We are stoked to bring you an interview with Rich Smith to accompany the “Ben + Pat” video, a new Slam City Skates release which he curated and created. This new video was put together to showcase Ben Keegan and Pat Coghlan, two of our most recent team acquisitions. It was nice to be able to speak to Rich about the process that went into making this, to take stock of friendships forged, and to honour the latest chapter which he has been busy building behind the scenes.
Words and interview by Jacob Sawyer. Rich Smith out in the field. PH: Bill Smith
Before jumping in to the conversation about making this video we invite you to take it in if you haven’t already. If you have, it’s highly likely you may have missed some of the madness so we invite you to watch it again. Arthur Derrien over at Free Skate Mag wrote that he was “Stoked to see Rich flip the script on this one and truly embrace the chaos of Slam‘s new gen by focusing on two of the most unpredictable fresh faces of the London scene”. We believe that chaos is only truly decipherable in a few sittings. Soak in Ben Keegan’s diverse skill-set, something Rich himself admits to have only begun to scratch the surface of, and then take a ride through Pat Coghlan’s spot list of London which looks like no-one else’s. There are some cameos along the way: Joel Banner backs up the Ben Keegan part, there is a Lew Lew moment, and a serendipitous Tygar Miles-Smith appearance leads into the start of Pat’s section. Rich killed it by ushering in some new energy with this one, have a watch and then read on to find out more about making it…
Slam City Skates: “Ben + Pat”. Filmed and edited by Rich Smith
How did the idea for this video germinate? Did you know what you wanted to do from the start or it evolved and later became evident what the vid would be?
I didn’t know what shape it would take or how big or small it would be. It felt like an opportunity for a new chapter for Slam – it was only fitting to find some new people to ride for the team, pump a little youth into it, and do something new, I didn’t want to recreate what had been done already. I didn’t want to do anything like erase the current team either, I just wanted to work on something different. The plan, as far as I was concerned was to create a video and build a team as organically as possible.
Who was put on first and how did that come about?
It was Ben Keegan and he kind of came as the full package really. Timing was nice, the shop needed staff and he was looking for work, I was looking for people to ride for Slam and he didn’t have a shop sponsor.
With the video serving as an official introduction beyond Instagram clips.
Yeah, exactly.
Am I right that you didn’t know anyone in the video before the project started?
No I didn’t, besides Joel Banner who i’d met a few times over the years. I’d heard of Ben and seen his footage in the HUF UK vid [headshot] that Jim Silver made. I could sense there was a buzz around him, I liked his footage in that video, and was intrigued to see more so I was happy to meet him.
How did Pat Coghlan come into the picture?
Me and Layth Sami had arranged to meet James Collins to shoot a photo and Pat was with James on the session… It must have been early stages for Pat shooting his Grey Interview.
I had seen Pat around and recognised him but wasn’t sure where he was from. He’d spent time in Bristol because he was studying there, I had seen him at Lloyds before but didn’t realise that he was from London. I basically bumped into him on this session and he was keen, he was trying quite a mad wallie at this Oxford Circus eight stair spot. He was just throwing himself down the stairs and I immediately felt the urge to point my camera at him. He seemed like such an interesting dude, he was tweaking out a little bit, and just going for it trying this trick after all of ten minutes of meeting him. So meeting him was completely unplanned, he was just on a session with a mutual friend. It all just went from there. He had such an interesting energy from that very first session, the way he dressed, the way he was tweaking out on the tricks, everything was interesting, not just what he was trying to do. I just needed to hit record, I was drawn to him, the energy came first, the skating came second.
He looks completely different to anyone else.
He is such a hybrid of different skaters. Every month I change my mind as to who he reminds me of. I have had moments where I think he looks like Ali Boulala, and when he dresses smart he almost reminds me of [Chris] Pulman sometimes. Not necessarily his trick choice but the way he dresses with Dickies and loafers. Then other days he looks more moshy. I think one of the reasons I’m so drawn to filming with him as it feels so different to anything else. The direction of skating he’s running with, he’s taking it to its limits I feel, the massive ride-ins, the crazy wallies etc. That’s what he enjoys doing and he’s sticking to it, I admire that.
I like how Pat dresses, it’s super distinctive. He always shops at vintage stores and he gets quite a unique look from that. It translates really well to footage too, when you see a one second clip through the fisheye what he’s wearing makes it more memorable. He knows what he’s doing, it’s calculated chaos to a certain extent.
He must have a totally different spot radar too.
