Jake Harrison Interview
- TNSB
- 1 day ago
- 32 min read
We caught up with Jake Harrison to discuss his latest video project "Its Subjective We're Interacting”. Jake gave us a look inside to the challenges as well as the triumphs he endured makeing a fulllength feature where the skating was heavily focused in and around Nashville, TN. This video shows skateboarding is alive and well in middle Tennessee and it has all the potential to continue to grow and progress. With people like Jake, motivating and pushing the skaters, the scene will only get better.
TNSB
What led you to pick up a camera and start production on "Its Subjective We're Interacting?"
Jake Harrison
When I started working at Blue Flowers, I recognized that I was basically just really interested in watching my scene grow. Having a kid, I also realized that my own skateboarding was declining. When I could only get out one or two days a week instead of five to seven, the things that used to be fun started to feel tedious and exhausting. I was still having fun skating, and I knew I had one or two days a week to get out with my friends, but no one was filming so I decided I’d get a camera. That way I could still go to the spots I wanted to skate, the ones that are fun for me but if I just wanted to kick it, I’d have the camera. I could still skate, but if someone wanted to try and get something, I’d be ready to go. It was about being proactive and pushing my friends to try tricks I can’t do myself.
TNSB
That's always the fun part right? Telling people better than what tricks to try, haha.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, Yeah, haha.
TNSB
Just living vicariously through them.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, I’m not getting upset that my backside flip sucks or that my knees just don’t even want to pop today. It’s different when you have, like I said, five to seven days a week where you can go out and skate and you always kind of feel “on.” Even not being the best, I had a lane for myself where I felt confident filming and skating at spots. Eventually, just being a dad, I kind of fell off from the stuff I was good at, it went away. Instead of going out and having fun skating, I was going out, getting frustrated, and leaving the session to go home, instead of feeling good because of that one good tre flip I did and the excitement that brings you. So you’re even more bummed.
TNSB
Yeah, I understand that completely. What ultimately sparked the idea for the project?
Jake Harrison
We started with three short Instagram videos that were just fun projects. Each one got a little longer. The first was about a minute, stretched with some slow-mo, and maybe had five tricks. The second one got a little more traction because people had already seen the first and liked the skating. Then the third one got a little heavier, with the shop, Blue Flowers, getting involved and me being like, “Let’s actually do this.” I had more confidence in my ability and understood the camera better, so it felt like, “Let’s do it for real.” After the third IG clip I was like, “OK, you guys, can we do this again? Let’s wait until we have 12 minutes.” Then we started filming and it naturally grew into having a couple of full parts. I was like, OK, well, there are two full parts and that’s eight minutes, then we’ve got a whole bunch of footage for a friends section. It grew into this thing where I’d text or call people saying, If you film like 30 more seconds, it’d be good for you, it’d look great for you, and it would help the video. Why don’t you split this section with so and so? While trying to round out Edgar’s part, we met Riley halfway through filming. I’ve known Riley for a long time, but we just didn’t really hang out. I reconnected with him through the shop. He had premiered a video called Prismatic that he shot a year or two before we started this. We linked up with him again on a trip to Birmingham for a Red Bull event. It went from Edgar basically having a part done and just wanting to fill out his section, to Riley hopping on sessions. Dude, Riley is so good, his style is amazing. I was like, alright, if you’re down, dude, let’s do this. Within three months of deciding to put him in the video, Riley already had a minute and a half of footage. So I just started to push Riley. Let’s put a focus on Edgar, and we’ll build sessions around Riley. If you can get a trick at the spot he wants to go, that’s great, but the focus is on him. Those sessions, watching everyone skate and stack clips were incredible. I just watched the project grow. Then I gave them a hard deadline, I think I said the first time it snows, I’m dumping everything into the timeline.
TNSB
Was that the moment where it became really clear, like, “Hey we're working on a video, lets do this?”
Jake Harrison
Seeing Riley get a minute and a half was like "OK, we have clear cut dudes that will have parts." Seeing the scope of the skating now, I was really just thinking "OK, we'll get two full parts and then like a friend section or two." You know, you see it from every brand, the 7 to 15 minute video format. We just got lucky enough between the two sections, with Edgar and Riley and then everyone else hopping on and living off the stoke of their parts too, to fill the video out. When I set the timeline I was hoping for 12-15 minutes by the first snow. Then it was like "alright, we got 17 minutes." And yeah, it was a reality from there.
TNSB
I guess you kinda touched on it a little bit, but was there like a trick or like a clip that you filmed that made you think “This is gonna be good"? Was there any moment that got you really sparked?
