{"id":64910,"date":"2016-01-19T17:09:00","date_gmt":"2016-01-20T01:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/?p=64910"},"modified":"2022-07-11T15:28:52","modified_gmt":"2022-07-11T22:28:52","slug":"julien-stranger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/julien-stranger\/","title":{"rendered":"Julien Stranger"},"content":{"rendered":"

JULIEN STRANGER<\/strong>
\n INTERVIEW BY JESSE MARTINEZ<\/strong>
\n PHOTO BY TOBIN YELLAND<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jesse Martinez and Julien Stranger are two of skateboarding\u2019s most notorious characters. Both have spent the majority of their lives, since the early days in Venice, dedicated and committed to skateboarding, and skateboarding wouldn\u2019t be the same without them. Here\u2019s to two of our favorite heroes and antiheroes: Mess and Stranger…<\/em><\/p>\n

Hey, Julien, let\u2019s bang this out.<\/strong>
\nOkay. Let\u2019s do it.<\/p>\n

When were you born? What year?<\/strong>
\nI was born in 1970.<\/p>\n

How did you end up in Venice? I always wondered that.<\/strong>
\nI was always in Venice. I was there since I was a baby. My mom was kind of a beach bum back in the day, so I was in Venice since I was really young. She\u2019s from L.A., more from the North side.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re one of the rare and few born in Venice. That\u2019s an honor.<\/strong>
\nYeah, dude, I don\u2019t take it lightly.<\/p>\n

When did you start skateboarding?<\/strong>
\nThat\u2019s a tough one. There were always skateboards around. I remember getting a Roller Derby Pro when I was like four, from a family friend. When I really knew that I was super into it, I was probably 11 or 12.<\/p>\n

You couldn\u2019t help becoming a skateboarder. It was all around you.<\/strong>
\nYeah. For me, it was a super consistent thread in my life, once I started moving back and forth to San Francisco. It was the one thing that I could bring with me to both places. I didn\u2019t have to start completely over. I could find skaters to hang out with.<\/p>\n

Well, S.F. and Venice are similar. I don\u2019t know why, but I always felt like S.F. was a second home.<\/strong>
\nRad. Definitely. They both had some diehard skate teams for sure.<\/p>\n

What was your first real board, your first good one?<\/strong>
\nIt was a Steve Caballero.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a fine selection. Who actually hooked you up first?<\/strong>
\nMondo.<\/p>\n

Mondo Beck was an Alva boy.<\/strong>
\nYeah. I saw him at the beach and he told me to come by the Garfield house and get a board. I was fucking stoked. I went over there and T.A. gave me a board. I walked in and it was all black and T.A. was laying on top of his bunk bed with this naked girl and he grabbed this board from against the wall and handed it down to me. He said, \u201cTell me what you think, man.\u201d It was a window into a whole other world and I was beyond stoked.<\/p>\n

It might as well have been a gold bar, huh?<\/strong>
\nYeah, dude. It was insane.<\/p>\n

That first time someone gives you something for free, you\u2019re like, \u201cWhat?\u201d<\/strong>
\nYeah. I went right home and cut it up.<\/p>\n

A lot of rad shit went down at that Garfield house. To get a skateboard from Mondo Beck and the Jak is an honor.<\/strong>
\nYeah. Mondo was sick. He was a good dude. Is he around still?<\/p>\n

I hear Mondo is in Hawaii somewhere.<\/strong>
\nThat\u2019s where he belongs for sure.<\/p>\n

Yeah, he does. That dude could skate. Who was your first real sponsor?<\/strong>
\nI guess it was SMA, but it was funny. I got traded from SMA, after two or three boards, over to Dogtown and Skip told me, \u201cYou ride for Jim Muir at Dogtown now.\u201d<\/p>\n

I remember that happening. I gave him shit for that. I was like, \u201cThat guy is one of the best hopefuls in our neighborhood and you just handed him off?\u201d<\/strong>
\nThat was pretty funny. It was cool though.<\/p>\n

