Keith ‘Slasher’ Meek, one of Santa Cruz’s first skateboarding stars, in 1980.
By the late 1980s, Santa Cruz was grinding its name into the history of American subculture. Santa Cruz Skateboards had already established a name for itself, featuring graphic art by Jim Phillips and sponsoring some of the best California shredders like Keith “Slasher” Meek (whose iconic Slasher board is still sold today), Rob Roskopp, Jeff Grosso, Steve “Salba” Alba and many more.
At the same time, Santa Cruz’s music scene was one of many around the country exploding in the second wave of hardcore punk rock. Among the dozens of bands, Bl’ast! was the local act that broke beyond the city’s borders, not only through their music, but through their affiliation with Santa Cruz Skateboards.
Jim Phillips, his son (and fellow artist) Jimbo, Keith Meek and Bl’ast! singer/songwriter Cliff Dinsmore discussed with Santa Cruz Weekly how Santa Cruz changed the face of underground culture.
Jim Phillips: In the 1970s, Santa Cruz became a Mecca for surfing and rock music, two of the basic necessities in life. Surfing had emerged from Southern California in the ’60s, leaving skateboarding to find its own music culture. In the late ’70s, punk rock was born by bands such as the Clash and the Sex Pistols, and by the ’80s became a perfect fit for skaters who were then punks in their own right.
Cliff Dinsmore: We were trying to bust out at the time. We saw Santa Cruz as a burnt, hippie town and we just wanted to fuck shit up!
Keith Meek: It was boring! Everyone dressed the same, everyone looked the same, everyone listened to the same music and it was time for a change. It naturally happened, and we were lucky to be the handful of guys to ignite it.
Jim Phillips: By 1988, I had established Phillips Studios as the art department for Santa Cruz Skateboards, and hired about eight young skateboarders to train. I usually listened to classical music while I worked, but gave way to punk music as my new hires grew in number and brought in their albums—including Jimbo, who was a big fan of punk and eventually played in several bands. I had the studio “no rap and Led Zeppelin” rule, but in order to preserve their creativity, I let them play just about any music. I actually became fond of some punk, excluding some of the worst headbanger songs. By the way, it was then that Jimbo’s name was dubbed by the studio artists to differentiate the Jims.
Jimbo Phillips: Music is the soundtrack. It amplifies everything and punk was the soundtrack for skating and surfing then. It got you pumped if you were skating a ramp or shredding. You know, blare some Bl’ast!
Cliff Dinsmore: Around ’84 or ’85 was when Bl’ast! really kicked in. That’s when there was the whole first wave of Black Flag, Minor Threat and Adolescents wave of hardcore gave way to the new scene of Corrosion of Conformity, DRI, Battalion of Saints and the rest.
Jimbo Phillips: The first thing that comes to mind is when Bl’ast! put on a show at UCSC.
Cliff Dinsmore: Now that was chaos! That could possibly be the gnarliest show in the history of Santa Cruz. It was just insane! It was supposed to be students only, and we didn’t know! Our friend was going to the college and he said he wanted to do a show. It was three local bands—Bl’ast!, Mock, and Several Fish—but then we got SWA to play—which was Chuck Dukowski’s [from legendary L.A. band, Black Flag] side project. There was this old guy who ran the building—it was like Kresge or Crown, one of those. I pulled him aside and said, “Hey man, you really can’t push the envelope on this thing. You have to just be accepting of the situation or shit’s going to go bad. My mom worked here all through my childhood. I don’t want to see this place get destroyed, but it’s going to get really stupid if you try to shut down the show. Go with the flow, and I promise we’ll make it through.”
Keith Meek: It just blew up! There’s video of it online. That was the biggest pit I had ever seen! One guy’s filming and Clifford’s singing, [bassist Dave] Cooper’s going nuts and there’s this whirlwind of legs flying by the screen, upside-down!
Jimbo Phillips: Every local from the city barged to the school and the place was just mobbed! I remember being out front, trying to get in, and Cliff props open the back door, yells, “Heeeey! You guys!” and lets about 50 people from the local crew in. I remember when [Bl’ast!] came out there was so much feedback ringing in the place. There was wall-to-wall craziness going on, the place just erupted! I always remember that night as the pinnacle of the era. I think it was ’88 [according to the video, it was 1989], right when Bl’ast! was really at their peak.
Keith Meek: At that point, with everyone traveling into Santa Cruz, I think it started having an influence. That’s when people saw we had a lot going on. We always had the surf/skate culture; that goes back to Kevin Reed. He was a ripping surfer and skater, he was a pro at both. So that scene was going on here and, at the same time, Dogtown was happening [in Santa Monica]. Then there was San Diego and San Clemente. Certain spots had the culture, but Santa Cruz embodied all three.
Jimbo Phillips: We had the pro skaters from L.A. and San Jose come in and talk about their graphics along with a lot of local rippers; Meekster was already here, but Roskopp came around at that time. It really was a hot spot back then, so a lot of people were coming around.
Cliff Dinsmore: This town became such a Mecca because of the skateboard association and a lot of the people that rode for Santa Cruz Skateboards were from somewhere else. People like Jay Adams, Steve Olson, Jason Jesse, [Jeff] Grosso and Salba would come by to visit and skate.
Keith Meek: Jay was a huge influence on us, because he’d come up and show us what they were doing in L.A. Here, people at shows were bouncing off each other and doing the pogo. Jay came up and did this gnarly whirlwind of violence on the dance floor and we all thought, “Wow! Look at that! Let’s do that!”
Jimbo Phillips: The Santa Cruz logo really went worldwide at that time. A lot of people probably didn’t even know it was a town, they just thought it was a brand, but then they figured it out. Having that stuff distributed around the world definitely put Santa Cruz on the map.
Jim Phillips: As a surfer who doesn’t like crowded surf, I’d rather keep [the city] off the map, but I did whatever it took to make a living. Santa Cruz Skateboards is the oldest operating skateboard company in the world. Santa Cruz, the city, realized that surfing is a money pie and promotes traveling surfers as “ecotourists” instead of what they used to call them: surf bums.