I don’t usually encounter this with a lot of the skaters I’m used to filming but some of the tricks he’s done, that we have filmed, just don’t look possible. When he suggests something and he’s up there I always go up to see things from his perspective, I can’t help it. If we have shot something I’ll go up after the session, peer over the top and imagine myself doing the trick. It has never not looked impossible, his ender is a perfect example of that. It’s cool being taken to all of these unusual spots, he has a really good eye for aesthetically pleasing spots. He is part of the generation that was heavily influenced by Cherry. That’s what you get, the result is skaters like Pat.
“it was only fitting to find some new people to ride for the team, pump a little youth into it, and do something new”
The flyer for the “Ben + Pat” video designed by Ben Keegan
How long did it take to accrue all the footage?
I would say it’s taken pretty much a year of filming. It was a slow start and we didn’t hit the ground running. I am grateful that Ben was willing to get out there and start getting clips at the start when we didn’t really know what they would be going towards yet. We knew there would be something Slam-related but I hadn’t met Pat at that point and we weren’t really sure what the project was going to look like. Was Dougie [George] going to have a part? Was Helena [Long] going to have footage in there? Nothing was set in stone but we just started filming. It began quite slow-paced but as soon as Pat came on board it started to feel a bit more solid, two new guys, and their introduction to Slam. It all started to take shape and then the pace of the filming started to pick up once we had our direction.
Had you already begun to get footage of other people before streamlining how things would be?
Yeah I have actually got quite a few clips here and there of people who don’t appear in the video. There’s a Dougie [George] clip, I have clips of Helena, Jak Pietryga, and there are clips of a few other guys as well. I decided to condense it and make the video about these two guys so it’s really clear that’s the focus instead of something more complicated. It seems like the right move and Ben, Pat and co were hyped on the idea.
You have been double busy throughout with the Skateboard Cafe vid in progress too. That’s a lot of time on road. How did you juggle the filming missions?
It was hard some days. I was thinking about this earlier actually. There’s a scene in one of the Spiderman movies where he has the option to save a bus full of people or save his girlfriend. It’s quite dramatic I know haha but the Green Goblin presents him with this dilemma and he has to make a choice then chooses to save them both at the same time somehow. That’s how it felt sometimes when I woke up in the morning to texts from the guys, one wanting to film a trick in South London, the other in East London. I obviously want to film both but can’t be in two places at once. So it felt a little like that sometimes but it was also something that played to my advantage, because it’s always good to have a few people out on the session for the morale. So it has worked really well in that way, especially in the earlier days when we were less sure about what we were doing with the project. Before Pat was on board and I was just filming with Ben there were days when he would come out skating with me and Korahn [Gayle] or with Layth for example. There was more of a session and it felt good so it was beneficial actually in a lot of ways.
Do you feel like you watched anyone progress during the filming period?
Definitely Pat, some of the stuff that we filmed earlier on haven’t even been used for this. He’s just gone for bigger and bigger stuff as the project evolved. I feel like Ben progressed too, he’s so in the zone right now, skating a lot is a whole different headspace to filming a lot. Around halfway through Ben just got into that zone where he was used to filming, used to that frame of mind where he could just go for things and get them. I saw that get switched on halfway through the project, there was a point where every time we would go out he would get something but it took us a while to get to that place. I guess it’s the same with any project when you’re filming regularly, we were filming every week, and you just get into that flow.
“with Ben I’m still learning what he can and can’t do”
Ben Keegan with a Surprise backside bigspin out of this switch nosegrind revert to manual
What tricks stand were most shocking to see go down?
In Victoria there’s a ledge with a three set after and Ben did a switch nosegrind revert to manny, back biggie out. I think on that day he would have easily just settled for a back 180 out but he started throwing a few bigspins out there. I had no expectation that he would land that, it was a pipe dream when we got there. Then he did one, it just came out of the blue! His shock at the end sums it up. With some of his manny stuff Ben is so unpredictable. With Pat I kind of know his bag of tricks, with Ben I’m still learning what he can and can’t do. He did a switch manny switch varial heelflip out on that London Bridge manny pad for example which is insane because I don’t think i’ve even seen him do that on flat, haha.
I enjoyed seeing him take the Kareem Campbell for a spin over the Bermondsey hip.
Yeah exactly, stuff like that, that’s such a mad idea, that was another one. Many of the tricks from both of them over the course of that year were surprising to be honest because I’m still getting to know them and their skating. I’m used to filming with the Cafe guys and have been filming with them for such a long time that I’m so familiar with their skating at this point. Pat’s ender in the video is so crazy, the way he was going about doing that was wild and the execution just couldn’t have been any better. It’s so satisfying to see all of the four wheels hit, and often with tricks like that there’s the concern that you just stop dead when you land and lose momentum but he came out of that one perfectly. It was such a magic clip, I still watch it now and I can’t get my head around it, so cool.