Are you kidding? Riding for Dogtown, you\u2019re set in stone forever.<\/strong>
\nAt that time, going to all the CASL contests with Murray, Oster, Eric and Kelly, with Jim driving us to contests in the Falcon, was just huge. That was my first sense of team camaraderie and brotherhood that I still try to keep going with what I\u2019m doing these days. That meant a lot to me for sure.<\/p>\n

The neighborhood tradition is hard not to follow wherever you go. What an honor for you to be with such legends at the beginning of your career.<\/strong>
\nIt was fun, man.<\/p>\n

What did your parents think of you skating back then?<\/strong>
\nThey were cool. My mom bought me the Cab. My stepdad used to try to ground me off my board when I\u2019d fuck up in school, but there was nothing they could do about it really. They were probably just stoked that I wasn\u2019t doing worse shit, because I wasn\u2019t that into school, so it was good.<\/p>\n

There was a lot in Venice to get into back then.<\/strong>
\nWe were pretty innocent. I wasn\u2019t really getting into much, other than skating and surfing and hanging out with my friends. I was playing Dungeons and Dragons and shit.<\/p>\n

Who was your crew? Who were the younger dudes that you were skating with? I know that me, Murray, Dressen and Oster were the older crew and you were the younger guys with your crew.<\/strong>
\nYeah. We just skated around down by Brooks. We definitely weren\u2019t like the Breakwater Locals dudes. We were like four blocks away and it was a whole different world. It was just my friends, Hector and Richard. That was my crew.<\/p>\n

What about when \u201985 and \u201986 came around?<\/strong>
\nI was hanging up here a lot in S.F. and my skate world started expanding a lot. I was skating with you guys too. Out of my little crew, I was the one that wanted to go skate down there with you guys all the time.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s rad. I know Natas had a big influence on you. When was one of the first times you hooked up with that guy?<\/strong>
\nThat\u2019s a cool story. I had just transferred schools from San Francisco because I used to spend the second semester of every school year down South. It was my first day of school at Santa Monica High School and Natas was in my class. I had heard about him or seen him somewhere, so I knew who he was. There were only a few skaters so, immediately, I was like, \u201cWhat\u2019s up, dude? Let\u2019s go skate.\u201d From then on, I would skate by his house on the way to school and we\u2019d skate to school every day. That\u2019s how we started hanging out.<\/p>\n

Natas was a big influence on a lot of guys back in the day. A lot of us were pushing towards the pool style of street while you and Natas and a select other few were paving the way with pressure flips and all of that stuff.<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] Pressure flips? No way, dude. You\u2019re missing something there. I don\u2019t remember that.<\/p>\n

Not from what I saw. You guys were a step up from us back then.<\/strong>
\nNatas was always definitely smashing new territory. You inspired me though.<\/p>\n

I did a lot of skating with Natas back then and I could see his influence on your skating as the years went on.<\/strong>
\nDefinitely. We would just try to not ever do the same trick. Our whole thing was to out-creative each other. Remember Brandon Murdoch?<\/p>\n

Hell yeah.<\/strong>
\nI just ran into that guy the other day.<\/p>\n

How does he look now?<\/strong>
\nHe\u2019s fucked, but it was cool to see him.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re all fucked.<\/strong>
\nTrue. True. That was rad. I had just been talking about him with somebody. He was in Venice and he was definitely one of the best skaters around, from before I even got super into it. He\u2019s a little bit of the lost skate history of Venice. Gonz used to come down to Venice to skate with him.<\/p>\n

I was just going to mention Gonz because he\u2019s probably one of the most gifted skateboarders to ever step on a street board. When did you see him come into the fold? I remember him and Natas were tight back then, so you couldn\u2019t help but wind up skating with the Gonz. He was the man. How did you meet him?<\/strong>
\nThat was definitely how I met the Gonz. My memory is a little fuzzy, but it had to have been from him coming to skate with Natas and me just kind of tagging along.<\/p>\n

You guys had your thing going on back then.<\/strong>
\nBig time. It was nuts.<\/p>\n

