If you haven’t taken notice of Carl Aikens’s rising star over the past year, then you haven’t been paying attention. The Chicago-by-way-of-Santa Clarita native has been getting a ton of coverage since transplanting to Brooklyn last summer. He linked up with Naquan Rollings of Gang Corp fame, and dropped a heavy clip that firmly planted him on our collective radar. This was followed up with his Chocolate introduction in January, and more footage in the brand’s T.O.N.Y. tour video shortly after. Aikens is clearly emerging as one of the prominent figures of skateboarding’s next generation; so we wanted to take the opportunity to document his story during his ascent. He rolled through our studio last week for an in-depth conversation with Lee that covers his history, come-up, current events, future plans, and much more. Get familiar with this legend in the making via the latest episode of Mission Statement. There’s no doubt that we’ll be seeing much more of him in the years to come.