Trendsurfing: Krumping (The Times)
By David Rowan
Think of clowns performing aggressive hip-hop routines, and you'll understand why krumping has become street music's most talked-about new dance style. Barely four years old, this manically energetic, furiously competitive, full-body-gyrating art form has finally escaped from the ganglands of South Central Los Angeles to obsess trend-watchers on both sides of the Atlantic. MTV has feted it, rappers have worked it into videos, and now a feature-length documentary is heading for cinemas.
This extraordinary underground spectacle is best seen in its raw state in the playgrounds and parking lots of Compton or Watts. Children as young as seven paint clown make-up on to their faces and then compete against each other to out-dance their rivals. "It's a freestyle dance form that's full-bodied, adrenalin-driven and confrontational," as Dance Magazine describes it. "If movement were words, this would be a poetry slam."
Krumping evolved from a slightly tamer dance style known as clown dancing. Its origins are widely credited to a children's party entertainer, Thomas Johnson, who, in his rainbow Afro wig, has spent the past 13 years using hip-hop to entertain birthday parties, Black History parades and church picnics. As Tommy the Hip-Hop Clown, Johnson has found a way to combine magic tricks and face-painting with a dance routine that, as he sees it, demands "a raw, natural and expressive freedom of the body". It didn't take long for his young fans to start practising the dance steps on LA's streets.
Johnson has become something of a community activist, promoting clown dances as a way to keep teenagers away from street gangs. He launched his own dance school - located next to a discount coffin shop - and now runs regular "battle zone" contests in which entrants try to dance rival clowns into submission. But it is only recently that the rougher variant known as krumping, with its syncopated back-flips and frantic body-twists, has reached a wider audience. This began with pop videos from the Black Eyed Peas and Missy Elliott, but the real kicker came with the video for Christina Aguilera's video for Dirrty. Its director, the fashion photographer David LaChappelle, was so fascinated by some of the dancing he saw that he decided to make a 24-minute documentary, Krumped, which premiered to acclaim at last year's Sundance Film Festival. He has now expanded it to a full-length documentary called Rize, due for release this spring.
LaChappelle, more used to directing videos for the likes of Elton John, describes krumping as a sort of "hip-hop punk rock". "You can't believe what you're watching," he says. "It's insane. You've never seen bodies move that fast. These kids are creating an art form from nothing. It's inspiring."
In the meantime, there are said to be around 50 groups of dancing clowns now fighting it out peacefully in California. Tommy Johnson is attracting the attention of magazines such as Vanity Fair and People, although he still keeps up his regular gigs in churches and Bible classes in some of LA's toughest neighbourhoods. As Johnson sees it, what matters is to offer young people "a positive outlet" in the tough inner city. "Now," as he puts it, "you can be a Crip, you can be a Blood - or you can be a clown."
(The Times Magazine, March 18 2005)
Think of clowns performing aggressive hip-hop routines, and you'll understand why krumping has become street music's most talked-about new dance style. Barely four years old, this manically energetic, furiously competitive, full-body-gyrating art form has finally escaped from the ganglands of South Central Los Angeles to obsess trend-watchers on both sides of the Atlantic. MTV has feted it, rappers have worked it into videos, and now a feature-length documentary is heading for cinemas.
This extraordinary underground spectacle is best seen in its raw state in the playgrounds and parking lots of Compton or Watts. Children as young as seven paint clown make-up on to their faces and then compete against each other to out-dance their rivals. "It's a freestyle dance form that's full-bodied, adrenalin-driven and confrontational," as Dance Magazine describes it. "If movement were words, this would be a poetry slam."
Krumping evolved from a slightly tamer dance style known as clown dancing. Its origins are widely credited to a children's party entertainer, Thomas Johnson, who, in his rainbow Afro wig, has spent the past 13 years using hip-hop to entertain birthday parties, Black History parades and church picnics. As Tommy the Hip-Hop Clown, Johnson has found a way to combine magic tricks and face-painting with a dance routine that, as he sees it, demands "a raw, natural and expressive freedom of the body". It didn't take long for his young fans to start practising the dance steps on LA's streets.
Johnson has become something of a community activist, promoting clown dances as a way to keep teenagers away from street gangs. He launched his own dance school - located next to a discount coffin shop - and now runs regular "battle zone" contests in which entrants try to dance rival clowns into submission. But it is only recently that the rougher variant known as krumping, with its syncopated back-flips and frantic body-twists, has reached a wider audience. This began with pop videos from the Black Eyed Peas and Missy Elliott, but the real kicker came with the video for Christina Aguilera's video for Dirrty. Its director, the fashion photographer David LaChappelle, was so fascinated by some of the dancing he saw that he decided to make a 24-minute documentary, Krumped, which premiered to acclaim at last year's Sundance Film Festival. He has now expanded it to a full-length documentary called Rize, due for release this spring.
LaChappelle, more used to directing videos for the likes of Elton John, describes krumping as a sort of "hip-hop punk rock". "You can't believe what you're watching," he says. "It's insane. You've never seen bodies move that fast. These kids are creating an art form from nothing. It's inspiring."
In the meantime, there are said to be around 50 groups of dancing clowns now fighting it out peacefully in California. Tommy Johnson is attracting the attention of magazines such as Vanity Fair and People, although he still keeps up his regular gigs in churches and Bible classes in some of LA's toughest neighbourhoods. As Johnson sees it, what matters is to offer young people "a positive outlet" in the tough inner city. "Now," as he puts it, "you can be a Crip, you can be a Blood - or you can be a clown."
(The Times Magazine, March 18 2005)
posted by David Rowan at Friday, March 18, 2005
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