STARFISH-HITLER......Japanese monster villain

Loony late seventies jap TV show KAMEN RIDER with controversial Nazi-bad guys and an unsettling mutant Hitler/giant starfish opponent!

LEE.......

What is it about the name LEE?? If you are lucky enough to have the word "Lee" somewhere in your moniker then you are probably destined for greatness. Straight off the bat we got 5 all-timers:

Christopher Lee, Lee Hazlewood, Bruce Lee, Lee Marvin and Jason Lee

JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS 1967

Another HANNA-BARBERA cartoon that had an impact on me.....Even as an 8 year old I knew this was almost identical in format to SCOOBY DOO but with groovy, better looking chicks! There was obviously some tie-in with ARCHIE COMICS too

DEVLIN 1974

Another influential HANNA-BARBERA cartoon. Based on Evel Knievel it followed the exploits of professional motorcycle jumper Ernie Devlin. Can't tell you much more about it other than they actually used an image of E.K. on his XR750 in the opening title sequence.

FRANKENSTEIN JR. 1966

The Japanese get all the credit for cranking out outragious, crazy kids shows but this HANNA-BARBERA cartoon from 1966 is pretty insane! Look out for the OCTO-VULTURE monster! I used to watch this when I was a very young kid. I love the vivid colours and the stylized depiction of the mad doctors laboratory. I was totally mesmerised by it and maybe that's a contributing factor to how I turned out as an adult.

UGLY BUGS BALL part two

More pics... at the top we got BAMBI LA BEAU performing her "Cleopatra" routine then a bunch of random snaps...the caterers ran out of paper plates so TOPSY STAG ate her hotpot out of a washing up bowl!!

UGLY BUGS BALL PART ONE

First few pics from this weekends UGLY BUGS BALL with The Stags here in Wigan! A great party for sure....some good bits were an eight-armed drum solo from Arachnid Kenny Roquette, a bug related burlesque routine, a human fly buzzing around a giant turd stuck to a blanket and full-on honking saxaphone by our special guest Mike the Fireman. The party was totally sold out and people showed up in some great costumes. Next up is a Halloween party with The Stags  Friday 29th Oct.  at THE ROARING PSYCHEDELIC OCTOPUS in Wigan. It's an official OCTOPUS/SIDEBURN/DAVIDA HELMETS bash with amongst other things, special guest DJ Sideburn head honcho, Gary Inman......absolutely not to be missed!
Thanks to GoGo Lou and Wilky #99 for these pics.

Forgotten footage.....

Untitled from Barry Thornton on Vimeo.
Big thanks to Psychick-Boy for digging up some skate footage of me on my mini ramp 15 years ago in 1995. The ramp stood for 12 or so years until it was dismantled to make way for YOYO'S BOWL.
That's Capt. Highside on the platform waiting to drop in. I had completely forgot I could do both those tricks...Frontside Rock 'n' Rolls and little Frontside Ollies.......Looks like I just threw down a gauntlet to my own self.......

UGLY BUGS BALL......WITH THE STAGS

C'MON AND CRAWL TO THE UGLY BUGS BALL....This Saturday 25th Sept. THE STAGS play The Ugly Bugs Ball in Wigan. For one night only the Royal Oak, Wigan is being transformed into an upside down insect utopia.

It's gonna be a truly bugtastic evening with performances from THE STAGS (with special guest), THE UGLY BUG STOMPERS (17 piece brass band) ALAN ANT (vinyl disc-slipper) and BAMBI LA BEAU (buxotic burlesque dancer)

Other activities include a fancy dress contest with prizes, hot food, wild cocktails, crazy decor and a lucky dip!

This is a ticket only event....NO PAY ON THE DOOR! It's almost sold out but I do have a handful of tickets left. Cost is 10 quid (inc. free cocktail, food and confectionaries) get in touch if you wanna come and I can hold your tickets on the door.....call 07785 110645 and quote "spider bollocks!"

FIRST TURN ACTION...

Another Gregory Mild shot of the Thunderbikes first turn. Two things of interest here.....Paul Harrison #4 on his ear at the back of the pack and for a fleeting moment, my good self # 31, out in front!!

WILKY # 99

2010 SKOOTER FARM rookie Pete Wilkinson # 99 in action at Rye House last weekend. Pete rode really well all day, making the cut to the "A" final....an increasingly difficult thing to do. Here's a sequence of him giving team-mate Capt. Highside # 76 a hard time.

Thanks to Gregory Mild for hanging out and taking all the shots. http://www.gregorymild.com/

FULL-TILT, BOZO....

Just had a great long weekend Dirt Tracking. Took off with Wilky #99 to the practice session at Rye House on Friday. Hooked up with Steve Red Max, Ant 'n' Geoff from Co-Built and Ben from Sideburn Mag amongst others. Sun was shining, track was awesome.....life was great until my rear wheel bearings disintegrated and my bike threw a chain. The CO-BUILT guys came to the rescue, somehow sourcing a new set of bearings out of business hours and even getting the supplier to post 'em through Anthonys letter box. They were there waiting for us when we arrived back from a stop off at the ACE CAFE on the way home.

Wilky and me were then treated to some overnight CO-BUILT hospitality thanks to Anna and Ant.

Saturday morning was spent with a Co-Built super tune up on my bike. Not only was the rear wheel repaired but an intensive "dialing-in" was carried out. When my bike broke part way through the practice, I took a couple of runs on Ants bike and was knocked out by how well it handled. So, we tried to set up my bike with the same characteristics. The gearing was lowered substantially, the wheelbase shortened, we switched to lower rise handlebars, the forks were dropped in the yolks, lowering the front end and finally, the offset tweaked somewhat.

The end result was my bike handled 100% better! On the Sunday I had one of my most enjoyable race meetings ever and made yet another "A" final with a respectable 7th place finish (I could have possibly pushed it to a 5th or 6th if I had been a bit braver)

Big thanks again to Anthony Brown and Geoff Cain for all their help and hospitality

So all in all, a fab weekend....can't wait for the final round at Scunthorpe on 3rd Oct.

YOYO'S POOL PARTY 2010

Thanks to everyone that showed up to YOYO'S POOL PARTY 2010.

As the sun set, folks started to show up...skaters and non skaters alike. I spent a good coupla days fixing up the backyard and setting the scene with a Tiki/Voodoo theme, which looked really great. GoGo Lou and Lady Di took care of the skarfing material, serving up killer veggie chilli dogs and an awesome Indy cake.

It was mainly a gathering of older skaters and a great session was had by all. Some skate highlights were PSYCHICK BOYs Slob-Airs and Rock 'n' Roll slides, CYBs backside grind to tail, CAPT. HIGHSIDEs Rock to Fakies and Cess Slides and BULLCRAIGOs Tail-Drop, his first time on a skate in 22 years!!

Some other things worthy of mention were JOHNNY ALPHA and CONWAY CASTLE providing a terrific aural backdrop to the nights activities, my "BMX Bastard" nephew Jake pledging to skate more often, my neice, Shea, skooting around on my 33 year old G+S slalom board and Capt. Highside drunkenly barbecuing a 2 foot long giant marrow at 2am!

Other shout outs to Geoff from CO-BUILT, driving over from Oxford to make the scene, Foxy (with a broken foot) and Daisy for hooking me up with a new S.S.S.-SHRED-SLED deck, Mr. Wilson, out of action with a back injury for all the photos and Joe Crow for his electrical expertise and inadvertantly taking the "slam of the night".