BLACKMAN INTERVIEW

What's your name, where are you from and where are we at right now?

My name is Desmond Rhodes aka Black Man. 17 years old, I'm originally from Queens but I was raised in Brooklyn. The grime. The slum. Where you'll get your pockets run at, Brooklyn. I dunno. The hood.

How'd you get into BMX at a young age?

I was riding since I came out my mom's stomach. I always had a bike since I was little. When I was 6 I could do 180s and shit. When I was 13 I was doing handrails and all this other crazy shit. I just liked jumping off of shit, running from the police. Just doing crazy shit, racing cards, jumping over cars, smacking girls in their butts while I'm riding by. Whatever I gotta do to do... I dunno. Blackman. It's life.

So where do you live now?

I used to live with Ed ( Edwin Delarosa ). My peoples and them. Shout out to Ed, Vinnie, Scer, Jerry, bitch ass Tyrone, Nigel...

Haha, you got beef with Tyrone?

Nah I ain't got beef with Tyrone. Tyrone my nigga, he just get a little angry sometimes like a little girl. But he my nigga though. Blackman's everybody's friend. I don't really care no more.

So when you were living over there at the Snoff Shack, what was that like?

I was on the couch. The Snoff Shack is crazy. Niggas be smoking weed up in there all day, having fun, everybody getting pussy except for Vinnie, haha, little joke there. Snoff Shack was good though, we had mad fun, smoking piff all day. Fighting... mad fights went off at the Snoff Shack. Niggas putting holes in the wall. Bitch ass cat Linda all dirty. Especially me, I was always fucking a girl up on the dirty ass couch. Always fucking bitches in the shower and shit. Harlem... shout out to Harlem. All my other bitches too. G-day, all my bitches man.

So what happened to your situation out there? You're staying with your mom now here in Brooklyn.

I'm about to become a man, I can't be sleeping on no couch. I dunno, niggas helped me out. But niggas is leaving.

Do you think you outstayed your welcome there?

I bet they would say so. Fuck it though, they can have fun. Everybody moving anyway. But right now I'm just chilling at my mom's crib. Smoking... eating... fucking bitches. Same thing I've always been doing. Riding my bike, fucking bitches, hustling, smoking weed.

So are you still cool with all them?

Yeah even though a little bullshit be happening. They all my peoples. It's all over some girl shit anyway. They all my friends though.

So tell me a little bit about what it was like growing up in hood and shit. Being a BMX kid kid growing up here is kinda different.

It's kinda different... well not really. You still gotta go through all the bullshit. The only thing is that I'm quicker than everybody running. When they running I'm riding away. Police can't never catch me. I don't even run from cops like that no more. But growing up in the hood, riding a bike, shit is... my bike showed me a lot of shit. Like if I wasn't riding bikes I wouldn't have never seen Manhattan. I'd be right on my block, chilling with everybody else. I don't wanna be like everybody else.

You been out in California and shit.

Yeah, I went mad places, B. I love my bike. My bike is my soul, it's my heart. It's what pumps me. I smoke weed and ride all day, that's all you gotta do. The only thing in life is to ride your bike. Even if I break my neck, break my arm... I'm always going to ride my bike. I'll ride my bike until I die.

You were saying on the train that you think a lot of people have misconceptions of you and they think you're a different kinda dude than you really are.

Yeah alot of people just say "Blackman, blaaaaeeeh, grimey. Blackman do this and that." Yeah I'm grimey, so fucking what? I got a heart. I ain't always grimey. I know how to respect people. I know how to say "Hi, how are you doing, sir?", I know how to talk to people. I just like playing around a lot and having fun. That's why I ride my bike. I don't ride my bike to talk shit or this and that. I just ride my bike to do what I gotta do and get my name out in the streets. Get my name out in other people's hoods. But there's alot of shit going on now. It's '06, almost '07. I'm about to be 18 on February 1st.



So who are you riding for now?

