The Cole Foster Interview Part 1

So as much fun as Sweden is, I'm growing very homesick. After that long and controversial plane ride out here to the Northern Wastes, I wanted to reach out to someone Ive known for years and hold in the highest regard. We've laughed we've cried. Ive put him on time out for a couple years and he's fired me on the Discovery Channel. My phone call to Cole Foster was meant to be brief but ended up going for quite a while so Im going to break this down into a few parts. In the first chapter you will learn a little about him and a few other O.G. Salinas Boys, Noah Greenberg, Job Stevens, and the Gravelle brothers Todd and Chad. Over the past ten years theres been TV shows, interviews, tons of articles, fuck I think there was even a book? But that stuffs just to sell T shirts. Sit down and relax while Brando has a couple cold Fosters with Cole Foster.

self portrait



Brandon: hiiiii.


Cole: fuck….

B: ok were recording its recording right now…

C: yea?

B: this is the first time I’ve ever done this, I remember when we were kids we…

C: done what interviewed someone?

B: yea you know I remember reading interviews in skate magazines and stuff and you have to put stuff in parenthesis when it’s happening behind the scenes like (laughter) or SP?

C: what’s that?

B: I don’t know wrong spelling or something?

C: LMFO write that, laugh my fucking ass off… that’s my first word

B: ok deal, so we’ll just do this by the book here...

C: this is for what now? This is gonna be you on Nick’s blog?

B: yea I’m in Sweden right now and Nicke is in Richmond….

C: oh Nicki..?

B: yea Nicki or Nicke you know like Nick-Eh..

C: I call him Nico… I don’t know…

B: Nico??? Ha well yea that’d be ok too I mean Velvet Underground... pretty good…
B: ok please give your full name.

C: Arthur Coleman Foster

B: date of birth?

C: 2/12/64

heavy metal life drainer

B: ok excellent. So there’s so many things that I know about you and I got to see from hanging out with you for so many years but for sure like 3 quarters of that shit can’t be told until you’re in the ground right? You and probably Rico too...

C: yea… yea Rico would have to be dead

B: you guys have to be loooong gone before that book can be written (laughter)

C: which is soon….

B: you have some pretty great theories and I think we…

C: oh god….(laughter) I’m pretty tired man…

B: wait what? Shit you’re tired?

C: yea but go ahead…

B: shit sorry ok we’ll keep it short! So when was the last time you went to a swap meet? Like when was the last time you were up at 5 am to wait in line for a swap meet?

C: ummm… I’ve never gotten up at 5 in the morning … unless I was still awake at 5 am and just went to a swap meet. But I went to one not too long ago, I actually sold some stuff here in Marina.

B: ok ok not bad. But you always used to say why does this shit have to start at dawn? Why can’t we get in at noon and have breakfast first?

C: yea flash lights in the dark I’ve never been into that scene

B: kids now that have just come around, there like fuck bro you gotta get there early you gotta get the sweet deals… I can remember havin to go to the Turlock swap when I was like 9 with my fuckin dad and always dreading it I was done getting up at 5 by 9 years old. You don’t wanna be there you don’t wanna be in Turlock at any time of the day.

C: yea its bad but one time before that was pretty good, it was the only time we sold in Pleasanton and Job had the shittiest model T radiator or grill shell or something and it was wasted it was not movin so he made this sign for it that said FREE TO A FREEK

B: free? Free too a freak?

C: yea (laughter) and this guy came up and said I’m total a freak! And away it went (laughter)

still uncomfortable to look at

C: that was also the time, or one of those was the time that I was with Mike Ness and introduced him to Jason Jessee

B: no way (laughter) at a swap meet!

C: at the Pleasanton swap meet. And it was horrible. I like both of them and I said you guys will like each other but it was like putting two shitty dogs together. It was fucked. It was so awkward they just wouldn’t look at each other. There was no talking; just looking away it was super fucked. I mean they both had patent leather shoes…

B: (laughter) were they both going through a cholo phase?

C: yea I mean I don’t know if Mike had a fedora on but for sure Jason did (laughter) now there friends but it was just a terrible first meeting… (laughter)

B: Job and Jason and even Mike… all those guys surf right? Did you ever surf?

C: a little when I was in high school. We lived in the Valley so we didn’t get to the beach much. I mean I liked the surf board its neat you know what I mean? But I wasn’t that excited about it.

B: yea sharks are fucked I don’t blame you for every human I hope there are 10 sharks.

C: yea a kid got eaten right when I moved here. Lou Born, he’s dead.

B: shit…

C: yea I didn’t really know him but the coroner’s kid, I did know him, the kid brought the pictures to school the next day and I saw them. Carmel high had a surf team, I remember I had to tread water for a half fuckin hour (laughter) I quit skating before I moved here (from the San Fernando Valley) and got back into it when I moved up here that’s when I met Job and Noah through skating.

