A full-length skate film is the master challenge for a company and also for the guys on the team. In a promo you film two hammers and a few lines and you’re done. But for a part, the skater is really working on his skating. You get a different depth in it. And as a brand, it's important to have those 45 minutes to tell the brand's story. The idea of the skate video as being more than just a promotional tool for a new pair of shoes, or deck, or new whatever, is what has become the dividing line between skating as a sport and skating as lifestyle and art. It's what Swedish born filmmaker and profession skater Pontus Alv has wrangled in past and now his most recent video, I like it here inside my mind, don't wake me this time.
The full-length is not only the first for his company Polar Skate Co, but undoubtedly stand as a work of art, drawing influences from abstract filmmakers like Hans Richter, and exploring old music from parts used in seminal skate videos like H-Street and Planet Earth's video Now n' Later. Alv felt responsible to pass those great videos and the great music they featured – which changed his life – on to the skaters in his video, like Oskar Rozenberg, David Stenstrom, and Dane Brady. It was Alv's mission to present the songs again with modern skating, and to pass the history on to the new generations.
The most successful skate videos aren’t designed to sell you their products, but rather invite you into another world that may or may not even exist; that's exactly what Pontus Alv does with I like it here inside my mind, don't wake me this time. Through both concept and purposeful execution, Alv does more than just set tricks to music, he visually communicates everything that's good about skateboarding; the thrill, the addiction, the desire, and the chase to get that rush of experiencing something for the first time.
We pulled together the carefully curated soundtrack to Polar's “I like it here inside my head, don't wake me this time.”, which is now viewable via Youtube.
0:24 - A1. On Entering York Minster - Digital Master by Sacred Summits
1:07 - Panorama - War In Love (Instrumental)
3:52 - Ceramic Hello - A Grey Man
4:45 - Allen Ginsberg reads America
5:25 - Tortoise - Ten-Day Interval
5:50 - The Cry - Alone
10:54 - All Sorts of Heroes
11:34 - Brian Bennett - Early Spring
13:10 - A2. Rooftops - Digital Master by Sacred Summits
13:50 - John Hogan and Mark Gator Rogowski - Dudesblood
16:36 - Skate and Destroy - Johnny Rad & The Jordanaires
17:27 - Magazine - Vigilance (Original Version)
18:33 - Ceramic Hello - Dark Rain
19:45 - Anne Clark - Sleeper In Metropolis
23:47 - Kraftwerk - Computer World 2
25:05 - Joy Division - From Safety To where
26:00 - These Days - Joy Division [1980]
30:10 - Lust for Youth - Lungomare
32:14 - Klein & MBO - Dirty Talk
34:37 - OMD Navigation
39:42 - Powell Peralta - Propaganda: Ruben Dominguez + Trent Gaines + Paul de Jesus
43:00 - Handy with Shovels - Nervous Nightmare
44:00 - Colin Potter - Rooftops