I ride for Volume Bikes and fucking... sometimes I think I ride for Animal. I don't really know because everybody shitting on me now. Talking about "Blackman sold an Animal bike piece"... I never sold an Animal bike piece. I'm not gonna lie, I sold a TIP Plus bike piece. But TIP Plus gave me a brand new wheel, I would ride the wheel but when I break the wheel and I don't wanna fix it, I just sell it. I always break wheels because I'm always jumping off of something crazy and high for no reason. Not for no reason, like, that's what I do. That's what Blackman do, I fly around. I dunno though... fuck it.

How'd you hook up with Brian Castillo and Volume?

This bitch ass nigga Glenn ( PP Milligan ). Glenn... I ain't got no problem with Glenn, he just don't understand Blackman. Glenn's my nigga too though. I'm sorry Glenn, I didn't mean to get mad at you in North Carolina. You know it's all good. Glenn got me on Volume Bikes. I appreciate that and I love him for it.

Pretty much when people think about Blackman, they think about you doing crazy shit like grinding a 15 stair flat rail on the cover of Ride. What made you want to do that? Is it because you just want to get your name out there or do you want to push yourself or do you want to make your sponsors happy?

I mean, I do it for me. Just to know I can do it. I do it because that's Black Man. I always wanted to do that ledge. That's my high school. I always used to get out of school and go look at the ledge. I just always wanted to do it. I ain't scared to do nothing like that. The person I like riding with most is Mike Hoder because me and Hoder ride the same, we both love jumping off of shit. I can ride with Hoder all day. Ralphie, Nigel... I can ride with anybody. Anyone I feel is doing something crazy, I'm with the same thing. I dunno man though, life is crazy. You break your neck, you break your fucking neck.

You seem like you've been through a lot of shit lately. Like your perspective is changing on life and shit. Like maybe you've become more mature lately.

Yeah I mean, I'm about to become a grown man, I gotta do grown man things. I can't be fucking sleeping on the couch. Fucking robbing, stealing, I gotta make my own money. I can't be hustling. I'm about to finish high school. Hopefully.

You thinking about going to college?

Yeah I'll go to college if I can go to college. I dunno.

So how are you getting by these days? I don't know if you're comfortable talking about that shit.

How I get by? I hustle. I do a lot of different things. I ain't trying to get locked up or nothing. I mean whatever you gotta do to survive, that's what I'm doing.

Living In Exile, how did you feel about that video part?

B: I dunno, Living In Exile, that was my first video part. I'm glad it came out.

So what's the situation with Nigel? It seemed like he was really your boy for a minute but I sense that there's some tension now.

Nigel's a little punk ass Long Island nigga but that's my nigga, that's my brother. I ain't gonna lie, I ain't gonna say "Fuck Nigel", Nigel's my homeboy nigga. We'll always be friends even though he don't like me. At the same time he probably do like me, I dunno. I spoke to him lately, we been cool. When I see that nigga, tell him to get a dutch so we can roll something up. That's my nigga.

So I seen your ass on Myspace. You stay getting that Myspace ass or what?

Yeah I got a lot of Myspace pussy lately, I ain't gonna lie. Girls like me, I don't know why.

You fuck 'em up here on the roof?

Yeah I fucked Harlem up here. Yeah I fucked a couple girls up here on the roof. Night time status. If you ain't got a room, use the roof.

So you got anything else to say?

Yeah I'd just like to say that I ride for me, and for all the little kids in my neighborhood who don't have nothing. Where I live, things are rough. Kid's running around in the streets selling candy, asking for change, they ain't got no money. I help them out a lot. Me, I wanna be like Michael Jordan. But not on a basketball court, on a bike. Like I want niggas to say "Yo, that's Blackman son, that nigga rides bikes, that nigga's nice".

So you'd be down to be doing the BMX thing on a real professional level?

Yeah. I wanna show these little kids that there's something else to do in the world besides just being in they neighborhood.

You were talking on the train also about how you feel like a lot of bike riders are just little girls.