What did you think the first time you saw that guy skate?<\/strong>
\nYou know what, dude? Do you remember this? You and I had just gotten to one of the early Oceanside street style contests and here comes the Gonz with orange hair and you elbowed me in the ribs and you said, \u201cThat\u2019s the Gonz.\u201d I knew Gonz, but he had just showed up and you wanted to make sure that I saw him. It was funny. He proceeded to trip everyone\u2019s brains out. He didn\u2019t even know what he was doing.<\/p>\n

I remember. The Gonz was a step ahead of everybody back then.<\/strong>
\nThere was no point of reference. He wasn\u2019t necessarily ahead. It was more like, \u201cWhere is he? What the fuck is he doing?\u201d You didn\u2019t know where any of it began. You know what I mean?<\/p>\n

Yeah. The way I saw it, even if you beat the Gonz in a contest, he still beat you. He did such crazy shit that even if you beat him, it didn\u2019t matter.<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] Yeah. Everybody knew that he was the best skater there. It was just a matter of whether or not he could stay on his board. He almost never did, which is even cooler.<\/p>\n

The Gonz didn\u2019t care. He was like, \u201cHere I am. Watch me rip.\u201d I remember the first time I met you in mid \u201984 or \u201985. I started hearing about you from Natas and I was like, \u201cYeah. I\u2019ve seen him around. He\u2019s a young kid.\u201d Back then we didn\u2019t hang much. We had a different crew with the older guys and you were a young kid then. Once we connected, you and I started skating and you really made me better because you skated such a different way than I did. Remember that one morning we went to the Venice Pavilion and skated off the stage and we were trying to do the first ollie kickflip to catch it on the bottom of your shoe?<\/strong>
\nI\u2019m not sure if I\u2019m just making that up in my head, but that sounds hella familiar.<\/p>\n

That really happened. I met you one morning out at the Venice Pavilion and you were like 13 years old, and I said, \u201cHey dude, I\u2019ve heard of people doing kickflips and catching it to their feet.\u201d You were like, \u201cSweet!\u201d You and I went and tried it for about an hour. We were ollieing off that stage kickflipping and trying to catch it to our feet. You did it first within the first ten tries. The first person I ever saw catch a kickflip to their feet was you.<\/strong>
\nNo way. Really? [Laughs] Wow, dude. That\u2019s funny.<\/p>\n

What I saw you do that day was on the same level as the day that Christian Hosoi came rolling down the street to Hot Cuts. Street skating wasn\u2019t even invented yet and he said, \u201cWatch this.\u201d He did a stationary ollie and our jaws dropped. We were like, \u201cWhat the hell was that?\u201d Skating was never the same in Venice after that. It was the same thing as that day when you did that first ollie kickflip and it landed on top of your shoes, and you rode it down and landed it and rolled away, I never saw skating the same again after that day.<\/strong>
\nWow. That\u2019s nuts.<\/p>\n

Yep. Sure enough that\u2019s where it is now.<\/strong>
\nThat\u2019s a good one.<\/p>\n

You were the first guy I ever saw do that. You\u2019re skateboarding royalty. That\u2019s all I know. Okay, I remember the first moment when I went, \u201cYou know what? I\u2019m ripping! I\u2019m here.\u201d When was that moment for you? Maybe it was one day when you were competing or maybe it was just one day when you looked at yourself and you were like, \u201cI can skate now. I can charge!\u201d<\/strong>
\nIt took me a long time to get there to where your strength and your skill are equally in sync. That took me a long time. Honestly, I\u2019m a late bloomer. When I was 24, I could do anything that I wanted, and I was like, \u201cThis is it. This is the best.\u201d I could still drink all night and skate all day and burn the candle at both ends and have the time of my life. It was a good feeling.<\/p>\n

Do you remember the beginning of wall riding and who did it first?<\/strong>
\nYeah. My first memory of that was the no-handed wall ride and that was you. That was all you. You weren\u2019t putting your hand on the wall. Natas had his hand on the wall. You guys had your own styles to go about it. He would stay above it and you would get right there under it. There was a lot of wall jamming going on. There was the hand on the ground wall rides too.<\/p>\n

