SALMAN AGAH
W
HAT ARE YOU UP TO, 135
pounds? Have you been working
out there in The Valley?
135? More like 235, baby. It's all about
fat cat.
Do you break boards a lot?
Break boards?
Not with the Black Label super industrial
'cave, huh?
I'll destroy a board.
Would you destroy Mike Vallely?
Would I? I'll destroy anyone.
You can take Mike Vallely?
I can take anyone.
And Mike Vallely's first on your list?
I don't think so.
And it will go on for thousands of
years more.
That's right, and we'll probably instigate it
all the time.
That's the thing; it's small potatoes
compared to the big picture of reality.
Sure.
We're doin' this 20th anniversary of
Thrasher, can you believe that?
It's amazing. I'm stoked.
You know you guys are pretty much the heros
of the boards. You did a pretty good job in the
early '90s of keeping it real when it was kind
of flat.
Hey, you know what? I'm so stoked on that.
I just love it. I love it that I skated at that time;
"I'LL DESTROY
A BOARD"
'Cause he's tough.
No, I'm just not into wrestling.
You'd just do the thump-down and that's
pretty much the end of it?
I'd do the well fly and into the dome and
be done.
And the Babylonian back crusher.
Exactly.
What do you think about all the shit goin'
off in the Middle East, Sal? Is it all fueled
by the gas prices?
I don't know; that shit's been going on for
thousands of years.
THRASHER
THRASHER
January 1996
HE
February 1994
not that I don't skate now, but just that I
loved it. I love it even more now.
Because you realize how much it sucked
and how we were a bunch of scared little
girls trying to fit in, like high school.
That's what it was. I feel like it's more like
that now.
It's huge. Skateboarding's never going to
be like, "Do it yourself, bros. My friends
and I are going to have a little mini-ramp
jam." No, that's not the way it is. It's like,
"I support Bagel Bites, Club Med"-
cheap. This ain't skating.
Skateboarding right now reminds me of
high school. Not skateboarding, the
actual act, but the fuckin' people involved
are idiots, basically. Why do you think I
live in Coursegold?
What was the first Thrasher you ever saw?
Do you remember?
Yeah, Mark Gonzales bean plant.
You think that's what that was?
Whatever he's doin'.
It's the Gonz's interview, right?
It's 1986, and on the cover he's doin' a
reverse bean plant or somethin' like that-
ice plant.
That's right. Alley-oop frontside bone
to fakie.
Somethin' like that.
Is Thrasher still as important now as it
was then?
It's more important. -Jake Phelps
Switch ollie.
NO PARKING
Backside Smith.