above Cory's head. In a room full

Zealand. Every day was a media blitz.

of laptops, iPads, iPhones, a flatscreen, a skateboard and fifteen surfboards, it's nice to know that something as simple as a rubber band can still provide so much diversion.

vii. A local told me that the area around Rere Falls was the site of a battle during the New Zealand Land Wars, between the indigenous Maori people and English settlers in the late-1800s.

ii. O’Neill hired an old boat called The Takitimu so that

It’s believed that at one point the battle was so violent that the

photographer Marc Prefontaine could shoot the team in a new

falls ran red with blood. Whether or not that’s true, it’s a pretty

line of wetsuits. Cory patiently did his job while beautiful sets kept

incredible thought. Cory took in the glory of the falls – cold,

breaking off shore in Poverty Bay. As soon as Marc said he got

clear and crisp – his wetsuit providing the only red.

what he needed, Cory grabbed his board and jumped ship. viii. Cory shared room No. 7 at the Ocean Beach Motor Lodge iii. Cory seen zipping up before his heat. The waves in the back-

with Nat Young and Eric Geiselman. It didn’t matter that

ground were getting progressively mushier. Cory didn’t make the

Cory is fifteen years older than Nat and eleven years older

cut and the conditions got so bad the officials moved the contest

than Eric. They’re all after the same thing – good waves and

after his heat. Like a true professional, he took it all in his stride.

a good time. Surfing’s good like that; the great equaliser. The

iv. Waking up nearly 10,000 miles away from home. Getting ready

guys were at their laptops. Nat busied himself with Facebook

only time an age difference was even present was when the for a contest that will stream live to the entire world. Anxious?

chat while Eric worked on hip hop beats with Garage Band.

Yes. These contests have so many variables: the conditions of the

Cory took to the other room talking to his wife and two

waves; whether or not you picked the right board; who else is in

adorable daughters on Skype.

your heat. At some point you need to just let it all go and surf. ix. Leaving time. Cory dead-lifted the ten boards he travels with. v. Cory stood at the edge of the water shouting to Nat Young and

He spends eight months a year in exotic destinations, chasing

Eric Geiselman as they shredded in Wainui Beach, Gisborne.

the next wave. With his family at home, the weight of travelling

Due to New Zealand’s proximity to the International Date Line,

begins to weigh heavy. But paddling out on a good day, it’s

Gisborne is technically the first city to see the sun rise each day.

easier to remember why he is wherever he is. Bryan Derballa

It’s a beautiful piece of coastline and not a bad place to spend six days in the water.

62 HUCK

oneill.com/cwc

A R T I S T

K E L S E Y

B R O O K E S

facebook.com/rvcaeurope

A N P

Coming of Age

Prodigal skateboarder Nyjah Huston is proving he can stand on his own.

Te x t K e v i n D u f f e l l Photography Mark Rubenstein

64 HUCK

Nyjah Huston is your average sixteen-year-old skate

could legally operate a moving vehicle, but Hollywood, with its

rat. Rocking an oversized skate-logo tee over slim-fitted jeans –

overproduced and endlessly calculated drama, parallels anything

tied to his waist by way of a white shoelace – he sports adolescent

but skateboarding. Yet, with a tale that rivals any birthed in

trademarks in spades. Polishing off the look is a disheveled mess

Hollywood, Nyjah Huston may very well be skateboarding’s first

of dreadlocks that spill from the confines of his backwards-facing

documentary-worthy child star.

White Sox cap. Then there’s the iPhone – a seemingly permanent

While most kids around him were still playing in the mud

fixture fused to his hand – which, like anyone his age, he checks

and eating worms, Nyjah was toying around with a Tony Hawk

every thirty seconds or so.