“the way he was going about doing that was wild and the execution just couldn’t have been any better…I still watch it now and I can’t get my head around it”
Pat Coghlan’s ender, four wheels down on the unthinkable
It was sick to see something go down the Slam shop stairs, they’ve taken others out.
Yeah Cam Barr was unfortunate and I heard that Kyle Wilson had an issue with the window before. That was a fun one to film and I’m really glad we got that one in the bag. It ties the physical store into the vid nicely.
Did you have to be quite stringent editing stuff down?
Yeah I’ve been quite particular about what makes it in and what doesn’t because I want to be 100% about every clip. That’s why the video is quite short. We could have easily made it five or six minutes but I would rather it was shorter and prioritise quality over quantity.
Is there a moment in there that was a “My War” situation with multiple return visits?
It would probably be something Pat did, he loves a saga. That’s just part of skating for him, if he hasn’t had a battle and eaten a load of shit he hasn’t gone skating, haha. Ben rarely has to go back for stuff, it’s usually taken care of in the first session.
There’s only one two-trick line in here, was it a conscious decision to keep it as a video made of singles?
That was completely unplanned. I guess that’s just how they skate, they’re not particularly line guys. It’s funny because I personally love filming lines but it didn’t happen. Maybe for the next project they’ll film some. So it was unplanned but I really like how it panned out with the quick, single, fisheye clips. I got to use the fisheye quite a lot in this which was nice. It’s funny I was reporting back to the guys on how we were doing having got the video ready and they were surprised at how short it was but I had to explain that it’s all singles. I think when a video is put together like that you’re more likely to go back and watch it again because you can’t take it all in a first. Pat’s section is very fast-paced and I like that because it adds to the chaos, you wonder what’s going on, then before you know it, it’s over. That’s the intention, that people go back to see things they may have missed.
Outside and inside the Slam shop on the night of the “Ben + Pat” premiere. PH: Kieron Forbes
It was good to see Tygar [Miles-Smith] in the mix.
Yeah, I’m so happy with that clip. I was out with Pat that day and Tygar by chance cycled past with a bit of a hangover. We convinced him to skate the spot with Pat and he ended up getting a guest trick. Again, another moment which connects the store to the vid, Tygar’s been holding it down at Slam for years now – nice to have him involved.
Did you have any heartwarming encounters with the general public?
There was a funny one when Pat attempts the drop in at Paddington station at the beginning of his part. It was in the middle of winter and he was well up for trying it. I knew that I was going to get a clip whether he landed it or not. Somehow I think he managed to get three attempts at that shit which is crazy in the middle of Paddington. The security guards were in shock, they were angry and shouting at Pat. When they turned to me they could see that I was older compared to Pat and he said something along the lines of “you should know better, you are a gentleman, sir”. It was so nice to be called a gentleman in that situation.
The last minute spot I went to with Pat today is a funny one because we have repeatedly been kicked out. I was trying to explain it to the security today. We have been back there about six or seven times so they know us now. At the beginning we used to get half an hour or maybe forty minutes. Now that they recognise us on camera we are getting five minutes. So we have kind of blown it for ourselves at this point, they are asking us why we keep coming back because we are taking the piss. I’m explaining that if we get the clip we never have to come back there, ever again. It’s such a bust, we’re never going back.
Pat Coghlan, Rich Smith, and Ben Keegan outside of the Slam premiere. PH: Kieron Forbes
Thanks Rich, I was stoked to see the video. Are there set to be more Slam video projects in the pipeline?
Yes 100%. This could change because skateboarding is so unpredictable but what I’d like to do next would be something that’s a similar length but this time let Joel Banner have his moment to film a full part, and maybe focus on two or three people. Whatever shape it takes what’s coming next will involve a Joel Banner section because he came on board late on this project. I really like Joel’s skating and he’s keen to film so I’m excited to see what he comes up with. I’d really like to do something with Dougie [George] too who has been busy with other commitments during this one. I’m curious to see, if this edit is well received, if other people will show some interest and want to be involved. Maybe with the momentum of this one behind us we’ll be able to turn something around more quickly. The reason this one took so much time beyond it being made of singles is that I had to find the guys and forge those friendships, with the next project maybe we’ll be able to hit the ground running a bit more. It would also ultimately be nice to spend some time on a longer project involving more people within the scene, a kind of friends and family affair.
We want to thank Rich Smith for these insights into the process and of course for the video itself. We are hyped on the Slam City Skates Team expansion and look forward to seeing more of the very same soon. Be sure to follow Rich Smith, Ben Keegan and Pat Coghlan for regular skateboarding inspo.
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