Andrew Lovatt: From Paris with Love

When I first met Andrew I thought he was a dickhead. Not for any specific reason other than he was the new loud-mouthed 15 year old kid at the skatepark with long bleached hair and spray-on jeans that thought he knew it all. As the years passed and fashions changed, Andrew slowly became a bit mellower, however still outspoken and the more time I spent with him I was able to see past the rude and topical exterior and see that he was just a dude who loved skateboarding with his friends and felt that anyone or thing that tried to put a stop to that was just harshing his vibe.

A couple of years ago Andrew went to on a short trip to Europe on which he fell in love with a girl whom he had met on the streets of Paris by asking "where can I go and hear some good techno?" After hitting the club with her and consequently spending the remainder of his trip together, Andrew came back to Australia where he was soon joined by his new love. While here on her tourist visa, Andrew and his now girlfriend worked together in Adelaide's notorious 'Sugar' nightclub while simultaneously Andrew began working on his part for the upcoming "Dial Up" video. After 6 months his girl had to return to Paris. After wishing her goodbye, Andrew became a man on a mission, working 3 jobs and skating as much as possible so he could put together his part and save enough money to move to Paris which he did at the end of last year.

Recently I realised I had a few photos of Andrew left lying around from his last few months in Adelaide so I decided to hit him up about the move to Paris and how he was getting along.

What’s the difference between the Adelaide scene and what you’ve experienced so far in Paris?

Definitely that people don’t give a fuck about what they think and what others think around them. So that is good but in ways it very bad because there’s so many little kids thinking that there super good but they can’t even ollie and they snake you like a dog. Scooters here, they’re still hot as shit, kids still use them, its fucked, and adults what else …

I always got told that there’s heaps of rollerblading in France, like France is the only place where rollerblading is still going strong.

Yeah, cause France and Paris is such a free place so many people like… parkour got invented in Paris so there’s so many cunts doing parkour, there’s people doing blading, it’s like dude… It’s fucking heinous but there’s a fucking lot of skaters. There’s so many. I can go out any day and there’s like a nigga out skating. It’s good.

Have you been only skating street? I know when I was living in Europe I never skated a park.

Well that’s the thing, with euro skaters the level must be a little bit lower cause they don’t have the awesome skateparks that Australians and people from the U.S. have. We have amazing skateparks to grow up skating, they just have the raw street spots, you know.

What, like they’re good at street skating but they can’t skate tranny?

Yeah or like the other way round, cunts are good at skating their shitty skatepark but they can’t skate street. Also they pick gay as fuck tricks. Like I’ve found so many people do noseslide shuvs, k grind shuvs like that sort of shit.

Fastplant to 5050

Haha that’s my shit… ok what’s it like vibe-wise? Have you found people hell receptive? What’s it been like trying to get involved in the scene?

*waits for Andrew to finish smoking his bong*

Whew… What did you say? The vibe? I’ve got a friend who I met here last time I was here and he’s a little bit older now and has started filming with a vx and a mk 1, he’s a little bit shaky but into the exact vibe I got, like wallrides and no-complys, you know that… He’s a good dude. And then I’ve got another friend who kind of more like, how do I say it? Like Justin Edwards, backlipping rails and stuff like that. So like I do vibe with him but my other friend I vibe with way more cause we just get to hang out and do no-complys and film iPhone clips.

What about getting used to the lifestyle? What do you think the biggest differences between Adelaide and Paris are?

Well, the weather… Dude the fucking weather sucks dick here. It’s been like minus 2 degrees everyday, one degree… But there’s blue skies. Um… the metro system is fucking brilliant. I love it. I got a metro stop at the bottom of my place and I can go down there any second of the day and there will be a train there and get anywhere in the city and you can just jump the metro’s (not pay) so that’s pretty cool. What else is different? The food. The food here is fucking sick, its expensive but fuck it.

Is there anything you miss about Adelaide?

Dude, there’s many things I miss, probably the top 3 things I miss are the weather. Definitely being able to go out any day and hit up Jimmy and just be able to go film and have a sick time with my friends and being able to just be with my close homies cause I’m never going to be able to have that again. I mean like I can go to the club with them, go skating with them, I can go smoke bongs with them and watch skate videos. I haven’t got that here yet. I really miss my friends and my parents.

What’s the most unique–to-France thing you’ve seen since you’ve been there. Like something you’d never see in Australia?

Just the spots man. Paris has unique architecture and it’s so good to skate. How do I say it man… There’s heaps of plazas so that’s sick. Oh yeah and you don’t see too many fat people. And there’s heaps of beautiful bitches. And I’ve seen, from the amount of time that I’ve been here, that there so many different people, so many different faces, so many fucked up faces. I mean I’ve seen the fucking ugliest cunts out, it’s funny as shit.