Birdhouse board, bought for him by his dad, at the age of five. By

At first glance, you wouldn’t guess the kid’s got enough cash in

five-and-three-quarters, he was already hooked.

the bank to buy a house with because, let’s face it, when’s the last

But Nyjah’s skills didn’t truly blossom until a couple years

time you met a teenager with that kind of loot? Sure, the Olsen

later, when his dad – an avid skater from yesteryear – opened a

twins, Macaulay Culkin and the like amassed millions before they

private indoor skatepark of his own in the quaint, rural Northern

65

Californian town of Woodland. Nyjah would clock hour after hour

But things didn’t go as swimmingly as the two had planned.

inside those four walls, surrounded only by the ramps and rails of

Evidently, running a business is no joke, especially at an age when

Frontline Skatepark. Like a kid in a candy shop, he’d often spend

those around you are gearing up to enter high school. Father and

entire nights perfecting his lines.

son managed to sell a number of boards, but, as Nyjah explains,

“When I was eight, there was a skatepark there run by some other

“Really, the hardest part was just getting it out to shops. That’s hard

people. My dad and eldest brother fully rebuilt and took over the

to do on your own. You need a distribution, you need marketing,

whole park. That’s where I learned everything,” recalls Nyjah, eyes

you need good business people backing you. It’s not easy.”

beaming as he recounts his formative years from the comforts of a

Outside his business operations, and within the skate industry

floral print sofa in Orange County, California. “Every single day, for

at large, it seemed as though Nyjah was simultaneously running

like four or five hours, I’d just go at it. When I was eight or nine, I had

into a brick wall, unwittingly morphing into a dark horse that

a routine every day. I’d do the same exact thing and the same exact

nobody wanted to touch. Other sponsors, like éS, began to drop

lines. That was all I cared about, just getting better at skating.”

him, and he was ostensibly slated for obscurity. “I think there was

The prodigy’s dedication quickly paid off, and within months

a little bit of a bad feeling with companies wanting to deal with my

he was already garnering the attention of pros all over. “I first got in

dad in the past few years, kind of what happened with Element.

contact with Element when I was seven,” recalls Nyjah. “[ex-Element

That had something to do with it, and it had something to do with

pro] Reese Forbes hooked it up. I was skating the Vans Milpitas

éS, too,” explains Nyjah as he recollects those couple of tumultuous

Skatepark [near San Jose, California] and he noticed my potential.

years which, to him, seemed to last forever, as if frozen in time.

It all grew from there.”

Then reality kicked in: “I feel like I was kind of held back

And grow it did. By the time he turned ten, Nyjah had already

with marketing and getting coverage the past few years, and

bagged his first legitimate full-length video part in Element’s

just doing everything in my potential.” He continues, “I kind

Elementality. At age eleven, he was travelling the world and

of felt like having my own company was a good idea – great for

entering the X Games, becoming the youngest skateboarder ever

my future – but it just wasn’t the right time, being so young. I

to do so. He held his own, too; placing second against the likes of

was trying to explain to [my dad] that I really wanted to focus

skating’s most established and talented names, Nyjah proved to

on skating, and not really be thinking about the business side of

be a veritable rising star. His second-place standing at the 2009

skateboarding yet.”

“When you turn fifteen or sixteen, you start to venture off on your own a n d l e a r n h o w t o b e y o u r o w n p e r s o n .”

X Games the very next year proved it wasn’t just an auspicious instance of beginner’s luck, either.

And with the accolades and contest trophies came fortune and

witnessed him skate. And in 2010, almost immediately after he

fame – all before the judges could legitimately label him a teenager.

won the very first stop of Street League with an utterly fucked-

Not that Nyjah cared about much else besides pushing around on his

up performance – snagging his first gold medal at a pro contest

board, though: “I was so young, like twelve, all I thought about was

– Element scooped him back up at the age of sixteen, issuing him

skating. I wasn’t worried about the money part of it at all.” He chalk-

a pro board in the process.

ed up interviews in every major publication, collected big sponsors

Sixteen’s a pivotal age, though. No longer an impressionable

like éS Footwear, and made a string of appearances in the Tony

boy in need of parental guidance, Nyjah’s growing into his own;

Hawk video game franchise. Needless to say, the world loved him.

he’s ready to call the shots as he sees them. “When you turn fifteen

But the one thing that began to stand between the kid and

or sixteen, you start to venture off on your own and learn how to

massive mainstream success was the person who introduced him to

be your own person. I definitely thank my dad for looking out for

skateboarding in the first place: his dad – a man Nyjah describes as

me and my future with the company, and guiding me along the

protective, albeit not necessarily strict, and who always looked out for

way. He brought me into this world. He taught me everything.

his son’s inevitably lucrative future. You know, a regular father figure.

