Gus Gordon in Fantastic Voyage

by Anti Hero

Most people I guess know Gus from Bronze videos, when he showed up wrangling the boys through Texas, a rodeo ready Brad Cromer or Alltimers style shorter stockier white boy. Gus had the energy, tricks and bounce to make a fast impression in the crowded cattle call of contemporary amateur skating. I watched the newest Bronze video last month at Nate’s crib with Nate and SP and we were all talking about Gus’s footage. When word of Anti-Hero’s Fantastic Voyage popped up, most early commentary featured Gus’s name. As Anti-Hero is one of skateboarding’s most enduring and iconic heritage brands, with a team I can name off the top of my head in full, it’s great news that Gus picked up this Deluxe sponsorship. Was he riding deadstock Jamica boards before this? I wake up on Mountain time to embark on this voyage with a few hits off the Alien Lab Creme de Menthe vape while my girlfriend makes coffee upstairs:

The tried and true way to run a skate company seems to be having a 12 passenger van and driving around America (why I see Limosine having longevity.) Gerwer and Hewitt have been doing this for all of adult lives well into middle age. Cardiel has gone through hell, finding heaven here in horseshoe tossing. GT and Pfanner are approaching Eagle stamped decades each and Fantastic Voyage’s first half could take place at any point in the past 10 years, with Tent City lifestyle shots as guidebook to living off the grid, Godspeed you Black Emperor post apocalyptic detritus surfing random acts of architecture through the American West and Europe, making beer chute from tree bark, carving through time against quantum agenda’s grain, still fighting the Reagan introduced capitalistic deification that remains the poisoned rotting root of so much un necessary suffering captured in documentary crossfire. Daan remains on team post cancellation, prompting consideration of Anti-Hero as archetype. Daan and BA share consecutive clips which suggests that the brand handled necessary re-education in shop. TNT, Schaff and Stranger contribute, Robbie Russo is a mustachioed man now, Peabody is as red faced, concrete dusted and bright eyed as ever. Who knows what truly lurks behind the grainy silver screen, but I am happy to accept the premise of this commercial product skate family presented here, as a blonde side parted dude who reminds me of Marius Sylvanien / John Fitzgerald gets heavy across a neglected brick park’s fountaintop drop and serves as segue to new faces.

Here at halfway we see Gus’s smirking mug as he lines up a bump to bench, lassoing coverage above advertising, “If you smoked when monitors were all monochrome, get your lungs screened now.” Nick Matthews appears in Eagle hat to notch a clip on the spot too. “Wassup playa?” asks barrel-chested Gus in a button-up to a security guard who knows when he’s out of his realm of control, eliciting a chuckle from filmer. Atop a pointed pink painted ledge, Gus stabs a back 5-0 as my girlfriend walks in with coffee. I savor first sip as he holds blade balanced back truck down for 5 real long seconds off the edge end, indelibly scratching himself into our souls and onto this 1-8 roster. “That’s Gus,” I say with levity. Gerwer gets Gus’s back with a lengthy back blunt popped out of same ledge, which really emphasizes how much longer Gus’s back 5-0 was, as Frank still has time to dodge the telephone pole and set up for sidewalk gap ollie and you know new signee Nick is ready to get buck at every spot. He now back tails top of pink ledge and sets up to backside flip side walk gap. Gus levels up the spot so heavy that he brings out the best in others, first time in the van proving indispensable. Kanfoush and yinz gitz some at Ryan Bobier Balboa street rail while Elissa looks on in approval.

Harsh barging continues gangway, but now that I’ve had a taste I’m just looking for more Gus. He reappears at new Union Square with an everything’s longer when you’re from Texas back tail, 360 flip because he can in loose denim, navigate through to the park exit for gap to back 5050 into the light. Maybe it’s not Gus or Kanfoush who does steezy 360 flip up curb then kickflips stair set into hill bomb. No titles is the truest way to experience a skate video; we are the spectator puzzle piecing together this post-grunge pre-artifact asking how well can we truly identify our anti-heroes floating atop a sea of art bros, then Here’s unmistakeable Gus in dust caked patterned button up going bug eyed hyping himself to roll away off this drop after he gymnast twists his way out of a neck high slam. He holds a leafy branch while noseblunting a sideways refrigerator to fakie drop roll away switch as the squad unleashes bellows of approval while rising from their seats. “Works every time” regarding his herbal supplement sticking tongue out happy.

Here now Gus follows GT’s lead in a transitioned ditch like the ones he grew up ripping in Texas, switch wallie front 5050 stand on top against chainlink, pop out with dazed Shrek face. After more impressive Gerwer maneuvering, Gus pops up again, blasting a backside air double tweaked grab over, beyond and into multiple transitions on Grant Taylor / Alan Peterson level. He grabs a back nosegrind in on a crusty DIY bank to infrastructure wall to bank. He wallies off a bank over a perpendicular Jersey Barrier to back nosegrind revert out a parallel Jersey barrier, maybe Kosciuszko Bridge adjacent in Anti-Hero green tee, then speedometer blast out of a walkway for varial heel over sidewalk into street. He backside powerslides for control down a multi-trick line through downhill switchbacks more crooked than Lombard Street filmed overhead, real Rhinestone Cowboy making a hit on Anti-Hero’s home turf shit. Gus switch drops in a quarterpipe bannister then puts his chin in to work for a front porch gap to front 5050 grind. He crouches his mouth down by a car wheel like a maniac as the tire runs over a can of beer and explodes the golden nectar all over Gus’s waiting face.

In a camo tee on skatepark transition Gus blasts out to backtail along a big ledge block above the coping to pop back in, a reenactment of the trick he did on a ditch bank to ledge in the first Bronze coverage I saw of him. Skatepark legend Gus stands tall on front 5-0 before dovetail diving double waterfall drop. A pigeon literally powersliding is the Anti-Hero caliber B-Roll that nobody else does, and Gus rolls away with adrenaline busting out of his eyeballs like the boy in the classroom with the forehead vein meme who absolutely cannot wait a second longer to tell us something before exploding. Kanfoush sends it full family man toward ending this section of Gerwer mentored new talent.

For Gus’s ender, Gus plays the straight man to Frank dressed as a Minion, powering on Frank’s corded device, prompting Frank sing Laura Branigan’s “Gloria” through vintage keyboard yellowed as old urethane dictation, so Frank responds to command and sings Gloria until Gus backspaces the machine into simulation glitching, cut to Gus blasting an air to grab and fully extend an alley oop invert atop a chain link fence back in, speedball Speed Demon Spitfire style, compelling Minion Frank to “Dance,” hereby announcing the Grimple Stix head trip advert, followed by tropical Hellriding, then Pfanner and Doobie closing things out. I look forward to Gus enjoying as never-ending of a Fantastic Voyages on Anti-Hero as he wishes, as many of his welcoming teammates here have shown possible.