Jake Harrison
It had to be Edgar, his skating is so sick because he'll sit around and be like "oh, I'm not feeling it" or "this spot's not it," but you take him to something he's into and he's on. I think the first thing that really set it off, where I was like "OK, this can turn into something that's actually real”, I think it was when he did this gap 50-50 in the snow. We were out shoveling spots, putting cat litter down to dry it out, and it was like 30 degrees. He does this gap 50-50 that's at the end of his part and I was like "alright, this is the standard."
Then another one was when we took the dudes to Lafayette for another Red Bull contest that Daniel Barrouse put on. It's the first thing I ever filmed with Tre, and he tre flips this pretty sizable set, I think it's like a four stair double set. I was like "alright dude, that's your first clip, that's the standard for you.” I think setting those bars with people out of the gate kinda makes it good for them and ultimately good for the video.
TNSB
I think any good filmer sets a standard for the people they are filming.
Jake Harrison
It's easy to set a bar behind the camera.
TNSB
Yeah but its the filmers job is to push the people they're filming.
Jake Harrison
Yeah
TNSB
I know from my experience, you're around these skaters so much, you know what they can do, right? You know what they're capable of, so you have this standard you hold them to even if they don’t realize what they are capable of doing. You see it and know what they can do.
Jake Harrison
Yes, exactly.
TNSB
A lot of times, I would just throw out the most ridiculous trick out and be like "alright, you know, shoot for the stars and you're gonna hit the moon, right?" It's not that you're being a jerk about it, right? You're just, I know they can do this and even if they don’t do the trick you suggested at least you got them to think and they usually walk away with something pretty amazing.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, ha!
TNSB
You know what they can do and you see it in them so you push, any good filmer will do that.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, I think that's it. That's a tough line that I think I find, cause you know I'm not always there in a lot of these dudes' lives.
Like I know it's like the dudes that have smaller sections - Matt, Blake, Christian, people I've known my entire life. Edgar I've known since I was a kid. But people like Josh and Tre were, you know, 10 years younger and ultimately I didn’t know how much they cared about this video.
TNSB
I think they definitely cared, they committed to the project and produced.
Jake Harrison
I know that they care about it. It was just one of those things it's like so weird for me, there's no backing right? Like, it's even different like that. I ran the shop and Chase was also like "yeah, you just do it." Like it is a Blue Flowers video and it's also not. It's like my project. I don't know, like some companies are getting Nike money and their like, "OK yeah, do your thing”
TNSB
Well, I think what’s important is that you know, in regards to backing or not, you had Chase and the skaters believe in your vision.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, that’s true.
TNSB
As long as you're confident with your vision and do what you say you’re gonna do they're going have confidence in what you're trying to produce, right?
Jake Harrison
Yeah, it’s just hard. I’m not anybody, you know? Like I said, there were three Instagram videos, maybe six and a half minutes total that I’d done with this camera. Very little editing, very little color correction, very little actual concept put into it. So I’m having to be like, “Trust me, this is gonna be sick,” to kids, some I don’t even really know, who are just like, “we’re cool, we film clips all the time, can we put them on our Instagram?” And I’m like, Not yet. Just hold off and it’ll pay off. You’ll get your clips soon enough.
TNSB
The IG/TikTok generation are like, “I gotta put the clips out tonight!” Haha.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, for sure.
TNSB
Well, their trust in you is a testament to what skateboarding does, right? It brings people together. I think that’s really the essence of skateboarding. You kind of touched on it a little bit with the lineup of skaters and how it came together. It really seems like a lot of people reached out to you, and you had a set crew you were always filming with, and then everything else just happened organically.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, a lot of it was me wanting to push people who were riding for or affiliated with the shop. It started as this thing where I was like, “OK, let’s do your thing,” and I really wanted to skate with Josh and Tre because they’ve got their own lane. They do the Cold Summer stuff, very Instagram-heavy, lots of constant content and I thought it would be really sick to see them have a full part. I’m sure you understand, you see a skater and you’re like, “I’ve never seen a full part from this person,” but you see them around and you know if you can help them put a part together, it’s going to do something special for them and for the people who see it. There were a couple people like that. Then we linked back up with Riley again and saw the way he and Edgar skated together, plus his determination. Every weekend he was out, 100%. The stuff that built between them and the older guys, Blake, Fonseca and then our homie Jon, who we met after he moved from New York… it was just recognizing these dudes, Edgar and Riley, have something special, and being on the majority of those sessions to help push them. So yeah, it started through Blue Flowers, and then eventually it evolved into, OK, these are the dudes I want to see personally. I want to see what they can do with a full part.
TNSB
How was it filming around Nashville? Especially since they ripped the Plaza out which acted as the hub for skateboarding in Nashville for decades, it was essentially our Love Park, our MACBA. How has that impacted filming in the streets around the city?