But sorry dad, I’ve gotta do what’s best for me sometimes,” Nyjah

At the age of fourteen and under the guidance of his dad, Nyjah

declares with a budding confidence. “Getting back on Element

left the only support network he’d ever known without having yet

66 HUCK

While Nyjah was certainly down, he was far from out. His undeniable talent on the board left an indelible mark on all that

was definitely the best career decision.”

earned a pro board. In 2008, the teenager cut ties with long-time

Now, having abandoned the executive duties associated with

board sponsor Element and put everything on the line, including the

operating his own board company, Nyjah – a kid whose blood

substantial contest earnings he’d amassed, to start I&I Skateboards,

boils at the mere thought of skateboarding – can focus on his true

largely fronting the bill himself.

passion. “I know Element wants to do the most they can for me,

“Me and Element parted ways, not on any bad terms, it was

and all I have to do is focus on skateboarding, which is all I should

just a little bit of a communication problem between them and my

do, and want to do,” explains the teenager with an unrivalled air

dad. And then after that, it was hard to picture me on any other

of humility in his voice. Nyjah Huston’s your average sixteen-year-

board company. So, my dad had an idea to start our own company,”

old skate rat. The only difference is he’s already been through a

says Nyjah.

lifetime of ups and downs before he’s even learned to drive

GSM EUROPE: +33 5 58 700 700

IN RWANDA ON WHEELS In the land of a thousand hills, the bike is empowering all who ride.

Te x t A n t o n i a W i n d s o r Photography Greg Funnell

In a country where just two in every thousand

charcoal or coffee and, of course, people perched

largest event in Rwandan history. It has become a

own a motorised vehicle, the bicycle is a coveted

on seats over the back wheel. Look closer and,

showpiece for African cycling. It is one of the top

object for the denizens of Rwanda. If people

every now and then, you’ll also ee a man in lycra

events in cycling in Africa right now.”

haven’t got enough money to buy one, they’ll

zooming by on a state-of-the-art racer. These

Trained on the tough Rwandan terrain, the

pay to take a ride on someone else’s or set about

select professionals make up Team Rwanda, the

Team Rwanda cyclists are performing well in

constructing their own out of bits of old wood

country’s first national cycling team. As well as

races across the continent, and this year Adrien

and found wheels.

training for the Olympics, the team also take part

Niyonshuti became the first Rwandan mountain

in Rwanda’s own annual tour each November,

biker to qualify for the Olympics. Having lost

Known as the land of a thousand hills,

Theogen Rukundo

Rwanda isn’t kind to the cyclist. But take a ride organised by American five-time Tour de France seven brothers in the 1994 genocide that killed Twelve-year-old Theogen Rukundo made this bike himself just one month ago and he is very proud of it. across Rwanda’s verdant, fertile land and you’ll racer Jonathan ‘Jock’ Boyer.

800,000 people, his performance is proving to “My friends always want to have a go,” he says. Until very recently wooden bicycles were the mainstay of see bicycles being used to transport mountainous “For two years it has been an international the world that Rwanda is pushing ahead towards the Rwandan rural community, helping them to transport heavy loads to market. But the lack of brakes sacks of potatoes, mounds of cassava leaves so race, sanctioned by the UCI, the governing body a brighter future and the bicycle – whether it’s made them dangerous, particularly down-hill, and the government made them illegal for road use a large they mask the rider completely, gallons for cycling,” says Boyer. “Each year it has had carting coffee or letting a kid freewheel down a couple of years ago. Now, you will mainly see children like Theogen making them to play on, though they of water in yellow plastic containers, stacks of over three million spectators, and it is now the dusty hill – is emerging as a symbol of hope. are still used for transport among the tea fields, rice paddies and coffee plantations.

68 HUCK

T h e o g e n R u k u ndo Twelve-year-old Theogen Rukundo made this bike himself just one month ago and he is very proud of it. “My friends always want to have a go,� he says. Until very recently wooden bicycles were the mainstay of the Rwandan rural community and were used to transport heavy loads to market. But the lack of brakes made them dangerous, particularly downhill, and the government made them illegal for road use a couple of years ago. Now, you will mainly see children like Theogen creating wooden bikes to play on, though they are still used for transport among the tea fields, rice paddies and coffee plantations.

