11th December 2009 Review by Stuart Nettle. I was a hyperactive child, with a quick but erratic mind. Given my inability to focus, books didn't feature much in my childhood. The closest I came to literature was the slew of surf magazines I received each month and kept strewn across my bedroom floor. But there was one slight exception to my academic indifference. My old man had a good mate, Phil, who used to look after me when I was young tacker. Phil was a keen surfer and a bit of a reader too. I always looked forward to spending time at Phil's house because I could read the surf books that he had stacked on his shelves. And he had a few. Unlike my magazines they were robust and timeless. They defied the pop culture tendencies of surfing and were obviously created with longevity in mind, not the monthly gossip cycle. And the pictures! Of headlands that I recognised with nary a house nor road to blight the scene, of barrel-chested blokes doing odd things on large, cumbersome boards. Even as a naive young'un I was awed. My favourite was The Australian Surfrider by Jack Pollard; it was the first one I'd pull off the shelf whenever I visited and I never tired of reading it. Old Phil must've realised my fondness because he allocated it to me in his will and since he passed away it's taken pride of place in my surf-book collection. Aside from the obvious sentimental value, my enjoyment of it hasn't waned. For the last three years The Australian Surfrider has shared top-shelf space with another book that I've become attached to. That being: Switch-foot. Self-published by NSW north coast surfer Andrew Crockett, it's a beautifully bound and printed collection of classic photos, anecdotes and interviews. Crockett won the Australian Surfing Hall of Fame Media Award for Switch-foot and now, three years later, he has backed-up that release with Switch-foot II. Considering the title I shouldn't have to tell you that Crockett's second installment continues in the same vein as the first. It's not just a sequel though (and nor is it, as cynics might believe, outtakes from the first book). The story goes that, upon release of Switch-foot, Crockett was inundated by surfers and collectors looking to air their own photos and see them in print. And with 368 pages, including ninety 'Legends Of The Lens', in Switch-foot II it is clear that there were quite a few fellows who may not have been tapped into the Evans/Witzig surf-media machine of the 60's and 70's but were still shooting their Bolexes wherever they went. Switch-foot II doesn't spend all it's time in those decades however. Keen observers might recognise contemporary names from the fringes of our sport: Nathan Oldfield, Alex Kopps, Justin Crawford, Terepai Richmond (in the best Shark Island sequence I've ever seen), Ryan Heywood and more. All contribute incredible images or words. So what is the theme that unifies all these photos and stories? Where is Crockett coming from? Perhaps the book's byline best explains his position: 'The other side of surfing'. When the dominant aspect of our sport is competition, the professional realm and even celebrity, how do we connect with 'the other side'? Of course you can simply go surfing, but what part of our culture binds all those people uninterested in the media-saturated aspect of surfing? Where is their common ground? I'm not completely sure, but with photos of boards unadorned of logos, surfing unadulterated by competition, and even countryside untouched by man Switch-foot II is a good place to start looking. If it sounds like Switch-foot II is the work of an idealist then I'd have to agree with you. But then again this isn't a philosophical treatise, it's a surf-book. But it's a surf-book that made me smile. And it's also one that will sit on my bookshelf for a long, long time. Switch-foot II is $90 and available to purchase through the Switch-foot website. //STUART NETTLE