Red Bull Beat Battle 2012

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

Eight dance crews, 1 winner, R100 000. Stakes were high at one of SA’s biggest dance competitions, the Red Bull Beat Battles (RBBB) held in Bassline, Newtown , Johannesburg on May 26 2012. Last year’s winners Artistic Intelligence (AI) fought frantically to maintain their title, but challengers wanted nothing less than AI’s heads served on a silver platter. The 1 100 bloodthirsty crowd were baying for slaughter and to their delight, many heads rolled.

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

Debuting last year, RBBB are newbies to the dance scene.  However, true to the energy drinks style of plowing monster (small letter m) budgets and fierce marketing campaigns into events, plus the R100k grand prize for the winners, RBBB became a house hold name virtually overnight. In a year, RBBB have muscled their way onto the podium as one of the top three competitions in SA, alongside Strictly Hip Hop and Masters of Rhythm.

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

Unlike the glory days in the nineties and early 2000's when it was a huge crowd puller, seeing Basseline packed to capacity is a rarity this decade, and the owners have to attract events like this if they are to retain Basseline’s reputation as one of Joburg’s coolest night life pozi’s.  I had to wriggle, shove and even stand on my toes to get a lekker view of the action on stage, and I am a pretty tall guy BTW, which goes to show competition for the best seats was as hectic as the dance battles themselves. A giant big screen was erected outside the club for those unfortunate souls who couldn’t make it inside the packed venue, ag shame man. 

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

Yoh the stage looked hectically futuristic. Red Bull really went all out to give spectators a blow you away sort of experience that night. Legendary DJ Switch,  was in the DJ cockpit which was encircled by high-res digital monitors #dope. The giant LCD decks were cleverly assembled to resemble tall buildings in a big city skyline at night, too ill. Hypnotic high-tech lighting projected green strobe lights which created a beautiful, artificial aurora borealis like effect. As we became entranced by the kaleidoscope of colours, the Red Bull logos hanging on the walls seemed to emit an ominous glow. I swear there’s something occultish about those two bulls; the horns, hooves, tail #justsaying. Suffice to say; the groovy light show and overdose of Red Bull’s had everyone’s eyes more alert than a Spanish bull fighter. And with so many dilated pupils transfixed on the stage, the slightest misstep would be easily spotted by spectators, let alone the strict judges.

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

Crews represented a myriad of dance styles including uniquely South African genres like iSbhujwa and pantsula. As well as international genres like breakdancing, krump and this weird style called Vogue by the cross dressing crew Vintage.  Ashwin, co-founder of Vintage , says his grossly flamboyant, cross dressing crew’s unique dance style Vogue “partly originates from the poses on hieroglyphic figures…”He adds, “It’s basically a set of perfectly aligned angled poses.”

‘Mo’ from Afro Tribe which participated last year explains that, “Pantsula is the mother of all township cultures. Sbhujwa  comes from French word bourgeoisie, meaning upper class, because mabhujwa place ourselves higher than pantsulas.”

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

En battle, pantsulas did the clichéd footwork. Sbhujwa crew Soulistic Fusion showed Real Action Juniors why pantsulas and mabhujwa aren’t equal. If Red Bull does give you wings, Ninja Turtles would be good candidates for their next commercial.  They really clobbered Hlaks with their somersaulting antics, as in a proper bliksem, and so the mapantsula crews’ heads rolled first.

Ninja Turtles poes klapped the only all-girl crew Phly Nation out the competition. 

When mc AKA announced Phly Nation had their wings clipped, one of its members collapsed, clutched her ankle and writhed on the floor in unbearable pain from an apparent injury.  “She thinks this is a drama theatre,” remarked someone in the crowd, several chuckles approved his statement.

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

With four crews decapitated, things started heating up in the semi-finals with battles between AI v Vintage and Ninja Turtles v Reptilez. Artistic Intelligence got raped by a tutu wearing gang (LMFBAO) and Reptilez shoved Ninja Turtles back into the sewers.

Photo courtesy of Red Bull

The final duel, Vintage v Reptilez was a clash of two different styles. Reptilez had clean pop-locking transitions, whereas Vintage’s flailing limbs appeared disorganised compared to Reptilez who moved cohesively. Vintage eventually succumbed to Reptilez’s potent venom. The Soweto serpents were crowned champions and hugged the trophy tighter than a pythons embrace.

RBBB are here to dominate. As for aspiring crews gunning for the championship, prepare for the 2013 qualifiers. And if you are wise I’d suggest you bump Wu Tang’s track Protect ‘Ya Neck and heed the Wu’s advice, because plenty more heads will definitely roll at next years battles. Check out my interview with the reptilians in the clip below.

Photo courtesy of Red Bull