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Dear: Fellow BBO'ers


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"MOTORCYCLE MAVERICKS" with Arlen Ness & featuring the Ness aftermarket empire, which aired last night on TLC was absolutely awful !!!!!

As with my assertions regarding Russ Mitchell's version of MOTORCYCLE MANIA, there was so much wrong with this presentation I hardly know where to begin...!
But I'll try anyway...


FIRST, and always foremost, are the bikes themselves. Now, I'm not a professional mechanic by any means...I'm not a mechanic at all...so I'm definitely not an expert on design & fabrication.
However, It would seem appropriate that If a builder's name is to appear on a bike, then maybe that individaual should actually touch it at some point.
In fabricating the Ness JET BIKE the ubiquitous BOB MONROE was the only one shown building the bike.
I've seen this Bike in magazines...accompanied by the requisite pictures of ARLEN NESS sitting astride this machine with a smirk on his face as If this was a great accomplishment for him.
After what I saw last night, Arlen should be ashamed of himself passing off someone else's fab job as his own simply because he apparently 'sketched' out the design on a piece of paper.
When JASON KANGAS of "TWISTED CHOPPERS" sketched his bike design on a piece of paper in his kitchen, he at least had the notion to follow it up with fabrication by his own two hands.

I really can't believe what I saw last night. Just a mess.
One sure sign of lack of credibility in fabrication is when a builder's style is reminicent of an OCC fab job. That's excactly what [we] got last night -- A PAUL Jr. of OCC build special -- have someone else fab your ideas while you walk around like a king or something.

Now, to me, It's fine to work this way If the bike is one of the NESS' production bikes, but not If ARLEN or CORY, in essence, 'signature' their bikes as an artist would a work of art that he/she did not actually create. In my opinion, that's exactly what ARLEN & CORY NESS did last night with their respective "builds": the JET BIKE & the DUAL BELT DRIVE, 145 S&S engine bike.



SECONDLY, the showcasing of the "HAMSTERS" bike club was absolutely awful; easily the worst thing about the show.
BIKER BUILD OFF fans have seen this particlar group profiled on the PEREWITZ/YAFFE show, and I am assuming feel as sick to their stomachs as I do about this group.
I can't stand this group !!!!
Can you believe this bunch of SNOBS ??!!
Come on...is there anything more SNOBBISH or ELITIST about a biker club that requires it's members to possess custom bikes?
It's all about making yourself feel superior to others by coming up with a reason to exclude people.
I thought being a biker was about brotherhood ??
It was absolutely sickening to me to see these rich jerks pat themselves on the back by creating a reality in which they constantly remind themselves that they have something many people simply can't afford; as If this lends credibility to their self-perceived greatness.
Also, to be honest, the bikes the HAMSTER's were riding completely represented the ignorance of this pathetic group. The bikes were ugly, loud, oversized, over-chromed, over-accented pieces of ostentatious junk.
The exact type of bike that plays into the egos of guys like the HAMSTERS, OCC, and OCC clients.

Like a lot of the bikes the NESS' seem to produce, there was no truly discernable design aesthetic amongst the heavily NESS parts-laden machines.
Most of the bikes shown, especially those of the "HAMSTERS", seemed to have no flow or recognizable pattern.
They all looked liked giant, shapeless lumps of chrome, and possessed terrible "look at me" paint jobs; accentuated with the same type of huge, over-wrought NESS accessories such as front-ends, wheels, bars, etc.

Unlike the work of true builders such as an INDIAN LARRY, the HAMSTER's bikes really had no reason to be built other than as expressions of monetary excess and ELITISM.
INDIAN LARRY always seemed to have had a reason to create a bike.
He always seemed to draw upon some philisophical intent and/or spiritual underpinning on which to build.

The HAMSTER stuff just made me sick okay !!!

The FLOOD that transpired is exactly what the HAMSTERS deserved. It was almost biblical in Its intent, although this is just my Schadenfreude-inspired assertion however.

Schadenfreude -- is a German word meaning 'pleasure taken from someone else's misfortune.(From Wikipedia).

The "HAMSTER" whose bike was practically washed away; the others whose expensive, over-chromed behemoths were duly subjected to the mud, dirt, & filth brought forth by the storm is a lesson to any of us wishing to parade the over-chromed fruitfulness of our existence so shamelessly as the they did.



THIRD, Now personally, I don't have anything against the NESS', and ARLEN NESS has rightfully earned his reputation & wealth through dedication and hard-work.
However, last night's production was simply an hour-long commercial regarding the NESS after-market empire, and had little to do with biker culture and true ground-up customiztion.
Also, the NESS' seem to have an all-encompassing build philosophy of "bigger-is-always-better": Bigger engines, bigger tires, bigger front-ends, bigger tanks, etc.
Obviously this is simply not always the case.


FINALLY, The standard STURGIS stereotypical trashy fare doesn't make up for any short-comings in the production's allusions to biker subculture either.
I'm not even going to get started again on these ignorant Biker Rallies, but the "cole-slaw wrestling", tattooed guys who should keep their shirts on, and tired-looking women like the woman walking down the street in broad daylight with butt-less cowboy chaps is just simply old, tired, and lame at this point.
There is no authenticity here anymore...just people playing up to sterotypes of Biker Rallies that they have seen on old EASYRIDER MAGAZINE videos.


Another lame production, although not from HUGH KING & THOM BEERS this time like the recent RUSS MITCHELL version of MOTORCYCLE MANIA.

Just lame....



-- THANKS --