Think of a modern or interpretive dance piece, subtract the ballet, add a little bit of swag, and you have the Brain Bangers.
The Brain Bangers wowed audience members this weekend by kicking off the Carpenter Center’s “WOW! Series,” with shows on Saturday and Sunday that took the audience from the beginning of time through the future. The event was organized in less than two weeks, according to Scarlett “Scar” Nabil of Funkdation Crew.
Members of the I.aM.mE dance crew, winners of America’s Best Dance Crew’s (ABDC) season six, teamed up with other members of the show’s dance crews to form the Brain Bangers crew.
“They’re so innovative and creative I just wanted to watch them to see what they come up with next and maybe inspire me to come up with my own creativity,” attendee Andrew Perez from the Montebello Performing Arts Center said.
According to Carpenter Center’s Executive Director Michele Roberge, the “WOW! Series” is meant to awe audiences and expand people’s ideas of what the human body can do.
“It seemed like a dance crew is something everyone can relate to because they just wear normal clothes and they look like normal people but they do amazing things with their bodies that make you go wow,” Roberge said.
Spectators said they were surprised by the intricate choreography and amazing dance moves put together in three acts: past, present and future, each with its own subsections.
The Brain Bangers gave video introductions to each act, subsection and created dance moves that combined hip-hop, pop ‘n lock, crumping, tutting, b-boying, turfing and more.
According to Nabil, the dancers practiced for 12 hours a day, for 10 days straight to prepare for the show after ABDC’s season one champions Jabbawockeez cancelled.
The second act, the present, stood out most because the Brain Bangers took viewers through the decades with iconic songs, dance moves and pop-culture sensations from the 1950s through the 21st century.
The act opened with Frank Sinatra’s “Fly Me To The Moon,” followed by a dance to the Beach Boys’ “Surfin’ USA.” The audience even sang along as the crew danced to Gloria Gaynor’s 1970s hit, “I Will Survive.”
“What I liked the best was the ‘80s part when they did the breakdancing,” 43-yr-old Long Beach resident Vicky Coyle said.
The ‘80s began with freestyle by Jean “B-Boy Bebo” Lloret with a break down of the basic elements of b-boying.
The audience was then taken from the ‘90s to the present with artists like MC Hammer, Eminem, Outcast, System of a Down, Drake, PSY and more.
The first act had original music and was broken down into Big Bang, Caveman, Egyptian, Japanese, to Classical.
The third act went into the future with Crime, Weapons, Toys, Medicine and Space Travel featuring more dub step and electric music and elaborate group tutting.
I.aM.mE crewmember Phillip “Pacman” Chbeeb said this was the first run with a show that travels through time. He said, with more time and more thought, the Brain Bangers still want to improve the show.