Bboy Quotes

The job of feets is walking, but their hobby is dancing.

You got somebody in your corner, you lucky ... and blessed. And when you get that, you gotta know it, stand by it, and treat it with care. To nurture it. To build on it.

We started breaking because it fit our personality, not because we needed to find one

All of us are starving … for attention, for love, for understanding. I don't care what the sisters say: we take more shit than they do in this life, 'cause we are brothers in a white man's world, and there ain't no space for us. Never has been, never will be. All we want, all we need is someone to love us for who we are, to grow with us, so that the world ain't such a bad place.

You were hard or else you were soft, in the slang drawn from the territory of manhood, the state of your erected self. Word on the Street was that we were soft, with our private-school uniforms, in our cozy beach communities, so we learned to walk like hard rocks, like B-boys, the unimpeachably down. Even if we knew better. We heard the voices of the constant damning chorus that told us we lived false, and we decided to be otherwise. We talked one way in school, one way in our homes, and another way to each other. We got guns. We got guns for a few days one summer and then got rid of them. Later some of us got real guns.

The very subjects and activities that rappers rap about today are exactly what Hip Hop was created to avoid and even overcome. The point here is that knowledge and overstanding were also at the birth of Hip Hop right along with b-boying, MC-ing, graffiti writing and DJ-ing. However, the desperate quest to exploit Hip Hop’s artistic elements for profit (in Hip Hop’s later years) buried the principles and life skills that accompanied Hip Hop’s early artistic elements.

Remember when I said I was a bit scattered? It wasn’t just when it came to jobs. I had a slew of strange ex-boyfriends, too. There was George, who liked to wear my underwear . . . everyday. Not just to prance around in—he wore them under his Levi’s at work. As a construction worker. That didn’t go over well with his co-workers once they found out. He works at Jamba Juice now. I don’t think anyone cares about what kind of underwear he wears at Jamba Juice. Then there was Curtis. He had an irrational fear of El Caminos. Yes, the car. He just hated them so much that he became really fearful of seeing one. He’d say, “I don’t understand, is it a car or a truck?” The confusion would bring him to tears. When we were walking on the street together, I had to lead him like a blind person because he didn’t want to open his eyes and spot an El Camino. If he did, it would completely ruin his day. He would cry out, “There’s another one. Why, God?” And then he would have to blink seven times and say four Hail Marys facing in a southerly direction. I don’t know what happened to Curtis. He’s probably in his house playing video games and collecting disability. After Curtis came Randall, who will never be forgotten. He was an expert sign spinner. You know those people who stand on the corner spinning signs? Randall had made a career of it. He was proud and protective of his title as best spinner in LA. I met him when he was spinning signs for Jesus Christ Bail Bonds on Fifth Street. He was skillfully flipping a giant arrow that said, “Let God Free You!” and his enthusiasm struck me. I smiled at him from the turn lane. He set the sign down, waved me over, and asked for my phone number. We started dating immediately. He called himself an Arrow Advertising executive when people would ask what he did for a living. He could spin, kick, and toss that sign like it weighed nothing. But when he’d put his bright-red Beats by Dre headphones on, he could break, krump, jerk, turf, float, pop, lock, crip-walk, and b-boy around that six-foot arrow like nobody’s business. He was the best around and I really liked him, but he dumped me for Alicia, who worked at Liberty Tax in the same strip mall. She would stand on the opposite corner, wearing a Statue of Liberty outfit, and dance to the National Anthem. They were destined for each other. After Randall was Paul. Ugh, Paul. That, I will admit, was completely my fault.

If you’re not already at practice after watching BC One, you’re fucking up.

I battle for meat, if I don't win, I don't eat.

You may think of myths as worlds of light sabers, rings of power, and enchanted spells. Hip-Hop is also a mythical place. A place free from strangling bonds of racism, sexism and bigotry. A place where the only currency is your skills with a mic, a turntable, or a drum machine. Hip-Hop is filled with faraway lands populated by dragons, wizards and knights - places like Marcy Projects, 5th Ward, Compton, Shaolin and Strong Island. Our knights are MC's, B-Boys, B-Girls, DJs, producers and graf artists.

Tall, beefy, and brown, I give the people what they want. You’d be surprised how many White dudes fantasize about a Mandingo warrior stepping out of the jungle and into their bedrooms and aren’t afraid to tell you. Most Black guys are looking for tops, too. They want the Hard Rock brother or the B-boy fantasy that no one would suspect of being gay outside of the bedroom. It’s funny how we all seem to crave the man we want to be.

If I had a theme song it would probably be “B-Boys Makin’ with the Freak Freak” by the Beastie Boys.

Less immediately, [Mr Pye] is also about the relationships between art and religion and art and the world of commerce. Mr Pye would have the island's resident artist, Thorpe, who is for ever in search of the ultimate painting, believe that all inspiration is spiritual and divine. Thorpe finds it in the material world, for he is infatuated by the beauty of the island's whore, Tintagieu. That each exploits beauty in their respective trades is underlined when he tells her that she ought to be a film actress. 'They'd shoot you from below. Streamers of cloud behind your head and all that racket.' 'Shoot me from below? I'd like to see them,' retorts Tintagieu. 'Sounds bloody painful to me.' This exchange leads naturally into a splendid tirade, which Peake placed in Thorpe's mouth, linking all the themes of art and inspiration, artists and their physical suffering, the art trade and belief in spiritual values. 'Oh, these theories,' Thorpe added in a voice of scorn and with a flourish of his free arm (for Mr Pye still held the elbow of the other) - 'these theories about Art, they are all absolute n-nonsense.' (He was winding himself up, for Tintagieu was listening - he hoped.) 'Can't you see the whole thing is an organised racket? The p-painter digs his heart up and tries to sell it. The heart specialists become interested, for the thing is still b-beating. The hangers-on begin to suck the blood. They lick each other like c-cats. They bare their fangs like d-dogs. The whole thing is pitiful. Art is in the hands of amateurs, the Philistines, the racketeers, the Jews, the snarling women and the raging queers to whom Soutine is "ever so pretty" and Rembrandt "ever s-so sweet". 'What do the galleries know? They are merely m-merchants. They sell pictures instead of lampshades and that's the only difference. And the critics - Lord, what clever b-boys they are! They know about everything except painting. That's why I came out here to get away from it all. The jungle of London with its millions of apes. I came out here to find myself, but have I done so? No, Mr Pye. Of c-course I haven't. For artists need competition and the stimulus of other b-brains whether they like it or not. They must talk painting, b-breathe painting, and be c-covered with paint. That is the kind of man I would talk to. A man c-covered with paint. And with paint in his hair and paint in the brain and on the b-brain - but where are they, these men? - they're in the great cities, among the m-monkeys where they can see each other work and fight it out, while as f-far as the public is concerned they might as well be knitting, or blowing b-bubbles, for even you, Mr Pye, if you don't mind my saying so, haven't got a c-clue what it's all about, as your ridiculous "slap it on", "whisk it off" and "hey presto" attitude shows all t-too clearly. Your idea about colours is "the m-more the b-better", and "bright as p-possible", like a herbaceous b-border. Colour, Mr Pye, is a process of elimination. It is the d-distillation of an attitude. It is a credo.' Mr Pye's face was pink with admiration. he ran his eyes over the painter as though he had never seem him before. He turned his head quickly to Tintagieu as though for corroboration and then he ran his eyes again all over Thorpe. 'That was superb,' he whispered, as though to himself.