What Do Crooked Coast, Dr Bleiler and Falmouth MA Have In Common?
Passion is vital for any project to be successful. And that is exactly what we have seen here in our own backyard on Cape Cod with a group of devoted skateboarders looking for a place worthy enough to hone their talents.
Soon that place – the Falmouth Skatepark - will become a reality. It’s taken roughly eight years of dedication to a singular cause, all spearheaded by Dr. Keith Bleiler along with his 18-year-old son Emmett (check him out in the video here) and other area skateboarders.
Their collective passion is set to pay off in the late winter/early spring when Dr. Bleiler told us construction will start on the roughly $350,000 skatepark that will be built at Trotting Park Field.
Now an adult with a normal adult job, Dr. Bleiler still skates, something he started doing as a kid in the late 70s and early 80s growing up in Reading, Pennsylvania. The skatepark there, he says, was “where I kind of felt like I belonged. I played team sports too, but there weren’t any coaches or parents there. It wasn’t like I had to perform to anyone’s expectations except your own.”
And that is ultimately what he hopes the new skatepark provides for today’s youth.
It is a similar sentiment that Luke Vose of Crooked Coast shared with us at X-Wear. To prove it, the talented musician is organizing a concert to benefit the skatepark on Friday, October 9, from 8:30 to 11 pm, at the Woods Hole Community Hall. Joining the Coast will be DCLA (think Rage Against the Machine meets The Black Keys) and Taxidermists, a Western Mass band featuring Woods Hole native Cooper Handy. Check out the event specs here
While Vose is long past his skateboarding days, he has a respect for the Falmouth contingent that currently do. “Talking to the kids about being a skater, it is almost like being in a band,” Vose says. “You have to be self-determined and be motivated. People not involved in it don’t see how serious it is. There is something parallel about being a skater and a musician.”
Vose gained a better appreciation for the area’s local contingent of skateboarders – Bleiler, Emmet Breslin and Robbie Fogarty, to name a few – while Crooked Coast was shooting a video earlier this year for “No, Caroline, No” off their latest album “Wildlife.”
As part of the video, Vose said the band wanted to shoot “people doing cool things” in town so they went down to the current skatepark where they recorded Breslin on his board. “I was blown away by his level of talent,” Vose said. “In my opinion, he is a world class skateboarder here in town.”
That eventually led to the upcoming all-ages show Vose and his bandmates are organizing in Woods Hole. There’s a $5 cover which, along with a raffle, will go towards the skatepark.
The show is less about the money raised than it is about building awareness for the skatepark. “I want it to be a reminder that these kids still need a skatepark,” Vose said. “These are really incredible athletes in our town and we should be supporting them in any way we can.”
We couldn’t agree more.
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