DANCE HER & HIM

Mekhola bose, much more than just Soumitra Chatterjee’s granddaughter

Who is she: Mekhola Bose, 20, member of dance crews Crafts of Kammotionn and The Calcutta Waack Pack. This former drummer of the band Black Rose can certainly do a mean spin on her head, hands, back, elbows and shoulder! She sure has the bruises to show for it. But she really doesn’t care!

First crush: “I loved the boy bands Blue and C 21! They were the first boys I found good-looking. And then I heard Aerosmith and Queen and didn’t pay any attention to them ever again! My father (Ruchir Bose) would play these cool songs at home and I would wake up to Aerosmith songs in the morning!”

Drummer girl: “I could bang away on a drum set the entire day,” smiles Mekhola. How did she take to drumming? “I liked the intro to Deep Purple’s Black Night and I really wanted to learn how to play it. As soon as we (Black Rose) began, we started getting a lot of shows. We were doing mostly originals, and covers of Deep Purple and Nickelback. I was always told I play really well for a girl and that was quite annoying! But then I guess that was good enough for me. I never take these things personally.”

Fave drummers: Darren King (Mutemath), Mike Portnoy, Gavin Harrison.

Fave bands: Deep Purple, Mutemath, Karnivool, Asking Alexandria (“they are the remedy to my problems”).

First steps: Dancing happened by chance. “One of my friends told me that I can’t dance! So I thought I’ll just go and audition for fun (for a dance production at Gyan Manch three years ago)! I had never done western dance. Miraculously I was selected.”

Addicted to the thrill: At that time Mekhola didn’t know what hip hop was, and got the hang of it only when she joined the dance crew Crafts of Kammotionn two years ago. “I just wanted to do what they were doing. I was really attracted to it. Then they understood that I am good at choreography,” she says.

The Waackers: Mekhola and crew (The Calcutta Waack Pack) call themselves the first generation of waackers (waacking is a dance form) in town.

Waacking legend writes in: A few months ago Tyrone Proctor, pioneer of waacking, commented on one of their videos (that they had sent to him on Facebook). He loved their energy. “I love the direction your going in. It might help you too, if you learn the history of waacking, also try to control your middle parts (hips) more. To me Waacking is all about making people see what they hear,” wrote Proctor.

Waack music: Mostly disco, with the songs of Cher, Jamiroquai, The Weathers Girls, Patti Drew, D-Reflection thrown in. “If you can’t waack to disco you are not really a waacker,” says Mekhola.

Waack talk: “It’s the throw of energy to the music.” To choreograph their dance moves, the Calcutta Waack Pack mixes waacking with vogueing, a style where you pose on the beat.

Waack wear: Flashy, with dancers sporting black jackets, tight pants (in shades of grey, black, white, silver) and gloves.

Waackshops: The waackers book a studio for three hours. Mekhola teaches waacking for an hour, and Anusua (fellow waacker) teaches vogueing.

And, dear ol’ grandpa: Soumitra Chatterjee gives Mekhola his full support. “He has seen me practising and tells me to practise hard.... I like his Feluda films and Apur Sansar,” smiles Mekhola.

Anurag Ghosh of Crafts of Kammotionn decodes the moves

Bboying/breaking: It’s the time when dancers break free and go all crazy on the floor. This dynamic hip hop dance form came from Bronx, New York. It is mainly divided into four parts — toprock (dancing on one’s feet while standing up), downrock (once you go down to do your footwork), freeze (suddenly stop to pose, for example to a snare hit) — some of the basics freezes are the baby freeze, air baby, elbow stand/handstand — and then the power moves, the hardest part of the dance, associated with all the spinning moves (backspins, headspins, turtles, crickets, windmills...). This style requires strength, agility, stamina, endurance, dedication and hard work.

Waacking: A dance form that originated in Los Angeles in the 1970s, the disco era. This is a similar style like locking but with flailing of arms, and vogues (pausing while dancing to pose). The most basic move is the waack itself, a whip-like movement done with the hands. Some of the styles similar to it are vogueing and punking.

Popping: Mainly done to funk music and has its origins in California. It is based on the technique of quickly contracting and relaxing muscles to cause a jerk in the dancer’s body, referred to as a ‘pop’ or a ‘hit’. This is done continuously to the rhythm of a song in combination with various movements and poses. The well-known robotics and waving is also a part of this dance style. Animation, animatronics, boogaloo, floating, gliding and sliding, dime stopping, puppet, robot/botting, strobing, strutting, ticking, tutting, waving are some of the sub-styles.

Locking: Basically means freezing from a fast movement and ‘locking’ in a certain position, holding that position for a short while and then continuing at the same speed as before. It relies on fast and distinct arm and hand movements combined with more relaxed hips and legs. The movements are generally large and exaggerated, and often very rhythmic and tightly synced with the music. This dance form was created by Don Campbell.

Beatkill: Simply dancing to beats even when you are spinning.

Bite: Copying someone blindly.

Also...

Name game: After a person is ready to break, he/she is given a bboy or a bgirl name. For example, my name is Bboy Spirit. Spirit because I was the first guy in my crew to start bboying.

Dancing with care: You should take all precautions before you get down. Wear knee pads, elbow pads, beanies or skull caps. If you want to spin then wear jackets or else you’ll have sore shoulders and back. Too much momentum can be dangerous. If you can’t do a certain move at once then break it down in three-four sections.

