The Freshest Kids Page #5

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You know, I wanted to learn it so bad and they used to just make fun of me back then

Cuz I was so small they wouldn't even pay attention to me

And then when I saw New York City Breakers, I was like "Oh sh*t!"

There was a lot of breakers everywhere

And we had this Youth Center called the Radiotron

And a lot of the roughest kids from Los Angeles were kicking back at that center

Everyone would know the Radiotron

Everyone would know Ceaser

Max was big, Orko was very big

Like everyone would be here, I mean you would see everyone from everywhere

L.A. was behind New York terribly at the beginning

What it was, was we were just finding spinning moves and that's what we adopted

Because that's what we saw, New York had so much style

But their spinning wasn't up to par

As far as L.A.

L.A. started just rising

I mean, I'm proud to say that I'm from the West Coast

We are proud of our West Coast roots

You know, we're proud of Popping and Locking

Los Angeles was a real hot bed for new dance

And new hot things going on

Locking is the very first professional Street Dance

Locking was created by Don Campbellock Campbell

Some time in the late '60s

He was trying to learn how to do the Funky Chicken, he was like a real wild flower alright

He couldn't do it

And he stumbled on to this style of locking

I didn't meet Don until '69, I stuck with my all night prayer meeting

With this club called Maverick's Flats

And I looked across the dance floor, this guy was doing something that was just awesome!

I'd never seen anything like this in my life, what is this!

Locking is, comes from dance locking

This is Uncle Sam Point

Everything in Locking has a name

Knee drops, Uncle Sam Points, Locking, Wrist Rolls..

Playing with the hat, all of that has a name

Locking was a lifestyle

You would wear some tight clothes

You walked a certain way

You didn't look in Locking

You...LOOK, or...

You didn't point in Locking

You...

I was watching Rerun, Michael Jackson when he was doing the robot, the Jackson 5..

I was watching Jeffery Daniels popping on Soul Train

And I started trying it, you know what I'm saying?

I just started jumping off chairs, trying to do the dive

The "popping" movement was a combination of locking and the robot

Breaking came from the East, but Popping came from South Central to West

Talking to Pete, he was the first one to start "hitting" or "popping"

The actual "pop" part of it was Fresno California

Popping is really, really minute, it's like this...

See that's, that's...

Popping is like, like, like...This is Popping

Strut, Strutting is continuous movement in the same direction

And then there's Ticking..

And then Hitting is this..

When I hit, it reminds me of like a gangsta perspective

From where I come from, so when I hit, I hit like I'm getting ready to fire on

You know what I'm saying?

My Hitting comes from the hood! You know?

It didn't come from me, it came from the hood because I had that..

Gangsta vibe, you know?

Real niggas wanted to see real niggas hit

Popping and Boogaloo are 2 different styles

Boogalooing was like really loose..

So if I'm Popping here, if I'm Popping..

Then I'm here, I can hit, and then I can Boogaloo at the same time

And move, you know what I'm saying?

So Boogalooing is like, you're moving the body, you're turning

Your head's going, your body's going another way

Pete told me that his influence, besides that of seeing his brother

From San Francisco, there was a group called Demons of the Mind and Close Encounters of the Funkiest Kind

2 different groups that used to perform at San Francisco Pier

We didn't realize until later on that yes we were, we are a part of the Hip Hop culture!

The cultures blended along time ago

The brothers that represented the most in New York, always had respect for the West Coast

Always.

We were obviously inspired by the styles from over there

I mean, we were really far apart man

And to have both of these dances come from 2 distant places like that

And then come together man, that was like mad incredible

This is called Break Dancing, or Breaking

Like Rapping, it's a competitive display of style

The dance is a form of ritual warfare

After the initial splash of Break Dancing it became a phenomeon

And it was all about Break Dancing, at least as far as the media was concerned

As soon as the man with the money said "Hey we can make money off of this here.."

That's when it blew up, that's when it really blew up..

Remember when they came out with those books..

"Place your right foot perpendicular to your left ankle.."

This guy was selling cardboard, he had a company making cardboard boxes that you carried with you..

And opened up that says "The Oz Rock"

When we got on the train, there would be kids breaking

And when you went to the city their would just be people breaking

You know it was just all over the place

It was falling out of closets, coming from under the cars,

Looking around, I mean hanging from the ceiling, popping in!

I mean, it was everywhere, it was like "Daaamn!" You know..

"Ooh Damnnn!"

That's when the Olympics came..

What, 4 Billion people saw the Olympics

We are the pioneers of taking Break Dancing mainstream

Ladies and Gentlemen, Homeboys and Homegirls, the New York City Breakers!

We, the New York City Breakers, we certainly comercialized it more than any other crew did

We got it on to big shows..

And in advertisment

Probably culminating with this big television show..

That Ronald Reagan was at..

It was some big presidential performance and they had Break Dancers performing on national TV

And it was like, "What is going on?!"

And Break Dancing just spread so wide, I mean they had cardboards on every street corner

It was like, I think it even hit more bigger than it hit New York

And it went in every mall, malls had to close down

Sometimes they had things where kids were doing windmills and falling down stairs and getting up

Hitting customers while they were shopping

It was so packed that the police would go undercover

They would wear undercover uniforms and just arrest kids for Break Dancing

The media just fed into it and grabbed whatever breaker they could get

They were like "Well hey, if you can just do anything we'll take you!"

Make this election different, this year vote, break..

And make it count more

And more..

And more!

And more!

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is not the..

You are Ken Swift, right?.. Yeah

Rock Steady traveled all over the world and then next you know, "Boom!"

Beat Street came out and..

"Yo what's off?"

"Yo man y'all are biters, all your homeboys are biters!"

"Y'all are wack, so what's up with that?!"

"Yo, what are you talking about man, I never stole no moves from you!"

"All your moves ain't worth a bit! So what's up with that, punk?!"

"Punk?! Who you calling a punk?!"

And then "Boom!", Rock Steady and New York City Breakers in mad force

Chillin' in France, we was buggin! We was buggin!

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