The King's Tour '98

50-50 correspondent and BYK rock star 'the King of Vegas' reports on his not-so-recent vacation.

L.A.

It all starts off in L.A. Things aren't too happening. I just sprained my ankle the day before at Kapahulu trying to show off for these three little girls that said I was "SO GOOD!" AAAAAAHH!! Well, it's the price you pay for fame. I'm there for a week, most everyone is on the Eropean Tour and the people that stayed back, stayed for a reason. People were slacking! The Giant ramp, about an 80 ft wide mini that has every kind of lip, ledge, and tranny, was torn up because it was getting a bowl section put in at the end of it. Even though, being a pool and bowl lover myself, I thought it was a stupid idea. I guess I was just pissed that it was all torn up. So, we finally get a session hooked up. After driving for about an hour in traffic, I meet Kyle Yanagimoto and Angel, the owner of Ghetto Child and TSA. We are going to skate the TSA ramp tucked away in a wherehouse. I get there and we find out that Angel doesn't have the key and the guy that does is not home. While waiting for the key, we sit in our cars and look at the staircase that Chad Muska railslid down. You know the one with like more stairs than you've ever seen before. After a closer inspection of the staircase, it was better left to Chad.We wound up driving around wasting time and waiting for this dude to get home. Finally, after about a two hour wait, we get the key and we are in! The TSA ramp was fucking cool! It's a great ramp. It's like an exact duplicate of the Hickam Mini ramp, but a foot bigger. 16 ft. wide six foor ramp with an extra 8ft. wide 7ft high extention. This ramp was solid and fast. I only had about an hour to skate because I had a pussy call at 7:00pm and I couldn't be late. Later that night I got laid...Next stop....Vegas!!!

Las Vegas

Vegas is my kind of town. I am King there. The kids stop and get out of my way whenever I am there and ask, "are you sponsored?" Anyway, it was too fucking hot to skate there. There was no way in hell I was going to even exert myself in 115 degree weather. I saw Penn and Teller, had sex, got addicted to a new slot machine called Oddessy (that fucking thing kicks ass!), played a little craps, some roulette, and had our car battery die twice! The second time right when we were trying to leave and dive back to L.A. Trying to leave at 10:00pm to make it back to L.A. by 3:00am so I can pack and catch a 8:00am flight to New York! Anyway, I can tell you about last time Kyle Yanagimoto and I did a skate tour up in Vegas and Rocked it! There really is nowhere to skate there. There is some cool street stuff, banks everywhere, and there is one park.We had to wait for this park to open. We were like in the middle of the desert and we found this ditch. It was fun until I totally ate shit. But by the time the pain went away, the park was open. The park consists of this six foot mini with a spin and like an Animal chin transfer on the side so you can bypass the spine and ride along 36 ft. of flat bottom. This was the stupidest thing in the world!!! I could take a shit and whip my ass before I hit the other side. Anyway, we ripped it up and Kyle did the longest smoothest backside tailslides across the whole ramp. There were these little girls there that were checking us out. There were some sweet looking little girlies all over. There was this one little honey that we met the gas station that wanted us to take her to a buffet. Damn, she would have been the buffet, Spread 'em open, but I was with my girlfriends and she doesn't like fish.

New York!!!!

