I saw the hottest thing I’ve seen on TV in years the other night: the finale of American’s Best Dance Crew. If you want to instill nationalism in today’s youth and fight their disenchantment, simply promote shows like American’s Best Dance Crew. America is a mixture of many cultures and the people of each geographic region have various characteristics. I have been exposed to people from every area. I lived in DC, which is a mix of north and south. My husband is from the Midwest and I am from the West: THE WEST SIDE! The final episode was a battle between all the crews from each region of the country.
The first dance was the Westside, made up of teams from San Diego, Hollywood and the OC. They were the most diverse group with many Asian, black, white, female and male dancers. His dancing was slower, more skillful, fluid and funky, like Snoop Dogg’s voice. Their movements were more precise and sharp than any other dance team with a very complex choreography. The West is always the most creative and uses visual effects through clever positioning. During their dance, they simulated driving a lowrider with the hydraulics bouncing to the beat and ended with everyone doing their own b-boy stance displaying west side symbols. They were by far the most modern equipment.
The next dance was the South and they showed everyone why they call it the Dirty South. They danced to Lil’ John and danced low (I mean they seemed to be sitting on low chairs). They showed how someone is supposed to dance to the crunk beat: slow and powerful, hitting each beat hard. They did a lot of stomping and the girls twisted their hips with their legs spread wide towards the audience. The South had the best dancers and their big, strong, shiny thighs were hard to miss. They had the most explosive intense energy. Towards the end of the dance, a guy does a somersault and the girls bend over and touch their toes (as the song says) facing the crowd and shaking them as they walk backwards and the guys pretend to tap them with drumsticks. I was in awe at first, but the dance really summed up what I had seen in dance clubs in DC for a while. People in DC do those moves every weekend at the club. The south has a gritty sexuality that is unmatched by any other region and vaguely resembles a style of African Bantu dances. This was my favorite dance of the night.
The third dance was the Northeast, represented by teams from Boston and Jersey. They looked very clean dancing LL Cool J. His stunts were great as always. One guy ran up the stairs of people and did a somersault from the top; however, his dance was not original and his movements were imprecise. They ended up bursting the campaign glasses. (Ending Northeast snobbery – how perfect!) The dancing was as weak as the region’s hip hop.
The last dance was from the Midwest and they always exceed expectations. There was a men’s roller skate team from Indiana and a women’s team from Chicago dancing to Pop Lock and Drop It. They blended perfectly with intricate choreography. They started and finished the dance with one team holding the other like puppets. They all dressed like healthy children. They danced so well that it was hard to tell if everyone was on roller skates or if no one was on roller skates. They did some great break dancing and blew it up a lot. They were like the cute white boys next door flirting with the sweet naughty girl with the pigtails.
No wonder, at the end of the episode, Randy Jackson crowned (wearing hip-hop baseball caps) the JabbaWockeeZ as America’s Best Dance Crew. Their dances surprised me every week and had a style that no one had seen before. Randy says they are the future of hip hop but I don’t know if anyone else can do what they do. For the semi-finals they worked with a mixer to compose their own music with a Jaba-style dance. The song begins with applause and a black man preaching. They applaud like mimes and one pretends to be a microphone while the other pretends to be a speech. They then slowly dance in formation following the rhythms of the violin. They danced completely in unison with sharpness and made beautiful movements with their fingers fluttering and then a low hip hop beat played. They all adopted their own b-boy stance and their leader started doing the most amazing break dance I’ve ever seen. You have to check it in the following link. The song ended with the sound of rain and her fingers falling and pointing to the sky to remember her crew member who died at the beginning of the show. The reason I’m writing this is because the JabbaWockeeZ aren’t just dancers, they’re illusionists as well. They wear white masks and gloves that hide their identity to create a pure interpretation of the music. They have a positioning that deceives the eye. They had this unique pose where it looked like an 8 foot man was levitating in the air, having three men kneeling in front with the upper half of one body and the lower half of another sticking out on either side a foot from the grounder. . They also used props like wheels for a car made of JabbaWockeeZ and bounced around like a low rider. They are like Cirque du Soleil meets the streets. They have created an amazing cultural phenomenon among our youth that should not be ignored. This is the Broadway of the youth of hip hop, which is now being introduced in the United States.
http://www.mtv.com/overdrive/?id=1583319&vid=217727