69

J o h n B o s c o T u ri m u m ahoro John Bosco Turimumahoro, thirty, has had this coffee bike for six months. He saved up 120,000 francs (about £130) to buy it, because it can carry loads faster than a regular bike, increasing his productivity and income.

“Everyone is jealous,” says John. “If everyone could afford one, then I’m sure we would all have them.” The bikes are designed by Ritchey Design in collaboration with Project Rwanda – a volunteer-driven organisation that oversees the training of Team Rwanda – and were originally intended to help coffee growers carry loads of cherries to the washing station quicker, thereby increasing the quality and price of their coffee. But word has spread, and now Rwandans from all livelihoods covet these bikes for the transport of goods.

70 HUCK

G a s o r e H atege k a Gasore Hategeka was orphaned during the genocide when he was just seven years old. Without having had a day in school and unable to even write his name, he was eking out an existence working at markets, earning just enough to buy potatoes, until finally he saved up enough money to buy a bike. Every time he saw a Team Rwanda cyclist go past he would chase them and time himself to see how long he could keep up. Two years ago, Jock Boyer tested him. He did so well, Jock gave him a racing bike that same day, and invited him to train for the team. Now he travels all over the world and was Team Rwanda’s first rider to win an international race when he claimed top spot on the Tour of Cameroon last year.

71

J o h n Minawi John Minawi was fourteen when he began riding taxis. Now nineteen years old, he has owned his own bicycle for three years. Before that, he was working on a bike that belonged to someone else, and made less money due to rent. On a good day he can earn up to 3,000 francs (£3.20) giving people rides, but on a bad day it can be as little as 500 francs (60p). He is very proud of his pimped-out wheels and thinks the touches he’s added drive more business. “I think the more stuff I have on the bike makes it feel heavier on the road, which I prefer,” says John. “It also increases the price of the bicycle when I want to sell it on to someone else.” On the front of John’s bike, there is a sign that reads ubuzima – meaning life/health in Kinyarwanda

72 HUCK

P I C K ‘ N’ SK AT E I T ’ S S P R IN G IN T H E C IT Y ! SO G R AB YOU R C R U I SI N G W E A P O N O F C H O I C E .

74 HUCK

S O L I TA R Y A R T S

BUDDY CARR

GLOBE

S O L I TA R Y A R T S

GLOBE

ARBOR

S A N TA C R U Z

Piano Pinner City slalom fun.

Hello Aloha indeed!

Sea Pals Cruiser C a r t o o n c a r v e r.

Big Red Go red, get rad.

Pin City Bamboo Not for suits.

Hybrid Bamboo Summer on ice.

Landshark Rasta Where’s the leash?

solitaryarts.com

buddycarrskateboards.com

globe.tv

solitaryarts.com

globe.tv

arborcollective.com

santacruzeurope.com

75

In Ramallah I Can Breathe In the close confines of Palestinian life, a nascent street-racing scene is hurtling up and taking root. For one of the women sat behind the wheel, freedom is what happens when you refuse to slow down.

Te x t P o l l y F i e l d s Photography Guy Martin

76 HUCK

77

Mona takes a long drag on her cigarette.

pushing back their hair, waiting for their turn as

She’s the first to arrive tonight, and nervously

the men lead the way.

taps the steering wheel of her silver Opal Astra,

One by one each racer is timed as they speed

watching, waiting. The low, menacing rumble of

around a pre-set course – pulling handbrake turns,

cars reaches us long before we see them. They’re

performing doughnut spins and weaving in and

on their way.

out of orange cones. The emphasis is on agility and

We’re at a dusty piece of tarmac the size of a football pitch on the outskirts of Ramallah.

control, but, hitting speeds of up to 50 mph, part of the rush is about going fast, too.

Although everyone here still dreams of Jer-

It’s not only mentally tough, but also physically

usalem as the capital of any future Palestinian

demanding. Buckled into Mona’s passenger seat,

state, the city, for now at least, has become acc-

our heads are repeatedly thrown against the

epted as the West Bank’s commercial, political

window as we spin in seemingly endless circles.

and cultural centre.

