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This is a pretty great little video put together by Rob Harris, starring New York City’s secretive Slappy Cove. If there’s one thing I always thought skateboarding needed more of, it’s pirate references, so on that basis alone this clip scores some major points. But I guess it would be pretty hard to kickflip with a peg leg. Slappies might be a different story though, as the wise Eric Koston once said, “Slappies… it’s 95% attitude, you know, 5% ability.” Which I think means I have about 5% ability, and hey, that’s better than nothing!

In reality, this video could also be called “The Essence of Skating in New York City” — where low to the ground street ollies, slappies, and no complys still reign, uh, supreme. Now, obviously a lot of incredibly high level skating goes on in NYC too, considering it’s one of the East Coast’s primary strongholds of skate culture. However, when it comes to the daily experience of riding your skateboard within the city limits, this video is a far more realistic depiction than whatever Manhattan-based banger is in the mags this month. And that is a decidedly good thing.