Jake Harrison
You know, we were talking about that the other day, it's such a blessing and a curse. Obviously, we can't skate there anymore, but we got some tricks at the Plaza in the video during the last week it was skateable. You can see that, I think Jon has a back tail on the fountain ledge, and then a nollie flip flat followed by a back 180 switch front crook on the flagpole ledge.
TNSB
Yeah, we never really skated those flagpole ledges back in the day other than doing little board slides with no wax on them.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, but we got them going because we needed a second ledge, and it also opened up new lines like that manny drop-down gap to the flagpole legde in the front. It just kinda opened up this new way of skating the Plaza. But also, you know, when I moved back from New York, I missed the occupy days where you could go and skate the Plaza all day and not get kicked out. When I was growing up, the Plaza was always a major bust, I was in the era where at no point could you get more than 10 minutes before getting kicked out. And when I moved back the occupy movement had just ended, and Plaza was a major bust again because it had basically been open game for two years, and then it went right back to how it was.
TNSB
I guess the benefit to not having the Plaza around is that it forced you to go out and find new spots and get creative right?
Jake Harrison
Yeah, I mean, I grew up watching Static videos, Traffic videos, Subzero, Eastern Exposure—those are the ones, you know. My family's from New York, and I lived all around the East Coast, Jersey, PA, Florida—and all those places had such a big influence on those videos. There’s Plaza skating in them for sure, but the thing that I took away is... my favorite part is Puleos Static part. Like, that’s my Gino. You know, let’s find the spot that isn’t skated and make it skateable. It’s like, okay, it’s sick to do your back-tail big flip, but it’s cooler to ollie over this random rail and do a nosegrind or something. It just has this thing for me. So skating here has been really different for me because we basically I just go like, “Oh, I think I saw this thing,” you know, the classic skate around the block vibe.
TNSB
Well, that's something that never leaves you especially as a filmer. you just get an eye for spots. Even since I’ve been back here I'll be driving and see a spot and I'm like “I gotta stop and take a photo of the spot” you know, I started a little spot book in my phone and I don't even film anymore. It's funny.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, it's just one of those things you know? You get lost in the hunt. Everyone knows how everyone else skates, so it's like... I'll get a photo from Edgar: “Oh, there's this spot, its not for me, but you know this could go down,” or “Oh, this is my backside, but it’d be cool for a frontside trick” or whatever. And a lot of it's been spots that I've been to a million times but no one could skate before. So I'm like, “Oh, let me take this person here”, a spot that I knew back in high school or whatever. Skateboarding here (in Nashville) has definitely been different.
TNSB
Yeah, you definitely have to put in the extra effort here.
Jake Harrison
These days I want to be skating something new. You know, in the video there's tons of courthouse clips, we started skating the Andrew Jackson building a bunch. There aren't really ledges, but there's flat ground and just options all around. So a lot of stuff there. And then, dude, lurking on the east side, giving that a little shine, and the south side, kind of just anywhere that's not in the center of downtown. Because we could find shit nobody's skated, just like “lets break this mold,” or finding some stairs that look sick, and trying to get people to skate that.
TNSB
Talking about skating in and around Nashville, was there any one spot that was like your favorite to film at, or one that the majority of the guys enjoyed skating?
Jake Harrison
What’s my favorite spot in the video? The ones that really stick out to me... Riley skate this really tight double bank. Riley does a fakie flip and then shoves back into the other bank. It’s in this little alleyway next to an apartment building. We went there because you used to be able to ollie over the back of this tall rail into the first bank, but we went back and just watching that process of figuring out how to skate this really tight alleyway, like, I can’t even roll with them. I’m filming fisheye, I’m a foot away from him. It was really sick. That’s the only trick that got done there, but that was really sick to me. Then another one is this playground in Green Hills that Matt (Sharer) found while riding his bike. Riley does a varial heel into it, and then Blake does a back heel and a half cab heel. Just finding those two... The first spot I knew about, the second spot I’d never seen. Just the spots that are very East Coast, almost like European or London-esque spots that are super rough. It’s not obvious, you have to figure out how to skate it. Those two were like my favorite to film. Oh, and then also in Riley’s part, he does a blunt slide on this angled bank-to-ledge that I tried to noseblunt way back when I could actually do them, and nobody skated it. I just found it. Those three are like my favorite spots just because they’re not polished, they’re brown concrete, bricks, really rough. It just has this vibe of, “Oh yeah, like that feeling in New York” or these spots that are not supposed to be in Nashville. So I like those a lot.
TNSB
You kinda touched on this a little earlier when you mentioned the Static videos, but what videos or films have influenced you and given you inspiration for the project?
