Thrasher Magazine

Will he go back to Santa Monica? How does he like his bushings? And what's with the full-kit switch up? Dylan Jaeb answers your questions and more in this extra-packed feature from our June '26 mag.


Dylan's debut for Quasi shocked audiences everywhere. Give it a rewatch to fully appreciate the effort

So for this interview, you challenged yourself to another colossal fakie flip. This one was at another macho spot, Rincon. It’s over a bar, down a big drop, classic Zero spot. Nyjah has been there. Compare and contrast fakie flipping Wallenberg to fakie flipping at Rincon.
One’s just tall, and the other one’s long. It’s definitely scarier going over the bar. I kind of forgot about that spot though. I was just thinking like, I don’t want to drag the fakie flip too much, but it’d be good to do one over something or a little different. I talked to my friends about it, and a lot of them were like, Dude, that spot looks like shit. Don’t skate that thing. That’s fried. It’s a little less work getting it all set up than Wallenberg. You don’t have to get a ramp, which is nice. You don’t have to drive to SF either. I also like that it’s classic SD.

Visualizing survival strategies

When the popular style of skating is maybe not giant drops and those kinds of stunts, what makes you want to go to spots like Wallenberg and Rincon?
It feels really, really cool to roll away from something really tall. And jumping, for some reason, is the only type of skating where you roll away and you know it was the one. A lot of times you do a ledge line or something, you land it, and it doesn’t feel like the right one. But jumping, when you make it, you know you did it. Which is a really satisfying feeling, because you know you got it. I think the motivation also comes from being scared of other types of skating. I am more comfortable jumping down stairs than skating a big rail or something. I wanted to get a last trick for this part and this felt like the right thing to try.

It’s not like, Did my wheel touch? It’s like, Did I survive?
So much more satisfying, but it does feel like there’s not a lot of people jumping down stairs. I think it was just so overdone in the past and it’s such a simple type of skating that it wasn’t that exciting. But I just like the way it feels. It reminds me of classic skate videos.

No, I love it. I love when you and Toby are flying out there. It reminds me of the good old Zero Sundays.
Yeah, classic.

June 2026, an instant classic

So these are some questions I got from skaters on Instagram. @inandromeda asks, “Will he go back to Santa Monica triple set for more carnage?”
I probably won’t. That spot was good because of the run-up for the contest, but I feel like skating it without that masonite run-up would be a lot harder. I think there’s nothing there that I can really do that hasn’t been done, or that I’d really want to. You land on sandy ground. It is not fun to skate at all.

Thanks for coming to that thing. You and Toby really looked like you were having a good time. Was it fun to skate in the contest, though?
It is cool to jump down stairs with a lot of people. I’m usually kicking a lot of stuff out if I skate stairs, and for some reason, with people there, I just commit to stuff a little easier. So it feels fun. It feels like a safety net for some reason. It’s so loud and you’re so distracted that it helps you land on stuff. I usually get super anxious and don’t even want to skate in that type of setting. But I was trying to use it. It was fun. It just hurt really bad. Before we went, we were skating Stoner, trying to get all hyped up to jump down something. It was a fun day with Toby.

Tardy takedown at the Santa Monica Slamma. Fakie heel

"Hawaii!!!" —Christian Hosoi

Did you do all the tricks that you envisioned?
Toby and I were talking on the way there. I really only wanted to do the switch tré. I remember asking Toby if I could have that one. When we got there I think I was scared to jump down it switch so I tried frontside flip first. We got there a little late so I remember being scared that I would try something someone else was already trying. With that run-up it was really easy to get the speed so I did a couple other things, but I really just wanted to do that switch tré.

We had some other fun moments. The last time you were in a best-trick contest that we had, you ran into Grant Taylor in the air above a car. And this time, nothing bad like that happened, but you did run right into Andy Anderson and then Jereme Rogers. How was that?
That Jereme Rogers clip is gold. That’s the best clip I ever got. Yeah, luckily I didn’t smash into Grant Taylor. That was so fucking embarrassing, kind of the worst case. I don’t know if I’ve talked about it before, but me and Toby on the way to that contest, we’re like, What is the absolute worst-case scenario? And then I literally had one worse than we even could conceptualize on the way there—running into GT and doing a flip.

Ode to Gonz and Duffy

At least all the traffic was going the same way on the triple set. What did you say to Jereme?
I don’t even know if we exchanged any words. It was so loud. I didn’t realize that he did the sweat wipe until someone showed me the clip that night. That clip is so funny.



