Euro

Influence is a rather interesting phenomenon in automotive culture. There are, on the whole, three major camps: the European, the East Asian, and the North American, each of which has a near unlimited amount of subcultures and movements. While each of the spheres has their own unique aesthetics, individuals are constantly pulling ideas from each other and blending those designs into their own region's styles. One can look to the American hot-rod culture's influence on the European air-cooled Volkswagens or the American adoption of the Japanese tuner style.  Eventually these influences get passed around so many times, that they end up coming back to the original source in new ways. For example, the Japanese VIP scene was inspired by the large, classy sedans of Europe.  Japanese tuners were drawn to the imposing characters of cars like the Mercedes S Class and BMW 7 series, and sought to apply those same styling cues to their own domestic sedans, mixing the classy Old World style with the existing shakotan look. Michael Milano-Picardi was inspired by that bippu look and has applied it to his own Mercedes CL500; an American, modifying his European sports coupe in a manner invented by the Japanese for to mimic stately European sedans. Wunderbar! Read More »

As the new year comes along, new builds will appear here and there. Most of the time we feature rides once, however, there are builds that are worth mentioning more than once. This is the third time we are introducing Alan's clean black on black BMW 335i coupe. This time it's back with a brand new interior and engine bay. This bad boy is part of the worldwide car group, EuroProjektz. The sole goal of EuroProjektz is to increase the influence of European car builds to the show circuit. This 335i is here to prove that not all show cars need to be over the top. Sometimes there are finer details that are missed. This is a build we wouldn't mind following until the end. Read More »

After years of riding around slammed on coilovers the original Silverstone paint on the arches of Leo's GTI (or what was left of it) was a testament to the old saying "you have to pay to play". So Leo decided it was time for a change... The car recently received a full color change in Toyota's Quicksand color code (that cool color on the FJ cruisers), and the Image IFX's were sprayed in a complimentary BMW Sepang Bronze. Now in order to avoid finding out what brand new burnt Quicksand paint looks like, Leo enlisted the help of Drew Dorbritz of Dorbritz Designs to install his new Airlift struts and AccuAir E-level management. Our friend Tek was on hand to document the entire install on this "Coffee & Cream"  GTI and he put together this beautiful triptych showcasing the finished product. If you would like to see a detailed look at the install and more of the finished product jump over to Dorbritz Designs writeup!

Since it first hit the showroom floors in 2004, the Volkswagen .:R32 has become one of the most well-known and well loved cars of the last 10 years. Featuring face-lifted front and rear bumpers, an AWD drive train, race inspired Konig interior, and the always beloved VR6 motor beefed up to a 3.2L with 240 hp, there aren’t many platforms in the last decade that are better to build up than this. With a sport-tuned suspension from the factory, this powerful little hatch was built to be a pure driver’s car; ready to enter, brake, apex, accelerate and exit every turn it encountered. With these capabilities and build quality, many .:R32 owners are purists who keep their cars bone stock and drive it aggressively like it was meant to be but there are a select few who decide to take it that extra step and give it some beauty to match the beast. Read More »

Some of you may have already ordered your SDobbins Photography 2012 calendar, but for those of you who haven't or are still looking for a 2012 calendar, you're in luck!  For the third consecutive year Performance Volkswagen photographer,  Sam Dobbins, has traveled the country shooting some of the best of the best Volkswagen's and Audi's to compile one of the highest quality, most picture intensive calendars out there! We are happy to announce that for the second year in a row we will be offering a special $5 Off discount to you, our Canibeat readers! Read More »

As the year ends, another season of shows will end with it. To close out 2011, we present our Autocon coverage for you. The event, along with the turn out, was much larger than last year. We were excited to use that opportunity to booth for the first time on the West Coast. Organized as a charity event, the show was a great experience for us, and we enjoyed meeting everyone. We'd like to thank the Royal Origin guys for coming out to show at our booth with their quality cars and hilarious entertainment throughout the day. Four different photographers covered Autocon for us just to make sure we didn't miss anything. Enjoy, and we hope to see you next year! Read More »

Yellow has always been a color that grabs your attention. As far back as the 1960s, you can find the Lamborghini Miura donning the bright shade on it’s exotic body. For the next few decades, it seems that yellow was worn only by Lamborghinis, Ferraris, and other imports but that has changed in the last decade or so. Nowadays, you can drive down the road and see everything from a yellow Cobalt to an Amarillo Edition Ford F-250. It’s almost as if yellow doesn’t catch your eye anymore like it used to but when Volkswagen released the Fahrenheit Edition Jetta in 2007 with a different lip kit, wheels, and trim package, they were definitely trying to turn heads. Read More »

While searching through our blog roll, I found this video by a group out of Russia called "Only Dropped". It appears to have been recorded last summer. Can anyone get us in touch with these guys, or any photographer/videographer in the Russian stance community? We would love to showcase more work from that side of the world.

Canibeat is never too shy of steering clear from the abundance of European cars we feature and there is one model we particularly share a ton of. What? Not again you say? Oh not another Volkswagen? Well the German's didn't name it the "people's car" for no reason and how often do you see a fully shaved matte white MK4 rolling around your hood? Read More »

Dropping a car on nice wheels seems to be enough to get you noticed these days. We’ve become a scene geared towards the aesthetic and as a result, wheels and suspension are usually determined in the owner’s mind many times before they sell their current setup or even buy a car to put the new shoes on. Usually, when you choose a direction for your car, it’s usually form or function in the short run with a long-term goal of both because having a beauty with some beast in the bonnet is always optimal. Many people, however, choose to go mostly in one direction (with some definite attention to the other, though not as much) and carry it to its fullest capacity which is exactly what Rich has done with his sexy, silver sleigh… Read More »