Jake Harrison
I mean, dude, I’ve gotta give flowers to anyone that’s done it in my generation. Randy Smith was one of the first dudes doing something along those lines when I was probably 13. It was an amazing video. Then you’ve got Josh Shupe and Alex Rose, Matt Creasy, and the Threads / Supervisual Collective. Those dudes make amazing videos, and I’ve been lucky enough to have a couple guest clips and sections. Corey’s (Rosson) “Cuntry” videos are some of the best pieces of skateboarding to come out of Nashville. Conceptually, they’re amazing. He’s produced such a meaningful piece of skateboarding for the South between the photos he archives, the music, and just building something out of essentially nothing. Corey’s videos to me are like what you think of with down home southern cooking: you take the scraps that are left over and you make the most delicious meal. Those are so incredible.
So those local dudes, Corey, Shupe and Rose are the best dudes to have a hold of the VX. And obviously Josh Stewart, an amazing videographer, conceptually and technically. Beyond that, it’s tough, because all those dudes are VX dudes, and I didn’t want to buy a VX. I didn’t want to deal with all that capturing so I went a different direction and shot it all on a $100 handycam.
TNSB
That’s amazing.
Jake Harrison
I just did my research. I know the camera is from 2009, and I dug into what I needed: a variable zoom, a screw on thread so I could buy cheap lenses, and since I was going to shoot HD, I needed 60 frames at 1080p. That was it. I scoured eBay and found this Canon model. I actually bought two. I had a Canon HFS100 that I smashed halfway through filming, but I also had an HFS10 it’s the same camera, it just can store footage on the camera too. Same exact camera. They’re about 100 bucks, so if I smash one, I just buy another. I got really lucky with that. Filming HD is kind of different. I bought a cheap lens that’s basically like an MK2, but it’s from some off brand company. A lot of it was just figuring out what I actually like in HD filming, which honestly isn’t a ton. I think the Century Extreme looks kind of whack, and the MK1 only really looks good on 4:3. When you crop it into 16:9, it kind of looks like the Extreme. So I was like, I’ve got this “MK2‑ish” lens that has even more barrel distortion than the Extreme. I’ll just use this lens and try to make it look like the dudes I like, with the MK1 and VX setup. I took everything I love from those VX filmmakers and tried to make it look like that on an HD camera.
TNSB
So from the music standpoint, what was your approach? Did you already have songs in mind? Were you thinking about it as you were filming, or did you wait until the editing process and then work with the skaters, like, “I really want to use this song”? How did you know how you wanted that to color the video?
Jake Harrison
Yeah, nobody got to pick music, which is kind of lame on my part, but I just knew what I wanted. Things changed, obviously, but you know how it is: skaters listen to songs, filmers listen to songs, whatever, and you hear something and you’re like, “OK, this sounds like so‑and‑so.” I’ve had a playlist even before filming. It all doesn’t need to be in the video. Before I even bought a camera, there was this PJ Harvey song where I was like, Oh dude, Edgar would look so sick skating to this, or little things like that where you go, “Oh, their skating would go great with this song”. Music is so integral to my life. I grew up in a pretty sick music scene, and my mom is a punk from New York, so punk music and rock ’n’ roll have been a huge part of my life. Then you get introduced to other stuff through that. There’s a vibe that everyone skates to, and I tried to create a vibe with that like the Cocteau Twins song.
TNSB
The Cocteau Twins was my favorite song, by the way.
Jake Harrison
Dude, it’s so good for Rileys part. It’s incredible, and the way that it opens is so sick, and his kind of flow/vibe he’s got. I don’t know, it just worked so well. Thank you, I was so stoked on that.
TNSB
When you know the person skating well enough, it’s really interesting that when you hear a song you’re like, “That’s it, that fits them perfect.” You know?
Jake Harrison
Yeah, it is magic. That song was so good. Also, I knew I was gonna use my friend Jeffrey’s song, Jeffrey Novak, who I work with. He’s in town, he’s a great friend and an incredible musician with a ton of projects. I heard that “Blood Celebration” track when he released his record and I was like, it sounded like a western, or kind of like something Tarantino would use in his movies. That’s where the titles are from, I wanted it to look like a Tarantino movie.