Remember those days?<\/strong>
\nYeah. Remember street plant circle?<\/p>\n

Yeah. That was rad back then.<\/strong>
\nThat was sick.<\/p>\n

The Venice boys started wall riding and now it\u2019s amazing to see every other sport is doing wall riding, with motorcycles, bikes, and all that. We started that shit.<\/strong>
\nYeah. I trip out on where the wall jam is going right now. It\u2019s so sick. Dudes are slappying huge walls into stand up 5-0s, so they are like the shallow ends of a pool. It\u2019s like you\u2019re skating vert, but you\u2019re wall riding up the shit. Dudes are just ripping that stuff and I think it\u2019s really cool.<\/p>\n

Whenever I see new guys doing wall rides that advanced, I\u2019m always honored. I go, \u201cWow. Look where it\u2019s gone. It\u2019s still alive.\u201d I always thought it would be a night and day trick, here today and gone in a year, but it stood the test of time. I\u2019m shocked.<\/strong>
\nWhere skating is now, it\u2019s opened doors to where the ollie and the wall ride have been combined, so it\u2019s one move to where you can bash up the wall. The wall ride was more of a building block, just like the ollie that Christian did. It\u2019s just getting taken to the furthest.<\/p>\n

Yeah. I want to ask you this question. I know you had your hand in some trick that was created. There were so many. In our era, everything was new and everything was being invented.<\/strong>
\nI wouldn\u2019t lay claim to anything. [Laughs] Maybe if I was drunk enough I would, but not in an interview.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a great answer. Do you remember the Camel Toe Crew?<\/strong>
\nIt sounds familiar. I know it was a Venice crew. It wasn\u2019t girls. It was some dudes.<\/p>\n

It was Eric, Little Man and Tuma.<\/strong>
\nOh, yeah. That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n

They were the Camel Toe Crew.<\/strong>
\nAre you making fun of them right now?<\/p>\n

[Laughs] You used to hang out with all of those dudes.<\/strong>
\nOf course, we did. Eric is awesome. There were some major egos flying around then.<\/p>\n

Damn right. Venice is full of big heads.<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] Yeah.<\/p>\n

Did vert have any influence on your street skating?<\/strong>
\nMaybe so, in the sense that I could only pretend to street skate on vert and ollie into my airs.<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t it crazy that what you did then all the vert riders do now?<\/strong>
\nGonz was one of the first dudes to start ollieing into his airs. He took the street to the vert from what I remember. I don\u2019t really know.<\/p>\n

Do you remember the Venice Pavilion?<\/strong>
\nOf course, dude. We worked on those murals there when I was in pre-school. All those murals that were there on the inside, before they cut the high wall down and put the fence around it, we did all those or worked on a lot of them.<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t that rad? The Venice Pavilion was like the first street skatepark.<\/strong>
\nYeah. It seemed to me like a central spot. It was a landmark, like a beacon. That was a good one.<\/p>\n

I miss it every day.<\/strong>
\nI don\u2019t even recognize it down there now. I don\u2019t even know where I am in relation to anything. There is no point of reference anymore. I don\u2019t hang out down there enough.<\/p>\n

Yeah. You finally moved away from Venice. What year was that?<\/strong>
\nThat was probably in 1989. I think I stopped going down there because there was nothing left for me down there. I was totally on the outs with my stepdad. I kept coming down there and skating with everyone, but I just couldn\u2019t stay down there anymore.<\/p>\n

Times change, you know? Skating took a hit right around then too.<\/strong>
\nI didn\u2019t care about that. That didn\u2019t really have anything to do with it. I just think my vagrant scene up here was just way easier. My friends were vagrants and we\u2019d all hang out and skate curbs and we all had the same sort of vagrant skateboarding lifestyle, whereas, down there it wasn\u2019t easy. I couch surfed at Aaron\u2019s. Aaron Murray and Tim Jackson would always put me up. Aaron especially always had my back and gave me a place to stay.<\/p>\n

