The Skateparks of Chicopee - Part II (Ray Ash)

For the second installment of this series, we are looking at a skatepark whose design, obstacles, and lack of upkeep is truly dumbfounding and somewhat sad. 

Ray Ash Skatepark

Arcade Street

If you look at the photo above, you will notice there was at least 5 other people in the park when it was taken. This is a true rarity. It is almost always abandoned, for a good reason unfortunately. I will put up with a lot wrong in in a skatepark, but this place is pretty close to being completely worthless, even for me. If this park was literally in my backyard, I might skate it sometimes. But like I said, it's not a total waste - it achieves a unique, top-notch shittiness that most parks couldn't accomplish if they tried. This does give it some appeal in my eyes. Take for instance, this thing - the most wondrous, awe-inspiring obstacle of them all - something I like to call "The Pit".

THE PIT!

Front noseblunt in "the pit".

This extraordinary beast, believe it or not, is probably the most worthwhile thing here. The 'ramps' are about 2' high and pretty much just half-painted concrete jersey barriers. This setup is kind of interesting because you can get creative with it: slide, grind, or ollie into it perhaps? Attempt to skate it like a bowl somehow? Get some speed and launch outta there? Of course there are terrible cracks and random uneven patches of pavement around the whole thing which adds to the sketchiness and challenge. Oh and this one corner. Fun stuff:

Nearby, you have what I assume is supposed to be a spine - really it's just 2 ramps whose backs face each other. They are the same type as the ones found in the pit. There is a little gap in the middle of them that's usually filled with trash. The biggest problem here is the cracks at the bottom of this are especially bad, which makes skating this not a very fun experience. 

Elsewhere we have this…interesting…pyramid-type setup. 

It has 2 very needlessly long concrete banks that lead up to a small platform that's close to 4' in height. The bottom of these banks, of course, are marred with the same cracks as everything else here. My personal suggestion is using these banks maybe as a slanted manual pad on the lower parts, or as a bank-to-bank hip transfer of sorts, as there is a gap between them, which varies in size. It takes a stupid amount of effort, is inconvenient and difficult, etc. but it is a way to make them worthwhile. Otherwise you're headed for this atrocity:

True atrociousness.

                                 











Nothin' like pushing up a big ol' bank only to hit a giant crack right before a 6-stair, ay? You know that kid is stoked on it. At least it doubles as a trash receptacle. I think the last couple stairs are waxed and might grind on a good day. The other bank brings you towards a quarter pipe that is around the same height. 

The transition is pretty mellow and weird-feeling. It looks like someone tried to fix up the bottom of it, but a big crack remains - though it is more tolerable than its brethren. 

The rest of this park is pure, empty space; and even there the pavement is not very smooth, lots of sticks and leaves everywhere, etc. Other than the sketchy/challenging novelty aspect of it all, this park honestly doesn't have much for redeeming qualities. Still - go skate it! Think of it a super-exaggerated East Coast style spot. 

beer shorts

Paulaner Oktoberfest-Marzen

ABV: 5.8%

This is the classic+standard German oktoberfest for me, along with the Ayinger. As soon as the weather showed even the slightest hint at cooling down for the season I ran out and grabbed a 6-pack. The scent is straight up potent toasty lager, the taste is great and quite complex for the style. Lots of flavor including toasted bread, crackers, light floral and herbal hops, and some clove-like spice. Finishes clean and biscuity. The mouthfeel for this beer always feels a bit watery, which is unfortunate, but the flavor makes up for it mostly. Great balance of sweet and toasty. Probably one of my favorite lagers and always a definite purchase for me come the fall.

Sierra Nevada Flipside Red IPA

ABV: 6.2%

A new fall seasonal from Sierra Nevada, I picked up a 6-pack of this soon after the release. A solid dark amber ale that is more balanced than expected, but still packs a nice plethora of hop flavor (pine, floral, earthy, citrus, pineapple). Malts are mostly toasty with some caramel sweetness. The mouthfeel is hefty and smooth with low-end carbonation and mild bitterness. Not super remarkable overall, but certainly a welcome addition to Sierra Nevada's lineup.

La Blaugies/Hill Farmstead La Vermontoise

ABV: 6%

This is a collaboration between La Blaugies of Belgium and Hill Farmstead of Vermont, a saison that intends to combine Belgian and American influence/ingredients I imagine. Great scents of baked bread, farmy yeast, herbal and grassy hops and white grape. The taste is maybe a tad hoppier, but really what we have here is a very traditional, well-made saison with some subtle herbal and citrus hop goodness. Lots of great fresh grain and yeast flavors, cracker-y malts and some earthy farminess to keep things interesting. With all the crazy brett-laden/aged in wine barrel/mega-hopped farmhouse ales coming out nowadays, the straightforwardness of this one is a breath of fresh air, definitely well made.

