Alive At Carhartt’s Ishin Denshin LA Premiere

It goes without staying, we live in turbulent times.

The bizarre blooms strange days like infecting weeds in need of picking. Our eyes glued to the news and screens ramped with AI slop. Trapped in a head of webbing, catching every nightmare flying through the daily airwaves. Add in unemployment and making it damn near impossible to drag ourselves from our personal prisons into the twisted world waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

But for the new Carhartt WIP video premiere, you make the effort.

Ishin Denshin, roughly translated to telepathy, according to the production team, ran a short release celebration starting in Brooklyn, then LA, and finishing in Toronto. Directed by Romain Batard with additional filming by Geoff Cambell and Kamei Kyota, is a twenty-minute showcase of the crew’s exploration of Japan and the first Carhartt full length since Precious in 2024.

Reason enough for you to escape in your clunker vehicle toward a bizarro-world in the best sense. Finding easy parking on a posh Central LA street, which is normally impossible. To then be carded at Carhartt only for the doorman to exclaim, “Oh shit you’re older than me!” Eventually pushing your apparent geriatric-ass inside to find the opposite of every premiere setting you’ve ever stepped in. With clean floors, glass cases of merch, a back bathroom hidden behind a false mirror, and more folks hydrating than slamming beers.

But still, despite the unusual setting, you press on.

Because it’s not that you need a drink. And it’s not that you need the coinciding zine with the cool clear cover wrap that resembles a 90s comic cover aesthetic.

You don’t need distraction.

You need community.

While demo tours zig-zagging across the country may not be as prominent as it once was, video release events are still one of the great places to congregate and share in the collected energy of the place. The static burning from behind the eyes as you watch folks careen down stair sets and inclines all to achieve a trick.

Similar to concerts, this in-person aspect still holds true to skateboarding. And yes, there is a SLS and Mike Mo’s team-based PSL. And that’s fine for bringing in people to enjoy skating. But here is where the culture thrives. Discussions of style, selection, music, legacy, all swimming in the same channel. Not silently waiting between runs in a point-based performance.

This is the ammunition against AI.

A moment in time impossible to replicate. Significantly experienced by a singular perspective. There are many like it, but this one is yours.

This is the bobby pin picking the lock the workweek slipped you in.

And though you’re tired, aware of the long drive home, you stay even after the silent awe is lifted by applause to stand with strangers outside in cigarette smoke and discuss. So when you tear yourself away, strolling through the car lined LA streets, you no longer see a crushing existence or tomorrow’s problems waiting on sunrise. Instead you think on the community meeting that just commenced, wiping your hard drive and giving you a fresh start, a blank page.

You’ll later arrive home and without thought put on another skate video, maybe even another Carhartt, before diving into your new zine, wondering how you almost stayed in.