Technology blasted the doors open to the hip hop scene in 2005. That year, the debut of Youtube was a turning point for us. No other visual technology has expanded the awareness of street dance more than online video sharing via Youtube. It's accessible format made it easy to post videos of yourself practicing in your garage, to search for clips of the latest battle, or to study your dance idols by mimicking their moves. Suddenly, you didn't need to spend days and weeks scouring for precious video footage of Popin' Pete, OG Skeeter Rabbit, or Flattop. All you had to do was type their name in Youtube's search engine and click your mouse. It changed everything. Anyone, anywhere with a computer and an Internet connection could become exposed to these dance styles.
Homeland experienced a generational shift with new faces entering from the collegiate choreo hip hop scene in 2007-2008. Many college students came from UC Irvine, CSU Fullerton, and CSU Long Beach. Many of them were also of Asian-American or Pacific Islander background, suggesting the growing movement of these demographic groups in hip hop. This was different from the earlier new school in the early-mid 2000s, who came from various backgrounds. But this late 2000s group would then set the stage for a more unified community in Homeland.
One crucial step in Homeland's community growth was the start of regular weekly classes in lockin' and waackin' taught by Tiffany "Jimini" Bong and Donna "Sunny D-lock" Arrogante. Dance education became synonymous with Homeland. These classes helped to attract the new generation emerging from the college scene. It made Homeland more accessible to a newcomer who wasn't used to learning in an open session environment. It also made many folks less intimidated to visit Homeland. Previously, some may have Homeland intimidating not because of safety issues but because there were so many high level dancers there. A dance class was a safe way to enter the environment. This brought a sense of institutional organization to Homeland's weekly sessions, which previously only had open session learning.
With these structured classes, there was a larger influx of women into Homeland's community. The Monday night sessions had always been diverse, but they were still male-dominated. Historically, the hip hop scene had been populated by more men than women. Now, from 2007 onward, a larger proportion of women at Homeland changed the weekly dynamic. Several of these young women, including Tiffany and Donna, took the initiative to build a sense of community at Homeland. We also saw more waackin' being done at Homeland, which can be traced to teachers like Angel and Kumari Suraj influencing Tiffany and Donna who then inspired dancers in their Homeland classes. The sharing of new information only helped to strengthen bonds between fellow dancers. With Iceman's blessing, Homeland became a place where you felt like other people cared about what you were going through. It wasn't just a place where you went to session. When you walked through those doors, you were part of a family. You belonged.
Lockin' also benefited from these structured classes and the influx from the collegiate crowd. Now, there were young lockers training at Homeland and bringing what they learned back into the collegiate scene. The lockin' community had always been smaller compared to poppin' and bboyin' in Los Angeles. But now, this new blood was appearing at contests and putting on showcases. We usually saw lockers from Monteal, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan representing hard at LA contests like How Tha West Was Won. But now, local new school lockers were training to enter contests. At the Homeland Jam 2009, several young lockers from the newly founded Noisy Crickets Crew entered, repping their name which was in honor of their lockin' teacher Tiffany "Jimini" Bong.
Homeland also witnessed the development of rivalries in the poppin' scene, especially between two crews: Machine Gone Funk (MGF) and Funny Bones Crew (FBC). Both crews had showcased their rivalry at Freestyle Session 2007 in the final crew-on-crew contest at the Hollywood Palladium Theatre (except that Funny Bones members were labeled as Team Kleenhouse at this event). This was a significant event in that there was an auditorium filled with bboys and bgirls from around the world watching two poppin' crews go at each other. Through the 2000s, bboyin' and poppin' were usually segregated, but now the poppers were taking center stage. Looking back at the MGF vs Team Kleenhouse contest, you could sense how dancers from both camps would go on to shape the poppin' scene for the next few years. Many of them emerged as the most competitive poppers in local and international contests, including Frantick, Kid Boogie, Bionic Man, J-Smooth, Johnny 5, Jet Li, Lobo, Tronick, and Slim Boogie.
New music influences also began shaping poppin' culture with the arrival of dubstep in the LA scene. Old school funk like Parliament, Zapp & Roger, and Cameo were usually played at contests from the early to mid 2000s. G-funk also was in heavy rotation. We also listened to drum n' bass, electro, and hard house as well, but they rarely got played at high profile contests. Around 2008, the warped out sounds of dubstep started tripping out our eardrums. Local events sponsored by new school heads were responsible for broadening the awareness of dubstep among poppers. Mr. Fantastic's backyard jam in January 2009 and Lobo's Memorial Day Weekend 2009 contest are prime examples of dubstep-filled events that got documented online via Youtube. With these new sounds, poppin' took on a more animated feel with highly detailed body control and isolations. Poppers experimented with combining the dance feel of Electric Boogaloo style with illusional styles like waving, tutting, and animation. Hitting the muscles also became more emphasized as poppers used their chest, legs, neck, various arm muscles and back muscles to create a monster-size hit effect. At Homeland, this evolution in popping was on display every Monday at the open sessions.
The late 2000s was also a time when it seemed possible to get on TV and make some money as a dancer. MTV's America's Best Dance Crew shined as the prime target for every crew to show up and throw their hat into the ring. Fox's So You Think You Can Dance was another target for solo dancers. While it seemed like a far-fetched dream in the early 2000s to make a living as a dancer, the picture had changed by 2008. Perhaps the greater awareness of street dance through Youtube helped to convince TV producers that there was talent out there. At the same time, the new school from the collegiate world were coming into Homeland subconsciously influenced by the new celebrity culture emerging around dancers who appeared on TV and who were making a name for themselves online. Suddenly, you would hear people at Homeland marveling, "Look! There's Robert Muraine. And that's Hiro from We Are Heroes!" In the early to mid 2000s, you would never hear that except maybe for Burst Rock who appeared in a Superbowl Levi's commercial.
So, by the end of the decade, Homeland had seen a generational shift in its community and we had stepped into a golden age of street dance in media. Seeds were being laid for the next decade in terms of a higher level of poppin' and lockin' in the LA scene. Now, the dance community was one of many faces, not a singular face. It had many sides, not just one facet. And while Homeland's communal face changed, it's spirit stayed true to its original conception. It was still a refuge for many dancers who wanted a little more than just a place to session. They wanted a place where they could be inspired, to belong, and to share their love for a living, breathing, organic dance that connected everyone who dared to groove.
You really need a lot of energy to dance hip hop. It has a lot of exhibition moves especially when you go to clubs like an event space (Denver) for hip hop competitions. Every year, hip hop develops much cooler moves.
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