BOOB

BOOB, A Collection Of Stories And Other Nonsense From Big Brother Magazine

Big Brother was the most infamous magazine in skateboard history and one of its loudest voices was Dave Carnie. Boob is a collection of Dave Carnie’s best work in his 14 years with Big Brother—a magazine that not only transformed skateboarding and brought us Jackass, but influenced everything in the publishing world from Vice to Martha Stewart’s Living. Boob will go down in literary history as the greatest skateboard book not about skateboarding ever written. In this massive 712 page tome you’ll be treated to the entire catalog of Dave’s most delightful stories about penis pumps, enemas, Depends Olympics, Bong Olympics, Slayer at Disneyland, the infamous Andy Roy interview, porn stars who shoot fire out of their butts, his amazing cat Gary, the Poocano, Aggressive Street Dancing, Aggressive Sheep Herding, and all kinds of other nonsense. The book is also filled with exclusive, in-depth interviews with people throughout the world of skateboarding such as Louie the Chimp (skateboarding monkey), Jarret Barry (professional homosexual skateboarder), Arlo Eisenberg (professional rollerblader), Larry Flynt (professional pornographer), and many more famous skateboard personalities. Your toilet needs this book. Penis. Vagina.

Review of BOOB (By Joel Price Of The Berrics):

Yes, Boob suffers no shortage of scatological humor (“doo doo jokes”) and R-rated activity … [yet] what’s striking about this collection, in addition to the uproariously offensive humor, is its intellectual richness. Mr. Carnie is one of skateboarding’s most literate pundits and he treats his favorite authors, whether it’s James Joyce or Samuel Beckett, as guests at the raging party. (Many of his pieces rank with the very best of British comic novelist Martin Amis’ work.)

As corny as it sounds, the man makes learning fun.

After all, who else would write about a one-man skate-tour in the style of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick? Who else would be able to invoke the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein to answer letters to a skateboard magazine without coming off as a pompous nerd/total dork?

Indeed, though one of Carnie’s jokes is that he rarely talks directly about skateboarding, few books capture the wild freedom of skateboarding so well. Whether it’s a visit to Disneyland with the band Slayer and Danny Way, or a famously disturbing interview with Andy Roy, Carnie puts you there. (The film director Judd Apatow owes much to his explicit aesthetic as do many writers, copywriters etc. who strive for “self-conscious” yet “irreverent” effect.)

And Boob—spanning, as it does, more than a decade—can also be read as a kind of deranged, but valuable, cultural history of skateboarding and of American society during the 1990s and early aughts. (Events such as President Bill Clinton’s impeachment, Columbine, and 9/11 occasionally intrude. For example Carnie’s visit to a cat convention with Gary shortly after the attack on the Twin Towers conveys the absurd atmosphere of the time better than many more celebrated accounts. And few satires of the lead-up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq were as funny, or as accurate, as Big Brother’s skate-doll skits lampooning the pre-war search for weapons of mass destruction.)

… Beneath the fog of profanity—you get the sense—there lurks an earnest, even sensitive, author who cares enough about skateboarding to hold up a cracked, funhouse mirror to it, who cares enough to deliver unpleasant truths, who cares enough to ask, comically, unpleasant questions. (See his long, thoughtful interview with a famous rollerblader.) Yes, Carnie often “goes too far,” but that is also part of the book’s illicit thrill. And, like many artists, his aim is often not merely to shock, but to open dialogue.

By doing so, Carnie hopes to ensure that skateboarding never loses the sense of fun and playfulness that makes it so different from organized sports. —Joel Rice

FAMOUS PEOPLE QUOTES:

 “I met Carnie at Big Brother and he was the biggest dick. It wasn’t till four years later when he was drunk at Jeff’s apartment that he was suddenly nice to me. I’m not sure how I won him over, but it took years of trying.” —Spike Jonze

“On his best day Dave Carnie isn't too pleasant. He is often drunk, fairly abusive, and a goddamn awful fighter. He can write like a son of a bitch and is one too. I'm a big fan.” —Johnny Knoxville

“Dave tells it like it is, or however he sees it through his perverted prism. Never compromising, sometimes offensive, always funny.” —Tony Hawk

“When I think of Carnie, one word comes to mind: shitbag. Actually, that’s two words, but it looks way better written as one.” —Jeff Tremaine

NOT SO FAMOUS PEOPLE QUOTES:

“Dave Carnie is one of the only people—ever—to succeed at writing about the act of skateboarding. Or the act of not skateboarding. Carnie's prolific, often drug-fueled work for Big Brother was not only groundbreaking, but hilarious. When I think of Dave Carnie, I think of being stark naked, wasted, jacking off out of the open sliding door of a mini van on the open highway.” —Davoud Kermaninejad

“Boob is important. I think that this will probably go down as one of the most important documents ever compiled about skateboarding. The attitude, the thought, the arrogance sums up skateboarding in a way that I don't think anyone else has ever captured.” —Nikos Constant

“In a sub-culture ruefully conducive to the American inarticulate-is-good meme, the Carnivore's import lay in demonstrating to a generation of average skateboarding underachievers that words needn't suck, but could actually be cool. Carnie's text-heavy tour reports, rife with inane asides and devices more commonly associated with 'serious' fiction, were a defiant F-U in the face of publications like Transworld, which were responsible for the ESPNification of skateboarding in the mid-90s. Just how many people actually read his pieces remains moot, but in an industry fiending for the lowest common denominator teen denmographic, to have a publication like Big Brother with the silly but thoughtful musings of a Carnie or Pontius was like a breath of fresh air after an all-night Depends party… If skateboarding gave me an excuse to go outside and explore the world, the inspired scribblings of Dave Carnie pointed the way to the inner life that might be had when you genuinely cease to care what your well-meaning but witless friends and family might think, and pursue what is meaningful and true for you. Penis. Vagina.” —Jai van Essen (Amazon review of Boob)

“Even mentioning such ridiculous shows as Jackass and the Wyld Boyz when talking about Carnie's genius is insulting. His works go FAR beyond that… At the time these were written, skateboarding was very much an outcast’s way of life. Tony Hawk toys didn't come in Happy Meals, skateboards weren't sold at Wal Mart, Bam Margera actually still skated. This is a book that tells that story... well kind of. Needless to say, this is one of the best books I've read. Despite having read a lot of the articles before in Big Brother. I will read this again. And again. And again.” —Melisa Delgado (Amazon review of Boob)