Silas Baxter-Neal has a near perfect resumé for a professional skateboarder: countless covers, quality video parts, TWS rookie of the year, Thrasher’s coveted SOTY award, these achievements have set this now seasoned pro apart. The latest feather in his cap is a much-anticipated part in TWS’s new video Perpetual Motion, out early this spring. It drops the same time as Silas’s new signature series clothing line on adidas, which represents Silas perfectly—a synthesis of classic outdoor clothing and the everyday apparel that Silas skates in.
What shoe have you been wearing?
I’m wearing my second shoe, the Silas II right now. It’s just a clean basic shoe. Before that I was wearing my first shoe—I try and switch it up every now and again. I wore the Campus for a long time. I was wearing the Skate for a while too.
What’s the difference between the first and second shoe? What did you learn in that process of creating them?
The first one was a shoe that I really wanted—I didn’t consider a whole lot else other than I wanted to make a shoe. I went for a look that I really liked at the time, and actually still like a lot. It was a reflection of a shoe called the Marathon, which I was into when I was growing up, it’s a good-looking shoe. It was made to look like a trail, hiking, running shoe with a lot of panels and fancy details on it. The second shoe is more like a skate shoe, something that has a classic skate look. It’s as simple as possible on the toe, not a lot of paneling. There are a few things here and there just to make it unique, it’s a cup sole, but I went for vulcanized wrap. I like the feel it gives when you do flip tricks. It looks like a vulcanized shoe, but it’s a vulc/cup hybrid.
Are you fussy about what colors you wear?
For the most part I like blacks and grays. I try and venture out of my comfort level and wear some brighter colors, but it doesn’t last for long. I’ll always go back to the same colors—I wore the burgundy color for a while. I like my shoes to look clean and simple, the black and white is just really hard to beat.
Do you go back and forth between cup and vulc much?
adidas soles are so flexible—you get a lot of movement that other vulcs give you on the adidas cup soles. I like that extra bit of padding that a cup sole gives you, I like my feet not to hurt all the time—I never wore slippers, and I can’t wear the super thin vulc shoe. Their cup soles are better than anything out there, and I’m not saying that just ’cause I ride for them.
Where do you think shoe design is heading?
You go into a skateshop and seventy percent of the shoes on the wall look the same. I’d like to see skate shoes broaden a little and start to look different. The whole tech thing is done with. I’d like to see better materials—if you want to get technical then it needs to be with better suede, rubbers, and soles. People know what they like as far as skate shoes goes, we just need to make what’s already there better. Like how adidas has better flexible soles, it’s not unattainable; we just gotta make it work right.
Is shoe design something you think about all the time, or just when you design a shoe?
Just when I design a shoe—I wild out on ideas now and again, but in reality it never turns out the way I wanted it to. I don’t have the eye and the mind for the shoe design stuff. I’ll leave that up to the professionals. I’ll try and give my input when I can, but I’m not a shoe designer at heart.
What size board do you ride?
I ride an 8.0”, but it fluctuates a lot, sometimes a little smaller or bigger. I mix it up, but I always end up going back to a similar shape. Sometimes I’ll order a range of boards and ride all of them. I like concave and how it feels, but try not to analyze it too much, because when you don’t have it, it kind of throws you off.
Are you as flexible with your trucks as you are with your boards?
I ride Krux and just put them on—I don’t tighten them or loosen them, I just start skating them. If one day they feel tight, I’ll loosen them or vice versa. Krux bushings are really good.
What size wheels do you usually ride?
Depending where I’m at, anywhere between 51 and 52mm.
Do you have any quirks when putting a board together?
I put a board together when I really need to, or when I’m getting sick of the one I’m riding. I try not to be too picky about any of that stuff ’cause I feel that if you get into the routine of always having to have the right board, the right shape, the right concave, it messes you up if you are in a place where you can’t get it. There’s always something to stress about, and if you’re not too picky, it’s another thing you don’t have to worry about.
Are graphics important to you?
I’ll ride any board but I like cool graphics. That’s the reason I change my shape a lot, I choose a board by the graphic.
Being a part of adidas means you are one of the few teams that get to skate with Mark Gonzales, is that something you appreciate?
It’s definitely something I appreciate and notice. When I first got on adidas, Mark didn’t go on many trips. It wasn’t ’til our San Francisco trip that I spent some time around him. When you see him skate, it’s awesome. It depends what kind of mood he’s in, too. Sometimes he just charges it, which is amazing to see, other times he just jokes around and has fun. All the stuff is pretty inspiring and fun to watch. He has such a strong personality and character, it’s hard not to pay attention and watch him.
What has Mark’s contribution to skateboarding been?