You had such a tie with Dogtown and all of us back then. When you moved up north, did you still consider yourself a Dogtown boy no matter where you wound up?<\/strong>
\nI probably wouldn\u2019t put it in those words, but it was pretty engrained in my character for sure. I remember getting into it with my friends up here, about people not having each other\u2019s backs. I would be like, \u201cWhat the fuck are you guys doing?\u201d It\u2019s just that whole idea of really having your friends back when the shit hits the fan.<\/p>\n

Venice was always like that. We took care of our boys, you know?<\/strong>
\nYou definitely always had my back, Jesse.<\/p>\n

Oh, you know I did, man. You can always call me and I will drive straight to your pad.<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] Yeah.<\/p>\n

When did you start AntiHero? When did that come into play?<\/strong>
\nIt was like 20 years ago now, in the mid \u201890s. I just kept doing what I\u2019ve been doing the whole time and it just kind of led to that and here we are now. I have no master plan whatsoever. It\u2019s just skateboarding.<\/p>\n

No offense to any other company out there, they\u2019re all great and they all did what they did for skateboarding, but I consider AntiHero the truest to the end skateboarding company that I\u2019ve ever seen.<\/strong>
\nWow, dude. Damn. Thank you. Thanks, Jesse. That means a lot coming from you.<\/p>\n

You guys walk the walk.<\/strong>
\nWe\u2019re trying, dude. You\u2019ve got to live it and try to be as genuine as you can. It\u2019s skateboarding.<\/p>\n

Never bow down to the Google image with this new tech world crap that a lot of these companies portray. You guys have always stayed true to skateboarding. When I look at AntiHero, I see the purest of any skate company out there, along with Dogtown and SMA. To put you in that category of Dogtown and SMA\u2026<\/strong>
\nFrom a dude from Venice for life, believe me, I know what that means. Thank you. You had a part in it too, Jesse, in all of it.<\/p>\n

Hey, here\u2019s another thing I wanted to ask you. When you started AntiHero, how did you pick Todd Francis to do the graphics?<\/strong>
\nTodd was already working at Deluxe. He\u2019s the in-house artist. He was already doing a lot of the Real boards and Stereo boards. He was really easy to work with and we\u2019d just bullshit and come up with fucked up shit.<\/p>\n

You guys are always on the edge with those graphics. We\u2019re always like, \u201cDamn! Killer.\u201d What kind of reactions do you get to some of that from people?<\/strong>
\nWell, it took people a long time to warm up to the idea of AntiHero. I think for a long time people just didn\u2019t get it or they didn\u2019t want to get it. It\u2019s still like that now. I still don\u2019t know what it is. It\u2019s just grounded in skateboarding. The board graphics and everything else are an outcome or a byproduct of all of that. It\u2019s kind of organic really.<\/p>\n

You guys put out so many epic videos and you guys are so stylish and gnarly. What was the best video to you?<\/strong>
\nOf our skate videos, I really like the last one a lot and we did that Two Song video years and years ago with that Devo song \u201cBe Stiff\u201d and Skrewdriver. It was real quick. I like those two. They all belong in the time that they were made completely. I don\u2019t think we ever really tried to bullshit anybody.<\/p>\n

I never got the whole story about that Tent City incident with Buddy and Charno.<\/strong>
\nOh, I liked that video too.<\/p>\n

How was it working with those guys and what was it all about?<\/strong>
\nWell, I was just a fan of Northwest and Fruit of the Vine, truly. I just loved those dudes\u2019 take on things. I liked the film and I liked the patience and I liked the story telling and they signed up and they were down. It was great.<\/p>\n