TNSB
As soon as the title popped up, I’m like, this feels inspired by a Tarantino flick.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, that’s so sick. Wow, thanks. Yeah, the orange and the light, it’s the only time that orange is in the entire video. That slow drive and this kind of vibe… yeah. I heard that song and I was like, “This is gonna be it.” I was like, that song and then the credits with that Simon & Garfunkel song, those two were definitely getting used. If I didn’t come up with the name, it was going to be America, just because that song goes so good with it and feels right. Then I got lucky with the Cocteau Twins song after “Blood Celebration” ends. For Josh and Trey, I wanted them to be psyched, so I was like, “All right, what new rapper or what rapper from Instagram/TikTok do I like the most?” That dude 1900Rugrat had a really sick freestyle on the “On The Radar” show, and then I went through and found this song, it had like 10,000 views on his YouTube because it was so far back. A lot of times I could only get out to skate with them at night, and the song is called “Midnight Sunshine,” and I was like, “Dude, that’s perfect.” They were supposed to skate to some Dipset song and then I was like I don’t even know if they know who Dipset is, maybe they do, but this will be more fun, and it worked better. The Rome Streetz song with Method Man having a feature for Blake and Fonz was sick, being able to split them up through that feature section was cool, and I just needed that one to work. Cowboy Junkies is such a sick, quiet band, and if anyone cares to watch, you can notice it, Matt and John are both super floaty and really carefree, like water, and just really cool. So when I edited their part, it’s basically a raw video part. It’s the only part where you watch from the moment the camera starts to the moment it ends, you’ll watch me set up them rolling up, and when the shot’s done, you see me pull the camera away to palm. You get all of that, that song was sick. And then it goes into Ed’s section, which I’ve gotten so much response from the Avril Lavigne song. It’s so funny that that’s the one…
TNSB
Its one of those quirky songs that just works.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, I know. It was one of those ones, i was gonna use a Conor Oberst song, I don’t even know the name of the project… He’s got that song “Greater Omaha,” and it just seems like this really heavy part was edited so heavy. And like, he is heavy, but he’s also such a fun and goofy guy that I was like, I don’t think I can end it there. There needs to be some reprise from that.
TNSB
You made it fun.
Jake Harrison
Yeah. So with that one, I just dropped it in after going through all that stuff like Incubus, Nirvana, all these songs where it’s like, Oh, you really used that? That’s what you picked? And then that one just dropped in, the first three clips worked, and I was like, this is gonna be good.
TNSB
I’m still waiting to see when someone will be brave enough to use a Staind song or something like that, and maybe someone already has but just like, all the meme songs that everyone pretends to make fun of, but they’re secretly singing at the top of their lungs when they are in the car by themselves, haha.
Jake Harrison
Dude, I’ve already got this Alice In Chains song on deck for the next video. It’s so… it’s so cringe in that way, but yes. The music was just something where I got lucky, there are so many videos out there that have already used so many songs so you can never really tell, but you go to SkateSite and make sure what you are using isn’t that major.
TNSB
I’m one of those people that doesn’t care if a song has been used before or not, there are only a handful of parts that I would say the song is off limits but its very few and it’s only because the parts that these few songs are associated with had such an impact on skating that nothing could really fill its shoes so to speak.
Jake Harrison
Maybe in the future I will care a little less but for this one I was like so nervous.
TNSB
So who was the one guy like that really turned it on and you where you're like “Whoa!”?
Jake Harrison
Dude, it was Riley all day. Riley through the entire thing took it so serious. He’s a fun guy, he’s a goofball, but he got so real about wanting to do a part. Him and Edgar are the only people that watched the video before it was done, and I think when he saw his footage sequenced together, and he really liked his song, I don’t even know if he’d heard that song before but he got really into it. It was one of those things where he stepped up in a way I didn’t know he could. He nollied over the TVA rail. I hit up Josh Shupe in Chattanooga and was like,Yo, what’s been done nollie or switch over the rail? And he’s like, No one ever has done anything.
TNSB
What’s really interesting about Riley is he's got the same pop his dad, Aaron, had. I don't know if you know about his dad but I used to skate with him back in the day, one of the real OG’s of Nashville, he could ollie over anything. Back in the late 80’s he would ollie over trash cans standing up instead of on their sides which at that time you only saw people like Natas and Gonz doing ollies like that in the magazines and what little videos we had access to then. I know by todays standards that doesn’t sound crazy but you have to remember, it was in a time when boards barely had any noses, were super flat and every street trick was literally being invented, the boundaries of what was possible was being pushed. Seeing Riley's part just really reminds me of how his dad use to skate.
Jake Harrison
Dude, that’s so sick to hear, because he’s told me that he’ll chat with you, that you hit him up or whatever. I’ve never met his dad, but I know that his dad was around. His dad’s like a real skater, so it’s sick to know that he has a history here to represent in a weird way, and to see him put on.
