CG: Sounds like a rough life. I hear you
hated to mow the back lawn. What did
you do about that?
SA: With my skateboard money that I'd
won, I cemented the whole back lawn.
CG: Sounds like you're up to your fairy
tale stories to me, Alice.
SA: When you got that much money, you
might as well live it up. Too bad none of
you other skaters out there will never make
the money that I did.
CG: How about a few words on eating
shit? I know you've had the pleasure.
SA: I've had plenty of those. First time was
right before I went pro, I ate it on my chin.
Second time I ate shit on my head and got
37 stitches. Third time I slammed at Big O
and got 10 stitches. Fourth time I ate shit at
Winchester and pulled every ligament in
my knee and couldn't walk for a year. Fifth
time I pulled the other ligaments in my
other leg and couldn't walk for six months.
Are there any other ones that you re-
member that I don't? Oh yeah, I've had a
swollen elbow, broken ankle, and broken
wrist. I've paid my dues.
CG: But you loved it, right?
SA: Not any more, I don't.
CG: What's the biggest beef you've
ever seen?
SA: The biggest was when I was in
Arizona with Peralta. Skating those
Arizona pipes with a big gap in between
them, about six inches or so, and this guy
was about 10 o'clock frontside, hit the gap
with his back wheels, fell down about 30
thousand feet, hit his head on the other
crack, and cracked his head open in half.
We couldn't wake him up for about five
minutes, we thought he was dead. That's
the biggest one, man. No shit man, blood
all over the place.
CG: Okay, next question, what's the
second biggest lie you've ever told?
SA: The one I told my mom, that we were
at the Whiskey and I had tripped down the
Twa
Some might say he's left a scar, but one thing is for sure, he has seen it all. From the pioneering days
when he and his contemporaries were treated as VIPS, and seeing it all from his perspective as a
champion achiever in this very limited field. Here Salba lays down some of the first grinds in the capsule
at the "Big O" on opening day. Note the thrashed nose of the board and early truck width modification.
stairs in my bondage pants, but I really got
in a fight and got my lip swollen up like
Donald Duck.
CG: You were at Baces Hall, weren't
you?
SA: Yeah, Black Flag riot, with people
doing Nazi salutes.
CG:1 was there too. Remember, I shoved
you through the window. You and Jay
Smith, Alva, and Jim Muir and this other
skater who was in the parking lot of
Okie Dogs with a bottle of wine under
his coat. We won't talk about that
now.... Are you amazed at the now
resurging uprise in the skateboard
phenomenon, or do you think it's
getting what it deserves?
SA: It's getting better now. It got killed from
all of us messing it up. Me and Olson, Alva
and Duane.
CG: My next question was gonna be,
what do you think hurt skateboarding
the most a few years ago.
SA: Punk Rock. Punk Rock destroys
society. It's killing everybody.
CG: But it seems like it's uniting
everybody.
SA: It is now because it's not what it used
to be. If you skate you're a punk. If you're
a punk, you skate. Otherwise you suck.
CG: How much do you weigh?
SA: About four pounds for the eight-incher,
and about a hundred and forty-five for me.
I dye my hair black every month. I rat it up
and look like a girl, wear girl's clothes, wear
high heels and leather pants and I also
wear make-up.
CG: Do you have any goals, do you
have any values?
SA: What kind of values? Sexual values,
or moral values?
CG: You tell me, what values do you
have?
SA: I value my guitar, I value Julie, I value
my life and I value my weenie.
CG: So who's your favorite skater of all
time?
SA: Andrea and Olson. Never saw anyone
carve backwards in a halfpipe, so Olson's
it. He did it at the Del Mar contest and he
even got a grind while doing it.
CG: What's the most radical move
you've ever done?
SA: Eleven o'clock, frontside snapback in
a pipe. I ain't that radical, I just go fast and
do it.
CG: What do you think of this growing
brotherhood of skateboarding?
SA: I think that every skate punk should
get a tattoo that says "Skate To Live, Live
To Skate."
CG: What are your favorite new bands?
SA: Panther Burns, Cramps,
Meteors...stuff like that. None of that
"pretty" shit like Jimmy and the Mustangs.
TSOL is cool. Olson's band is cool.
CG: What's your favorite maneuver?
SA: Frontside grind or a backside edger.
Keep skating pure and simple. By far, do
you see anyone do backside edgers
anymore? Too radical for robots.
CG: What is your favorite place to
skate?
SA: Either "L" pool, 'cause the environment
was right and we'd get drunk then. Texas
30 foot pipes. They're still there, Mt. Baldy
pipeline is capl to get loose in and do
whatever you want.
CG: What shape pool do you like? The
"L" pool, big, squarish pools, kidneys,
keyholes?
SA: All kinds. The kind that're ridable.
CG: What about a pool to ride for
competition?
SA: Pipeline, so I can haul ass. Winchester
for the same reason. Winchester was a full
circle and you could do anything in it.
CG: On the average, when you go into a
place, how long does it take before you
get kicked out?