That is rad. A lot of kids always talk about AntiHero and they\u2019re always wondering how you decide who is going to ride for you because you have a very special team. You just don\u2019t go and find some dude that\u2019s ripping and say, \u201cHe\u2019s the best. Let\u2019s get him.\u201d You guys have certain requirements. You guys are no joke.<\/strong>
\nThat is a tough one. That\u2019s a really hard part for me as a skater because I\u2019m not here to judge any other skateboarders. We respect other people\u2019s deals and what they\u2019re doing. For most of the dudes on AntiHero, they\u2019ve put themselves on, straight up. They\u2019ve stood their ground and not ridden for anyone else and they are like \u201cI\u2019ll just wait for you to put me on. I\u2019m still here.\u201d I\u2019m like, \u201cAlright dude.\u201d You still have to get in the van and people have to like you enough to spend time and share adventures with you.<\/p>\n

Loyalty and character is a big part of being a pro.<\/strong>
\nYeah.<\/p>\n

Back in the day when Steve Rocco and I started World Industries, we got tons of videos. We\u2019d watch them now and then and every once in a while we\u2019d see a gnarly guy. How do you deal with that with AntiHero? Have you ever picked up a guy from a video?<\/strong>
\nTrujillo is the one. That is the one story. He gave us a 20-minute sponsor me tape and it was just like, \u201cFuck!\u201d He was just ripping, dude, undeniably. He was all about it and he was super into it. Dude, I trip out on this, Jesse. AntiHero has been around for 20 years now, right? We\u2019ve been skating, you and me, for a long time.<\/p>\n

Decades.<\/strong>
\nWith Raney Beres, who is 21 now, AntiHero has been there pretty much his entire skateboarding life. As a little kid, there was AntiHero, whatever form it was in at that time. I trip out on that. My entire skateboard life, there was Powell and Santa Cruz. Then I look back and think, \u201cOh, they haven\u2019t been around that long. We\u2019ve been around 20 years and they\u2019ve been around 35 years at the most.\u201d It just trips me out. It\u2019s crazy to be a part of that now and to be one of those established skate teams or companies or whatever we are, that has been around for kids whole skateboarding lives. That trips me out because, in my mind, we just got started. It\u2019s just weird.<\/p>\n

Well, you\u2019re a legend, dude. People still talk about you.<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] I don\u2019t know about that, dude. There\u2019s no past to fall back on, Jesse. There\u2019s only now. There\u2019s skateboarding now. There\u2019s only if you\u2019re doing it or not doing it. You know what I mean?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m a diehard. I\u2019ll roll the old way until I die. I\u2019m a Venice boy all the way.<\/strong>
\nI know you are.<\/p>\n

One thing I always loved about being a pro skater was traveling. I loved traveling. I had a few trips that I will never forget and I\u2019m sure you\u2019ve had a few good trips too. Do any stand out to you?<\/strong>
\nYeah. There have been a few good ones for sure. It\u2019s all a blur at this point. There have been a lot of miles. There have been so many times and places, so I don\u2019t think I can boil it down to one trip. It\u2019s just overall good.<\/p>\n

I know back then, me and Rocco based our tours off economics, like \u201cWhere do we sell the most boards? Let\u2019s go there.\u201d How do you guys determine where you go?<\/strong>
\nWell, we do it on what interests us. It\u2019s like, \u201cWhere haven\u2019t we been? That\u2019s probably the biggest motivator. Where haven\u2019t any of us gone that we want to go check out and go skate? That\u2019s number one. Then if you can get the skate company to pay for it or try to help fund it, I\u2019ll pay for my own ticket. I don\u2019t care. Bring some friends and you have all the ingredients for something unique; something really cool in your life.<\/p>\n

Yeah. Do you remember our old set ups that we used to ride compared to today\u2019s set ups? It\u2019s like night and day, isn\u2019t it? It\u2019s crazy.<\/strong>
\nYeah. Our boards were sick though. Skating was different. Back then that shit was state of the art for where we were. Even if we had the boards that we ride now, it wouldn\u2019t have made us better skaters or different skaters. We would have been doing the same shit. It would have been like, \u201cWhat the fuck is this big nose for? I can\u2019t do anything with that.\u201d It has changed though.<\/p>\n

