I’ve been a fan of The Nine Club since day one. Back when they interviewed Kelly Hart and the “studio” looked empty in comparison to how it is now. I can’t say I’m a big fan of podcasts, I believe I’m more of a “visual listener” so if The Nine Club was audio only, I’m not sure I would have engaged like I have. For me the best part about the show is all of the skateboarding history that gets talked about in the former living room of Roger’s apartment, now called studio.
There are so many good stories, and as a skate nerd is great to complement all of the knowledge I have from watching skate videos and reading magazines (Transworld and Thrasher). It’s like reaffirming what you know or getting that final piece of information in order to make sense of the tales. The skaters that sit on the chair do a look back on their life and with the help of Chris, Roger and Kelly they’re able to go back to certain moments that marked skateboarding in one way or another. My favorite is when multiple people are a part of a story and they each remember different things, because we all have versions of moments in life, we all have a different perspective.
I knew of Chris Roberts because even though he didn’t have many video parts, he had two that I remember vividly. The Hot Chocolate tour where he does a handful of manuals at Venice Beach, CA and shares a bunk bed with Justin Eldridge and Transworld’s A Time to Shine where he rocks a very messy beard that has haunted him since. I had seen clips here and there from Kelly Hart, but didn’t remember him like I did Chris and I knew nothing about Roger, although I’m a big fan of his work and had consumed a lot of it without knowing he was the one making it. The 3 of them complement each other very well. Chris has turned into a great host. I appreciate his sarcastic tone and he has very good timing when talking with guests. Roger is a skateboarding encyclopedia, he’s like the all knowing, all present skate guru, and Kelly is the laugh track, among knowing every single 411vm, he can pin point to a specific issue number when talking with the guests and he’s the team manager of éS skateboarding, my favorite shoe brand, so it’s easy to like him, I suppose.
Every Monday I’m excited to listen to the stories of that particular guest. Some are more interesting than others, some are my favorite skaters, some I’ve never heard of, but all share the same passion I have, skateboarding. At first episodes were around 30 mins, then they got longer and longer to the point where Mike Vallely’s episode is over 5 hours long and holds the current record for longest.
Two years into the show they created another one, The Nine Club Experience – described by them as “The other show that has skaters talking”, keeping in mind that The Nine Club is “The show that has skaters talking”. The Experience is a great way for the audience to interact with them, whereas The Nine Club is all about the guest, The Nine Club Experience is about a lot of different skaters at once. There are video reviews, raffles, on location interviews, live shows, special events, and more. Through that show the audience is definitely closer and recently they’ve implemented YouTube premieres in which they get to watch the show while they chat with the audience live and anyone can donate if they want to, anything above $1 gets you in the raffle. You can donate multiple times to get multiple entries into the raffle. I recently won! a $2 donation got me 2 pairs of éS shoes, a shirt, hoodie and a mask. I was so happy, did I mention I like éS.
They’ve had several different guests to compliment Chris, Roger and Kelly on the Experience, but most recently Jeron Wilson (who will slap a bird if need be) replaced Roger (who’s now fully dedicated to behind the scenes) as the co-host (in both the Experience and the regular show). Justin Eldridge is co-co-host and sitting next to Kelly is Steezus who’s the co-co-co-host.
Being a creative and a fan of the show, I’ve done some fan art in the past 4 years. The first one was back in 2016 when I rendered an icon version of The Nine Club. The second was a version of them as monkeys (I’m a big fan of monkeys). That one I sent to the show and it was featured on episode #21 of The Nine Club Experience. Later on I made a movie poster based on a suggestion of a fan of the show and that one got a mention. I’ve also called and made fun of Chris (still shocked he didn’t hang up on me).
The Nine Club is an awesome show, it is skateboarding history in front of your eyes and is being told by those that are so in love with skateboarding, that they’re willing to produce this the best way possible (there are multiple cameras, sound is great, lighting is spot on, and much more), it relates to those of us who are passionate about it too. Finally the fans are awesome, it’s like a little family full of positive vibes. We all love skateboarding and we all love the show, not sure their reasons, but I would think they’re not that different from mine. I look forward to learning more about skateboarding and hearing from my favorite skaters.
Thank you Nine Club for what you do.
