Dave Snaddon
June 26, 2007
Snaddon’s been lurking in the city of Bristol for some years now. Being a migrant from Exeter he’s been patiently waiting for his travel visa to arrive permitting him daily travel from Bedminster, a suburb lying south of the river into northern Bristol.
I heard the name for a long time but have only known the person a short time. I have only recently become friends with him and started chilling and skating with Dave on the regular since he left his training ground the skate park ‘Dean Lane’. Dave is a friendly, polite person who is very spicy on his steeze. He has been spotted trying to rub marks off his fresh white t-shirts that don’t even exist, image conscious possibly, street skater definitely with serious POP to add to his love of curries.
Safe, Drum + Bass, Kebab, Flick, Bolts, Maaaaaate, Clean, Wobble Jaw, Style, Half Cab, Power are just some key words that spring to mind when thinking about Dave.
Please sit back relax enjoy the interview peace out init my lovers…… Flynn Trotman
Dave Sneddon came to the nation’s living rooms in 2002 when he won Fame Academy, then going on to have a number 1 single and a top-selling album, but has been qui…. Ooops, wrong guy.
This is Dave Snaddon. One of those skaters who’s ridiculously good and whose name is probably familiar to you but the chances are that you haven’t seen that much of him recently. Since moving to Bristol two years ago – a city already heaving with talent – word was quick to spread about his skills, notably that infamous pop and the mean kickflick of his.
In getting this interview together, it’s been an up and down period for him, from switching board, shoe and clothing sponsors to a debilitating ankle injury from a flatground trick which kept him off the board for the entire autumn and winter. Doesn’t seem to have stopped him though and off the back of that injury he’s put down some more bangers for this interview. It’s taken a bit of a stretch to come together, but as they say, something worthwhile always takes it time.
Is it really your birthday today?
Yep. I’m officially 22 years old as of today…
And how’s that feel?
I dunno, these things come around pretty quick don’t they? (Laughing). 21 was all good but I’m not sure about 22; you tell me, is it all downhill from here?
Pretty much. You don’t seem to live the average 22 year-old life though; I mean, you’re always in, regardless of what time of day I call. Don’t you have a job?
Nah, I’m not working at the moment because I get a bit of money from DC and Oakley, that way I get to skate more…
We were going to do this interview last night but you were off out for a few birthday drinks; am I torturing you here?
(Laughs), I’m a bit out of it to be honest but it’s all-good. Just don’t expect me to be too sharp.
Did Leo ever tell you that the headmistress from the school that you had that switch heel sequence at phoned me and went crazy about us publishing a photo of her school in the magazine?
Yeah he did actually, that’s crazy. Quite a random phone call for you to receive, especially considering the fact that you weren’t even there: did she really lose it with you?
Yep, she wasn’t happy: “And why exactly do you think there are 8 foot high razor-wire fences around the school?” Etc. Fair enough really I suppose, I think I ended up saying that you were both foreign or something to get out of it…
(Laughs), it’s a shame because that’s a really good spot, and that was the first time I’d ever been there. I doubt I’ll be going back though. I can do without get arrested.
That’s pretty unusual for Bristol isn’t it? It’s not a place where you generally get kicked out that often is it?
Mmm, that depends on where you’re talking about really. The University is a straight bust, a total waste of time but most of the schoolyards that get skated are pretty mellow about people being there, as long as you don’t leave a mess. Your obvious city centre spots, Lloyds, College Green etc, they’re fine to skate whenever…
I thought the council had tried to stop people skating the Green…
Well they tried, but not that hard. Every now and again you’ll get told not to skate it for a day or something but everyone will be back the next day. The flat’s too good there; there’ll always be people skating there…
I can’t think why they’d care about people skating anyway, considering all the wastoids that hang out there; it’s like ‘Swampy Corner’ on a sunny day…
(Laughing) totally, in the summer all the weirdos gravitate there. Thing is, it’s not even that good of a spot, it’s literally just smooth flat to train your stuff up on. Sometimes we’ll have a flatbar or something but mainly just flat….
Well it’s definitely better than the surface at Lloyds.
Yeah, to be honest I’m not too into Lloyds really. I know that’s probably a bit controversial, (laughs) but I don’t really ever go there. I can’t skate the blocks anyway because they’re so rounded off these days. I’ll go down there to meet people but I try not to get stuck there. I’m more into going off on little missions, into Clifton or wherever…
Have you got your own little crew then?
Kind of, I normally go out skating with my housemate Bonus, who I’ve skated with for years. Him and me go out a lot when he’s not working, and I go out skating/filming with Ciaran as often as possible. I’ve been filming with Ciaran for a while now; some stuff for a video that Kev Parrott’s doing, and I try to be pro-active with my sponsors – you know send them a few clips every few weeks, just to let ‘em know what I’ve been up to.
What’s with the street hoodlum/sweat pants look: are you a wigga?
(Laughing), nah, I just like skating in trackies man, nothing more than that.
It’s the pikey in you then?
Nah, I just can’t handle getting all sweaty and that when I’m skating, I’d rather rock some loose shit. You can’t be ashamed of the trackie bottoms man…
So you live with your mate who’s a skater then?
Yeah, I’ve known Bonus for years, he’s from Exmouth and we moved up to Bristol together. It’s kind of a skate house, there’s another friend of ours who lives there too. He doesn’t skate but he’s into making music so we’ve got a shared interest too.