Although she wears gloves when she drives, her

And the city that surrounds us today is a far cry

hands are covered in blisters.

from the images of Israeli-Palestinian conflict that

“I love people watching me, I like proving what

have plagued television screens for the past two

I can do,” Mona shouts over her shoulder, clearly

a feeling of freedom. “There was little to do here

decades. On the streets where Israeli troops and

feeding off the speed, or the reverence of the

during those years,” Khaled says. It worked, and

Palestinian snipers were once a frequent sight –

gathered crowd – or, perhaps, a little bit of both.

even now, the fact that street racing is banned

where bullets fell and people cowered in doorways – there are now new glass offices, restaurants, gyms and double-fronted villas springing up.

in Israel makes its prominence here seem all the

Together,

more symbolic – it shows a resistance. As one racer these men and women are

But you don’t have to go far beyond urban

something of a team – Team Ramallah, to be pre-

boundaries to witness the physical restrictions

cise – and once a month during the summer season

that still encircle this occupied land.

they compete with other amateur street racers

The vacant strip of tarmac where we stand with Mona marks the end of the West Bank. The plot

says: “Having fun like this is one way to show we are still alive.”

from towns across the West Bank: Jenin, Nablus,

Back at the ramshackle race-track, the week-

Bethlehem and Jericho.

ly practice session is coming to a close. As the

is bordered on one side by a barbed-wire fence,

They operate under the guidance of the

a spiky boundary that separates the Palestinian

Palestinian Motorsport Federation, who organise

apartment blocks, the racers slowly edge away.

Territory from Israel. An Israeli watchtower looms

and fund monthly racing tournaments that can

But for Mona and a few of the men left behind,

nearby where, occasionally, a green-clad soldier

involve as many as fifty competitors at a time.

the night has only just begun. It’s Thursday and,

becomes visible, peering curiously at the scene

The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas,

beyond the minarets echoing the final call to pray-

unfolding just metres away.

has also shown his support for the sport. He

er, the underbelly of Ramallah is coming to life.

Suddenly, a troop of cars appears on the horizon. They screech to a halt and as the dust

even allowed one race to be held on his private helipad in Bethlehem.

sun dips behind outer-Ramallah’s whitewashed

We follow the group to SnowBar – an open-air club that sits nestled in one of Ramallah’s many

gathers up and then settles, eighteen hard-faced,

Finding places where the drivers are permitted

hills. A sound-clash of Arabic and US hip hop

muscular Palestinian men, each behind the steer-

to race has proved a major challenge for Khaled

booms from the speakers, and the queue at the bar

ing wheel of a modified BMW, Mercedes or Volks-

Qaddoura, the man who heads the Motorsport

is four deep.

wagen, peer out of a line-up of dirty front windows.

Federation. “Everyone knows we have many

Mona has cast off her racing attire and, sporting

Engines revving, they take no notice of the Israeli

problems here in Palestine – and we have to get

a denim jumpsuit, is sipping a double vodka

military vehicles patrolling on the other side of

permission to race anywhere,” he explains. “We’re

and lemonade. Her eyes are heavily lined with

the fence and instead concentrate on the obstacle

hoping to get a piece of land near Jericho where

matching blue makeup. Having lived in Ramallah

course that lies ahead.

we can build a track, we are just waiting for the

all her life, Mona is well known among this crowd.

Mona

plans to get approved.” But with land ownership

She flits between tables, and although she thinks

Ennab and a handful of other young women are

still very much at the forefront of the Israeli-

of herself as one of the guys, there is something

joining their male counterparts to take part in an

Palestinian dispute, he’s doubtful it will happen

flirty and fun in the way she engages people. It

ad hoc street-racing event.

any time soon.

seems infectious – people gravitate towards her

This

evening,

twenty-four-year-old

Mona is fidgeting; she’s excited, and leaves her

Khaled founded the Federation in 2005,

– and she feeds off the attention that comes with

car to leap around the men’s vehicles. She hangs

shortly after the end of the Second Intifada – the

being a recognised face. “I love this city,” she says

through their windows, shaking hands, talking

Palestinian uprising that saw escalated violence

over another round of drinks. “I wouldn’t want to

and laughing. This is the moment of the week she

and a subsequent tightening of restrictions

live anywhere else, I have everything here.”

lives for, that they all live for. It’s as much a social

imposed by Israel. He began to promote street

In reality, Mona’s Palestinian ID leaves her little

occasion as anything else – a rare escape from

racing almost straight away, knowing it would

choice. To cross into Israel is an administrative

a confined reality. It offers a release. The other

draw the attention of young people and hoping

headache, neighbouring Jordan is not much

women racers perch on their bonnets, sunglasses

it could become a way for them to start regaining

easier, and she can count the number of times she has attempted it on one hand.

