True Guy: Steve O Cealigh

Man True guys, the good ol' days! I finished this vid literally just before I went to oz for a year, I was trying to sort out the dvd's before I was trying to pack my stuff, but I had to leave it in Al's capable hands. Rich Gill said he's sort me out with a photo for the cover, so I thanked him in the credits before I'd even seen it! Turns out Luke did the cover, all I did was give him a photo from a Barcelona trip of Steve getting malled by about ten drunken hands/whale cocks and in me in the foreground looking bleached and out of proportion, it was just a funny photo. Before Al sent me a batch of the dvds to Sydney I was getting texts off people saying "Love the vid man, Keep on rockin in the free world". I'd no idea what they were on about until I got the actual copies, I was so stoked on the job Luke did, he's a funny cunt, and it was good to see he didn't take it too seriously while making it look rad, go Luke!

That vid took over my life for a couple of months in the summer of 2004. I'd never made a video, so I was doing my best to convince the lads that I'd be able to do it proper, Steve was real mellow and was always down to film, but he didn't give a shit in a good way. Like he's do something and everyone's jaw would drop but he never made a big deal of it, was just a fun dude to skate with, a true guy! Definitely the most natural skater I've ever skated with, both in abilty (he could do ANY trick, I witnessed everything from steezed out flip bs noseblunts to Puleo-esque quick feet street madness) and steez, 10kilos of Kerrygold couldn't come close to describing the butteryness.
Quick feet were imperative on the skate stopped trinity bank and the board wide run up flip front crook pop to metal mesh landed, I think he did that second go something insane like that.

When we were trying to finish the video he was back in school, I think in his final year, and I was working at Vodafone. I'd leg it home from work, unplug the batteries, tell ma I didn't want din dins and try meet Steve for the last hour of light, so when we did get to somewhere he'd have to try land whatever it was within minutes, one such occasion being the Dell Rails.
We arrived as the rails, and Steve was gonna try a back lip (he had already flip fs boarded it when sessioning it with Al, while Richard Mulder sat on the cerb and read fuckin' Transworld!)
Anyway, he started getting into the back lips but ground at those rails is yuck yuck, so he was eating shit a plenty, but still going for it. Then security came, out lads, OK. I was ferttin', he was so so close, so we went back, got close, but security came again, real pissed off, out lads, O.K. Went back, same happened, but he really wanted to land it, so he hopped the wall again and nailed it! We went nuts, his bro (James Kelly, brat king!, who almost feebled the rail.) and his mates were stoked, and we thanked security and he went. Cue the footy check- oh shit, tape chewed at the exact point of the back lip! Fwack! I was so pissed off, I remember saying that I wanted to smash my piece of shit camera into the ground, I felt like such a let down after all that hard work. Steve just broke his shite laughing, hoped the wall and landed it first go, and that's the one you see in the vid. What a champ!

The dude ripped spots that the rest of us would laugh at, like the pure grimey triple triple at the start of his part, ye might as well ollie onto a cheesegrater! He was so renowned for being a tech dog and looked so effortless that loads of folk didn't really appreciate how gnar gnar he was. That silhouetted tre flip he did off the kicker outside the Greystone's pharmacy was one of the worst spots I've ever seen, if you ollied that thing you'd be doing extremely well, the grain went the wrong way on the cement and was an inch deep on each groove! Me and Jer couldn't believe that tre, he pulled it out of his "rear end" as Jer might say.



Anyone who skated with Steve will agree that he was one of the most fun people to skate with and one of the nicest dudes out there ~(unlike the sea of cockyness that can be witnessed far and wide) , no big deal mind-bending skills, fry ups for brekkie and some stick ball for lunch! Viva Steve!

The song, what can I say, I love Creedance
here's the link to his part:


http://wallnut.blip.tv/file/630265/