TNSB
It was really cool to see. Riley, for me, was definitely the standout part. I think they were all good, but Riley was the standout, so it’s cool that he was the guy you saw really step up.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, to see him go from what we started with to, “your part’s good, but what if we replaced this trick and this trick, can we go out a little bit more?” And then it just evolved into this thing where now… Dude, he got smoked the other day, but right before that he grinded a 35‑foot rail. We went to this spot wanting somebody to try a trick there I wasn’t expecting somebody to just hop on it, and Riley’s like, “I’m grinding it.” We had to go back twice, and he did it the second day. I was like, “What?!” And he says “Oh, I think I’ve kind of always been a rail guy, I just don’t like rails.” haha. To see him be that excited and to have that ability to recognize the potential of a video part, even if it’s nothing… like, what does he get from it? Maybe a bo from some
brand? But to see him look at a project and be like, “this is important and I’m going to put it on.” His part in the last three months of filming changed, I would say, 60%. He has that sequence of tricks in Louisville where he does the back lip to manual and the bigspin back lip… he’d never done a bigspin back lip and he did it in four tries. And the nollie over the rail, he’d never skated that spot. He’s like, “I’ve never nollied a handrail.” Like, OK…? That, and all this other stuff he did, I watched him evolve in the sense of his concept of his skateboarding. So yeah, he’s the standout as far as the growth or maybe not even growth, but this recognition of his ability and the effort he put in.
TNSB
So what was a low point of making this video? What went wrong, and what turned it around? I know it’s not all Chutes and Ladders, right?
Jake Harrison
The lowest point… I think the toughest thing was trying to do it with a kid. And that’s not “low” obviously, the best thing on the planet is having my son.
TNSB
Yeah, of course your kids are the best but it does make it a challenge when you aren’t getting paid for the project, right?
Jake Harrison
Yeah, and it’s tough. A lot of people in the video had a lot of life changes in it, because we’re not 17 anymore. There’s relationship issues, real life issues, working, families, things that are very hard to beat. Harder than security guards, harder than lighting issues, harder than cold or 110‑degree days, the things you assume would be the hard part of filming a video. Those were so minuscule in the grand scheme of what was really difficult. Those were all very, very real. I think the most tangible thing was figuring out how to book it, how to actually put it out. That took months. These dudes, myself included, put a lot of time in and you want to give it the best sendoff you can and try to make it the biggest thing you can. I was definitely searching for a way to legitimize the premiere. I didn’t want a bar, because a ton of the skate community is under 21 in general, but also that’s the easy route. Like, my homie works at a bar, they have a projector and a bedsheet… or they don’t even have a projector and we have to bring one. Or we can do it at the shop, but the shop’s in Franklin and it’ll be showing on a TV that might as well be in a living room. I had to factor those things in. A pretty tough thing for me was going to one space, this art gallery I thought would be it and unfortunately I couldn’t work it out with them. They weren’t able to host us, which again is a blessing and a curse: it pushed the video back two months, which is when we got a lot of the best footage. But it was also a 50–70 person cap venue and we ended up getting, I don’t know, 150–200 people at the premiere. When we got turned down from that, I was like, let me shoot for a sick spot. Luckily I had a contact at Third Man, and they were super down, especially with the bands we booked, who are all skateboarders in bands. The DJ, people I grew up with… even our sound engineer, Shibby, skated with Blake from Hendersonville. Everyone who put everything together for that show is a skater, which I think is so sick. Something I wanted to showcase with the bands was that idea that skateboarders really run the world, you look anywhere and there’s somebody who skated or skates, who has that creative mindset, who’s pushing the scene or whatever. There’s somebody there with that part of their brain. So yeah, that was probably the biggest setback and the most detrimental for me, putting all this time and effort in and kind of feeling hopeless for a while, being salty, like, “All right, we’re gonna go to the pizza shop for the premiere”. Not the worst, we’d always make it a good time and everyone would be excited to see it, people would show up but I’m glad it worked out the way it did. The turnaround for me was getting the OK from Third Man. That was such a massive relief and, I think, what fired everyone up for the last three months of filming for the video.
TNSB
That’s cool, that was the thing that you needed, because it gave you two more months to film and then it really gave you this closure for the video and something to look forward to on premier night. So that’s cool.
Jake Harrison
Yeah
TNSB
What was a moment, either with the skating or the filming for the video, that you’re never going to forget? You could probably rifle off a hundred, but really narrow it down, what was that moment? And how did it feel witnessing and then feeling the reaction to the video?
Jake Harrison
In the process, there’s always good ones and bad ones. The good ones are always gonna be like, “oh shit, you just did the last trick!” Whether it was a month in or right at the end. And it’s not even the biggest tricks, like for Blake, for Riley, they were so last‑minute with their last tricks. Those are amazing, that feeling of, you’ve gotta stack one more. For them to do that was super sick. You put everything you got in to it and everyone knows dude, you’re done. Yeah, you can replace this, you can replace that, you can always add another trick but there’s something about that spot and the story that people don’t even know: how many times you tried this, how many other things you worked for that didn’t work out. Obviously there are standout moments. I think the worst moment and it’s pretty funny and not sick was thinking I was gonna get robbed for the camera, which is so worthless.
