Text: Wooley  //  Photos: Supreme.Digital.La

Want a solid piece of advice you’ll never follow? Well here you go…

If you’re attracted to grassroots import culture and what it’s all about, you need to think about taking a leap of faith. A cleanse. Go onto your computer and/or mobile device today… and delete every social media page that has anything to do with your make/model. Unsubscribe from anything that allows/encourages open comments from morons. And unfollow any amateur page that posts regurgitated photos every hour. You’ll feel MORE of a connection to this culture… by seeing LESS of it. Trust me.

But you won’t, because you’re/we’re addicted to the nonsense. You can’t take a dump, without ‘hearting’ some anonymous, passed-around photos of wheel fitment on Instagram. This is the voice of the new generation, broadcasting live straight from the source… literally the toilet. It’s gone too far.

‘Overexposure’ is a cancer on 21st Century digital life. A disease… masked as entertainment and involvement. We don’t NEED this much exposure. Does it really make you more of a car guy to know every car on the internet? Nah.

You wanna know the fast-track to getting bored, burnt out, and numb to your hobby? Look at 500 newsfeed photos of cars like yours every day, accompanied by 2,000 comments from know-it-all web-nerds… funneling originality & creativity into one lane. You’re living this.

And then we wonder what happened to this culture? It’s no mystery. It’s been brutally gang-raped by underqualification & overexposure. There was a generation, not long ago, that did it their own way. Now – the new generation clicks a ‘follow’ button.

Joe Schneider represents a different era of the import scene. The glory years. And sure – a lot of the founding import-fathers definitely embellish things in their memory. But what’s not embellished, is to say that it was different back then… than it is now. There was less conformity. More guts. We’re not gonna sit here and pretend the Honda scene hasn’t changed. And we’re kidding ourselves if we think it’s ever gonna go back to the good ol’ days. But we are who we are. This is what Joe brings to the table and conforming to the new way would be like putting Drake on your playlist.

Then again, every day is somebody’s ‘good old days’ in the making. This is a book with many chapters. Every chapter adds perspective, color, and content. But it’s important to make sure that the ‘overexposure’ isn’t leaving us with a bunch of repeat pages.