Wheewwww...made it back to L.A. at about 4am. I have about two hours to pack. I packed, fell asleep and missed my fucking plane! Okay, I caught a later flight. I got to New York and slept...The next day, I went straight to the city, my first assault was a small one. Just trying to take in a little bit of the city. The second day, I got a bicylcle and I went everywhere. I met up with the 5Boro team and we were hooing shit up. Went to old school new york places like the Brooklyn Banks and Downtown Manhattan. This town is street! Pure street! Nothing but! Although they have a vert ramp there and are in the process of building a mini. It looks good, but it's kind of far. Anyway, I hook up with Shaolin master, Sean Kelling. This guy used to live here for a while. They used to call him the Phatman. That's with a P. H. baby! Sean Rides for Shoalin and world now. His is fucking on it. His shit really is phat! Everything he does is so fucking big! He's got that crazy New York style, I thinkit's what happens when you listen to Rap Music.Sean and I want skating Midtown and several little secret spots. We caught up with Spencer Yammama and Alex Corporan. Everyone was cool and went off. Sean and I stopped off in a used music store so I could pick up "Old School Rap Vol. 1" This was the shit. We drove around the City listening to Grand Master Flash and Afrika Bambatta. I was all groovin to the Old Schol rap, I knew it was time to get the hell out of there. But I had to stay, I had the Warped Tour (see Hawaii Warped Tour '98) the next day. I woke up a little late the next day. I got up took a shower and loaded up my camera and shit into the car. I scarfed down a coconut doughnut and took off. I tatoo race

was off to the Warped Tour on Randalls Island which is next to Manhattan on an island in the East River. How pleasant. I had missed it the day before in D.C. because I wasa lazy, and I was actually making an effort to go that day. I was about halfway there drivin on the BQE when I spotted traffic. Then it hit me! I had the worst stomache ache!!!! I had to take a shit and I had to go now!!! I swirved off almost missing the exit and just missing the traffic. Luckily I saw a Wendy's and I knew that everything would be alright. I got inside, and the fucking bathroom door was locked and there was no one in there. Then I heard a voice from behind me. I turned around holding my stomache and what did I see? It was fucking Wendy! This girl, wearing a red mop like wig and freckles painted on her face in the dress and all, holding ballons. She said, do you ned the key to the bathroom in this Queens accent and I almost shit in my pants!!! Finally after releaving myself, I made it to Randalls Island. I went up front and got my pass. It was so fucking hot. I was supposed to meet Jaime Reyes there. But since there was no steet course, I don't know if she was even there. I walked up to the first stage and the Amazing Royal Crowns were playing their version of the Misfits "American Nightmare" They fucking rock! In te distance I could see two guys on the vert ramp. Two fucking guys! This was the fucking lamest skate event! They whole place was a huge dust heap and it was way too fucking hot. I spent the whole day in Hepcats tour bus drinking all of their beverages. Although I did go out to Watch Reverend Horton Heat. I was great! So, there were no pictures taken at the SHit Tour! That night was fun! tatoo engine fire

After the show, Various members of Hepcat, Deftones, and Epitaph Records crammed into my car. We drove to this club where they were having some ska show. That blew chunks! Evenm though there were young little titties bouncing around I was not ammused.So, we proceeded to the ounk rock club "Coney Island High" Even though I am a total expert at navigating around New York, we ran in to a little trouble getting there. Everyone started passing around the pipe in the car and I was totally chambering! After a couple of blocks and Ron from Epitaph rambling on, I was totally trippin! Somehow we made it and I just parked the car right in front of the club in a no parking zone. Some guy was like,"You can't park there" About 10 of us stubled out of the car laughing and I said to him " I can't fucking drive!" and walked into the club. The people at the club were expecting us so we just walked in. This club was happening. Everyone there was so old and punk rock! It was fun though. I knew this was the place when I saw a gogo girl onstage and she was wearing almost nothing. Dave, the bassplayer from Hepcat, and I walked up to the stage and stood there staring at the girl from about two feet away from her, watching her dance. We stood there all night just smiling. Finally we met the rest of the punkers... Duane Peters, legendary skater and now singer of the U.S. bombs, Rancid, Deftones, No Fx. All the fucking wankers were there. It was a blast. The music was cool there. Upstairs was like light punk rock and early underground. Everything from Iggy pop to the Bay City Rollers. Of course the dj threw in a lot of the Ramones, Joan Jet, the New York Dolls, and a lot of other New York Favorites. Don't forget the Mod stuff too! Cool mix! Downstaires oened up at 12pm. It was pure hardecore there! It was fucking rad! Sex Pistols, the Clash, Bad Brains, all the great fucking oldies! The door closed at 4am but the party stilkl went on till everyone left. We left at around 6am. I went back home and didn't wake up, totally missing the Warped Tour in Jersey. Sorry Jaime..I'll see ya back in Hawaii!

