Here's where the stream of consciousness starts: Glen reflects on skateboarding and the humble beginnings of his career...
I remember when we first saw a picture of a ramp in Skateboarder magazine and I remember when people started building the first half-pipes. I'm not trying get nostalgic, I'm just trying to explain the situation. I mean being at the Dog Bowl the day Tony Alva picked his board up above coping, and did an "aerial", -he does a frontside air and it wasn't even called that. There was no name for it. He just did i.
"There used to be all these rumors that he (Tony Alva)would write them (Skateboarder Magazine) all the time and say shit to them and tell them to fuck off. The reality was that he only wrote one letter in the history of the magazine and it was to give them shit for not giving me credit on a photo." |  |
I went to school the next day and I had a hard time explaining what the fuck he was doing. It was beyond comprehension. And what the fuck was going through Jay Adams head when he would go up and fly out of a pool like no one else? No one will ever know. He was just hyper and he was so aggressive, he didn't give a fuck
 | "Then you have Alva and Adams. That to me is the second generation. That's the generation that meant everything.". Check out Jay's aforementioned "moustache lap-over". |
The guy who influenced me and motivated me was Craig Stecyk (C.R. Stecyk III). He wrote the original dogtown articles, took the original photos. I don't have a mentor, but if there was anyone who I could say influenced me -and it wasn't just his photos, it was his writings- those Dogtown articles they changed my life. Every quote in the back of Fuck You Heroes that's skate related is by him.
"Frustrated young person like I was, and that might sound cliche, but if it wasn't for curb grinding in front of my apartment building in 11th &12th grade, if it wasn't for Black Flag, if it wasn't for Ted Nugent, I would have killed myself. When you're thinking different things than everyone else, you get frustrated. You get upset. You wanna make sparks fly out of your trucks. You wanna go slam dance at a show." |  |
Was it Stecyk that said "Hey go get this published?"
Yeah, it was him. When I was taking pictures with a pocket instamatic, I was sending those photos in anyway. I sent a photo of Tony Alva, I still have it. I even wrote a caption on the back, in my little 12 year old writing. It looks like a little idiot wrote it. Stacy (Peralta) saw my photos and said, "Warren Bolster's the guy, I'll tell him your sending them So I called down there and it's all true, I did make my voice deeper and I was nervous about making a long distance phone call and I said, I'm sending these pictures down. They are really important to me. I don't want you to lose 'em. It's important that I know what happens with them. Two weeks later, I called down there and they said "We like the photos and I think we're gonna use one." Then two weeks after that, I got a letter in the mail with Skateboarder letterhead on it and I was like shaking. I was buggin' out. Here it is, a tear sheet, full page with photo credit and check for $40. I fucking flipped. I didn't know what was going on. It was amazing to me -and from that point on, I had a picture in the magazine every month except for 2 or 3 issues until it folded. It wasn't until the third time I was in the mag that they found out how old I was and Bolster couldn't believe it. He said "I didn't know you were this little" and he gave me five rolls of free film.
 | "That's (Brett Adams' Ramp) the only place I ever got vertical frontside and made it. When I was weightless doing a frontside kickturn on vertical and I came down, I just genuflected or whatever. I crossed over and I said. "OK, I made it. I'm not fucking with that." I'm not the kind of person to go weightless ...I never hit coping a day in my life." |
I felt I got jerked a lot because I was little. And I know for a fact, one day they even told me, "Look, we need to use so and so's photos, he's got a family to support. Your shots are good, but we just can't use 'em right now." Look at Fuck You Heroes, some of those shots have never been published. Look at Fuck You Too some of those have never been published. People tell me "Oh I remember when that was in the mag." Guess what, it wasn't. Sorry to tell you. A lot of them were, but hundreds were lost. That's part of the reason I put out the book. We never knew what was going to be important back then.
Have ever had any problems shooting bands or artists that have been signed or have moved on from when you originally started shooting them?
First of all, I would never shoot anyone that didn't want to be shot. I'm not an outsider, this is my lifestyle. I'm taking photos of the people who are making the difference. I shot the pictures of those bands because these people were making a difference and I wanted to get these people in the magazine and I wanted to publicized them. I wasn't there trying to be an artist, I am an artist. I take photos that are in focus, that are composed and that show character. Since raygun magazine came out, if you take a photo that's out of focus, or not composed, it's art FUCK THAT. There's something to that, but mostly, it's bullshit. It's The Emperor's New Clothes, just like half the bands that are on fucking Grand Royal and all the labels that bands start. Most of these bands suck, it's just that a few people say that they're good and everyone follows along.
Darby Crash and Lorna Doom. |  |
The Emperor's New Clothes plays more a part in the media today than it ever has in the history of the world. Because the media is so quick. With your fucking internet with desktop publishing, video cameras, with auto focus cameras, it's all too easy as far as I'm concerned. People don't respect it or appreciate it. It's a joke. There are too many magazines in the world. Too many videos. It's oversaturation. There's not that much to write about. You might as well write about the shit you just took in the bathroom because it's probably more interesting than the band that's playing out tonight just because they want to be the next big thing and be on 120 minutes.
 | D. Boon, Mike Watt, and George Hurley. San Pedro's finest. |
When I was shooting pictures of the bands I liked, there were shitty bands opening up. Do you think I took pictures of them? FUCK NO. You know how many people tell my friends "Yeah, I know Glen Friedman, he used to take pictures of me when I skated. I remember Glen taking photos." You're stupid. I never took a photo of you. You must be dumb. I never took a photo of them, cuz I remember everyone I took a photo of and I never took pictures of suckers. And I still don't.
|
"Everyone related to Ian right away. He was like the hero because he was
young, he was unassuming,
he didn't separate the band from the audience at all. I saw a Minor
Threat video the other day and watching it, it would be corny if I
described to you how i felt." An outtake from the Salad Days shoot. |  |
(On the other hand...) Sometimes I think I don't deserve it (the attention). Because this guy was great at this and this guy was great at that but the reality is -and Stecyk put it in my head, for me to learn to accept it- that I was involved in all three of these things. (Stecyk said) Glen, you survived and your still going. I don't have any agents I never have. The only problem is that there's so much shit work out there getting exposed. People should know what the real deal is. Not that I'm the best photographer in the world, but look: this is the way things should look and you can do it. You don't have to be someone who just shoots black people. You don't have to shoot stars against a white background. You don't have to do just one thing.
 | An early photo shot of the group, just above ground.Chuck D in jail with star-studded posse. |