I caught up with the one and only Lee Smith to see find out whats been going on in the life of the easy one.
What up Lee long time no see! So your situated in Barcelona now, how long have you been living there for?
Yeah all together about 4 years but I went back to LA for a year and a half and have been back now about a year and a half, Barcelona is my second home basically, well maybe my third home, SF,LA,BCN!!
What made you move to Barcelona?
Originally I came to BCN because I fell in love with the city when I came for vacation, I was living in LA at the time and wanted a change so I went for an extreme change!! I thought about it for a long time, and one day I just did it when I had the opportunity. That was in 2005, later on I had the idea to do a store here so me and my man Julio decided to make it happen, a lot of work and a few years later here we are. But the truth is I came for the ham, I love Jamon Serrano.
Is there still a strong skate scene there?
Yeah for sure, dudes are out here killing it!!! Lot’s of OG guys like Raul Navarro, Gnes Ozdogon, Javier Sarmiento, , Javier Mendizabal, Jesus Fernandez, JB Gillet,Julian Furones, Luy Pa Sin, Vincent Bressol and many more. We have some kids that are coming up on the team as well, like Denis Yilmaz, Raul Lupanez, David de los Santos & Raul Valencia. There are a lot of Brazilian guys killing it out here as well, check this video “Olhos de Peix” they go hard!!
Have you seen it change over the years?
I think it’s changed a lot in the sense that less American pros are coming over, I think a lot of it has to do with the economy and a lot of the US pros seem to think that BCN has been over documented in mags and vids but they don’t realize that new spots are being built here everyday!!
You have been on FTC for years and have helped build it to what it is today, you have opened up a FTC store in Barcelona, when and how did that come about?
We opened on April 7th 2010 so it’s been a little over a year now. Like I said earlier me and my friend Julio Arnau had always talked about doing a store so we just went for it , just took it one step at a time .
Besides working at the store what else does a day normally consist of?
I like to ride my bike, I got a fixie so I’ll ride over to the skate park, skate a bit with JB & Vince, hit the beach, maybe skate Macba in the evening. Life is chill here, simple. it’s good.
Over the last few years it seems Skateboarding has turned more into a mainstream sport with more kids and families getting into it, with comp’s like Street League getting broad casted no your TV sets around the world and also the help of YouTube making it a lot easier to see skating. How do you see skateboarding going over the next 10 years?
Hmmm, it’s tough to say. As far as the mainstream coverage I don’t think that that would be something that hurts skating in the long run, you know like when the mass media plays something out, I don’t really see that happening, I think the state of skating will stay as is for the next 5 years or so, after that who knows. The level at which these new kids skate and progress now is going to keep skating relevant and exciting to older & newer generations of skaters and like you said with the ability to view everything through the internet at the click of a button is incredible.
Do you miss the days of when you used to have too go threw the old VHS’s to watch some footage?
Of course the days of waiting a year for Blind’s “Video Days” or Plan B’s “Questionable” and just cherishing that video and watching it religiously every day until a year later when you get the next video that comes out are long gone, it was like a feeling of Christmas or something!! I think the last video that made me feel like that was Lakai’s “Fully Flared”. But that’s life and things progress. I like how it is now, you might not appreciate the skating as much now but at least you have less plastic crap that’s gonna end up in the ocean one day.
Starting off as an original street skater sweating in the streets, do you feel that skateboarding has lost the little bit of grimmyness it used to have?
Skating is very politically correct now, in the 90′s dudes had bad attitudes and would talk shit about other pro’s, kick you out of spots and you had whole crews of skaters that didn’t like other skate crews. Now a days you can’t even critique anyone really without someone getting upset or calling you a “hater”. So it went from one extreme to the other, whereas like everything it should be somewhere in the middle. So yeah skating has lost a lot of it’s griminess in that way and also in the way that skaters weren’t making the money they are now, skaters were poor and outcasts. Now they all live in Hollywood, have TV shows, and are flashy and “cool”. I’m down for that though, I like that shit!!!
Top 5 things to do when not on your board?
1 Karaoke
2 Bowling
3 Biking
4 Chilling with women, such interesting creatures
5 Being fly
Any plans of traveling to the land down under for a veggie mite sandwich??
Hahaha, yeah not sure when yet but it’s number one on my destination list, I have so many friends from OZ and NZ, I definitely need to take a trip down there, I don’t know about the Vegemite sammy though mate, shit’s kind weird….but I’ll give it another shot!!
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