@juanestebanvallejo asks, “Do you have a list of tricks for your next video part, or do you just go to the spot and let the mood choose the trick?” How organized are you with these videos and these tricks?
I’m trying to be more intentional. It depends what you’re going for. We’re doing this big Nike video, and I’m trying to be kind of on it with planning singular tricks for a trip and basing the trip around that. But I’m not sure that that’s the type of skating I even like to watch. Some of my favorite videos are definitely just guys skating around and filming what they can at each spot. Like that Bobby Worrest and Hjalte Halberg video that Ben Chadourne made Looks OK to Me is so sick because it looks like they are just skating. And so it’s trying to find that balance. Like, for this thing that I’m working on now, it was mostly spur of the moment. Besides the Rincon trick, everything else is kind of just going to the spot and seeing what happens. I think skating feels like it’s coming back to a more intentional era. Feels like people are trying a little harder to do things with more thought behind them.

You can get a massage at this spot, but it would probably throw off your whole day. Switch front board, pants on

@ernietorres wants to know, “What was your welcome-to-skateboarding moment?”
It’s gotta be with Jamie Thomas, in some capacity. Probably going on my first Zero trip would have been the first time I was introduced to actual street skating, signings, demos and stuff. “United States of Whatever” was the name of the tour. That was the first trip that me and Cruise Mosberg went on.

How old were you?
I would have been 13, maybe 14. Cruise was probably 11.

Were there any eye-opening moments that you remember?
I definitely left that trip being a little confused about if this is what I wanted to do with my life. I remember being all-in on skating. I remember after that trip being like, Okay, maybe there’s another route? Maybe I should be a contest guy? Like, I don’t know if this is the thing I want to be doing, because that trip was pretty rough. We got to the tail end of their month-long trip, and everyone was super over it. The AC was broken in the van, and the door was broken. They had bungee cords holding the door open. Franky Villani was there, and he was about to quit Zero, and he hurt his shoulder or something. It was just really heavy vibes. I mean, it’s exciting, for sure, but it didn’t really make me super excited to be a professional skateboarder.

Switch back Smith, back East     Photo: Schreiner

What brought you back around?
Honestly, I skated the skatepark so much after that, and I think it was just because that was what I liked to do. It’s like, This is what’s fun. And then I realized there’s kind of different routes to skating, and you don’t have to just skate and do the gnarliest or scariest trick. It’s funny how, in my brain, I thought you had to kickflip a ten stair and then kickflip a 12 stair next year. That’s how I thought about it when I was younger. I was just really anxious about having to progress in that super linear fashion. And then when I found out that you could street skate and just have fun with your friends and do the tricks that are somewhat easy for you, but still have fun, that’s when I think it kind of turned around. Like, I could have a career and still have fun.

Was there anybody that was a role model in that direction of skating for you?
I think the first thing that I saw that really changed the way I was thinking about skating would have been the Sour Solution videos. I remember finding those and being like, These guys are running their own brand, doing something that’s not super scary or high impact, but it’s still interesting to watch. And then now, I’m kind of reverting back. Now a lot of my favorite skaters are the guys that are trying the absolute hardest and doing the tricks that I feel are scary and take a lot of work to get done—coming back around in that Jamie Thomas style.



Who are you excited about now?
I mean, AVE is the best example of just making it happen. I think AVE’s probably the blueprint. Marc Johnson is my favorite skater of all time, and he seemed like he tried really, really hard. Gilbert, like Propeller Gilbert, is a peak example of pushing yourself as hard as possible. I think those are probably the three, and Heath Kirchart, obviously.

On another topic: you have a new board sponsor. And an ad in this issue that says you’re pro! So congratulations! He’s pro for Quasi, everybody.
Yeah, I guess this is the first time I’ll talk about it. I’m so excited that this worked out. I couldn’t be more stoked to be a part of Quasi and do something new with someone like Chad Bowers.

The Ghost of Sponsors Past gets left in the dust on a speedy front blunt      Photo: Schreiner

Speaking of, @ohiohomegrowngemz wants to know. “Was the switch three flip at Santa Monica out of spite towards P-Rod and Primitive?”
Not even a little bit. That’s just one of the tricks that I do. I saw a lot of comments saying that, especially the way that they edited the Bust or Bail video. They cut to P-Rod right after, so it looked out of spite. But I don’t think there’s any hard feelings there. I had a nice long call with Paul when I left, and it seemed like he didn’t care that much about me leaving.

