Growing up in Seattle in the 80′s/90′s, Seattle was mostly known for Sir Mix A Lot, rain, the Super Sonics and the emerging “grunge” (hate that fucking word) music scene. As a kid growing up in this time, there weren’t enough of us to to fragment into different scenes – we were hungry for it all – If you skated you wrote graffiti, listened all kinds of music, went to shows, published zines – you did whatever because that’s what was available to us and we embraced it. We rallied around all of these things and drew inspiration from whatever we could get our hands on. We didn’t have much in the way of media and we looked to the outside to learn our history and get inspiration – and we soaked it all up. IGTimes and Can Control – if you could get a copy – were worth more than gold (I still have mine), and there were only a handful of copies of Subway Art floating around the city. There was only one copy of Style Wars for the crew (Hews One’s, copy of a copy recorded off PBS) and it was mandatory watching. Once in a blue moon someone from a far off city – NYC (Ceaser), ABQ (Went UNO) – would transplant here and bring new stories, skills and influence. There were all of two actual skateshops in the 80′s – Fallout Records and Skateboards (on Olive) and Time Travelers (Downtown), and although these two institutions are long gone, Seattle youth culture wouldn’t be where it is without them. It’s been a while since I’ve lived in that great city, but this time and growing up during it are at the deepest roots of SOAK.

@mkbian won this hefty prize pack from our recent twitter contest. follow @soakvskaos on twitter to get info on the next contest.

My good friends at Gravis dropped this video of Dylan Rieder. I spent a bit of time with gravis several years ago, so I have a soft spot for the brand. The crew running the brand is as solid as they come, and with rippers like Dylan you have to take notice.

Can’t wait

Win this one-of-one SOAK shirt and some other swag. Follow us on twitter to find out how @soakvskaos .
One winner chosen randomly next week.

via DisInfo

A new blog launched for girls who are in to kitting, baking, art, design, crafts, travel and other rad stuff. athomegirl is the newest member of the SOAK network. Check it.