Clothes: Sometimes I wear baggy clothes; sometimes I wear fitted ones. But good shoes are a must. Shoes to a dancer is like a guitar to a guitarist. And if it fits your image, sport a classy baseball cap.

the HIP-HOP CARNIVAL

More than 50 dance enthusiasts from across the country participated in five innovative dance battles at the Hip-Hop Carnival organised by Siddhant Sharma and Big Bong Theory on December 1 at Ballygunge Cultural Seminar, Hindustan Road.

Street dance in Calcutta has come a long way, feel the youngsters. Not only have the number of crews increased, but the dancers are also travelling across the globe to take part in different carnivals.

“People are willing to travel and spend money to learn different dance styles. International dancers are also coming down to India to teach. So even though Calcutta was taking time to pick up the hip-hop culture, it has come a long way in these few years,” adds Siddanth Sharma, the organiser.

The second year of Hip-Hop Carnival saw dancers from different states letting it rip.

rapper feyago on what his ‘brahs’ dance to and wear

IN THE GROOVE

On the edge of reality

Rappers need a beat, so do dancers. Street art is not complete without headphones booming to serve as motivation. Hip hop can be passive as well as aggressive. On the one hand the vocals are usually harsh, representing reality as we see it. To balance that, there are soothing melody lines and chorus vocals that act as the yang to the yin. Lyrics help us express, open up and share. Beats help us fall into a comforting rhythm. Bass stimulates the adrenaline to boil within. Rap was always there. EPR, the frontman of Underground Authority, represented Calcutta in battles around the country since 2005 along with MC Akm! There are several upcoming rappers now... kids who aren’t afraid of expressing themselves.

Yo, homie!

There are several old and new school phrases. People use ‘yo’ as filler (and some use it as a prefix to names!). Phrases like Know What I Mean, YOLO (You only live once), swag (style I admire), uh homie (friend), brah (brother) and ‘word’ (I agree with what you’re saying) are common.

Street dance

American influence is large, but there is also a huge amount of Asian influence when it comes to dance. Some infuse Indian dance with hip hop styles and the result is very interesting. There are few paid opportunities for crew members but pioneers like Crafts Of Kammotionn have managed to score.

Style file

Old school hip hop involved large T-shirts, droopy jeans and scarves covering half your faces. These days, urban streetwear has evolved and is classy. Bling is still there, but the use of suits, hats, ties and bows are very common. Rappers look less like street thugs and more like businessmen on holiday. I’m always in shirts, fitted caps, bow ties and trousers or jeans. Shoes play a crucial role too... my favourite pair are my Jack & Jones white sneakers. They help me move, slide and groove on stage. I like wearing gloves too.

Feyago performs with American rapper Kellee Maize in Nepal on January 3

SKATEBOARD

Who’s he: Tamojit Chakraborty, 15, is part of the group Kolkata Skateboarding.

Tricks: Ollie (guiding the board in air), ollie over obstacles, cave man, walk a dog, manual and space walk.

Cool skateboard: Oxelo.

Buy buy: Sites where you can buy Oxelo skateboards are decathlon.in, playgroundonline.com, playmore.in, junglee.com.

Tips: Don’t be afraid of falling as falling is a part of skateboarding. If someone is scared of getting hurt while skateboarding, wear safety pads. I have hurt myself many times and there were many cuts on my knees or hands but that’s natural, that is how we learn skating.

Fave skateboard movies: Lords of Dogtown, Street Dreams.

FAMOUS 4

Freakin Twistrz

Sarthak Sen, Sangram Mukherjee, Raj Bera, Debarga Basu, Reese Dasgupta, Neha Chaudhuri and Rajit Dey came up with the idea of forming a dance crew.

This seven-member street dance crew comes together twice every week to practise. Freakin Twistrz are known for creating dancers.

“We dared to break all regulations and experimented with different dance genres. Our crew has poppers and breakers who top the list of good dancers in Calcutta. Though we are from different schools and colleges, it is our love for street dance that keeps us together,” says Sangram Mukherjee

Dance styles: Locking, popping, waacking, breaking, free style, housing and contemporary.

Conditions apply

Aishik Saha, Avirup Das, Saraswat Roy Chowdhury, Sagar Sinha and Rahul Shaw had initially formed a group to participate in a college fest three years back. The competition was cancelled but the gang of five decided to stick together. Like any other dance crew they do it twice a week on their terrace or at home. “Place is a problem but before a show we book studios for five to six hours and practise. Or else terrace and hall room is our usual venue,” grins Saraswat.

Dance styles: Mainly hip hop (old school and new school).

Fullstop

Fullstop is not only one of the first crews in Calcutta but also one of the youngest. Sambo Mukherjee, Zaid Ashraf, Pranay Dutta, Dev Narayan Gupta along with two other members (who have left the group) would compete against each other at different school fests. But their passion for dance got them together and soon they came up with the group Fullstop in 2009. “We used to represent our schools and compete against each other but soon realised that if we come together and form a group we could do something big,” says Dev.

Dance style: Free style hip-hop and choreography-based dance.

Cavort Wid Kreativity

Two years back, Roshan Banerjee, Ralph Mao, Daipayan Ghosh formed the dance crew Cavort Wid Kreativity. Facebook played an important role. “We shared our ideas on FB and got together. Though each one of us specialised in different dance styles, we were ready to learn from each other and give our best,” said Dipayan Ghosh. Today the group has expanded to 15 members.

Dance styles: Breaking, popping, locking.

Arindam Chatterjee and Malancha Dasgupta

Pictures: Sayantan Ghosh and Bhubaneswarananda Halder