Steve Crandall

Coffee sipping pilot of a red FBM frame and a Nikon camera.

Posts from Steve:

Random Photos from a parking lot.

Garrett Guilliams.

Here are 9 snapshots from the FBM BBQ at the bike lot in Richmond Virginia Sunday April 21st…

Evan Venditti!

Eric Holladay!

Dillon Leeper!

Lustin Sexaur

Waterlunatics.

Garrett Ginch

Garrett Byrnes

Party!

Vintage Moto Partying

Crater Camp from Elrod Racing on Vimeo.

1950’s motorcycle racing from Crater Camp, located somewhere in the Santa Monica Mountains in Southern California (near Los Angeles and Hollywood). It was located near the area where Mulholland and Topanga Canyon meet.

FBM Vagabond Ritual

Vagabond Ritual from FBM BMX on Vimeo.

Lots of great riding and good times with the FBM Crew… Enjoy.

Profile X Madera Winter Skatepark Tour

Profile X Madera Winter Skatepark Tour from Profile Racing on Vimeo.

“Matt Coplon and Mark Mulville flew up from florida to met up with Grant Castelluzzo, Jeff Klugiewicz, Mike Hinkens, and Jeff Dowhen in Milwaukee and escaped the winter cold by hitting up a few skateparks in the area. Instead of having a traditional demo we decided to just have a session and invite all the kids to come out and ride with the team. A big thank you to all of the parks for having us and all of the kids that came out to ride with us.”

Wide Fuckin Open

I found this old photo recently, of my old friend Mike Tag, reading a magazine at the counter of what was once, FBM headquarters, and a tiny retail shop we did called WFO, or Wide Fuckin Open.
I remember the store front lasted the term of one lease, the inventory was always very modest, and the floor was plywood, in an attempt to give it the feel of the flat bottom of a ramp. The Office and the warehouse were one, and camouflaged behind some army netting behind the counter…
It was a good place, Mike, Erb, Tag, Kelly, and our friends would just kind of hang out, maybe sometimes dip over to the Chanticleer, shoot pool, and re-enact scenes from the movie Barfly, or hit a curb jump on State street…
Often times, Forgash would antagonize the greek diner proprietor across the street at the Ithaca Diner, or we would strike up conversation with the local transvestite, David Lisa, who would star in an FBM commmercial around that time, set to the song, “dude looks like lady” by Aerosmith.
Aerosmith is an awful band, but that same time period spawned the Material from the “live Fast Die” era, and the onset of Albert St.
One time, in an attempt to escape the early sunset, and boredom of the winter afternoons of upstate NY, I remember we started drinking some beers, and I had opened a 40 ounce bottle of Olde English, and in some meek attempt to impress my friends, drank it in one gulp.
I almost puked, and Kelly Baker shrieked- “Dude, that’s an Olde English, not Old Milwaukee, you shouldn’t be doing that…”

Wide fuckin open, and so it was…and it shall be.

Casual Encounters

I recently received some mail from my friend Brian Barnhart, and enclosed was a really cool full color zine, with phtos and stories from a trip to the great Northwest. I asked Mr. B a few questions about the zine, called Casual Encounters in the Northwest, check it out…

Can you give a brief summary of what this project is about?

Last summer my friend Grady and I went on a month long trip from NorCal to Vancouver and back. We had loose plans, and although we had our BMX bikes and rode most days, I won’t call it a riding trip. We did what came naturally, and embraced most opportunities that came our way. We are both photographers, I shot what I wanted to remember, including people, landscapes and action, then wrote about how I remembered it, and put it together into a zine. I also had an art show in my hometown, Bethlehem, PA to showcase large photo prints from the zine, with inspiration from Hannae at Secret Art Space. The following week, I had another in Brooklyn, NY before I moved away and bought a sprinter van to travel in.

Whats the story behind this zine, and what inspired you to do this?

The experience of traveling the pacific northwest was life changing, not in a dramatic way, but in a realization other ways to live. I knew I wanted to share my experiences, and through out the trip I was brainstorming what to do with the images I was capturing. I don’t send my photos to magazines too often, and even when I do, I usually don’t feel like they quite fit in. I wanted to tell the complete story, with all of the photos that I felt help do that. Doing my own zine, I could be the photographer, writer, and editor, all in one. I also have been pretty dissatisfied with the internet lately, not to say there isn’t plenty of great content online, there is. I wanted this to be physical, more of a piece of art, rather than just a blog post or something like that. DIY is only way I really know how, so thats how I went about it, of course with the help of some great friends.

What time span were most of these photos shot during, and what were you shooting with?

All of the photos were shot in or around August of 2012. I shot them with a Nikon N90 and a Contax T2 with either Kodak or Fuji 400 speed film.

How long did it take to make this a reality?