Was it a hard call to make?
I honestly hadn’t spoken to Paul a ton the whole time I was at Primitive. It wasn’t like he was the point of contact. Alan Hannon was the guy that makes all the Primitive videos, and he was the one that I was most nervous to call, because I knew that we were working on a video at that point. I just felt like I’d led him on a little bit because we were working on my pro thing for Primitive, and I had to call him halfway through that, right after they paid for this whole trip. I felt shitty about it. So I called him and told him the deal, and he was awesome about it. But calling Paul was super chill.

Q: Is this frontside flip really “the hard way” when it’s Jaeb on board? A: Yes

Let’s talk about Quasi. Because some people might see that as a curveball? 
Yeah, I could definitely see how people would think that. I think it’s a different audience than probably the people that watch Primitive videos. It basically all came about because of one of my best friends Jacob Palumbo. He’s from DC and grew up around Jason Nam, who skates for Quasi. He filmed Nam’s part in their last video Simulation. Jacob wears head-to-toe Quasi every day and talks about Chad and Tubbs nonstop. I think Jacob just sends Chad and Tubbs footage he’s been filming. And so I think, recently, when we were filming stuff for the Primitive thing, he was just sending them the timeline, just to show Tubbs the stuff he’s been filming. And I think Chad—or maybe it was just Tubbs—saw that stuff and asked Jacob if he thought I’d be down for Quasi. He told them to give me a call. They ended up calling me so random one morning. I answered and it was Tubbs, I had heard so much about him from Jacob, but I had never spoken to him. He was in the office with Chad, so I ended up talking to Chad and Tubbs for two hours that morning. They were explaining that they’re working on their video and how it all works over there, and how Chad and his wife Amber kind of run the whole thing. After I heard how involved Chad is with everything, I realized that this is exactly what I was looking for. Growing up with Jamie Thomas, he was so hands-on with everything, and I think I grew to expect that type of care from an owner. I was just at Primitive. It was kind of a bigger operation. There’s a lot of people involved, and not all of them are skaters. But Chad skates. He’s the owner, and he does 100-percent of the graphics. To me, what makes a brand good is when it’s ran by a small group of people that really know what they’re into. So when I heard the way he would speak about skating and the way that he’d speak about art, I was just like, This is exactly what I want to do. Even if it does look like a curveball to some kids, maybe this can expose them to a different type of skating as well?

It says on the ad, “Professional debut cold call.” Is that them calling you?
That’s a reference to that first call we had.


Jacob helped get him in the door and filmed his closer. Full-circle moment in SD

Gilbert Crockett, he does these funny posts where he just writes a few words. Didn’t he do some sort of shout out to you and Toby a while back?
Oh yeah, I forgot about that. I think that could have been part of it as well. I talked to Gilbert. When I was on a trip, he posted just a black screen that said, “Jaeb and Toby run this shit.” And I was like, Well, that’s fucking insane. That’s one of my favorite skaters. I was tripping. I replied to it, and then he said something about Quasi at that point. And then when I ended up talking to Chad, I DM’d him again to let him know how hyped I was on the idea of skating for Quasi. I was like, Dude, I’m down. I want to do this. And he just replied something like, Did they say that? He said something that made me feel like, Oh, Gilbert’s not down, maybe? It threw me for a loop. But I think he just didn’t want me to get my hopes up.

Well, congrats, man. Do you have an opinion on your pro graphics? Are you going to be in there pitching stuff? Or is it just whatever they want to do?
Chad’s really amazing. I really like everything that he does. But that was part of the first call we had. He was asking me what I’m into music-wise, and movies and types of art and stuff. I call him basically every day, and we talk about something. And then getting to spend that time with him in New York, we’d go to galleries and bookstores and stuff. I feel like he has a good gauge on exactly what I like. Obviously, I’ve seen the graphic now. I’m really hyped on the boards that we ended up making. I think they both kind of show something that I’m into in a certain way, but not too on the nose.

Kicky back lip, deep in Mafia ABD country

That’s super cool. You have a video part that goes with all these photos, right? Is that a Quasi video?
Yes. I think some of those photos are for the Nike video that will come out next year. But I’d say most of them are going to be in this part. That’ll be the Quasi part. That comes out, hopefully, the 20th of April, 4/20. Yeah, I’m super excited.

Are you going out there for a party or anything?
I think we’re gonna try to do something at Rose Street.

