A fellow spirit...

I spent a little time working on my bike this evening. Nothing complicated, just changing tubes and tires, getting ready to go for short jaunts into the frigid air between snowstorms. I'm ready for winter to die already, but living in Northern Utah requires patience and lots of indoor projects during the season. I have plenty, believe me, but I totally need to leave the house and do something out there!

Anyway, after putting everything away and admiring my ride (a 99 Schwinn Homegrown Factory hardtail that I bought from a friend for $350 bucks -- he bought it from the Yeti employee who lovingly built it at their Durango factory during the short time Schwinn was based in Colorado...he even put a vintage oval cruiser head badge on it instead of the ugly "compass" badge) I sat down to check my email. While Googling for some info on the Homegrown, I came across a rad webzine called Legs and Lungs.

Some time ago, its author, Chris Jensen, posted about the evolution of his mountain biking obsession, the increasing overspecialization of the bike world, and the possibility of escaping the madness through purchasing a used Homegrown. A beautiful bike and a well-written post on the capitalistic transformation of a revolutionary culture (riding bicycles) into just another consumer culture (buying bikes.)

From the little I've read so far, Chris is a very right-on fellow. He writes about many of the same things (parenting, aging in the hardcore/punk culture, bikes, activism, vegan/straightedge living, etc.) that I want to write about on this blog, and he seems to have a real knack for self-awareness that I really enjoy. His signifiers are right up my alley: Iceburn, Surly, Born Against, etc.

You should definitely check out his site. It's excellent.

P.S. Holy crap! I just realized that Chris was in Countdown To Putsch, an influential, and by necessity, obscure band that combined DIY political activism (their releases featured very cool companion books and zines) and free jazz aesthetics with their noisy hardcore punk. He also started the Mountain Collective for Independent Artists record label and published Mountain Monthly zine back in the day. This dude has some serious punk cred, and I'm stoked to chance upon his pages. I repeat, you should definitely check out his site.