TNSB
Wait, you got robbed for your camera?!
Jake Harrison
No, but there was a situation. We’re in Louisville at the spot where Riley does the back‑to‑back sequence in this alleyway. Louisville is such a funny city because it just looks like it just got money. It’s weird, because in a lot of cities you have what you’d typically call a good area and a bad area, but Louisville is like sidewalk by sidewalk. You’re in this alley where you can see between two blocks: one block looks nice and has string lights on the patios, that’s not where we are. We’re a block away, where you can still see that, but there’s piss and shit all over the place. So it’s this weird dynamic of young professionals and waitresses and bartenders walking around and then we’re 30 feet away in this alley where people walk through but no one is actually around. The most memorable moment? This dude rides up on a bike, he’s got his handlebars covered with a coat. Riley’s not there by the way, he went to get coffee because edgar is trying a trick ultimately didn’t even make it in, which sucks, he didn’t even get the trick, the story is for nothing. The guy rides up and he’s got his bars covered, and he asks me if I have a cigarette. I did, but I told him I didn’t. So he keeps going to the end of the alley and Ed is trying to get hyped up, and the dude looks at Edgar and Ed’s like, “Right here, right here.” The dude thinks Edgar is telling him that I do have a cigarette. As he’s talking to Edgar at the end of the alley, I realize: oh shit, he has a rifle across the handlebars under the coat. He turns around and comes back and I’m recognizing he has a full rifle! I’m like, maybe it’s a BB gun, maybe it’s a pressure washing gun he’s gonna scrap, whatever but then he turns back around and I’m like, that’s a butt and a barrel. I can’t see any other part of the gun because his hands are on the bars, under the coat, and everything else is covered. He pulls back up and asks me for a cigarette, and I’m recognizing what the circumstance is. I’m like, “oh yeah, dude, sorry, I thought I didn’t have any, here you go.” But the way he’s positioned the barrel, it was pointed at my temple. I’m sitting in a lawn chair filming, and the barrel is at my temple.
TNSB
Oh man…
Jake Harrison
And it’s an older dude, and again, I don’t think it was meant to be anything more than what it was, just a guy who happens to have this bike and this gun. He’s like, “Oh, you got a lighter?” Lights his cigarette, keeps sitting there and smoking, and then goes, “That’s a really nice camera.” I’m like, “yeah, actually it’s like 100 bucks, it’s from 2009.” Just making it sound like this is not worth anything if he’s thinking about doing anything drastic. He’s like, “Cool, thank you,” and then pulls off. I’m all, “Dude, Edgar…” laughing but like, “Yo! Five more minutes. If you see him again (because he’s at the end of the alley at the four‑way so he can kind of see all the way down) we have to leave!” That was definitely the most sus situation. The dude didn’t come back, but we didn’t get the trick, it got dark, whatever. It was one of those situations that was probably the most memorable . You hear about people getting stuck up for cameras or whatever, but just that combo of the gun and then the comment, “That’s a really nice camera…”
TNSB
Yeah I've I've definitely been in scenarios, especially in California where some of the best spots are in the hood and I knew someone had a gun and here I am with all of my camera equipment. Situations like that are so hectic.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, and you’re like, “Well, I’ve got nothing.” And obviously, I know what the camera’s worth even if I had an HPX,lan an Extreme but nothing is worth my life. You’re taking it. If you want it, it’s yours. That’s how it goes in that situation.
TNSB
For me it was only about the footage, that's all I want. In my head I had it planned out to say, “The footage means nothing to you, there's no value if you take it but it means everything to me.” It’s crazy to even argue that but I feel like I would at least try and salvage the footage. I’m all like, “I’ll tell you where to take and sell the camera to get the best price but please let me have the footage, haha.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, it’s like, “Let me get the SD, please,” I’m begging, “Let me get the SD,” and then… it’s just one of those things. So yeah, that situation was the most memorable.
TNSB
So how did the day of the premier feel? You already talked about the bands you had there, but what was the atmosphere? What did that feel like going into it, the day building up to it, and then seeing peoples reactions during and after?
Jake Harrison
It was amazing! I mean, stressful for sure, but such a good, amazing experience. I was stressed until the first moment where I walked outside and I saw the line, people were waiting to get in. I was like, “We’re not toast.” It was such a massive venue.
TNSB
You were all like, “more than three people showed up, yes! haha.
Jake Harrison
No, literally. I was counting, I was like, “well, there’s like five people in each band and like 10 people in the video, so at least there’s like 35 people that will show up”. And then you see the line, and that was crazy. People start filling in and I’m like, oh shit, I don’t know all these people. We had the bands, which was so sick, and a lot of them are pretty big local acts, and they had a good crowd but a lot of people were there for the video.