I’ll clear my calendar. Probably even bigger news than Quasi, you got on Indy, right?
Rhino!

What made you have to ride the only trucks that matter?
Fuck the rest. That’s all I gotta say. No, I moved up to LA and I was like, I gotta have some ties to SD. Shave my head, change the trucks, change the board, this feels nice. Switch it all up.

Meet the new kid

@rosestreetskateshop says, “Ask about bushings.”
Sean’s just been seeing me go in there for the past month and a half. Since I switched my trucks up, I’m trying to figure out how to skate ’em, and I’ve been in the shop pretty much every day trying different bushings.

What does Rhino say?
He sent me every bushing that Indy makes. He should have just told me, “Skate ’em stock and shut up.” I feel like that would have probably solved this. Now, I’m in too deep. Indy makes so many bushings.

Right?! More reader questions. @vegoharris wants to know, “Who has the best style in skateboarding?”
Marc Johnson.



True. @theorydoor wants to know, “Which of your contemporaries is the best of your generation? Or, is it cringe to like skateboarding too much?”
No, liking skating is back in. And I think it’s gotta be Cruise or Eetu. They’re pretty unbelievable.

@buddybones is asking, “How does it feel being in the rare group of people whose names have been turned into verbs?” Is there such a thing as Jaebing? Is this a diss?
That’s SLAP message board shit.

Do what you love, love what you do. Kickflip, in and out, in Paris

What are they talking about?
That’s when I roll away from tricks. I breathe out of my mouth and I smile, and it looks pretty crazy. I don’t know if I’m really doing it too much anymore, but there’s like three clips in a Primitive video back to back where I’m doing it pretty bad. Someone made a thread, and it was pretty mean. It was really, really hateful. I remember being pretty bummed that I’d have to think about it. Because you don’t really get to think when you’re rolling away. It was not fucking with me on a real level, but I definitely was aware of it. And how’s it feel? Not that good. It wasn’t a positive thing.

I know what they’re talking about. I guess because I know you, I thought of it as a pure expression of like, I’m so happy I landed this.
From what I gathered on the SLAP message boards—which is probably somewhere you got to stay out of—basically, they’re saying that it looks like I’m selling it to be something more than it was. And I’m making it look like I was more shocked or surprised that I was landing something that wasn’t that hard for me, or that wasn’t as spontaneous as it was treated.

These fucking dickheads robbing us of our joy. Fuck ’em.
It’s scary out there.

Switch front shove to switch nosegrind, mop top days

So you moved to LA recently. What made you want to finally move up there? That’s the place where everybody goes.
Yeah, I didn’t want to. I went on a couple trips and came back, and all my friends moved up here. So they kind of forced my hand. Now I’m sitting in Echo Park.

You’ve got a great crew. Talk about the friends that you skate and film with, because I really like them. And they’re all kind of on the come up right now.
It’s really awesome. This lined up well that we were all skating at the same time, and pretty much everyone’s doing something. The twins Nico and Indy, Cruise, Toby, Cyprus and Gavo, all of us are really close in age. It’s awesome to have that. It’s so rare, and I didn’t realize that. I feel like that’s how it used to be; everyone would come up with a career. So I feel really blessed to be a part of something where we can make videos on our own, and we can do stuff on our own without brands. That’s a luxury that most skaters don’t have, and we’re trying to do more with that and make stuff. And that was a big reason I wanted to move to LA, just to be around everyone that was already around every day, and be able to make stuff without being super brand heavy.

Well, I also know that you’ve got a whole crew of friends in Europe. Talk about those guys, ’cause it’ll be like, Where is he? He’s in Switzerland!
I felt so lucky that the Nike stuff worked out, because I got to meet some of my best friends. Eetu’s one of my best friends ever now. I never got on a brand and then met someone that I was, like, best friends with—maybe Kyo as well, Kyonosuke. It’s so awesome. Eetu is amazing. I’ve gone out in Finland and skated with him, and then we’ve gone on a bunch of trips. I think Will Miles was the connect. I think Will told Scuba that he wanted me on a trip or something, and then I got to go on a trip with him. It would have been QuickStrike. It was like Joe Campos, Eetu, Casper, Kyron and a lot of those guys. I got to meet all the London guys. And then Tao made his video Mid Summer. I’ve just gotten really lucky to be able to go on those trips and hang around people that are from different places. I think that’s really helpful for your skating as well.