At the age of nineteen, Mona became the first female street racer in the West Bank after being spotted speeding through the city’s narrow roads by the Motorsport Federation’s Khaled Qaddoura.

79

But it wasn’t easy to persuade the other guys she was serious. “The men, they would laugh at me, they said I couldn’t do it and that I should be at home like all the other girls,” she recalls.

And during races, even when she was doing well and taking the right lines on the obstacle

The following day, we meet Mona and her

“My mum, you know she puts the Koran in my

boyfriend, Mahmoud in downtown Ramallah.

car,” Mona says, pulling out the book that’s been

He’s a bodybuilder, and his sleeveless shirt

shoved in the side pocket of the door. “She thinks

exaggerates his bulky physique. Other street racers

it will keep me safe. But I’m not really religious.”

we met the night before join us, and we head off in

Mona’s mother, Nami, is a tall, round woman

a convoy of BMWs towards the Dead Sea – a spot

who looks nothing like her petite daughter. After

the crew head to every Friday afternoon – about an

the death of Mona’s father, she raised Mona

hour’s drive away.

and her younger sister on her own. Although

Barely a few miles outside Ramallah, Mona

some families are reluctant to let their daughters

and the men roll down their windows as we pass

compete in such a male-dominated sport, she says

through the first Israeli checkpoint. “We’re not

she loves to watch Mona driving and has never

allowed to have tinted glass,” Mona explains.

missed a race. “My daughter, she is crazy. Every

course, the men would distract her by shouting

Like most major Palestinian cities, Ramallah

that she was on the “wrong road” – an instant

is under complete Palestinian civil and security

disqualification in the sport. But it didn’t put her

authority. Hidden inside Ramallah’s cocoon, it’s

The family has gathered to celebrate a

off. “I am the fastest woman in Palestine,” she

possible to momentarily forget that Israel still

wedding. As Mona’s mother, cousins and aunts –

says, explaining how she’d simply lock the doors,

retains full control over sixty per cent of the West

each wearing a brightly coloured headscarf – start

turn up her Arabic house music and immerse

Bank, including the majority of the roads.

dancing together in front of the newly wedded

herself in the need for speed.

day I tell her she is crazy. But what she does is very brave,” she says.

Today the soldiers let them pass through

couple, a few stares are directed towards Mona,

At 1am the party starts to wind down. People

without stopping. Soon, we’re racing across the

who’s wearing tight skinny jeans and a white,

pile into their cars and head towards the centre

open desert at 100 mph, slowing down when we

short-sleeved top. There are more than a hundred

of Ramallah, to another bar that will take over

see Israeli police. The car’s thermometer gauge

women in the room, and she is the only one not

until 4am. But before we leave, Mona pulls us

edges upwards, and by the time we’ve reached our

wearing traditional clothes.

aside towards a dimly lit outdoor swimming

destination, it’s risen by nearly twenty degrees.

pool, designed to draw in the daytime crowds.

Mona says they often talk about her – about

Since our group consists of several men and

what she does or wears – and for the first time since

She heads down the steps, takes off her denim

only two women, Mona thinks it is unlikely we will

we’ve been here, she looks awkward. “I’m the lucky

jumpsuit to reveal shorts and a strappy top, and

be allowed to enter one of the Israeli-owned beach

one,” she says. “My mum tells me to ignore them.

dives into the pool. Her shrieks and splashes

clubs, which are dotted along this stretch of the

If I didn’t have a mum that let me be free, I’d die.”

fill the night air. A cool breeze has picked up,

Dead Sea. Even after watching several groups of

Yet as another family wedding approaches

whipping through the valley – and ten minutes

Israelis heading into one resort without any hassle,

later that week, we arrive at Mona’s small apart-

later she is back out the water.

it doesn’t seem to bother them. One of the guys, a

ment to find her in full traditional attire. She looks

“In life, you just have to have fun,” she says,

lanky twenty-three-year-old called Malek, says it’s

uncomfortable and cannot do up the belt that acc-

grabbing her clothes and leaving us trailing as

just another barrier and shrugs it off dismissively:

ompanies her floor-length red dress. “It’s stupid,”

she rushes off to catch up with the boys.

