Review: UK B‑Boy Championships 2017

There’s a buzz that goes through the Lon­don hip hop dance scene when the UK B‑BOY CHAM­PI­ON­SHIPS  comes around for its yearly event.  A Hip-Hop dance com­pet­i­tion cre­ated by DJ and Pro­moter, Hooch James, over the course of two days, B‑boys, B‑girls, Pop­pers, Lock­ers, Free­style Hip Hop and House dan­cers, from all over the UK and aboard, com­pete to see who will be crowned cham­pi­on of their style.

This year Day 1 of Champs star­ted on Sat­urday April 7^th in Peck­ham.  Going down in Block A of the Bus­sey Build­ing’s CLF Art Café, Champs took over 3 floors of the ware­house, blast­ing music  that rumbled up and down the stair­case and mark­ing the areas where the battles would take place with the lino of their part­ners, Relent­less Energy Drink.

The Break­ing Solo battle took place on the second floor, with DJ’s Khan Fu and Jam Fu spin­ning the beats, and MC Swifty on the Mic.  On the third floor Dami­en Any­asi was MC and DJ’s D.bo, Mr Blue and Rob Manga played the music for the dan­cers com­pet­ing in the stand up styles of Pop­ping, House, Free­style Hip Hop and Locking.

Image cour­tesy of Relent­less Energy

With some styles hav­ing over 100 com­pet­it­ors signed up to com­pete, judges picked the best 16 Break­ers, Pop­pers, House and Free­style Hip-Hop dan­cers, from show­case battles.  In the 2on2 Lock­ing they picked the top 4 pairs to go imme­di­ately through to Day 2.  The styles with 16 dan­cers then battled down to the top 4, in a knock­out com­pet­i­tion, to see who would also go through to Day 2, and battle on the main stage.

Com­pet­i­tion qual­i­fic­a­tion days are nev­er easy, and Day 1 was no dif­fer­ent.  It was a long, packed, hot affair, with spec­tat­ors stand­ing on speak­ers and chairs, and vying, shoulder to shoulder, for good spots from which to see all the dance action.  It felt like a packed rave at times, with all the body heat caus­ing the tem­per­at­ure to rise in each room.  Com­pet­it­or’s skills, stam­ina and endur­ance were all put to the test in hav­ing to com­pete in the hot com­pet­i­tion circles formed by the spec­tat­ors.   But if you know the Hip-Hop cul­ture then you know that it was born in packed clubs and under­ground parties, and cyphers (circles) are the tra­di­tion­al place in which the dan­cers have always got­ten down.  An empty room is death to a jam because it’s a sign that no one cares about the com­pet­i­tion that you are put­ting on.  So even with the place being as stuffy as it was, the rooms being packed was a good thing that brought a hype energy.   And when the heat got too much for indi­vidu­als they either chilled and prac­ticed in the stair­case or simply went out­side, refreshed their lungs, and then dived back in to see more dance skills on display.

In the end the dan­cers who qual­i­fied for Day 2 were:

BREAK­ING:

Sunni (UK) the 2016 champion.

Spin (UK)

Kid Karam (UK)

Fever (France)

POP­PING:

Breakz (UK)

Brooke (UK)

Jutsu (UK)

Sacha (France)

HOUSE:

Tamara (Hol­land)

Frankie J (UK)

Troy (UK)

KC (Canada)

FREE­STYLE HIP HOP:

Kofi (UK)

Ded­son (France)

Sharifa (UK)

Gonzy (France)

LOCK­ING:

Vovan and Funk y J (Rus­sia and France)

Crit­ic­al Mass (Korea)

LMC (Cyprus)

Pan­cake Bros (France)

The Break crews qual­i­fic­a­tion was the last com­pet­i­tion of the day.  Legendary B‑boy, Crazy Legs (Rock Steady crew) and  Afrika Islam (Uni­ver­sal Zulu Nation) took up their yearly UK Champs host­ing duties, as crews of up to 10 break­ers went head-to-head in more show­case battles.  The judges picked the best 8 to go through to Day 2 and the main stage:

THE CREWS:

Mon­ster Energy Drink (USA)

Soul Mav­er­icks (UK)

The Itali­ans (Italy)

Ariya (Japan)

Free­style Idi­ota (world­wide)

Every­one Else (world­wide)

Skil­lu­min­ated (Switzer­land)

HFC (Hol­land)

Image cour­tesy of Relent­less Energy

On Day 2 the buzz of Champs took on a dif­fer­ent air.  It took place in north Lon­don’s Kentish Town O2 For­um.  In the much big­ger, con­cert ven­ue, no longer was space an issue, with theatre like seat­ing upstairs and a massive open floor for the audi­ence to spread out in.  Com­pet­it­ors also scattered over the whole build­ing, prac­tising and warm­ing up every­where from the private room for com­pet­it­ors only, to the car­peted area in front of the second floor bar, and on an open lino put out on the main floor. No mat­ter where you were, dance was hap­pen­ing!  But the com­pet­i­tion itself went off on the main stage, and every time a dan­cer dis­played a high level of skill and music­al abil­ity a ripple of energy vibrated in cheers and screams through­out the arena.

Tamara won House, beat­ing Frankie J in the finals.

Brooke won the Pop­ping, beat­ing Sacha.

Ded­son won Free­style Hip Hop, beat­ing Kofi.

Vovan and Funky J won the 2on2 Lock­ing, beat­ing Crit­ic­al Point.

And defend­ing cham­pi­on, Sunni, won the B‑boy solo battle for the second year in a row, beat­ing Kid Karam.

Then, before the crew battles kicked off,  legendary rap­per, Talib Kweli, hit the stage and per­formed a con­cert.  The power of his music reversed the energy for a while, and a crowd whom had come to watch dan­cers, became the dan­cers themselves.

The finals of the crew battle ended with Mon­sters Energy Drink crew beat­ing Soul Mav­er­icks in the finals, and with that the 2017 UK B‑boy Cham­pi­on­ships came to a close.

The event, itself, has changed a lot over the years.  It’s been held in Brix­ton, Isling­ton, Birm­ing­ham and now Kentish Town and Peck­ham.  It went from a two day stage event to mak­ing Day 1 a smal­ler more dan­cer focused, cypher affair, and then mov­ing onto the big­ger, spec­tat­or focused, Day 2. It went from being in part­ner­ship with Sony, to now being in part­ner­ship with Relent­less Energy Drink.  But no mat­ter how much it changes, it still con­tin­ues to bring that buzz to Lon­don every year.

Keep it lock on I Am Hip Hop Magazine for our exclus­ive foot­age and inter­views from the finals com­ing soon with GlobalFaction. 

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Emanuel Adelekun

Emmanuel Adelekun is a writer, poet, storyteller, mar­tial artist and B‑boy (break dan­cer). He lives the hip hop life, trav­el­ing for the inspir­a­tion he finds in adven­ture, explor­a­tion and the dis­cov­er­ing of hip hop, street cul­tures all around the world. Always striv­ing to devel­op, improve and bet­ter under­stand the fre­quency on which he vibrates, he believes in keep­ing it simple: stay open, live to explore, exper­i­ence, and enjoy the moment. Cher­ish your mis­takes, always be a stu­dent, don’t take shit from any­one, treat oth­ers how you would like them to treat you, and live a life that inspires you. Peace, Hip Hop and Perspective.

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• Review: UK B‑Boy Cham­pi­on­ships 2017 — May 9, 2017