Bollie recently came out with a new deck shape, and after some kindness from the lovely people over at Blackriver I got one for free to review! After using it for ages and doing some investigations, I'm ready to do my review, so here it is. First, pictures.
Shipping of this deck was really good, just a few days from Germany to the UK as it came with a huge order I placed for Fingersized. 10/10
First impressions of this deck I was stoked on how nice the graphic was! Its always been one of my favourite graphics from the Berlinwood/Bollie line up, so seeing it on a new deck is always a good thing. The shape reminded me a lot of something so I had to investigate, but I'll cover that moreso in a sec. Nonetheless everything looked great, and nice little touches such as rasta plies and a stamp on top finished it off perfectly. 10/10
Craftsmanship on this deck is nearly flawless. It should be, because its made by machines in a factory. Yes, these are china decks, and normally I'd hate a deck for that, but this one is different. Not only do they put a graphic on afterwards, but this has perfect holes, and REALLY crisp pop, and a nice lacquer too. Every other china deck I've tried has been terrible to be honest, certainly not to the level of these. The edges could have done with rounding more, but that's the only downside to this, otherwise its crisp and setup was effortless. Nice 30mm wide shape too. You might just read this as 'oh, here's someone being bias to BRR again' - but they couldn't get their current deck supplier (flat shape bollies are made in Germany) to make a new shape for them, so they went down this route. Why? Because kids are gonna buy these china products anyway, so isn't it better they have an option to do so and support fingerboarding, rather than line the pockets of some ebay company? I admit I'm not stoked to know where these come from, BUT these are customed with BRR perfection and made with a lot nicer quality woods than the standard china decks it seems, so I don't overall think it's bad. 9/10
Performance of this deck is pretty nice! It pops for days, and the wear graphic being the same type Berlinwood use, slides off really nicely and realistically. My park is quite gentle on decks, so the graphic hasn't worn much at all, but I'm sure concrete and unfinished marble will make some nice slide marks. The concave is a little deep for my preference, but I found myself able to do all my tricks on it almost as easily as any other deck. I had a bit less control on it than a deck with lower concave, probably because I'm not used to having to get my fingers so much into the concave of a deck (for example, on 180 tricks I found I'd have to put much more effort in to get my fingers into the deck to be able to control it for another trick after said 180 trick) - but I think its a fantastic shape for beginners. And that's really what the aim of these decks are, low price point sick decks for people to get into fingerboarding with. However overall I think for non beginners its just a little too hardcore. 8.75/10
Overall whilst the origin of these decks will probably cause sad faces on those in the core of the scene, I think they're a great beginner deck. AND they are soo much better crafted and perform soo much better than standard china decks, due to I imagine BRR getting them specially made, not just clicking 'buy it now' on a deck from a wholesale site. And that's really been my dislike of mass produced products - the lack of thought that goes into them. Perhaps a little too hardcore for some people to enjoy, but if you like things at least medium on your kicks and concave, you'll really get on well with these decks. And I think its great that BRR offer such a low price graphic deck that fills the gap nicely between tech deck and professional high end decks. 9/10
Go check these on Blackriver here :)