De Molen Hel & Verdoemenis (Bourbon Barrel-Aged)

ABV: 10%

Many different barrel-aged versions of this imperial stout were released in the past, and most were spirit-specific when labeled (Wild Turkey, Bunnahabhain, etc.) For this one, they decided to confuse everything and simply label it as "bourbon barrel-aged". But who am I to complain when I open a bottle that smells this good? It's slightly boozy and sweet, but quite decadent, with scents of chocolate-covered cherries, caramel, coconut, and bourbon of course. The taste, though very good as well, is a bit of a letdown after the scent. The alcohol and sweetness muddles the beer a bit; bourbon, chocolate and dark fruit still rule overall. Some brown sugar, oak, and char are noticeable as well. The mouthfeel is pretty lowly carbonated, oily and hot with alcohol. No doubt a good beer with nice flavors, but I would've personally preferred a heftier feel and less harshness. It's a sipper, for sure. I have 2 more bottles which I'm planning to age, maybe they will mellow out with some time.

De Struise Pannepot

ABV: 10%

A classic, one of my all-time favorite beers for sure. Huge scent of raisins, leather, chocolate and spice. Taste brings on an abundance of musty dark fruits; raisins, figs and dark cherries especially, along with nice dark malts, chocolate, molasses, and spicy notes. Finishes slightly peppery. The mouthfeel is absolutely velvety smooth with great carbonation. Waaayyyy too drinkable for 10%, I'm not sure what is more impressive, its flavor or ability to hide alcohol content. I've been lucky enough to try this beer a number of times: fresh, aged anywhere from 2 to 6 years, various vintages, etc., and have never been disappointed. This is a treat no matter what stage it's in/vintage it is, but I will say this one really does age spectacularly - don't be afraid to throw a few of these in the cellar!

life lately man

now songs

Throwing Muses "Hazing" and "That's All You Wanted"

from University

During the summer, I found a copy of University in what I thought was a very unlikely spot. It was in a decrepit cardboard box given to me by an 58-year old ex-co-worker, alongside a plethora of mostly terrible demo tapes and scratched-to-hell CDs which he had amassed while doing sound for a living. Having only recognized the band name, I decided to save it from being donated/tossed into a dumpster. What I recovered happened to be one of the best albums I had gotten in months. I don't think there really is a bad track on the disc, but I decided to highlight two songs that showcase their different talents and sounds. 

"Hazing" is scorned and brooding all around with simple yet effective bass-heavy stop-n-go riffs aplenty. It is a track I would consider the epitome of female-led 90's alternative rock power trio greatness. Much like the rest of the album, this song is just super tight-sounding. 

"That's All You Wanted" is a softer, catchier side to this band you don't see as often on this album. A minor complaint is that it's a little repetitive. Now that that's out of the way -- how can one resist those vocals?!? and just a great little song. This song not only truly shows the range of Hersh's singing, but the band as a whole. The cello here helps give it a touch of sadness.

Link

Link

The Rolling Stones "Hey Negrita"

from Black and Blue

Like many of the songs from Black and Blue, this one can stand on its guitar riff alone. This particular one could easily go on forever (it kinda does) and I wouldn't mind much. This one happens to throw in some great coked out Jagger singing/jibberish/hollering/purring that is more unintelligible as it goes on, well-placed sloppy barroom piano, and one hell of a fun jam out to end it.

Link

Yo La Tengo "Let's Be Still"

from Summer Sun

The guitar and vocals are few and far between, in the meantime it stuffs your ears with layers of horns and flutes, live drumming, a 4-note piano melody and spacey keyboards stuck on repeat, and other unidentifiable sounds going in every direction. It's busy with no bombast and no build-up, with a kind of classy subtlety this band can achieve far too easily. Sure, it basically becomes noodling after a while, but it's some damn pleasant noodling. I listened to this a lot while taking lunch breaks in a park during the beginning of autumn -- it did well.

Link

Alice in Chains "Down in a Hole"

from Dirt

I try to exclude singles -- especially ones you can still often hear on the radio -- from these lists. Why highlight songs that have already been chosen for the public ear to be proverbial examples when I can dig up and showcase the oft-more intriguing underdogs? However, singles are picked out of the lineup for a reason, and exceptions are inevitable. Dirt boasts quite a few tracks that fall under this category, but for me the standout is the most single-y single of them all: "Down in a Hole". 

It is the ballad of this album, maybe of their career, and certainly one of their most genuine and powerful songs. It sounds absolutely great, and Layne Staley's vocals of course, are especially effective. Especially given the history of his heroin addiction, and what would come of him, this song is downright goosebump inducing. It carries a weight and tone that his/their troubles are a bit more serious than feeling a little down and out, having some trouble with the gf/at the job pettiness. If nothing else though, the guitar slide at 2:15 rules.