Bros in different area codes. Switch back tail a three-up in Europe      Photo: Pires

Where do you find the songs for your videos? Are these DJ mixes of multiple songs? Because a lot of it is just like atmospheric, ethereal, trip-out electronic, mixed with something else. What’s the technique now to find and use music for a modern skate video? 
I do it all through YouTube. That ambient, electronic stuff is my favorite genre of music for sure. I kinda just click on stuff on YouTube and then go down a rabbit hole and spend a couple hours. It is a real thing that you have to do for hours. It’s something you can’t really even do while driving. It’s not the same as looking at the computer and looking at the album covers and then going to ones that have less views. And you have to be really intentional about it. I’m definitely just scratching the surface, though. Someone like Benny Maglinao does an insane job at finding stuff. Chad at Quasi, as well. He’s finding these super obscure, 14-view YouTube videos that just have a really cool bass or something. And then they’ll layer that with maybe a cover of a song that you already know, and you make it like a David Lynch film, where you’re creating the atmosphere and adding sound effects and stuff in places that need it. But it’s so subconscious that it just adds to the experience without people really noticing what they’re doing a lot of the time.

Well, I remember Memory Screen came out, and that was the first Alien video. And when I saw it as a teenager, I was like, What the fuck is this? Where’s the tricks? And then in my early 20s, it became our favorite video, because it had all that layered stuff—film it off the TV and then fucking put it in the bathtub and then record it again. It was like an art project, like a zine-type of thing. And I think Quasi, by way of being in Ohio, inherited some of that legacy. So it was really cool to watch all those things get put together. It kind of elevates it. What’s your take on it?
There’s so many ways to make a skate video. I like that super-intentional artistic way of making videos, but I also love stuff that’s under-edited. Logan Lara is one of my favorite filmers. He made the 917 videos and stuff. They definitely have aspects of Memory Screen, but it’s a lot more about the feeling. Johnny Wilson’s the same way. He makes videos that just feel really good. It’s a lot more about picking the right song and not doing too much crazy layering with the audio and visual effects. It’s all just because you just feel the energy of their crew. But that’s not really possible with every skater. It only really works when you have a crew that genuinely skates together and likes making stuff and likes similar music. It’s not something that anyone can do.



Yeah. I remember meeting somebody in the ’90s that I was a big fan of their video part and the song and stuff, and then meeting them and realizing, Oh, this guy’s just a fucking redneck. Somebody else made this.
I think the best video parts, you almost feel like the skater’s singing the song.

Exactly. And in the Dashawn video, that’s what you get.
It’s actually happening now.

Switch pole jam. Careful of that pine straw!      Photo: Schreiner

Do you ever think, I’m just gonna have to make my own music for this?
I make some stuff, but I’m definitely not confident enough with it yet to put it in something like that. I think I would maybe sneak stuff in, but I’m not fucking singing on shit.

Talk about our Moby tribute portrait. Are you a fan of Moby?
Yeah. Moby’s one of my favorite artists ever, and he has a couple cool album covers. I wanted to do something like Play, but I thought that’d be a little too on the nose. I think less people know that Go cover.

Best art department in the biz

What’s your five-year plan?
Five years? The Nike video’s next year. The main focus is just filming for the Nike thing, and kind of getting something started with Nico and our friends.

Another big video project with your buddies? You guys started a brand, too, right?
It’s called Laand. We’ll see what it becomes. But right now, it’s just us learning and making stuff. Yeah, probably a video, and even product stuff. My friend Noah that I live with, he sews and is hand-making bags and belts and stuff like that.



That’s cool that you’re branching out and trying new things. Did your Instagram persona at a sterile-looking skatepark mislead people about what you’re all about?
It misled people, for sure. I don’t know if it slowed me down. I think it helped me a lot with skating stuff. I’m glad it went that way. But a lot of stuff that you make isn’t meant to be shared with that big of an audience when you’re learning it. In a lot of ways, it made me scared to do stuff that I otherwise would have done. But that’s why it’s awesome to have friends that are doing it. Making stuff with my friends has been safer and more fun than trying to just post my shit. That seems insane. I don’t really mind it. It’s like a different thing. It’s like skating is one thing.

You’re making your own shit and doing what’s funny and cool and exciting to you. That’s how skating got invented. 
I really appreciate that. We’re gonna try our best.

But then back to Wallenberg!
Yeah. You gotta focus. You only get three hours in the morning to do it all.

Dylan kickflip back Smith’s into the pro ranks, probably five years after he could have. Worth the wait    Photo: Schreiner