Faction

“Music By Skaters For Skaters”. These words; crawled across an early demo by San Jose band The Faction, are written in my mental scrapbook of 80s culture. Bones Brigade, Alva, Pushead, reverse mullets being tossed from side to side, walking around the mall aimlessly on friday night, BMX, checkered VANS, Hip Hop, and Punk Rock… you know, the 80s!

When we worked with Faction bassist/ legendary skater Steve Caballero and artist Chris Shary on a shirt (featuring Cab) a few years back, I couldn’t help but thinking “This puts us one step closer to working with The Faction”! As luck (and a fair bit of creative energy) would have it, we ended up working with Chris and the band a year or so later on a limited edition Faction shirt. Needless to say, stoke level was high. Imagine my excitement when (a few weeks ago) Faction member Adam Segal emailed us asking if we were interested in doing a shirt featuring art from their new record “Greatest Grinds”!

“Greatest Grinds” is the Faction’s final record, following their final live show on February 22, 2020. On the album, the band have re-recorded their 12 most popular songs. Regarding the album Segal had this to say: “We wanted to give the fans the best closure we could, as we never felt the 1980s recordings sounded very good.

Mike Fisher is a well known illustrator and designer from the Los Angeles area who’s worked with an endless parade of amazing bands over the years. Here’s what he had to say about this one: “I was honored to work with a band that I not only love, but consider to be friends. I’ve been along on the journey all these years with The Faction and to be a part of the final chapter seems fitting and a nice bookend” We hope you dig this shirt as much as we do!!! -Charles Cardello