Of all the years of traveling, what spot do you think was the raddest?<\/strong>
\nThat is a tough one. I like cities a lot. I like a city that I can jump on my board and the streets are smooth enough to just hit it. I like that. New York is great. I like any skateable city. If you like natural beauty, there is New Zealand. There are a lot of beautiful places out there, like Barcelona.<\/p>\n

Have you guys ever built something to skate up there at AntiHero?<\/strong>
\nYeah. We\u2019ve been building a bunch of shit the last few years. The last ten years we\u2019ve been building shit and it always gets torn down and we always come back for more somewhere else.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what rad about AntiHero. You guys give back without expecting anything to be given to you. There are so many fans of AntiHero and you don\u2019t hog what you have. You give back to your neighborhood and build things and help people out. That\u2019s the way that all skateboarding should be, but it isn\u2019t.<\/strong>
\nYeah. You\u2019re doing it for yourself, but the whole scene can\u2019t help but get stronger, definitely. We like to inject some radicalness into it, something new for fun.<\/p>\n

Who are you skating with nowadays? Give me their names because if I move up there, I want to know them when I see them.<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] I got some friends up here. You know Andy Roy, right?<\/p>\n

Yeah. He\u2019s a fucking legend.<\/strong>
\nHe is a legend. I know. I like skating with him. He\u2019s around. Actually, we have a pretty good crew up here right now. Everyone is a real skateboarder. They\u2019re not in it for any other reason than to have good times with friends. There are so many names. People can figure it out if they want. I\u2019m not trying to be mysterious. I just don\u2019t want to forget somebody, so I\u2019d rather not even get into it.<\/p>\n

When I think of San Francisco, I know I should be saying Tommy Guerrero but the only two names that come to my mind are Mike Archimedes and Mickey Reyes.<\/strong>
\nHell yeah, dude, that\u2019s my OG crew right there.<\/p>\n

The first time I went to S.F., I met Mike Archimedes and I left San Francisco depressed. I thought I was hot shit and that dude put me in my place in a heartbeat. I was like, \u201cWhat? I\u2019m the number one amateur? I ain\u2019t shit. I just got smoked by this long-haired hippie.\u201d<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] Was that at a contest or were guys just pushing around?<\/p>\n

We were just skating around. Natas and I went up there for a photo shoot with MoFo for the first time and we hooked up with Mike Archimedes and he proceeded to dismantle the curb. I sat there in awe.<\/strong>
\nYeah. I would skate with him and then, for the second half of the school year, I would go back down to Venice and bring little bits and pieces of that back down with me. There was definitely some transference there.<\/p>\n

After meeting Mike Archimedes, we came back here and bashed the shit out of our curbs.<\/strong>
\nYep. I remember Cooksie teaching me frontside slappies down there in Venice. I still remember the exact curb it was. I just don\u2019t remember what street it was on. It might have been Horizon. I remember Cooksie taught me slappies one afternoon and I was like, \u201cThat\u2019s it. I can never get bored. I\u2019ll never look at my skateboard and think, \u201cWhat am I going to do with you?\u201d It was seriously a mind-blowing epiphany of a moment and it held up. That trick doesn\u2019t get old.<\/p>\n

Some tricks never get old. It\u2019s crazy how that happens, isn\u2019t it?<\/strong>
\nYeah. We\u2019re lucky, dude. We\u2019re lucky because skateboarding has kept us somewhat sane, not always, but mostly.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been skating for 44 years straight now non-stop and I had a guy ask me, \u201cHow do you stay interested?\u201d I said, \u201cSkating has so many aspects to it. I can go skate vert. I can skate a curb. I can skate a jump ramp and now I\u2019m bombing hills. It never ends.\u201d It\u2019s evolving constantly. Have you ever drifted away from the street because it seems like you\u2019ve been pretty loyal to the street for decades?<\/strong>
\nNo. Never. Burnside came into the scene and we had a heavy ten years of always having a vert ramp around up here, which was great, but the streets were never not there. That\u2019s just life.<\/p>\n

I remember in the \u201890s, I didn\u2019t see you for a couple of years and then I opened up a Thrasher and there you were blasting an ollie on vert on this wall. I was like, \u201cOh my god, is that Stranger?\u201d<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] You didn\u2019t expect that, huh?<\/p>\n