Link

This Morning

This morning I remembered

this morning:

It was December, brisk and a bit foggy

A Saturday, slightly after seven a.m.

An area rural enough to assume roosters.

The road still slick from the night prior,

still sick from the night prior,

a fulfillment of curiosities

from which I still breathed fire.

My roll-pace was particularly risky;

caught in the clutch of some min-rest,

surprise survival adrenaline.

Casually,

I swerved around curves and cut corners

like a heat-seeking missile

with no programmed destination.

Suddenly,

I am spiraling sideways, a calm sort of skidding

There was no effort put forth to screech –

matter of fact, I just let go.

Though there was danger, there was no danger.

This was now a motorized waterslide – 

arms folded, I enjoyed the ride.

A wide open field felt my callous wrath,

wheels ate away at its insides,

spewing dregs to the side

like some earthy brownie batter.

This lasted all of seconds before finding myself

at a halt; and facing the wrong way

in the middle of a Sheep Pasture,

upward, mobile and unphased.

I then threw her in a U-ie

and made my way north.

The Skateparks of Chicopee - Part I (Sarah Jane)

Chicopee, Massachusetts. An unassuming town that somehow has accumulated FIVE skateparks. Yes, five. Surely there are towns out there, very likely nearby, that are in dire need to just have one, but instead they have all amassed in Chicopee - must be because of its booming skateboard community! Ahem. Anyways. It is a case of quantity over quality, however each park has its own charm - whether it be cheesy-but-fun plastic ledges or laughably bad obstacles, they are all kinda turds in disguise in their own ways, in varying degrees. I've always been a fan of turd parks in a way, they force you to work with what you have, deal with unkemptness and general sketchiness, and often present you with oddball things to skate.

Thus begins this five-part series. A general overview of each Chicopee skatepark, presenting them in all their scrappy glory. Hopefully these summaries will make you laugh, make you cry, bewilder you, frighten you, then make you want to get out there and skate! We're going to start off easy. Our first look is at perhaps the most legitimate, well-known park out of this cast of maltreated jokers. 

Sarah Jane Skatepark

Chicopee Street

Sarah Jane is probably the most skateable overall of the fearsome five. It's got a lot of open space, the pavement is decently smooth, variety of obstacles. Maybe the highlight for me here is being able to move lots of things around (boxes/ledges/manual pads of varying shapes and sizes and a picnic table). The plethora of boxes are, as plastic boxes always are, very slippery. You'll have no problems grinding or sliding as far as your wild heart desires - and thanks to overzealous middle-of-the box waxers, powerslides are an option as well, though they'll usually be accidental. Though slickness can be an issue and it is tough to lock into a grind, they are fun and portable, so there really is endless possibilities with these, I've skated them with alot of different placements. There is probably about 6 or 7 of these total, ranging in ~2" high manual pad, ~10" box, ~14" bench. The picnic table is the same plastic material but also has metal coping on the edges. It is pretty big at around 2' high, though the 'seat' parts are lower and also coped.

Kevin Walker utilizing junk.

Like any good outdoor park, there is bound to be random objects from the outside world that get tossed into the mix. Here it is often empty Arizona Iced Teas and such, but sometimes there will be things that are useful, like trash cans or a metal slab that was once a piece of a kicker ramp.

There is a big, smooth metal bank in one corner that's maybe about 6' high. That leads into a little bank-to-box which is often surrounded with the other movable boxes in any way imaginable. There is pretty much an identical bank in the adjacent corner, though a little less steep and made of a different "Skatelite" metal, or something. Across from that you have a tiny pyramid setup with banks, a launch ramp and a spine. That then leads into a quarter pipe that's about 4' in height. The flow going back and forth here is kinda bad, but not awful. It's mostly the pyramid to blame, which, if anything, slows you down, mostly due to unrepaired wear and tear. Its smallness is an intriguing oddity, however, the quarter pipe and bank are more worthy foes. They show some light damage too but have been fixed somewhat recently I think. Quarter pipe coping grinds fine.

You like rails, do ya? Pfft. Well, you shan't be disappointed at Sarah Jane, methinks. You've got this round rail that is not only nifty and curvy but lengthy too:

You've also got your standard straight round rail that is about half that length, and a green flat rail kinda hidden next to the pyramid. They're all around a foot in height.

So there you have it. Really if you're not expecting too much this isn't a bad park, if you're into ledges, rails and manuals Sarah Jane should at least suffice. Like all Chicopee parks, it's rarely crowded, or even occupied for that matter. If it is, it's usually kids on scooters, bikes, or nothing at all. Having all sorts of things to move around makes coming here always an adventure, you never know what kind of setup you're going to walk into or what new ones you can come up with. Lots of possibilities with lines and such. Go skate!