TNSB
That’s sick to hear, I’m stoked for you.
Jake Harrison
It was kind of crazy for me to have that experience. I’ve played in a lot of musical acts, I’ve had art shows, I’ve done all these things, and I’ve never had a turnout like that.
TNSB
When you make a video and then invite people to come and watch it you really feel like you're putting yourself out there, you know? It is kind of like art, because it’s a part of you. It’s your personality on the canvas so to speak. It’s hard to explain to someone who has never put something out there to get criticized especially when you’ve put so much time, effort and heart into a project. I remember I was always super nervous, like, “Are people gonna like this?” Because as much as I was making the project for me and the skaters in the video, you still want people to enjoy it right?
Jake Harrison
Yeah. And like I said, a lot of the dudes in the video other than Riley and Edgar, none of them saw it. The only person that saw the final edit was Riley, because he burned the DVD the night before for the premiere. Everyone else didn’t want to see it. They were like, “No, we trust you.”
TNSB
Now that’s cool. I like that they wanted to experience it for the first time at the premiere, that’s awesome.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, and so it was cool for all those dudes to see it. It’s great, everyone’s response, but the dudes in the video being like, “when are we doing the next one? When do we start it?” It was nice to know they felt like I did them justice. The response from people was so sick. The venue was amazing and they were so kind. It was good. There were obviously the nerves , you’re showing your work and you want people to like it. There were a couple filmers I mentioned earlier that I look up to who were there, and those were the dudes I was like, man, they’re gonna make fun of my fake‑super8‑treated HD, all these things where I’m like, “I shouldn’t have done that,” or whatever. Those are the dudes whose opinions I cared about, and for them to come up and be like, “Yeah, you get it,” that’s all you can ask for.
TNSB
Yeah, that’s awesome, man. So you kind of touched on it a bit throughout the whole interview, but now that the video’s out and you’ve had time to breathe, do you have a desire to do another one? It sounds like you do.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, a new camera comes on Saturday. We’re stepping it up from the hundred‑dollar handycam.
TNSB
What camera are you stepping up to?
Jake Harrison
So it’s still a Canon, which I know isn’t industry standard, but it’s an XF205 , the Canon version of the HPX. It’s a little smaller and a little lighter, but I already have all the Canon gear, so I didn’t want to switch and buy new batteries, new chargers, whatever. I’m just going to take that setup and run with it.
TNSB
What lens does it take, what do you want to run on it?
Jake Harrison
So that’s the next purchase, making that choice. Like I said, I don’t really like how the MK1 looks cropped on 16:9. My lens is wider than the “Extreme”, so I might not change it. I’ll just stick with that, and yeah, the handycam will still be in the arsenal for sure. It did a great job on this one, so I’m not gonna get rid of it.
TNSB
Well, that’s how legacies are made my friend, you have a look and style and a way you wanna do it, and you stick to it and keep doing that.
Jake Harrison
Yeah, so we’ll definitely have another one soon. Riley’s already crushing it.
TNSB
When are you trying to have the next one out?
Jake Harrison
I don’t know, we’ll see if we can make it happen quicker. I don’t know, a year… maybe two years max. Setting deadlines on these things is tough, you know. I probably think that we’ve got at least, you know… I’ll try to keep the dudes on this momentum of being excited. I think this one was probably a year and a half, maybe a little more when it came to, “the deadline is here,” plus the venue issues. That first half‑year was getting everyone in the swing of the process, myself included. So I think a year is pretty manageable, especially with the way people are skating right now. Of course we’ve got cold times here but it’s always hit or miss on the weekend with Tennessee weather.
TNSB
You don't have the advantage of California weather where it's sunny every day, perfect ground, perfect spots, all of that just helps speed the process up.
Jake Harrison
You’re right, we are kind of in that sweet middle zone of not a full-on northern winter, it’s not tornado season but you will get enough rough days to slow things down, but not enough to completely shut filming off. That’s pretty ideal for trying to stack a year’s worth of footage.
TNSB
Any last words?
Jake Harrison
Thanks for having an interest, this is awesome. Shout out to all the guys in the video and for making it happen and to anyone who supported us along the way. Big thank you to Chase at Blue Flowers for backing us and shout out to Harrison for shooting all the photos at the premiere. And yeah, thanks, dude, it’s definitely important for Tennessee skateboarding, Nashville skateboarding. It means a lot when a dude like you, or you know, Read Blankenship, Nate Brown, whoever, has interest or promotes what I’m trying to do. That means a lot to me. Anyone that we look up to, where we’re like, “yeah, those dudes put this scene on the map”, that’s the most meaningful so thank you dude.
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