I was shocked. I was like, \u201cThat dude is blasting!\u201d I was proud when I saw that.<\/strong>
\nOh, sick.<\/p>\n

Okay, I wanted to ask you something else. Did you skate for Element at one time?<\/strong>
\nYep. That was right before Real. I got kicked off SMA the second time I rode for them when they sold out to NHS. Some guys that worked at NHS kicked me off.<\/p>\n

Well, don\u2019t feel bad because they left without me too.<\/strong>
\nYeah. That scene sucked and then they just went and did that reissue thing that sucked too. Whatever.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s just the way it is. Here\u2019s another question I had. How did the Sick Boys crew become a crew?<\/strong>
\nCBS was the crew. That was Tommy and Arco and all their buddies. Sick Boys was just a video. All those guys go way back. They all grew up skating together.<\/p>\n

Well, you know, San Francisco is known for its hills. I notice you guys really integrate hills in street skating. What is the best hill to bomb in S.F.?<\/strong>
\nWell, there\u2019s backside 9th that just got repaved and I haven\u2019t even gone to check it out yet. It\u2019s funny. This nine-year-old kid, Zoah, at the park the other day, asked me if I still skateboard. I was pretty embarrassed. He\u2019s the one that was telling me that this hill that I grew up skating just got repaved and he\u2019s out there bombing it all the time. The kids are on it. You have to spend a lot of time on the streets to really know what\u2019s going on out there. You\u2019ve got to be on the streets all the time.<\/p>\n

The skaters in S.F. have been bombing hills since the wheel was invented.<\/strong>
\nYeah. I guess, as skateboarders, we are all products of our environment in a very literal sense.<\/p>\n

I had my ass handed to me the second time I went to S.F. by Tommy G and his crew. They took me up to a hill and I thought I knew hills, but I went to the top of that hill and I crashed about 15 times.<\/strong>
\n[Laughs] Backside 9th. That\u2019s the hill. I know it. It\u2019s gnarly.<\/p>\n

Okay, I don\u2019t know this story, but I want to know. What was up with the Safeway curb?<\/strong>
\nIt was just a double-sided curb. It was kind of like our Pavilion back in the day.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a question for you. Downhill skating is coming up now along with free riding and racing. What\u2019s the fastest you\u2019ve ever gone on a regular board?<\/strong>
\nI feel like I got clocked once going at least 40MPH. I\u2019m not even sure. That was on a regular street board.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s really fast on a street board. You\u2019re in for some skin loss. That\u2019s crazy. So you know I said I\u2019ve been skating for 44 years now. How long have you been skating now?<\/strong>
\nIt\u2019s been 30 or 35 years.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re a lifer.<\/strong>
\nI guess so. You just reach a point where that\u2019s just who you are. I don\u2019t want to change anything.<\/p>\n

Some people ask me, \u201cWhy do you keep skateboarding? You don\u2019t get paid anymore?\u201d I have the same question for you. Why do you keep skating?<\/strong>
\nI don\u2019t think there\u2019s an easy answer for that. It\u2019s a lot of reasons. When something has defined you for so long, that\u2019s just how it is. I feel my best when I\u2019m skateboarding. That\u2019s the simple answer. Straight up.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FOR THE REST OF THE STORY, ORDER ISSUE #74 AT THE JUICE SHOP\u2026<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

JULIEN STRANGER INTERVIEW BY JESSE MARTINEZ PHOTO BY TOBIN YELLAND Jesse Martinez and Julien Stranger are two of skateboarding\u2019s most notorious characters. Both have spent the majority of their lives, since the early days in Venice, dedicated and committed to skateboarding, and skateboarding wouldn\u2019t be the same without them. Here\u2019s to two of our favorite […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64911,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4027,4028,4041],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-interviews","category-skate-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/JSTRANGER1-2.jpg","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64910"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64910\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90858,"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64910\/revisions\/90858"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juicemagazine.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}