Yo, yo, let me tell you what. A lot of kids wear tight pants. That tight pants shit don't rock. We ain't bitches, we bike riders. Y'all skatepark kids, y'all can ride that shit at the skatepark. Don't bring that shit to the hood. Because the streets aren't having that. In the streets you'll get fucked up. There's a lot of good riders. A lot of good riders you gotta watch out for like my nigga Joe, Ralphie, Big James... there's a lot of good riders we got out here.

So are you trying to get up out of here?

Believe me I love my neighborhood. I can't move out the hood. The rent's cheap. Nobody got no 2 grand for no one bedroom apartment. But I mean if I get paid, I'll move out the hood. I'll probably buy a house in the hood. I'm always going to be in my neighborhood though. I'm always going to go around the world and then come back to my neighborhood yo. Niggas in my hood love me. Ain't nothing like your neighborhood.

You got any new shit lined up that you're going to show the world in your video parts?

I mean there are a lot of snakes out there. I don't want no niggas to snake me.

Do you think that's a real problem now? People see someone doing something and all of a sudden everybody is biting?

Yeah man. I mean niggas gotta show respect. You can't be doing shit that everybody else be doing. Like, I crooked grinded the rail at the banks and then I heard some mother fucker came through and did it. I don't give a shit though, I'll do it both ways.

How do you feel about people out there that stay hating on you?

Really I love the haters. If it weren't for the haters nobody would really know who I was.

I heard kids say online that you stole your style from Edwin.

WHOOOOOOOOO. I don't ride nothing like Edwin. I probably did the smith to feeble to hardway 180 like Ed did. But I didn't know he did that shit. I don't ride nothing like Edwin. When people see my video part they'll see I'm different. I don't barspin. I repeat: I do not barspin.

You do whips?

I can do whips, I can do whips on the floor. People ain't seen me do that shit yet. It's all good, I do a lot of shit people ain't seen before. It's cool though, Ed's my nigga. Ed's like my older brother.

You know a lot of BMX kids are out there fronting, wearing big white T's and shit.How do you feel about that?

Niggas gotta stop wearing them big ass white tees. People in Harlem wear big ass white tees, I live in Brooklyn. We don't wear that shit. Everybody got their own style. We wear black hoodies. Not even a black hoodie, just hoodies. If you see a nigga in a hoodie coming at you, run. Just act like where you're from. Don't act like someone else. I'm never changing the way I act. Suck my dick, no homo.

So what is this "no homo" shit all about? I think a lot of people outside of New York don't really understand that shit.

I mean "no homo"... a lot of niggas be saying gay shit so you just gotta say "pause". The real word is "grimey life" man. GRIMEY LIFE. Grimey life is the life I live.

For someone who doesn't understand though, when is the proper time to say no homo?

Niggas with tight pants, they homos. I ain't really gonna say nothing but a lot of niggas might be like "blah blah, fuck blackman" and start crying and shit when I say you got tight pants on. I got tight pants friends. I got a lot of friends.

What's up with the piff? You stay high all day huh.

When I'm broke I smoke schwag, but if I got money I buy some piff. I smoke a little bit of weed and I ride. When I smoke though, I ride fast. I ride like I'm a car. Going fast for no reason. And gearage, I ride a 25-8. I ride my bike real crazy, I got an oversized chain. People might say "what the fuck is that?" but if you look at my bike you know what I'm talking about. I'm not a beast but I don't ride no bullshit bikes. My shit gotta be stabilized.

What are your favorite spots in the city?

Utica banks. Not Brooklyn Banks, Utica banks. A lot of people don't know about those banks, but they're in the hood. I been known about that spot since I was about 8 years old.

I know you used to ride with Adam Armstrong. What do you have to say about that?

That's a really sad story. All I know is he was riding his motorcycle and something else happened, I don't even want to say. I've known Adam since I was real young, coming up. We always used to ride together but Adam used to make fun of me. He was on some crazy shit. Rest in peace to Adam. I'm sorry he's gone.

Do you have anyone you want to thank?

Nah I ain't got nobody I want to thank. I want to say thank you to my bike.