“We’re Palestinians, we’ll always find a way.”

she says. “How will I even drive my car in this?”

Ramallah’s

And they do. We drive on down the coast –

As our time in Ramallah draws to a close, we

lined with yet more barbed wire – and come to a

meet Mona at SnowBar for a final drink. I have not

street racers and night-

place where a jagged hole has been cut. “You see,

seen her with her boyfriend for several days and

time revellers aren’t just a symbol of an emerging

there are always special gates for Palestinians,”

ask where he is.

subculture of Palestinian youth – they represent

Malek points out.

She tells me she is avoiding him.

an increasingly affluent class who have money,

Crawling through the opening in the fence, the

I ask if she has thought about marriage. “My

disposable money, and after years of conflict

group makes its way across the squalid ground,

family say it’s nearly time, but we have some prob-

they are now more than ready to spend it. The

which is covered with bits of metal. It lacks the

lems,” she says, biting her lip. “He is very jealous

racers all have jobs or financial back-up from

amenities and holiday charm of the beach clubs

and very traditional.”

wealthy family – powerful cars, slick tyres and

just around the corner, but other Palestinian

She says she fears that if she marries him, he

constant vehicle maintenance come at a sub-

families start to arrive. Not wanting to sit on the

will stop her from going out and – worst of all – stop

stantial cost.

muddy ground, we leave after spending less than

her racing.

But Ramallah’s booming economy and im-

an hour by the Dead Sea.

proved security isn’t a story that is shared across

I ask Mona if it was worth the trip. “We don’t

the whole of the West Bank. In fact there’s been

have a lot of choice, there aren’t many places we

an underlying resentment from those outside

can go,” she laughs, but moves on quickly and

Ramallah who complain the territory’s financial

doesn’t dwell. “It’s just the way it is.”

growth has been far from evenly spread and has centred almost entirely on this one city.

“I am worried he will want a wife who is at home with the children, and right now, I don’t want that,” she says.

“So what will you do?” I ask.

“For now, I will just wait. For now, I can breathe.”

Despite all the talk of Ramallah’s thriving

The nighttime exploits and adrenaline-fuel-led

Our thoughts go out to photographer Guy Martin,

success, many are quick to point out the fragile

missions are not the only side of Mona’s life. She

a long-time friend and contributor to HUCK, who

and limited scope of the prosperity, and the

is also a young Muslim woman who is expected to

was injured in the attack that claimed the lives

potentially turbulent times ahead.

conform to traditions and fulfill strong obligations

of photojournalists Tim Hetherington and Chris

to her family.

Hondros in Misrata, Libya.

Mona and her friends talk little about what the future may bring. They live firmly in the moment, perhaps only too aware of how quickly things could change.

80 HUCK

81

First st in in SURFING S SU URFING NEWS NEWS First

www.surfersvillage.com Rider: Tim Boal / Photo: Agustin Munoz/Red Bull Photofiles / Design: ID

Tim

Bo al

86 HUCK

89

BREAD & BUTTER presents a SPORT & STREET production featuring TROY & TRAVIS COCO SUMANI BILLY BOYLE FATE MORGAN FACEMAN DUSTY McRHODES LEANN O‘GILFY •

•

•

•

•

first class music acts TBA, be prepared for the 10 years BBB SUMMER HAPPENING from 06–08 JULY 2011 at Berlins historic AIRPORT BERLIN-TEMPELHOF check our website WWW.BREADANDBUTTER.COM/SPORTANDSTREET for more info

94 HUCK

95

HUGE SELECTION * !

R CHE U O V 5€ : HUCK

photo: m. lämmerhirt

CODE

facebook.com/bluetomato * 5€ voucher - valid for your next online purchase over 30€!

info@blue-tomato.com | www.blue-tomato.com Order Hotline: 0043 3687-24 22 333 Deutschland: 01801-55 57 778 178 Skype: blue-tomato-snowboardshop

99

2011 STREETMEAT SUPERSTARS HERE’S TO THE AFTER HOURS ATHLETE