I originally released Casual Encounter in the Pacific Northwest at the art shows in December 2012. I was working a lot after the trip, and trying to figure out actually how to make it all come together. Scanning the film took a while. I laid the zine out pretty quickly, and my friend Chad Moore told me about a printer called Magcloud which worked out perfectly. The art shows came together in the matter of about two weeks, which was pretty rushed. I tend to procrastinate. I finally finished a website to promote it in late March ’13, thanks to Dave Ghandi Hall. All together making a zine and putting on my own art show was a great experience, I recommend it to anyone.

What are some zines you have seen in recent times that have gotten you stoked?

To be honest, I am not a zine collector, or a collector of much for that matter. Just wanting to do something with my art work, to complete a project with tangible results was the main motivator. I of course do draw inspiration from things I see and read. The Holeshot issues are one zine that comes to mind, and magazines like DIG, The Albion, Victory Journal, photo books like “The Bike Riders” by Danny Lyon, and “Jones Beach” by Joseph Szabo, books like “Into the Wild” and “On The Road” have been really inspiring to me. My friend Jon “Sinner” Lynn also made an imagery zine for a film he plans to make, which helped get me stoked on the idea of making this. Sinner also helped out with the hand drawn title, thanks. I also would recommend a zine called Bring on the Dancing Horses, which I read after making this.

How can people find out more, and how can someone get a copy?

You can visit Casual Encounters wed site or talk to me in person. I’m going to begin the process of making another zine ASAP under the Casual Encounters title, and hopefully can also get together another art show. I’ll keep you posted. Thanks!

Steady Rollin- Jordan Dwan

Steady Rollin – Jordan Dwan from TiogaBMX on Vimeo.

Shit Show 4

Shit Show 4 from FBM BMX on Vimeo.

Produced by Kenny Horton, featuring FBM Riders, and friends including Space Needle,Tom Blyth Latane Coghill, Eric Holladay, Neil Hise, JAson Anderson, Ruel Smith, Chris Neighbors,Jackson Allen, Bob Quirk, John Held, Costa, Ginch, Chunk. Evan Venditti, Eric Hennessey, Darryl Nau, Kenny Horton and more…

Bathroom Laughter

Pissed Jeans Video by the weird and only Joe Stakun.

Drop The Gloves #1

Drop The Gloves #1 from Drop The Gloves on Vimeo.

Footage Collected and assembled by the one and only Matty Brown!

Kenny Horton Rail Beast

Kenny Horton Redux from FBM BMX on Vimeo.

Puerto Rican Black Chicken

My first visit to Puerto Rico was in mid December during one of the weirdest years in my life..

Some friends and I flew in and were picked up by adventure capitalist, Evan Venditti, in a shit box Toyota van, he had customized with bamboo, from the rainforest he was living in, the interior was all wood and looked like a tiki bar, the van was actually a thatched hut on wheels you might see on a beach in paradise.

We stayed in an apartment complex, in ocean park, almost directly on the beach. It was a scene like out of a book I imagine an old drunk novelist would write, painted stone cement, with metal gates on the windows, beach sand scattered about, feral cats, and half wild dogs everywhere. Spiked fences, christmas lights on iron bars, rooftop camping, with gunshots in the not too far off distance…

In one of the apartments was a en ex-patriot retired merchant marine known simply as the Clutch. I was told he was called the Clutch, because when he walked he stepped like he was trying to engage a clutch in an automobile. I mostly saw him sitting in his one room apartment, with the door open, cage door shut and locked, watching american idol’s talent show on TV, clapping his hands at the entertainers, and stomping his weird foot. His own paradise on an island in the tropics. The clutch was sort of the mayor of this fucked up Puerto Rican melrose place where we stayed with our friend Vicio Del Toro. Vicio had a ramp in his living room, 2 pitbulls, named Dixie and Midget, a bunch of toys, and starred as our tour guide in our off beat puerto rican untelevised reality TV show.

The island had an interesting mash up of beauty and nature, combined with overdevelopment, slums, historical landmarks, palm trees, coconuts, beaches, penned up goats, roaming animals, bad traffic, tourists, criminals, children and more…

At the end of the block was the beach, which turned into a cruising strip for gay prostitutes, where the Clutch would trade 20 bags of cocaine for favors. “Two bags” he would shout in spanglish

We first set off to Quebradilla to sight see, and wander, via automobile, and then pedaled throughout San Juan, and the old city on bicycles. I got to see stockades and fortresses, and landmarks from hundreds of years ago, fancy new hotels and casinos, and eventually ended up beneath the fort in Old San Juan in one of the most notorious ghettos in Puerto Rico. It was called La Perla, and in shambles layed a small community on the side of a sea cliff, half abandonded multi generational shitholes with a reputation so bad, the locals described its legend as being worse than most people know. We chilled on the coast where it was rumored bodys were disposed of in pieces to be devoured by sharks. An old man gathered coconuts from a tree and gave them to children. No one bothered us, but we could sense the danger,even though just a few hundred feet above tourist flew kites and ate cotton candy.

Steady Rollin -Puerto Rico from TiogaBMX on Vimeo.