It’s changed a lot over the years, and I wasn’t around at the time of Video Days, but from what I can tell, back then he was all over the place and his skateboarding was his medium in a lot of ways. He was just trying to be himself, and because of that he ended up creating a lot of tricks and his own style. Through time, he’s shown us that there isn’t a right way or wrong way to do things—you can go your own way and still be an innovator. You don’t have to follow any steps to be the best. You can be weird, invent new tricks, and still lead—he’s shown us that there are no set ways to do anything. Now he’s a big character in skateboarding, and that’s what makes it special. You can tell a lot about people the way they ride a skateboard, and you can pretty much see how Mark is as a person the way he rides his.
What did you do with the money you made from Real Street?
I invested it in a fund that will eventually help my kid go through college. It was unexpected money, and I did think about buying a boat, but now if everything else fails, at least my kid can do something down the road.
How is life as a father going?
It’s a great gift that’s been difficult and rewarding all in the same breath. There’s a lot more you have to deal with at any given moment, but it feels good watching your kid grow and it feels good to be responsible for somebody. As a skateboarder, it’s made me value my time a lot more and organize it better. If I go on a skate trip I have to make it worthwhile. I can’t go on a trip to hang out at the bar and get a couple of tricks here and there. Sometimes it feels like you have two lives, when you’re at home you’re the responsible Dad, but when you’re on a skate trip you’re not responsible for anything.
What made you decide to do a Transworld part this year?
I’d been asked before to do one, and I really wanted to, but I always felt that I had so much on my plate that I couldn’t dedicate a whole lot of time to it. This time when I got asked, I really didn’t have a whole lot going on. It seemed that if I put it off, I wouldn’t have the opportunity again. I’ve been feeling good and my body has been healthy, so it just felt like the right time to do it. I was lucky enough to be asked again.
Watching you skate, it seems that you are comfortable on a lot of different terrain, why is that?
It’s a combination of a lot of things—growing up in Eugene, there aren’t a lot of spots, so you just have to skate whatever you can. Being a hungry kid, I tried a trick on everything that I saw. That helped me get a broad ability level. When I was fifteen, they started building a bunch of parks. I have a hyperactive personality that comes out more in my skating than anything else. I’m always looking at the landscape around me.
Can you talk about the double rail that you just filmed on?
It’s near my house and it’s something I’ve been thinking about doing for a while. At first I thought you could just gap to the second rail, then I thought it might be possible to grind and grind, kind of as a joke. Then the more I drove past it, the more I thought it was possible, I couldn’t get it out of my head. When Jon Holland [Transworld videographer] was here, I went and try it, to see how it felt, and it ended up working out.
If you were in the wilderness alone, could you survive?
For a limited amount of time, it depends on the place. I know how to make shelter, make fire, get water, and hunt a little bit. But to spend more time, like a year, I don’t think I could do that. To get enough nutrition is hard. I hope one day to be able to do that.
Could you live in Japan?
I’ve thought about that a lot over the last seven weeks of being out there—maybe. I couldn’t live in Tokyo, but maybe outside of the cities, I’d have to learn the language. I don’t think you could live in Japan and be a professional skateboarder. Maybe when I’m older, I’d like my kid to live there for a while, I think it would be good for him to be immersed in that culture, it’s really different from the United States.
Have you ever fallen into a skateboarding trend?
Not consciously, but I must have—that’s what makes it progress. You see what other people are doing and you try to imitate it. I guess that’s what a trend is. I look at what I used to wear when I was fifteen compared to now, it’s just being a reflection of what you see.
What’s the inspiration behind your new clothing line with adidas?
As an adult I want clothes that I can wear, stuff that fits my personality, that I can wear when I’m not skating, whether it be going hiking or doing whatever. The idea is good clothing with good quality materials and a good fit. It’s not extravagant, it’s simple clothing done well.
What does adidas look for in the team?
It’s not a normal team, and it isn’t full of a certain type of skater. They look at personality and how you handle yourself and skate. There’s a large level of creativity within the team and we only do two trips a year, so we may not see each other for six months of the year. You need to able to hang out, get along, and skate a lot. We do the videos and shoot the ads, so we need people who are down to skate everything—adidas has a good mix of that—people who love to skate.
I wasn’t going to ask you this. But after just being in Portland, I feel I have to. Is Portlandia a spoof, or is it really like that?
It’s an exaggerated version of the truth. Portland is a unique place, and it takes a certain type of person to live here. People who live here want a good life, and they get into their little niches. They have their ping-pong league or pool league; they spend a lot of time at the bar, and eat out a lot. If you open a vegan tattoo shop here, there will be people who will go and get a vegan tattoo. If you opened a coffee shop that had two types of beans and was six dollars a cup, people would go there and try it. The bars and coffee shops have a lot to do with the weather—it’s an easy thing to do. The food is really good up here—if it’s a really crappy day out, a hearty meal is something to look forward to.
What are your plans for the next year?
Try and finish my Transworld part. I just did this Tokyo night part, which was awesome. I keep on telling my wife that I’m going to mellow out and spend some more time at home, but that never really seems to happen.
