San Francisco wasn’t always a wretched hive of scum and hipstery. Well, it’s always been full of scum, but I’m OK with that. And back in the 90s, the best graffiti scene in the country was without a doubt the Bay Area. The part that made it so awesome, and the reason it made such a big impact on me, was the intersection of graffiti and scrappy white skater/hardcore kids. Without naming any names, the 90s Bay Area (and Seattle) graffiti and hardcore scenes were made up of a LOT of the same people, and I feel pretty lucky to have been around to be a part of all of it.
The legendary ORFN. YOU LOSE EVERYTHING.
Sadly, the SF scene went mostly unknown to anybody who wasn’t there at the time until a couple years ago, when movie came along called PIECE BY PIECE. Documenting the last 30 years or so of SF graffiti culture, this movie is pretty much the last word on SF graffiti. The whole thing is on Youtube, but it’s worth getting the DVD exclusively for the one part that isn’t: in the “extras,” there’s a little feature about BISIE and US crew, who were probably my biggest influence as a kid and very closely linked to the hardcore scene.
EDIT: my comments were originally based on an 8-part version that Jewtube apparently took down. I’m leaving them as-is because I’m lazy, but whole movie is embedded above.
Part 1: Mostly about old stuff and SF in general. Gets good at 6:45 when NORM and REYES come in.
Part 2: More about old shit, I recommend skipping to the bit about bus writing at 5:00. That was the foundation of the entire US crew/San Mateo county style that alllllll the hardcore kid writers were into (AOD/BTM/NCS etc).
Part 3: This is about the first-gen SF oldfags hating on the second-gen kids who were trying to do something other than copy wack NY graffiti from the early 80s.
Part 4: These are what I would call the golden years of SF graffiti, when pretty much the whole SF graffiti scene was dudes from various hardcore/punk/power violence bands that you probably fap over. The punk/hc influence really cannot be understated… for example, I guarantee it’s not a coincidence that KR reps a crew called MDC.
Part 7: The beginning of this is all about KUK (Killing Ugly Krusties), who were the epitome of the West Coast DIY hardcore kid graffiti scene. Note the Dystopia song in the background.
There are a few other parts, but I left them out to make it a little less TL;DR. Definitely cop the full DVD and watch it from start to finish!
I didn’t even know that graffiti scenes existed. I thought it was just gangsters marking their territory and hxc wiggers who really want to be gangsters.
I recently found out graffiti was more than gangs claiming territory and i gravitated towards it and tried it out for myself. That aside i am a lazy worthless teenager with a short attention span and the videos arn’t embedded sorry sarg.
Yeah dude, graffiti really has nothing to do with gangs. That said, there are a lot of rough dudes in graffiti who aren’t playing and will definitely kick your ass or put a gun in your face if you cross them so it’s a pretty good idea to keep a low profile.
more graffiti posts for obvious reasons >:(
those video must not have gotten very many views before now, they are already taken down >:(
Goddamit, let me see if i can fix them. They worked 2 days ago when i wrote this!
you can watch the whole thing here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ub8uRFzUCQ
WTF!! i was expecting a fucken slayer post!! I am pleasantly dissapointed… but finally something that people of all colors and creeds can come together with… good ol fashioned vandalism =]
didn’t know san franfeelings had a scene back in da day… tight … all i grew up w/ was the typical edgy el-lay shit like AWR,TKO,LTS,KOG,etc and of course the typical tagbanger scene in which those kids eventually do end up as loser cholos having way too many kids and working @ (insert warehouse, Fedex/UPS, janitorial job here).
nice post sarge but the fucken jews @ jewtube took the movie down already…
oh well… i wonder who used the term “catching heaven” or a “heaven spot” first?
I definitely think LA took over around 96 or 97 when TKO/AWR/MSK/LTS/KOG/etc started really going off, but SF had a few amazing years in the early 90s. It was always more arty and soft than LA due to the lack of terrifying tagbangers, but the amount of white punk/hc/skateboarder kids was pretty cool despite the faggotry that came along with them.
I don’t think I know who specifically came up with the term “heavens” first, but I’m pretty sure it was a So Cal thing. At least that’s who I first heard it from, since OILER/SER/CHAKA pretty much pioneered that whole concept.
Props 2 U for acknowledging the San Mateo county scene!
Dude the San Mateo county style was my shit! A bunch of the dudes from the West Bay hardcore scene (Spazz and all that) were also graffiti writers, and to this day I still love that US crew/bus writing style. Wish someone would bring that shit back, nobody really knows about it anymore.
Thanks for this Sgt., and uuuuuhhhh NO COMMENT.
I will give u a story tho, in exchange for buying me an ultra-wide, a mini-ultra & ome extra nibs @ Berkeley Arts, I took Rigel (CrayOne) to meet/buy comics off Vaughn Bode (his stuff was an easy go-to for characters), I made him get me the stuff 1st, because when he found out Bode was a suuper-creepy groce tranny he was totally UNSTOKED. It was hilarious watching him squirm w’ discomfort @ being in the guys house, just wanting to get through the transaction and GTFO, all his fanboy questions abandoned.
love that sentence at the end about tags being the essence. i feel like buying the dvd and use it just to slap consedending artfags “oh yeah it’s so great, but tags and hollows are just vandalism blah blah” *SMACK*
inb4 someone calls this tagging.
dude, i don’t know where you are sgt d. but the a whole bunch of the scene around here in orange county, ca is highly influenced from us/srt/bkf and they are still doing their thing in the bay, not sure what you mean.
very cool, bro, will definitely have to sit down and watch this whole thing. back when i was a young vandal and racked up more “destruction of property” arrests than i care to admit, all i really knew was the NY/NJ scene (I know, i know, its where i grew up, gimme a break) so its awesome to see what was going on elsewhere.
I went to a film festival screening last night (cause I’m artfag and proud) of a documentary called Vigilante Vigilante. It’s about those random dudes who get obsessed with buffing shit. The Berkely guy was pretty entertaining, but the guy from LA is monster.
A simple, but entertaining flick made by a couple “retired” writers.
http://www.vigilantefilm.con
what is the song by dystopia?