Memo to MTV: “Pimp My Bike” = Ratings Gold

Via TreeHugger, this YouTube clip features Oakland’s Trunk Boiz boasting about their scraper bikes, which sport custom-painted frames and rims to match (more photos here). The video has become an online sensation, drawing more than two million views. Tyrone Stevenson, one of the creators of the scraper bike style, is ready to capitalize, reports NPR:

"Oakland has been taken over by scraper bikes," says Stevenson. "On
the Internet, it is worldwide. There’s people from literally across the
world making these bikes, from Portland, Oregon, to Japan to Australia
to Jamaica."

Stevenson says he’s already making a living
scraperizing bikes, but he’s got big plans for the future: trademarks,
patents and, someday soon, a scraper bike shop.

Stevenson’s rhyme also includes the heavy favorite for Streetsblog’s 2008 Lyric of the Year:

I’m movin’ on my scraper bike
I’m cruisin’ on my scraper bike
My scraper bike go hard
I don’t need no car

That’s the sound of America’s youth culture catching up to the Japanese.

  • E.Q.

    I used to watch this show sometimes on MTV in Germany. Good for bike-pimping inspiration. Some of the thrift-store/total junk bikes really were made into beautiful and enviable objects. There it’s called “Pimp Mein Fahrrad”, which means, of course, “Pimp My Bike”. It’s very popular.

  • Jessica Roberts

    “Pimp mein fahrrad” doesn’t seem to exist anymore…too bad; it was pretty funny!

  • matthew

    This is even funnier if you’ve seen the cars they are riffing off of, with huge scraper rims. Often the car’s owner has sawed the fenders down with very rudimentary cutting instruments, leaving them jagged and sharp. Or they jack the car so high up on a lift kit that it would tip over with a gentle push

    Oaktown what up!

    http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f219/phat_tc21/box_chevy.jpg
    http://www.anniemayhem.com/blog%20pics/WildCar.jpg

  • matthew

    oh yeah, and ghost ride that bike!!

  • Did they just say ‘stay away from Lezbos’?

    Thanks for giving these retards hits, Streetsblog.

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