REVIEW | BREAKIN’ CONVENTION – SATURDAY MAY 2ND: HIP HOP REDEFINED THROUGH BOUNDARY-BREAKING DANCE AND RAW EXPRESSION

By Rohun Batra • On Reviews

Gary-Clarke Photo Cred­it: Paul Hampartsoimian

If you thought you were in for a day of typ­ic­al Hip Hop styles, you were in for a sur­prise. Jonzi D hos­ted a night of eclect­ic per­form­ances and dance styles, each with found­a­tions of typ­ic­al hip hop dan­cing. From pop­ping to lock­ing, each set of per­formers mod­i­fied their routines to mould their pref­er­ences, giv­ing us all an array of move­ments that we had nev­er seen before.

Let It Hap­pen kicked off the even­ing show with clean move­ments, cre­at­ive cho­reo­graphy and energy that res­on­ated with every­one in the crowd. A total of 4 females dom­in­at­ing the stage, and to a wider extent, the whole room with moves that were both famil­i­ar but excit­ing. Song selec­tion was key here, with the crowd def­in­itely get­ting hyped of Tupac being used as a track.

This was fol­lowed by Gary Clarke, show­ing us a mov­ing dance per­form­ance that moved the crowd. Show­ing us the extent of what Lon­don is about, the dance was dif­fer­ent yet famil­i­ar and got the crowd excited for what was to come. Show­cas­ing a city in a per­form­ance is a chal­lenge, but noth­ing the dan­cers weren’t pre­pared for. They showed us the grit, grime and grav­ity of what it means to grow up in Lon­don, all trans­lated into an excep­tion­al dance performance.

ILL-Abil­it­ies Photo Cred­it: Paul Hampartsoimian

ILL-Abil­it­ies came next and sur­prised the whole crowd. Usu­ally if someone has a phys­ic­al impair­ment, we assume that they are lim­ited in what they are able to do. This was not the case here. With energy from with­in, these two tal­en­ted indi­vidu­als over­came any dis­ab­il­it­ies they may have and showed us what can only be described as phe­nom­en­al. Using walk­ing sticks to aid move­ments, the syn­chron­icity was out­stand­ing and really made you think ‘they can do all of this, yet I have two left feet with no impairments’.

We then had AS Com­pag­nie with an impress­ive show of pop­ping abil­it­ies. Mind you, this was def­in­itely not a nor­mal dis­play of dance, and was very exper­i­ment­al. If you were new to the scene, you may have thought that this felt extremely ran­dom, but true dan­cers knew the skill it took to pull off not only the moments they have, but the memory to remem­ber it all.

After the inter­val we were intro­duced to a mix­ture of dan­cers that the world may have nev­er truly appre­ci­ated, but every­one inside these 4 walls did. Y.O.U Com­pany gave us their inter­pret­a­tion of dance before Bel­lando showed us a power­fully mov­ing inter­pret­a­tion of what it means to be in love, yet not have the oth­er love you back.

From play-fight­ing to express­ing intim­ate desires, the cho­reo­graphy was intense, highly detailed and com­pas­sion­ate, yet neither dan­cer missed a beat. What you may describe as what looked like ‘mak­ing love on stage’ came a com­pel­ling per­form­ance of emo­tion and intimacy.

Bel­lando Photo Cred­it: Paul Hampartsoimian

We also had more tra­di­tion­al bboy­ing / break­dan­cing with Rock Force crew, as they showed us what it means to take it back to the roots. Hard-hit­ting moves, insane core strength and everything you’d expect. Think Jab­ba­wock­eez and you’re almost there. They showed their skills by giv­ing us a battle-style show and truly, they just enjoyed every moment on stage. That’s what dance is, that’s what dance should be, and that’s what dance will be to us; pure enjoyment.

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Rohun Batra

Rohun AKA Poet­ini­at­ive is a UK-based writer. With a huge interest in Korean Hip Hop and RnB, he looks to devel­op fur­ther into this music scene, and hope­fully work as an artist with­in the scene one day.

About Rohun Batra

Rohun AKA Poetiniative is a UK-based writer. With a huge interest in Korean Hip Hop and RnB, he looks to develop further into this music scene, and hopefully work as an artist within the scene one day.