SA: I went and saw the Ramones once,
and got kicked out on the first song.
CG: How'd you do that?
SA: Dancing too hard, spitting, kicking.
biting. At Winchester there used to be this
guy who used to head butt people.
CG: So I hear you've got a job now.
What's it like?
SA: It's all right. I work in a music store. It's
called Mucus Puss. I clerk and run the
register and listen to records all day, like
Michael Jackson and Paul McCartney. But
then again I listen to my blues stuff. We get
to pick a record every month that we think
would be a good seller and I always pick a
blues record.
CG: In the beginning, who'd you look
up to the most?
SA: Magazine people, man, Peralta, Alva,
then all the guys I skated "L" pool with. But
I really didn't look up to those guys.
CG: Why?
SA: 'Cause they had long hair.
CG: How did you ever get affiliated with
Indy?
SA: Well, we were skating the Newark
contest, at the very first Hester series.
Some weird looking scummy guys, one
with a moustache, come up to me and
asked me if I wanted to ride these trucks. I
said, "What the hell, I'll give them a try,"
right? I ended up riding them for the
contest. They were real slaves. I said, "If
you want me to ride the trucks, you put
them on my board," and they did it. I rode
them just 'cause they did that, you know.
Now I work for them, and they tell me what
to do.
CG: What did it mean to be on the Indy
team back then?
SA: Indy is the coolest, and it will always
be the coolest. We didn't give a shit, we
just did it.
CG: Who was on the team with you?
SA: Blackhart, Olson, me, Micke, Duane,
the Buck Brothers, all the up-north guys,
Darrell Miller was on it for awhile and
Bobby Valdez.
CG: What maneuver has blown you
mind the most?
SA: The "Gay Twist." It's real gay.
CG: Who thought of that name, any-
way?
SA: I think it was Tony Hawk.
CG: Did you invent any moves your-
self?
SA: I invented a lot of tricks that people are
just doing now today, that I've done four
years ago. Gator, for instance, doing a
360-degree frontside air which I did four
years ago. 360 rock-n-roll was my trick.
Real long frontside grinders were my trick.
A lot of slides that no one has done either.
Another one was, Stacy Peralta did my
360-degree air at the Winchester contest
and got credit for it 'cause I messed up my
knee.
CG: You've been ripped off and de-
praved.
SA: Deprived.
CG: So what are you gonna do now?
SA: I want to have a baby. Just joking. I
want to become a rock-n-roll star now. I'm
gonna be more famous than Mick Jagger,
the American singer, I think the band's
name is the Grateful Dead.
CG: That's Jerry Garcia.
SA: Oh, that's right. Mick's in the Rolling
Stones. Really, I like Keith Richards a lot,
he's one of my idols.
CG: So, have you seen all the Cheech
and Chong movies?
SA: No, I've only seen "Up in Smoke."
CG: Why do you do what you do?
SA: Because I'm a REBEL, and I was born
to it. If you really knew how I was, the
average American parent wouldn't put up
with it. But my parents are real cool about
it. They're the coolest parents around.
Whose mom would let their son go out of
Salba still does shred and credits his skateboarding career for his wonderfully sharp personality.
Here the Salba attack style prevails through the years at a recent session at Joe Lopes' Hayward
ramp. The frontside grind, "Keep skating pure and simple."
THRE
HATEBOAR
the house looking like some kind of fag.
with tattoos and an earring, and the whole
works.
CG: You dabble in art. How long have
you dabbled?
SA: A long time. Since third grade.
CG: What are your main interests,
subject matter? Skulls?
SA: Skulls, leopards, girls, dikes, crosses,
ribbons, daggers, hearts, eagles, Harley
Davidsons, Wild Ones, Marlon Brando,
Jimmy Dean, Marilyn Monroe, Elvis
Presley, ships, Eddie Cochran, lions, Little
Richard, Buddy Holly, Gene Vincent, Bo
Diddly, John Lee Hooker.
CG: I've drawn all of those. I drew the
exact same stuff.
SA: We must be brothers born of different
mothers.
CG: What about the scene down there
where you live, what's going on?
SA: All the kids are listening to the Stray
Cats. They're poseurs, they think the Stray
Cats are what it's all about, and they don't
even know who Eddie Cochran is.
CG: Is that what it's all about?
SA: Yup. If you're into it. You gotta have
your roots to do anything. Credence
Clearwater Revival was a roots band.
CG: Would you say Isaac Hayes was a
roots band?
SA: Yup.
CG: How did you ever incline yourself
to be wrapped up in music?
SA: Because my mom bought me a
Gibson 125 on Christmas. I got out the
good old Mel Bay guitar learning books.
and learned the chords.
CG: So, for aspiring new guitarists, you
would advocate the use of the Mel Bay
system?
SA: Yeah, I also took lessons from some
old blues guy who used to play with Cab
Calloway. He's dead now. Had a heart
attack, smoking too much. All the blues
stuff I know now, I know from that guy.
Continued on page 42