Bence Bálint

Buta's finest!

It's been since the very beginnings of LIVE, pretty much, that we've been sharing the corrosive edits from Budapest's finest, the Rios crew and for an undying reason, too: it's been almost a decade since they started regularly mailing the Internet their unique brand of audiovisual anthrax, every time representing all the urgency of a skate scene that's forever been boiling in spite of the spikes of quite the antagonizing local sociocultural context. The inhabitants don't get it, the bystanders get pissed, the cars freak out on the road first and then their drivers too, in the YouTube comments. A landscape dipped in stress, yet one which doesn't suffice to block the movement of several generations of skateboarders who persist to grow and blossom in between the local pavement cracks, constantly stealing clips from destiny.
 
Mátyás Ricsi is one of those; and, if you may have distinguished his silhouette before in earlier Rios edits or in Push Periodical's "PARTIAL WORLD TOUR", today, he's the main star of the five minutes of footage on the menu. Well, that would be underestimating the role of Bence Bàlint, behind the lens capturing all the moving but also still images - since he also caught many of the tricks in photo form. You can check out a gallery of that, as well as a great interview with Risci on the Grey Skate Mag website. Speaking of which, as Henry Kingsford rightfully observes, most of the spots are bound not to look familiar, regardless of how many Rios clips one already might have watched; that's only testament to the intensive scouting from the crew, focused on exploration before exploitation for close to a decade now and counting.
 
For more things Rios, one can still (re-)read this interview with Bence for Magenta, here; and since just one skater being featured in one of their releases is so rare, might as well send you back to this five-year-old other instance in particular, still as fantastic as when it first dropped and featuring the genius Attila Fehér.
 

 

Panic In Butapest

 
Butapest's [sic] RIOS crew has been the most reliable of go-to's when it comes to punchy skate video output for a while now, accessorily writing their own chapter of the book of European skateboarding via relentless YouTube uploads of just as brutal montages over the years, successfully putting Eastern Europe on the map of a global scene that's otherwise popular for its tunnel vision, in the process.

Activists and active for eons in a local, seemingly just as indomitable society that still holds out against the cultural invader skateboarding is perceived as, you better believe those guys' teeth are sharpened by now; although, if Bence Bálint (interviewed solstices ago on the Magenta website here) hasn't had to prove that he's one of the most crucial (and gifted) skate filmmakers of his generation for a while now, it's still always surprising how the entire crew somehow manages to surpass the quality of their past video productions with every new offering, all the while adding more to the structure of a common style - under their own form as an authentic crew.

LIVE already shared Victor Turcsik's part from their latest release: "TOLÓ 2" just a few days back, after it was broadcasted by Quartersnacks; today, it is the whole piece that we're featuring, straight from the RIOS themselves.

Twenty minutes of raw, ferocious and inventive street skateboarding essentially equates to a full-length video nowadays, and that's exactly what's in the cards here, with love from the finest street ambassadors of a Hungary they help modernize further than it looks ready to, judging from all the pedestrian reactions punctuating the edit with just as many displays of raised guard. Bence documents his local skateboarding as part of a bigger, traditional ensemble that the RIOS love to vandalize with progress, whether the local public likes it or not.

Meanwhile, they also keep weaving the most positive of networks and recently, France's national pride Mickaël Germond as well as Samu Karvonen also chose to jump into the picture - that was before the quarantine, will only fuel your desire for it to end and whatever the case might be, LIVE will extensively cover how that visit came about - real soon, and most likely before you can even recover from the impact of "TOLÓ 2"!

Rios alert!

One just doesn't keep the RIOS crew locked in easily and, in spite of the cancellation of the Paris premiere of their new video "TOLÓ 2" (amongst other features and festivities), here they are still sharing a bite via Quartersnacks. And said portion is no joke quality-wise as it happens to be from the lion's share: we're talking Victor Turcsik's section, which is somehow even greater than his latest solo web clip (and may we also provide a link to Attila Fehér's contemporary Vienna clip while we're at it).

Viktor's approach to barely-spots is sharper than ever, with some improbable violence on wallride variations and against the friction of many an unpractical surface. Meanwhile, Bence Bálint hereby signs some of his finest production work to date, which only leaves us hyped for the full video!

Pristina affair

Generally, any new incoming video transmission from the Rios warrants stopping in one's tracks - and that is, for as long as they can appreciate the subtleties of gritty street skating footage. Bence Bálint is a filming and editing wizard, forming with illustrator Buta Jani quite the efficient duo and with the Budapest locals, a combo the feats of which have only been documented in succession. Their output is always raw, brimming with group energy of their own and today, they're back at it with this new edit of a trip to Pristina, the capital and largest city of Kosovo. Sweet Skateboards and Vans gave them a hand, the VX-1000 was the weapon of choice and in order to learn more about the Rios, click here for a classic interview with the crew, on the Magenta website.

"Dunja" / Rios Crew x Belgrade Zoo / PREMIERE

It's not just that the Budapest-based Rios Crew no longer needs an introduction, but also that they may not want any. They made another video featuring them alongside the Belgrade Zoo gang in Montenegro then zoning around Croatia with some old acquaintance, called "Dunja" (see below!), regardless of the mere existence of such considerations.

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