Red Bull’s series detailing life inside the
most famous Pipeline houses continues, this time with a peek
into the preparation for Vans World Cup of Surfing and also
how the boys surf it. Bruce Irons, pops up and gives an interview
on Pipeline, his relationship to the wave, and how he
still visualizes himself hoisting a trophy at an event here. Plus a
little bit of Balaram Stack. Remember how awesome it almost was
that he was dating Christie Brinkley? He texted me, after
the story went live, that they were just friends but it was too
late to do anything. A boy can dream, no?
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Technology: Be the surfboard!
By Chas Smith
WaveWrecker promises to be a massive breakthrough!
Which surfer will first ride one on tour?
Surfboards are one of the greatest things about
surfing. They are very seductive, smooth and curvy. Gorgeous,
sensual even. How many times have you picked one up and caressed
its rails so tenderly? Do you wish someone would caress you that
way? Well your dreams are about to come true!
There is a new thing being Kickstarted called WaveWrecker! Let’s
read about it!
WaveWrecker is a form of wearable technology that’s designed
to make your body streamlined and able to glide through the water
and ride waves with marine mammal-like ease. It also has built-in
buoyancy that allows wave riders to stay in the water longer, catch
and grip waves with control, and exceed the limits of bodysurfing
alone.
Experienced wave surfers love using it to push the limits of
traditional bodysurfing by catching more waves and performing
tricks, like spin moves and windmills. WaveWrecker is also loved by
less experienced riders. It shortens the bodysurfing curve for
beginners, and its buoyancy helps parents feel more confident about
their children’s safety in the water.
Does that inspire? Would you like to climb into one? I think you
need to give some money first. Go here!
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Quiksilver: “Empathy doesn’t exist!”
By Rory Parker
But who needs empathy? Only the
lazy/untalented/communists!
I was talking to my dad this morning, he’s up
in NorCal doing whatever it is people do up there. Look at otters,
marvel at the solitary lunatic who’s always, inexplicably, trying
to surf freezing cold onshore terribleness.
Towards the end of our conversation his phones started cutting
in and out, I barely understood a garbled OC Weekly and Quiksilver
before he was disconnected.
The Quiksilver machine hummed noiselessly and made handsome
profits for McKnight and others—he cracked $1 million in base
salary in 2007, two years after McKnight had engineered a $560
million acquisition of ski brand Rossignol and a part share in
Cleveland Golf in an effort to branch out. By then, Quiksilver was
producing movies, TV shows and books. The company was flying Slater
to remote breaks using branded seaplanes. Corporate parties got
more and more lavish, and McKnight became a staple of Orange
County’s society pages. But the execs didn’t let much profits
trickle down. Of several dozen posts at glassdoor.com, an online
discussion site for workers, almost all employees complained about
Quiksilver’s crappy pay. “One of the most hostile environments I’ve
ever experienced,” a former design professional wrote in 2013.
“Empathy doesn’t exist.”
It’s an interesting read, certainly worth your click, with a
gorgeous amount of dirt you won’t find in the surf media.
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The best surf movie soundtrack…ever?
By Derek Rielly
Can you guess?
Does it amaze you, as it does me, the power of
song to elevate a surf film? The opening piano chords of Life
on Mars for Creed McTaggart’s section in Cluster acts
on my brain like a narcotic every time I hear it.
Other times, songs can feel like wedges being hammered into your
neck.
And so I wondered, what is the best surf movie soundtrack,
ever?
A Kai Neville film? Maybe something further down the timeline, a
Jack McCoy movie?
Taylor Steele’s punk lite scores?
What songs have stayed in my head the longest? What songs
accompany my own jams on a wave?
In the very distant turn of the century there was a Volcom
movie, made by Australia’s Ozzie Wright, that became the template
for almost every surf movie, and for every hipster, since: the
super eight footage, the static landscape shots, street painting,
goofy tricks.
With a soundtrack populated by Sonic Youth and Iggy Pop, among
others? And pivoting the movie around a punk ska track called
Arsehole?
It’s a ridiculous, trivial soundtrack, absurdly insignificant,
that works better than anything before or since.
Here, taste.
(Oh, and there’s a song by a band called The Line in there
that lives in my head, too. Goddamn, if I could find it. Anyone
help?)
(The section with Arsehole, by Snuff)
And this is what Snuff look like. So not surf!
A little Sonic Youth
Yuh, yodelling…
The closing hit.
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Laugh: Dan Bilzerian is a kook II!
By Chas Smith
The King of Instagram's surf saga gets even more
tawdry!
This morning, I posted a story that genuinely
tickled. Dan Bilzerian, the
self-proclaimed King of Instagram, made famous for posting pictures
of lots of girls hanging out with him and his beard and his
airplane and his lack of self-esteem posted a picture of him and
his beard and a strangely concave Al Merrick waxed all the entire
way to the nose. The caption read “Good gettin back in the
water today w the gambling surf guru @ricksalomon”
Oh how funny! But, apparently, the whole business gets even
better. A wonderful man by the named Earl White informed me, via
Facebook, that, “My buddy saw him take this picture then pullout a
longboard to paddle on…wouldn’t say he ‘surfed’ it.”
How amazing! But really? Is true? I had to know.
“Yes.” he said. “It was at Sunset (Santa Monica). Big yellow
longboard.”
And don’t social fame just cut both ways? Dan gets paid,
presumably, to shill whatnots to his 15 m followers. They say
things like “You live a blessed life” and “Amazing” but sometimes
“You have very short legs.” On his surf post his non-followers say
things like “Kook” “What a kook” and “Go back to the valley, kook.”
And also bury him deeper with tales of what truly went down that
day.
