Josh: ‘Kalis in Mono’ is widely regarded as one of the first (if not the first) ‘standalone’ video sections, which, intentionally or not, paved the way for the ‘solo video part’ that the internet is filled with today.

Josh: You know what, I think that full length videos haven’t changed at all; I still see them coming out. The problem is in my opinion that there’s too much coming out, via Instagram and all that, that it doesn’t have the impact when the videos do come out. The video comes out, a solo part comes out, whatever it is – there’s only one big platform, and that platform is Thrasher, Transworld, whatever? Every single one of these platforms, the dudes’ video part comes out and, two hours later, there’s a new video. No-ones given the time to…I don’t know, we used to rewind videos….

Mike: I think it takes a while. A video can come out and, going with Josh’s point, can get overshadowed by whatever. It used to be that, when a video part came out, that was the only thing that people watched for a long time. But now, if something is truly good and meant to be watched over and over again, people still do that; it just takes a little longer for it to be recognised as such.

Josh: But dude, I mean I’m 40 years old and I’ll still download a video – but I’ll download it in a way where I can slow mo tricks. I’m still doing that on the computer, hitting the arrow like you were hitting the arrow on the remote back in the day. So if I’m doing it at 40, you fucking best believe some kids are doing it too! It’s just Instagram, Youtube, all that shit, it takes away from the impact that full length videos do have.

Mike: I choose not to watch a lot of it, because it’s too much for me, but a lot of it too is that skaters themselves put out stuff that they would have never put out of themselves a generation previously. Now, dudes will film stuff of themselves in a park, all day long every day. That’s not really what…

Josh: I gotta tell you Mike, we were just talking about this; how there’s this whole generation of motherfuckers watching people play video games. They’re watching people play video games and they’re watching people build shit on Minecraft. This whole new generation of kids are watching other people do shit! So yeah, when you watch Mariano, or Appleyard, or whoever putting up slappy grinds, sloppy kickflips and shit like that, it’s the same mentality of that kid who wants to watch that person play the video game. They just want to see what that person’s doing and how they are as a normal person – it doesn’t matter, Appleyard…I always use Appleyard in interviews, don’t I? He could put himself up playing video games and the kids would be just as stoked. It’s like anything goes right now, your fans are your fans no matter if you’re tre flipping bump to cans or slappy grinding curbs. And you never knew that before because you never got instant feedback, whereas now you get that; “Damn, I only got 500 likes on that shit? I won’t be doing that again.” [laughs].

People are down to watch a video of the Gonz ride his bike around New York for five minutes.

Josh: And I don’t know if the Gonz pays attention to that shit…

Mike: I’m pretty sure he doesn’t. [laughs] Did you watch him caveman that icebox, cooler, whatever the fuck it was? That was amazing. I guess that’s the good thing about all this – that may not have ever even seen the light of day years ago or ended up in the credits section of a Blind video or something. Now, you get to watch that! There are good aspects to it too.

Going back to Love Park, Mike, have you ever seen a photo of Josh that you looked at and thought “damn, I wish I’d shot that”?

Mike: I mean…you mean like a photo that’s been shot, and you’re bitter that it wasn’t you? [laughs]. Probably the switch back tail on Hubba, if I had to pick one. I mean I lived in the city at the time, but he had to do that one with Ballard because he had started to ride for DC and Droors. So if I had to choose one – that would be it.

So to finish off – with the Olympics taking in skateboarding in their next round, do you see skateboarding moving even further away from the plaza vibe?

Josh: I don’t…

Mike: Nor do I…I mean there’s good and bad aspects of it and you have to take the good with the bad, or vice versa. It will shed light on skating, but at the same time people will be in plazas, skate street and not give a shit about all that. I think there will always be those kids out there and I don’t think that will ever change.

Josh: Here’s my thing man; maybe I’m tripping, but I think that there were more skaters that made more good money – pro skaters that made a good, living income – before all that shit even fucking existed. Before Monster and Red Bull and Nike, before that shit was even here and it was just ma and pa skate shops, skaters made better money. Skate shops were thriving better…how long is it gunna take before these motherfuckers figure this shit out? Think about it…

Mike: Well there were fewer skaters too…fewer everything.

Josh: And there were fewer skaters! The hard goods were kicking ass, shoes were kicking ass, you had skaters buying cars and houses – we’re talking the late 90s, early 2000s. Then as soon as the big corporate money came in…how the fuck did that come in? Then the skaters made less money, skateboard companies started going out of business, skate shops started going out of business, what the fuck happened?!

So the Olympics is coming in, maybe it’s just gunna completely kill a huge side of skating…then real skating can come back, you know?

Mike: Well I do think that there’s a huge group of kids who just won’t be about that, know what I mean? There’s dudes like Wes, Wes will never be in the Olympics [laughs].

Josh: I dunno, Wes could be in the Olympics dude…

Mike: Maybe we can bet on that one right now? I’m pretty sure he will not, I’m pretty sure he’ll be driving his mum’s Volvo still, not wanting anything to do with it.

Josh: Nah, he’s secretly stacking chips! [Laughs]. I mean I’ll watch it for sure…

Mike: Yeah I’ll be watching it just out of curiosity, but I want to see the first fool who walks out in a goddamn uniform, like a Ralph Lauren Olympics uniform!

Blades of Glory, peacock style…

Mike: Exactly, it’s going to be insane!

Josh: We should go and heckle everybody… I just want to go and see who gets kicked out for having weed in their system.

Mike: It’s going to be just two dudes left, competing against each other…