Rockers Contribute To Tony Hawk’s Skateboard Auction

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Reporting Marilyn Nelson

Remember the endless hours you and your buddies spent in your driveway or the street in front of your house knocking out your best 360 or kick flip? So do a lot of rock stars. In an effort to help preserve the favorite pastime of their youth, many have teamed with Tony Hawk to help build skate parks.

Paul McCartney, Tom Petty, and the late Beastie Boy Adam Yauch put pen to skateboard to contribute one-of-a-kind creations for the Tony Hawk Foundation. The rockers were asked to write song lyrics on skateboard decks to be auctioned off at an upcoming skateboard auction. More rockers are expected to participate, including Elton John.

Hawk selected one his own old boards and approached McCartney. “I decided I’m going for broke and get a Beatle,” he tells Rolling Stone. “I thought, ‘If I’m going to do this, I’m going to for the top.” To Hawk’s surprise McCartney agreed. “He told me his grandson skates and he tried doing it with him fairly recently – and decided he should not be doing that,” he said.

McCartney is writing the lyrics to “Blackbird” on a deck to be put up for auction.  Petty is donating a deck with the words to “I Won’t Back Down.”

Two months before Yauch passed away he got involved in the project. At the time they didn’t know how sick was when the foundation asked his to participate, and probably wouldn’t have asked if they’d know, but Adam “responded immediately, and enthusiastically.” He used three decks to write out the words to the Beastie Boys’ Bodhisattva Vow.”

The funds raised from Boards + Bands will be used to create public skate parks in low-income communities across the U.S.

Money raised from the sale of Adam’s decks will stay in his hometown, and go to a skatepark in New York City.

The online auction is scheduled for November 29th.  Check out www.TonyHawkFoundation.org

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