You’ve been around for a good few years now Snaddon, had a fair bit of coverage and yet you’re almost invisible. What’s up with that?
Well to be honest, I’ve had bits of coverage over that time but whilst I was living back in Exeter it was pretty hard to get anything done coverage-wise because there’s not much going on down there. Since I’ve moved back to Bristol everything’s kicked off again, it’s so much easier to get things done here.
What was it like growing up skating in Exeter as a skateboarder? It’s hardly New York is it?
Not exactly, no - I actually grew up in Lyme Regis in Dorset, which is even quieter than Exeter where I ended up a few years later. I started skating in Lyme, which is just your classic tiny seaside town in Dorset…
So how did skateboarding come to be a part of your life living there?
My brother skated way before me, so it was through him really. I used to borrow his board to start off with and go out on my own then all my mates at school started up too. There were a fair few of us at one point, but it wasn’t really a ‘scene’ as such…more just a chilled place to learn to skate with a few skateparks dotted about in the surrounding areas – Sidmouth, Seaton, etc. Nothing amazing really, but enough to learn on. It wasn’t until I moved to Exeter that I really became a member of a scene if you like, even then it wasn’t a scene in the way that Bristol is because there aren’t really any good street spots in Exeter, the scene is focused on the skateparks again, on ‘Flowerpots’ in particular, which is amazing. That was the main spot in Exeter when I was living there. Tim from The Boarding House designed it so it’s sick, rather than being some crappy council effort.
So what was skating like when you were getting into it? Shellies and noseslide nollie heelflips?
(Laughs), no, it was before that. Probably the Birdhouse ‘The End’ video, that was one of the first ones I saw. So I guess the whole Reynolds, Warner Ave sort of time, before the whole PissDrunx thing started…
You weren’t a Smolick victim then?
Not really, but I was definitely into him, he’s a sick skater for sure but I never cloned him…
Who did you clone? Come on, everyone did it when they were young. I know I did.
Probably Reynolds if I’m honest. I definitely used to spend days on end frontside flipping everything because of him but I never really dressed up or anything.
A lot of older skaters these days whinge about how mainstream and commercialized skating has become, and how gay it is compared to BITD. Did skating seem less gay back when you were first in it?
Maybe, but I don’t really see the mainstream exposure and commercialization as a negative thing. You know, maybe you have to get out there and do a bit of gay shit for the TV or whatever but if that means you can make a bit of money and live from skating, then I don’t see that as being bad really…
Your generation is the one benefiting from that as well, 5 or 10 years ago shoe sponsors and companies like Oakley definitely weren’t paying British street skaters.
Exactly, that’s what I mean. Obviously skating was much less commercialized even back when I first started which isn’t that long ago but really, who cares? That’s just how skateboarding has moved on.
You mentioned in your Haunts, many moons ago, that you were plucked from obscurity due to a random meeting with Mat Law during one of the OG Osiris tours, is that actually true? What happened?
Yeah it’s basically true. There was this Osiris demo at Mount Hawke, a long, long time ago and I was basically just a little nipper. I had braces, long hair, obviously well keen like all nippers are. I went down there, got in amongst it with all the riders and skated. Mat pulled me to one side and just said that he wanted to hook me up with Osiris. I didn’t really know what he meant at the time; I was only 15, I didn’t know shit about sponsorship or anything…
Did you eyeball him whilst pulling off your very best crowd pleasers until he noticed or was it all more innocent than that?
(Laughing), oh you knobhead, (laughs again). I knew you’d ask me that. Well, what can I say? It’s all part of being a little kid isn’t it? You know how it goes, you land your trick then you do the ‘look back’ to see if anyone saw you. There was definitely a bit of that involved but you know, it worked so who am I to complain?
So you went from being a totally unknown kid from Dorset to being on an Osiris mega-tour almost overnight. How was that?
A bit weird - to put it mildly: I was painfully shy at that point too, which just made it even weirder. I was going to school and then going on a tour around the country with loads of famous people, (laughing). For a kid living in Lyme Regis that definitely wasn’t normal…
I bet you dined out on that for ages at school, didn’t you?
I did, yeah, ridiculously, (laughs). People were pretty hyped on me at school for a while.
Was that your first introduction to skating in the wider scene outside of your hometown?
Yeah, I’d hardly traveled anywhere at that point and then the next minute I was skating all these places that I’d seen in mags and whatnot.
Is this the reason why you continued to push it and progress instead of doing the whole, “oh I’m sponsored now, I don’t have do anything” routine?
Totally, I’ve always been like that, wanting to push myself and progress and that probably is tied into getting sponsored so early on. I’m going through a good patch at the moment actually; I’m learning new stuff all the time. There’s actually this new little park down the road with a bunch of Parallel style ledges and manny pads. It’s supposed to be an exact replica of Parallel but they f**cked it up a bit. One of the blocks is perfect but the other ones are too close so it’s hard to skate them. Still, it’s a perfect place to learn stuff, especially manual tricks, which I’ve never really been that good at.
Some time after that initial plunge into the world of the skateboard media, you went on another Osiris trip to the then unknown soon-to-be skate mecca of Mallorca. If I’m right this article was the first time that any of the now famous Palma etc spots had ever been in a skate mag. How was it to be there discovering that?
Pretty crazy because we went there with virtually no expectations of what we’d find and then we rocked up and realized that it was basically mini Barcelona. I was still really young at that point so it just blew me away. I couldn’t believe how good the spots were; I’d love to go back there again.