50-50

So what was it like with the whole terrorism jib, Je suis Charlie?

Well… it was pretty scary. I was coming home from work and I got a call from my girlfriend saying theres been a terrorist attack at this magazine place and its probably not best to catch the metro. So when I got home, I met my girlfriend at the metro and it was fine, nothing had happened there. It was just a scary time how that shit happened cause we have never really had that happen in Australia. So, it’s pretty nuts. All we did is just stayed inside and got high. I didn’t leave the house for 2 days.

How far away do you live from the magazine?

Probably like 20 minutes away. Its pretty far I guess but they got the dudes. They fucked them up.

So could you see the protest when they had the millions in the streets?

Yeah, I was gonna go with my girlfriend cause so many people showed up. I don’t know, it makes me feel good about Paris because so many people will stand up and so many presidents came just to, you know, be there.

Do you think that’s something that would happen in Australia? Like people would go that crazy?

I think people would go crazy but I think most people in Australia would go crazy and do their hate on the internet. People in Paris just show up and they don’t give a fuck. They’re all about having their freedom of speech so they wanna keep that.

Europe’s always been about going in the streets and getting buck wild.

Yeah. I actually haven’t seen any fights here though.

Ollie - photo Jack Brookes

What are the 3 worst things about Paris?

Okay. Fucking French people pushing in lines. Number one. Tourism and tourists, fucking with their fucking bags. And the weather wait no the price of weed. Yeah put that in there too. The price of weed. Make it a top four. Shit, it’s like I’m paying 70 euros to get a fucking bag.

So I saw you’ve started getting hooked up with some product since you’ve been there, how’d that come about?

I guess in Australia cause the scenes so small it’s hard for companies to sponsor people but here skating’s massive and they sell heaps of shit so the companies are happy to help people out. So when I got here I hit up a couple of companies and element were down. I mean I like Evan Smith and they’re a good company. So I let them know I knew George and was friends with Jack (Crook) and they were like we really like your tape, we’ll send you some boards.

Sick. So you sent them your footage from “Dial Up” right? (An upcoming Adelaide based video in which Andrew has a part)

Yeah. That’s what got me hooked up.

How do you think filming for “Dial Up” is going now that you’re not here to motivate everyone?

I heard it not going as productive as when I was there because I was kinda like a coach I guess, trying to push people to do shit that they didn’t think they could do. Kinda like Evan’s with Streets Made Us but always high.

Evans was high, don’t worry.

That’s good. I mean I don’t think its going as good but I have faith in everyone and that they’ll have awesome parts. I’m glad they got the opportunity to finish their parts and have them the way they want and I’m still able to have my part the way I want. It just sucks I’m not there to be able to see the finished product with my buddies.

No-comply

Any idea when it’s supposed to be coming out?

It’s supposed to be coming out pretty soon. I hope before everyone goes on their euro trips this year cause they’ll be gone for a while. So I think it might happen in a couple of months.

So who’s gonna have the best part?

That’s hard to say cause there’s so many individual styles and so many people not giving a fuck. I’d say my favorite part is gonna be either Caillean Holland or Chris Fletcher because I don’t think anyone really knows what those dudes are capable of or what they have filmed and they got fucking style coming out their asses.

Last question, do you miss Mike?

To be honest I haven’t really thought about it much.

Anything else?

Thanks to all my homies in Dial, everyone in Adelaide, my parents, Jarrod for doing this and shooting the photos. I guess I should say thanks to Element. Make weed cheaper in Paris. Make it legal.

Andrew in Paris - photo Augustin Nnonninnoni

Good read! Mean looking no comply too. What's he doing for work in Paris, and has he learnt french or already knew it? Pretty big life change.

Glad you liked it Tim. Andrew's working as a bartender in an "irish" pub and can't speak much french as far as I know.

This was the photo that was supposed to be in the last post but for some reason stopped appearing....

this shit is hard as !!!!! sweet tricks

2015 baby

KOOK

"know where to hear some good techno?" lol bong on dickhead

"Yeah or like the other way round, cunts are good at skating their shitty skatepark but they can’t skate street. Also they pick gay as fuck tricks. Like I’ve found so many people do noseslide shuvs, k grind shuvs like that sort of shit."

LOL you did a Fastplant to 5050

*waits for Andrew to finish smoking his bong*

i wonder how "fast" that fastplant was? maybe i'll wait for him to finish his bong