In the past many years, I haven’t been a huge fan of Transworld Skateboarding Magazine.  It’s been the magazine I browse through the most, but never buy.  It’s always had really good photos and nice print, but nowadays, with all the ads and industry crap, I think of it almost as more of a skate industry catalogue than a legitimate magazine.

That being said, on the other hand, Transworld Skate videos are the best.  Sight Unseen, In Bloom, even Uno or Four Wheel Drive.  They always come out with some sick shit.  The thing I like most about all magazine videos (not video magazines), is the variety of skate talents they’re able to assemble together.  No teams, no tours, underground skaters and just plain randomness.  Transworld has always had good definition and quality to their videos.

Are you Alright? is a video which touches on my three favorite things right now: skateboarding, road trips, and the skateparks of the Northwest.  It’s a combination that can never really go wrong.  Just throw some ripping skaters in an RV for a couple of weeks, and have them drive around to skate some sick terrain.  Always a winner.  Some of those skaters may or may not be: Pat Duffy, Donny Barley, Clint Peterson, Ryan Wilburn, Aaron Harrison, Jake Brown, Matt Dove, Lance Mountain, Danny Way, Danger, Judd Hertzler, and Jesse Fritsch.  Some of the spots they hit up may or may not be: Grass Valley, Reno, Klamath Falls, Orcas Island, Bainbridge Island, Burnside, Donald, Bellingham pool, Anacortes, Seask8, Hood River, Hailey, and everywhere in between.  The skating is phenominal as you’d expect.  I mean you have Danny Way in there, fresh off of his video part in the DC video, whose skating has morphed into some type of Vertical Skateboarding / Snowboarding / Street Skateboarding / Anti-Gravity hybrid, that nobody can match.  And the reemergence of Mr. Questionable Pat Duffy (even though he never really went anywhere) as a complete all-terrain destroyer.

But, almost the most impressive thing about this video is it’s ability to convey the reality of professional skateboarding and the whole road trip experience.  In the video you get not only the skating, but the down-time activities as well, along with injuries and hospital visits. Just about everybody in the video gets worked: Barley fractures a toe, Wilburn gets a swellbow from hell and wrecks his knee, Duffy needs a knee brace, Peterson packs it on his hip, Way needs to get his knee drained of fluid, even the photographer Ped gets a board to the head.  Probably the lowlight of the video is the severe body packing that Danger takes, the blood curdling sound he makes as he gasps for his first breaths of air, and his subsequent trip to the hospital.  Definitely not for the squeamish, but still a part of the whole skateboarding experience.

If anything, Are you Alright? is inspiring.  It is a reminder of all the good times to be found out there on the road skating with your friends.  Never forget to escape from your humdrum life every once in a while. Take some time off from work or school and get out there and see something new.  Some day when you’re too old to leave the retirement home, you’ll be thankful. 

Still don’t know what kind of messed up rating system we have.  From now all videos we review, four stars