Photo/AnnA hArt
Christian Camacho, Jose Peralez, Erwin Tiangco, Roberto Rodriguez, James Huliganga and Eddie Torres of Vibe Vultures freeze for the camera.
TH E R E N O DANCE CRE W V IB E V U L TU R E S B R E A K IT D O W N
“The essence of the music
is put into a b-boy when he is moving,” said James “Killa Kimo” Huliganga, one of the original members of Vibe Vultures, a Reno b-boy crew that formed in 2009. “Breaking is representative of how dance has evolved alongside music. It’s one of those art forms that never stays the same.” Vibe Vultures consists of six members, ranging in age from 20 to 35 years old, each with anywhere from 5 to 15 years of experience under their belt, all finding a commonality in their dedication to breaking and the culture surrounding it. While each member of Vibe Vultures brings a different skill to the table, each member possesses an instinctive ability to merge inventive musicality and refined ferocity within the scope of their breaking. Huliganga, Erwin “Rez 1” Tiangco, and Roberto “Tegroc” Rodriguez founded Vibe Vultures, and over the last five years, they’ve added Jose “775 Superhero” Peralez, Eddie “Bboy Touch” Torres, and most recently, Christian “Riddle” Camacho into the mix. Vibe Vulture’s dedication as a crew has afforded them several performance opportunities, from the recent Reno InstaGrammys event and Reno Artown, to onstage with big name hip-hop artists, like KRS-One and Taboo of the Black Eyed Peas.
18 | RN&R |
SEPTEMBER 11, 2014
BY ANNA HART B-boying, short for break-boying or breaking, originated sometime during the 1970s. The term “breaking” alludes to its creation, signifying the dancing that would occur when a DJ would take the instrumental rhythmic breakdown sections, or “breaks” of a dance record and extend them, by looping it, giving a rhythmic basis for “breakers” to improvise with. The term “breakdance” is more familiar, but less accurate—and isn’t looked on favorably by the hip-hop community. While it seems like simple semantics, the word “breakdancing” has become a blanket name that inaptly places various styles of dance such as breaking, popping, locking and electric boogaloo under the same generalized label when it is publicized. One of the biggest reasons that the distinction between “breakdancing” and “breaking” is so hotly disputed is that it’s seen as an unwitting construct of mainstream media. It’s often thought of as a phrase that fails to address even the most basic terminology of the pioneers of the genre, let alone the world beyond the head spins and the catchy nicknames.
“There’s a little resentment in the b-boying community against the word ‘breakdancing’ because when hip-hop dance blew up in the ’80s, big business said, ‘Hey, how can we make money off of this?’ and that’s when the term ‘breakdancer’ was coined,” said Peralez. “Then everybody and their mom was a stinking breakdancer.” In an art form closely tied with a culture and a history, “breakdancing”, which overlooks those ties, is burdened with the stigma of ignorance—it could be compared to trying to write a novel before you’ve learned to speak. Nonetheless, the exposure to breaking in popular media has sparked its practice all over the world. Breaking originated in New York, but has made its way to the west coast, to Canada, and has even gained popularity in places like Brazil, the United Kingdom, Russia and South Korea. Currently, there are competitions all around the globe for b-boying, with “Battle of the Year,” “The Notorious IBE,” and “Chelles Battle Pro” to name a few. This international practice of the dance form shows the kind of atmosphere around b-boying that you’d find in the Reno scene today. “Through breaking we are able to unite people of different race, religion, and outlooks on life,” said Huliganga. “No matter who you are, we want to welcome you into our culture.”
