The first thing that struck me about the movie was the soundtrack, 90 East bucks the trend of recent street videos and opts for a chilled soul sound rather than the rap/hip hop which has become so popular in recent years. Its a real breath of fresh air and in this case it works perfectly. With artists like Eric Clapton, Isaac Haayes and The Fabulous Three the soundtrack fits the riding and editing perfectly. The editing is as basic as it gets, theres no flashy titles or graphics, and again, it fits the feel of the video perfectly. The film is about riding bikes and thats 100% the emphasis here. Theres nothing to take away the main focus, the riding.
The riding itself is solid, its an all street video so expect grind combos of every kind on any and every possible obstacle! The film is split into the usual rider sections opening with Abdul Fofanah, a name I had never heard but I expect to hear a lot more from him after seeing his section. Abdul takes nose wheelies to the next level throughout his part adding real 180s out and seemingly being able to roll them as long as he wants and out of all kinds of grinds.
Abduls section sets the tone for the rest of the video with technical grind combos and smooth street lines throughout. The rest of the film includes full sections from Jake Frost, Mike Penney, Carlos Rohena, Lino Gonzales, harold harwood, a jake gayewski and Jesse Williams split section and a New England mix section featuring Matt Pappas, Zack Cooke, Jamie Mauri, Alex Liv, Sean Burns, Bob Scerbo and many more . Everyones section has some stand out parts, Carlos Rohena can ice pick grind further than most can manual and Jesse Williams has, possibly the best smith lines in BMX as well as a God like balance on rails.
The one problem I had with the film was that I think given the caliber of current street videos, this just didn't match up. But, I don't think it was supposed to, I don't think it needed or wanted to be the next Animal video and that comparison doesn't need to be made at all . I think the film was supposed to be exactly what it is, a good street video with a chilled atmosphere and good, solid and chilled riding. You wont see people dropping off buildings or gapping half way across the world, that's just not what this is about.
Overall the video has some awesome riding, a great soundtrack and made me want to ride and really, what more do you want?!
