Concert last summer at Operation PUSH's Hyde Part headquarters, the B-kid
equivalent of dervishes leapt onstage and broke into a frenzy of windmills
and helicopters. A fascinated Jekill and Jive viewed the incident as a
zealous affirmation of their Cali-bred skills instead of just plain old
Hip-hoppish anarchy. "They snapped-like old school," Jive swooned
immediately after the concert. "We don't see much of that anymore at
California concerts. Everybody just stands there thinking they're too
cool to dance."
But don't think of Chicagoland as a Great Lakes hope chest for an archaic
art form. B-boys and B-girls from northeastern Illinois have developed
breakdancing into a kind of aesthetic religion. any Hip-Hop set devoid
of footwork, spins, locking and popping in a circle is often branded as
bourgie and surrendered to disco/House or R&B devotees.
Breakdancing music tastes to flock in thier greatest numbers to the Blue
Groove Lounge Hip-Hop sets that DJ jesse de la Pena throws every Monday
at Lincoln Park's Elbo Room. Favorite all-ages breaking spots include
the parties Chicago's Universal Zulu Nation throws sporadically as well
as the Hip-Hop Cafe head the first Tuesday of ever month by Another Level
at Literary Explosion Bookstore in the Wicker Part Guild complex at the
Chopin Theater.
with skills dating back to 1977 when he was a Marshall High School student,
Shaka Pone ( SpaceCapital says "this guy name was Lee back in the 80's,
and he was the best breaker in chicagoland back in the 80's. I still
heard that he is still very good, I will be hooking up with him soon")
to is considered the founding father of Chicagoland breakdancing.
his group Tidal Wave outperformed hundreds of North American breakdancing
crews in the mid-1980's at the National Break-Off in Montreal. At age 34,
he's still a holy terror to reckon with on the floor, as he demonstrated
recently during a Chopin Hip-Hop Cafe breakdancing competition.
Current Chicagoland breakdancing culture has inspired independent record
label tunes fo at least two underground Hip-Hop artists in the region.
this output reflects a respect and fascination for breakdancing culture
that has eluded such major-label Chicagoland artists as Common sense or
Da Brat.
the lone "milk chocolate" member of northeastern Illinois' most developed
lyical crew, III state assasins, E.C. has one cut dedicated to the region's
street terpsichoreans on his current E.CC IIIa LP (Wicked Entertainment)
titled "III Breakers Anthem." One of Chicago's major breaking crews, the
Champions, has become closely associated with the tune, and they can be seen
executing footwork, headspins, windmills and helicopters before the graffiti-
decked wall of Uptown's Graceland Cemetery in the video for the album's
"On III" cut.
South Side-sawned Brickheadz, the Chanpions' chief nemeses, enjoy their own
self-titled son on Stony Island's Supertransfer Good All Day Today (Nalej
Eyeland) EP. the feisty, competitive nature of Chicagoland's breakdancing
crews is demonstrated in the following lyrics from the tune: "you wanna
battle, you're doomed to fail/Breakers rockin' III chicago Knalej from
the motherf**kin' pits of hell/you wanna battle, you're doomed to fail/
Sell the rocks to the hypes 'cause the Brickheadz ain't for sale."
Both the Brickheadz and Champions represented at B-boy exhibitions sponsored
by the Chicago Zulus in an uptown rooer rick and a club in west suburban
Elgin this past winter. Because they've conducted numerous free Break-
dancing clinics throughout chicagoland and performed coast to coast,
Brickheadz are considered the more traveled and community service-oriented
of the tow groups. Among the other crews that regularly represent in
Chicagoland are Drop Squad and Ground Force from Northwest Indiana.
At many a haute B-kid event, 32 year-old Chicago Zulu King Cashus D can be
found barking out break moves like a square-dance caller (he owes his Zulu
roots to All Mighty Zulu Nation dancer shaka; both were breaking at Navy
Pier in 1977). Cashus remembers brekdancing crews gathering every sturday
from all over Chicagoland to flex near the 19th-century water tower at
Michigan and Chicago Avenues before the emergence of new groups resutled
in a Hip-Hop warring period in northeastern Illionis.
Such dancers as 19-year-old Phil Rivera and 22-year-old Aaron Dismuka
(a/k/a Soul) prefer not to affiliate with breaking crews in order to aviod
the beefs that can accompany them. Both take their moves to the hightest
aesthetic levels, incorporating additional steps they've learned from
tap and jazz dance classes. rivera-who condiers himself more a poplocker-
even works mime into his moves. Dismuke overves that there is more flexing
in Chicagoland breaking that in its East and West Coast equivalents.
"Either you're popping or breaking in Los Angeles," says Dismuke, who runs
with Chicagoland's second largest lyrical crew, Elements Of Nature, and
claims dancing with Rock Steady Crew on their first visit to the region.
"There's no mix and match. My roomate says that on the East Coast people
are mostly walking around with a bottle of Moet and trying to get up on some
girl. Here we really go to a partly or club to dance."
Despite simmering beef between some crews, the Champions' line female breaker,
Lady Champ (19), finds that local breakers are most united when northeastern
Illinois dancers battle those from other areas. She also foresees a healthy
future fo Chicagoland's breakdancing culture in a budding generation born
demonstrating moves. She says E.C.'s son D skills and the daughter of his
III State kinswoman Devine are displaying an enthusiasm for spins and foot-
work as toddlers. even Lady champ's own daughter is caught up in the fever.
"they're calling her Baby Champ," Champ beams with bemused maternal pride. "She has her own little pose and wannabe headspins, and she's only two."