Have you ever seen someone ride a custom mobile SOUNDBOKS through the streets whilst blasting dubstep bangers at full volume? You haven’t?! Sounds like we need to introduce you to Long Beach’s legendary Tails Up community.
This motley crew of personal electric vehicle (PEV) enthusiasts zoom around the coastal streets of Southern California every Thursday like a millennial version of the Hell’s Angels. Instead of grease-stained leather jackets and gas-guzzling hogs, this group opts for LED lights, customized hoodies, and turbocharged scooters.
How An Idea Came To Life
Leading the group on their weekly ride, Chris and SMLS are the driving force behind Tails Up. Longtime members of California’s ever-growing Onewheel and PEV scene, the duo were part of the original crew that formed Tails Up.
Having gone to Onewheel music festival Seek n Shred, they realized a lot of the other riders had traveled from Southern Cali just like them. And just like that, Tails Up was born.
It was just meet up at this parking lot and we'll ride until our batteries die. But eventually, the more of us that showed up, the more of the community that kind of started banding together and meeting up every week
Bringing A Community Together
Like all good ideas, word spread. Soon the ride had gone from a few friends to over 30 members. As the pair put it, Tails Up has turned into a weekly reunion of the family they got to choose. It gives people from all over California a space to be themselves, express their passion, and hang out with like-minded legends.
When you're in the middle of a ride, everybody's carving in the same direction. You're like a flock of birds.
But it’s not just their own community that they’re bringing together. The Long Beach locals get involved too. Hearing music blast out from the SOUNDBOKS as the PEVs whizz by, pedestrians stop, stare, shout, and smile, soaking in the insane vibes this crew creates. For some, seeing Tails Up in action acted as an open invitation. Soon, people started tagging along from the street and joining in throughout the ride.
Once we reached about 20 or 30 people, we would get people tagging along. People would just join us from the streets.
If that isn’t the definition of a good time, we don’t know what is.
Creative Customization
One of the coolest things about this crew is their creativity. Now that may sound cliché but trust us. When you see either of Chris’ custom rides, you’ll understand.
Strapping both a SOUNDBOKS Go and a drinks cooler onto his Onewheeler, it’s hard to miss out there on the road. Shows just how important hydration and good tunes are. As well as this insane ride, he’s constructed a boogie-board SOUNDBOKS 4 mashup to surf through the streets. Whichever one of his PEVs he’s riding, the SOUNDBOKS always gets people looking.
People tend to gravitate towards this new device.
This creativity is a trait shared by all the members of the Tails Up community. Every member has gone all out on the customization, threading LED lights through their grills, plastering their SOUNDBOKS with stickers, spraying crazy designs all over, and upgrading helmets with all sorts of accessories.
If you’re ever in Long Beach, you don’t wanna miss seeing them in action. And with those dubstep bangers filling the air, you’ll definitely hear them coming.
