Rome Snowboard Design Syndicate

My Friend Kevin Cyr just started a pretty cool new project, Camper Kart.

Check it out, http://www.kevincyr.net/

While your at it, take a look at some of his paintings.

I just stumbled across this one, and since I’m in the middle of photographing our 2011 product line, Dumont is about to embark on the fun times that is color correcting of said photographs, and EVH is busy getting all the layout dialed in I felt it was a perfect video to post. See kids, getting a product from the photo studio into your hands (or eyes, if you see it on the web) is quite a drawn out process. We definitely don’t have such a fancy studio/camera/computer setup/elevator here at Rome, but we seem to manage. I hope you enjoy this video, and gain some insight on what it takes to make something as massive as a new catalog (or in this case, the cover of the new issue of Macworld).

Cover creation from Peter Belanger on Vimeo.

THE roadtrip snowboard video of all time–pack a couple old Cadillacs with some of the best riders ever, ride resorts and document the mayhem.  Cardiel killing everything, Palmer with clown hair smith grinding, Guch when he was breaking out of Socal, and Terje still making time to film.  Watch parts 1, 2 and 3.

Portland base ad agency Wieden + Kennedy is one of the best know ad agencies in the world. You have definitely seen their work. Does a company called Nike ring a bell? They’ve done most of their most memorable commercials. Anyway, I stumbled on the video below, which is amazing, in scope and concept, so I dug around a bit to learn more.

The google turned up an entry from the Fusebox blog, and rather than butchering what Robert wrote, i’m just copying and pasting it here. It may be lazy, bur at least it’s honest.

In an entrance way at Wieden and Kennedy this sign was made from 150,000 pushpins. The message reflects one of W+K founder Dan Wieden’s sayings, “You’re only good to me after you’ve made three tremendous mistakes.”

Hence, the advice to everyone at W+K : Fail Harder.

At the conference Mr. Wieden noted that thru failure and mistakes, a kind of chaos and confusion grows. Most people try to get away from the confusion or deny it. He said, “return to the confusion and be at home in the chaos. By doing this you will start to see different patterns starting to emerge, thru seeing these different patterns you will also think in different patterns and thus evolve the creative process in yourself.  So dont get discouraged next time your work is not chosen, or you find you have misread your clients wishes, Failure is a part of doing and creating, and you should not be punished for it, nor should you torture yourself over it! But rather understand that you are one step closer to coming up with something truly creative and great!”

Today’s WWBM is an audible one, for a change (and if anyone has the actual video of this from SNL, send over the link). Back in the late 70′s, when Star Wars took over the big screen, our hero took it upon himself to create a cliffs notes version, set to the tune of a lounge singer. Today’s post is dedicated to Mike Forester, up in the far off land of the UP of Michigan. Enjoy.

I know some people out there may think the Stones are not heavy enough for RRT, but I disagree. Keith Richards is rock and roll. Rarely do you see a guy take his guitar off in the middle of a song and smack an irate fan twice, then start playing again like it’s no big deal.. Rock and roll at its finest in my opinion. Older for sure, but still relevant today.

We’ll slow it down a bit with this cut.

Long Live Rock and Roll!!!!

Salasnek should definitely be in the Top 10 most influential snowboarders of all time. When this part dropped in TB2, he opened up a whole new realm of tricks and style with shit like late switch bs180s, butters into spins, and spins in natural terrain. And he rode gnarly Alaskan lines.

Here’s a pretty cool (and accurate!) time lapse of Senator Al Franken drawing the 50 United States. Enjoy.

Via Draplin.

Coming in hot with one hell of an awkward/funny clip that was cut from the final edit of Lost in Translation. Having traveled a fair amount, and not grasping the local languages one bit, I can relate to this clip whole heartedly. Bill kills it, once again.

George is in China Strong arming factories, spreading his American Dream, and preaching the holy word of the Pittsburgh Steelers to any one that’ll listen over there….Really I’m not making this up he’s in China getting shit done…apparently China doesn’t like freedom, and they really don’t like Google, youtube, blogging and probably anything to do with the band we will be discussing today. For these reasons George is unable to come to you this week with his usual one two punch of live music, (He did try….from China which is awesome in it’s own right)  so he’s enlisted me to help tide you over until he returns safe and sound from the land of far away.

Today’s band is the Circle Jerks…….The Circle Jerks are a band that every fan of music should hold in the highest regard. Not to sound cliche, but today’s music sucks, it’s so safe, it’s so planned out….it’s a well rehearsed formula to gain the band the ultimate sense of accomplishment….and no I’m not talking the top of the charts I’m talking the  credits song of the Hills or the OC or some shit like that. Founded by the original lead singer of Black Flag, the Circle Jerks were dangerous, out of control, and just the sort of thing the punk rock world needed to spawn a revolution and a thousand more bands that grabbed their instruments and thrashed the shit out of whatever they could find.  They played with a fevered ferocity that has since seldom been matched. They represented rebellion, teen age angst, and a Fuck authority mentality that made them legends. Viva Punk Rock and Viva The Circle Jerks!

“Wild In the Streets”

“Live Fast Die Young”

Man I wish I was at this show…look how awesome this shit is. This show looks like it was in someone’s garage and it looks dangerous as hell. People grabbing the mic, slamming each other, slamming beers, Good times, God Damn it why can’t there be bands like this anymore…

I hope you enjoyed, George should be back next week, or if he isn’t hopefully I’ll be allowed to throw another one up in his absence……CAVAN