Back to L.A.

I was back in the ghetto! New York was fun but I really missed L.A!!! I was back, my foot was healed, and So Cal was in full swing again too! Kyle juist got back from Hawaii the day before and called me up to skate. The Giant Ramp was finished. Everyone was also back from Eroupe. Kenny Hughes came back earlier and Reese Forbes got back a little later but had Mono! I met Kenny at the local skateshop Network 17. I was waiting for Kyle to get off work. We all skated the New Giant Ramp. It was good. The bowl sucked! I fucking hated that thing! Kenny and Dave Doran bailed and Kyle and I kept skating till the sun went down. Finally I started to get lines un the bowl corner. It was so fucking tight. It's only 5ft. high and vertical with brand new masonite. I busted my ass so many time in that section. I also burnt so many holes in my pants! Kyle and I skated that thing everyday. We were joined by suched famed stars as Kenny, Dave, Tim Mulligan, and Jim Gagne to name a few. Finally Reese came out. I hadn't seen him in about a year and he lost so much weight! He was like a little twig! Sessions were going on there every day. We also hooked up with old time legends and now owner of Black Label, John Lucero and Jeff Grosso. We all met Marty (Jinx) Jimenez, another 80's pro for Vision, at the Hub (CH-1) where he works. We had the narliest old school session there. Jeff and John still skate the same, except with bigger bellies. Marty is in great shape though and busts some unreal tech shit! He's the mini ramp man! The Hub consists of a 12 ft. wide 4 ft high mini ramp with a vert wall, a 40ft. wide 6 ft. mini with a vert wall and a tombstone, and a 10 ft vert bowl. The bowl has two corners and two bowls that form an ass crack! That place is fun and we usually skated there at nights until about 10 or 11pm. One day I got a call telling me the hookups were on at the basic pool. I thought, oh cool, thats going to be narly! I got there and I was freaked! I've never been scared of any ramp or pool before in my life. But I was really sweatin this bowl! It was big in a whole, but it was small as in the bowls were close togeher and you could easily go way too fucking fast and break yourself. You roll in 4 ft. and then suddenly thrust down 6.ft at Mach 10 and then hit a 10 ft. vert wall, which shoots you out into either a 7ft. bowl or a ft. one. It's sick , but it's scary and I'm not ashed to same I knocked my ass the first few times I rolled in!

above: Eric Ricks

Well, the sessions still went on everyday at the Giant ramp. Kenny pulling of sick backside disaster bigspins and fackie nose grinds. Kyle was skating faster than ever, Everyone standing back whenever he came near and when he fell, he fell hard. Everyone was all quiet, except for me! Hahaha. Kyle and I would do this double run that went around the bowl and all over the ramp. We were cool. Real cool!!!! We were known as the rockabilly dream team. Kenny wanted to join our team and asked if he had to get a pompadour? Well, the last few days were spent at Universal Studios and Disney land where there are more horny girls than you can shake your stick at! The Haunted House is the ride to bone on! It's dark and scary!!!! All you have to do is touch something and the ride shuts down. Then you sit there for a while in the dark, with scary sounds, all naked!!! You know that there are a lot of people doing it because the damn ride stops like 20 times during the whole duration. There are some other cool things you can do at Universal studios. Gary from Destructo, tells me in is fucked up british accent, tells me that on E.T. the ride, you enter your name and E.T. says goodbye to you when you walk out. Gary says that it's hilarious if you put Doug Zars. byk This might be remotely funny if E.T. was british and had a cockney accent, but I don't think Gary is all there. I think that, E.T. being American and all, a better choise would be Dick Soccer or Hugh Jass. Now wouldn't it be much funnier having E.T. saying, "Bee Good dick sucker! or Be good huge ass!" Wel, that was a condensed retrospective of the Kings Hell Tour '98. See you in December for the End of '98 Tour!

- Rockabilly Willie!