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DVD Review: Ignition DVD Vol. 2 - 08/02/23Disclaimer: I have been friends with Leo Donhauser, the owner of Ignition, for the past six years (Yes Leo, it's been that long, ever since you started the shop in the basement of your parents' house and I bought four pairs of skates at once). Also, I know, have hosted and fed, or am friends with 50 percent of the featured riders and some other skaters that appear in the release. Still, tried to be as objective as possible.  But, let's start with the review of the DVD double pack itself. Yes, its a double pack, cause with the team DVD, you also get a tour DVD, and to top it all off, a big movie style poster of the team, all of that for only 15 euro. Both DVD-s have film poster style packaging. After I got the DVDs in the mail, I first put the team DVD in the player and watched it all at once, which proved not to be a problem each other time i put it in. The thing you notice first, except Gape's (Gabriel Hyden) and Gagi's clean and stylish skating, is clean filming and colours, accompanied with good shooting angles, and that stretches all throughout the film. I realy loved Mark Heuss' decision to keep the editing clean and simple, which helped to keep the film entertaining and easy to watch (there's nothing I hate more than overuse of effects that makes seeing the trick more difficult). After the intro, the newest member of the Ignition team, danish powerhouse Jacob Juul takes the spotlight. And indeed he does, with an array of stylish and tech tricks and switchups (remz helped make his skating a lot more solid, too). Some of the highlights include a fishbrain on a long and curvy square ledge, a fakie 360 misfit on a kink rail, 270 front fahrvergnuegen to top acid 540 off on a flat stair ledge, grabbed front torqueslides on various obstacles. His skating is edited to mellow electronica, which goes well with the skating. Next up, it's Gabriel Hyden. One of the nicest kids off skates realy kills it on skates, be it clean and powerful fast lines, stunts or tech switch ups. One thing I have to admit, I always loved his style. He's only 18, I think, but with the style and smoothness of a seasoned pro which shows in his choice of tricks and obstacles. The section made me want to see more of his skating. Mixed section features skating from Rowin Hoefer, Sven Hausmann, Mathias von Gostomski, Olav Nordheim, Frieda Reisch, Leo, Gagi, Michi, Johnny von Kralik, and others. The austrian / german scene is, and this shows it the scene with the omst stylish skaters in Europe, right next to the swiss skaters. The split section between Philipp Preuss (a really humble and nice kid who's always welcome at my place), Gagi Wagenblast and mr. Winterclash himself, Jojo Jacobi.  Phillip's skating is enjoyable to watch, wether he's getting spinny on ledges or tech on rails, because he oozes with clean style. Gagi has been skating for a long time, he's always up for skating being injured or not, and his clips show that he has a lot of fun with his relaxed no sweat lines or savannahs on drop off rails. Jojo should be skating with a parachute, because he skates like a pilot, fast and controled. Next up, it's the guys that run the shop, papa Michi (his beautiful son is now a little over one year old), and party boy Sebastian. Michi is my tech punk, skating switch ups on rails, probably with Rancid or the US bombs blasting on his ipod. Seppi, on the other hand, skates clean and fast lines. Both with more then ten years of skating under their belts, they can pull off a section for any new release. Chris Obermeier..can you say 450 front nugen on a 23 stair ledge? Some of the highlights of his section include a topsoul to 270 bs unity, 270 bs torqueslide to soul, and a lot of other spinny switch ups on rails. His style reminds me of Erik Bailey, really fast, clean and even a bit wreckless. Sugar at the end with Dominik Wagner. I'm not exaggerating, both Dominik' s style and trick choice are a combination of Chris Haffey and Alex Broskow, what makes him probably the best european skater in my opinion. His skating is really fast, incredibly clean and just tech enough. He skates both big and small obstacles, and gets creative, be it lines or weird obstacles that he actually does grind, not toe-roll or whatever. The tour DVD features skating from Ignition's two week 2007 tour of Scandinavian countries, and it is quite similar to last year's release in at least one detail. It rained almost every day, the same as the 2006 tour. You will get to see Jojo, Gagi, Gabriel, Jacob and Dominik travel during the nights, skate street in the rain, win competitions and skate parks. Five people with different styles and trick vocabs that blend into one team are followed through rain and pain, in a documentary style film. You will witness laundromat dilemmas, and pure will to keep skating after a bad cold. Touring is a job, make no mistake, and they try their best to earn their pay, no doubt. Sidenote to Alex Schneider: Bon Jovi is not cool, he never was. Not even funny, lol. The party footage this year is more mellow, thank god, no more spitting and puking.I won't bother you with skating highlights as there are many. The editing is superb, and manages to get the best out of even some of the poorly filmed clips, nice going Alex. A double feature for the price of one DVD on discount with great content is something you deffinitely shouldn't miss. To sum it up, this is one of the better releases lately, with a music choice that compliments the skating and a general feel of the love for skating, that only seasoned skaters with true passion can put out (unlike some poor and overexposed American films with great hype and no substance). Great job, Mark, Jojo and Alex. Sorry for the length of the review, it is a double feature. Review by Josip Jagic Ignition was also kind enough to make an exclusive trailer for this review! (right click here - target save as) Tags: andreas wagenblast chris obermaier dominik wagner gabriel hyden gagi ignition jacob juul jojo jacobi josip jagic phillip preuss rowin hoefer | |
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1 comment so far
Awesome review Josip, well done! ;-)
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