B: I kinda remember you telling me a good story of the coast guard or the navy that caught a plane or a boat or something?

C: that was a good one that was my most water time. The summer of the Sea WEED.

B: the summer of the Sea WEED?

C: yea I guess what had happened was a boat got caught comin up from Mexico full of weed. We heard about it on the news. But all the people living on the coast listen to that emergency radio deal you know, for emergencies or whatever. And I guess what happened was those guys were getting chased and they just started blowing their load over the sides. People were paddling out in kayaks and shit pulling in bails of weed. I never got any bails but I got remnants. There’s a little spot down there a little secret surf spot called Fullers that you gotta hike down to. Its fucked it’s a faggot spot I think. I paddled out with a bag in my teeth. I went out to the kelp beds and there was just tons of weed. (laughter)

I found a dead cow full of maggots when I swam back in. I took the weed home, washed it in the bathtub and repackaged it…. made some money (laughter).

B: strictly resale?

C: yea mainly sold it. Carmel High school it was rad you could make bongs in ceramics I still have mine. I’m not a big weed guy though. I’m a midnight toker. (laughter)

B: I bought Becky a vaporizer for Valentine’s Day you tried that shit yet?

C: what? No I just smoke it.

B: it’s like putting a supercharger on your mind dude!

C: the weeds so powerful now I can barely take it… (laughter)

B: speaking of superchargers… let’s talk about the car chase in your 55 Chevy.

C: yea that was a gnarly one. That was the last time I probably got into a real fight. I used to scrap a lot when I was a kid and it kinda sobered me up. After that I figured someone’s gonna get brain damage or die.

B: did you get fucked up?

C: well yea yea I got pretty hurt, it was a deal at a party were some guys ran up on a lawn or were tryin to run some people over. We jumped in the bat mobile you know? 55 Chevy pro street, drum brakes… but it had a good motor, 4 speed. It was me Job, Noah, Chad and Todd. Like six cars went chasing after these guys but we were the only ones that kept chasing them (laughter)

B: now were you lime green at this point?

C: yea

B: fuck lime green 55, the flag ship, you had to keep chasing them!

C: It was pretty crazy if you knew the area, from sleepy little Pacific Grove through Monterey through the tunnel getting sideways, they had a brand new Jeep Cherokee or some shit, good brakes and tires. We had like 165’s on the front and big meats on the back (laughter) Noah sitting on the window ledge in the back throwing beer bottles at their car.

B: making contact?

C: oh yea oh yea pretty good…

B: shit well done…

C: It was about six miles as fast as we could go at midnight running every red light. It was pretty bad ass. So we ended up in Seaside, DEEP in Seaside actually wich is .. you know… dark town…

B: it gets a little dark out there.

C: the kids pull up at this liquor store, one kid jumps out one kid gets punched and one kid jumped into the liquor store. The one kid came outta the liquor store with a bat and just hit Todd right in the back, never saw it comin…

B: Todd, he built that chevy that Rob (Fortier) has or had or whatever?

C: Yea Todd Gravelle…so it turns out that kid’s dad owned the store. So me and Noah run in there chase the kid, shits flying I get to hit him in the back of the head a few times but he gets behind the counter… and the kid just does this beautiful roundhouse kick right into my nose. Broken, blood is flowing, and Im pretty hurt. Noahs throwing pots of coffee and racks of shit.. Im telling Noah we gotta go man cause my nose is a faucet. Theres no stopping the blood. So meanwhile the Gravelle brothers have decided to bend back the doors on this kids Jeep. Noah jumps on the roof and caves in the roof on this thing, and the kid, the roundhouse kid is just a bad motherfucker. Im in my car with Job who never got out because he was the smart one, and this kid comes out with these two jugs of wine. You know Gallow or some cheap shit. He just hucks these jugs one goes right onto my windshield, gone, side window gone, just fuckin bombing me. I finally get my piece of shit started, my guys get in. The kid comes out with another barrage of wine jugs. So fuckin pissed, so I ask the guys will you help me fix it and theyre like fuck yes so I side step the clutch and push the jeep up over the curb and pushed it in hard between the doors, backed up and split…

B: radical…

C: it goes on and on but we never got in trouble for any of that mess. We went into the cop station one time but Todd and Chad’s folks were friends with some judge so we never got in trouble. I mean the other guys assaulting people out of their store with bats, that’s probably frowned upon too you know but we went down lied through our teeth and I never heard another word about it.

B: do you ever run into any of those guys anymore? Around town?

C: yea one of them was Rick-O-Billy!

B: oh shit that’s right. That’s what Job said. Rick actually worked with us at Salinas Boys for a while years later. And it was never spoken of!

C: yea it never can be its finished.

B: you know that may be the last time a 55 Chevy was ever in a car chase anywhere. I mean a real car chase.

C: It was in a rumble. (laughter)



TO BE CONTINUED in part 2