Hello, I am TIP Crews founder, Virus - Hwang Dae Gyun.
When I first started dancing, my Korean age at the time was 14 years old (International age 12).
Later on, when I was a 1st grade student in high school, about 17 years old,
It was about round about then
that I saw bboying for the first time on a VHS cassette tape.
The first tape,...
it was some japanese tape,... maybe Waseda Breakers
with LA breakers doing some popping and wave dance in the video.
After that,.. maybe,..
.. I think it was a bboy event held in the USA.
I think it may have been bboy summit 3.
I was lucky enough to get that video and practice while watching it.
The first crew I joined and made was TIP Crew.
In the year 1996.
My friends and I, 6 of us, made the crew together.
Also, the crew name...
Before a friend of ours who was our class representative in school
once suggested we should be singers and he made a few names for the team.
Among them was the name TIP - Teamwork Is Perfect.
I liked the name and meaning
So from then on we used the name for our bboy team.
Haha. So the name Virus,...
My Korean name is Hwang Dae-Gyun.
That last part Gyun,
in Korean language the same word is used to describe a bacteria
or also to describe a virus.
That's why I made my bboy name like that.
At first, It was a joke and friends said
"Isn't Dae (which means "Big" in the Korean language) Gyun - "Big Virus"?
but then I got to like it and kept on using it.
At that time in Korea,
Video tapes were the main thing.
Everyone used to watch, copy and learn from them.
At the time, normally,
Maybe most Korean dancers,
watched Japanese or American dancers and practiced that way.
and then
they only watched the parts with the cool (big) moves so many times
that the tapes got damaged and
parts got blurry and inaudible
and the videos became unwatchable.
That's how it went on.
Afterwards,...
In 1999, or around that time,
Korea, for the first time,
held a world hiphop festival in 1999
It was a battle and had teams
from Japan, Spartanic Rockers and then
From America, was the Rocksteady Crew.
Also, Circle of Fire.
There was also a team from Canada (Bag of Trix)
So as it was,
for our country it was the first time to actually see the teams we saw on tapes.
So from watching all those videos and then
also seeing the real bboys
all together doing the live battles,
all that combined to influence the Korean bboy scene to develop.
Since I am the one who made the TIP crew
So, I am the first member
and the founder of the team.
At the start of TIP crew,
Including myself, there were six members.
Bboy BiBi, who was my friend
and is the same age as me.
He was a member of the bboy crew, Visual Shock.
Then there was Jong Hwan. He didn't have a nick name.
Back then bboys used their real names so rest also didn't have nicknames.
Then there was Tae-yang.
Also, Hwang He-won, another friend.
Then there was Chong Ju. My other friend.
Three guys were born in 1979 and three born in 1980
and made the total six members of TIP crew.
Of which, I was the leader. Till now I am still the leader.
In my 20s,
somewhere around that time,
after a long time of dancing,
I had once seen Bboy Benny and Bboy Tuffkid doing airtracks
In my teenage years, the hardest part of training
were power moves and the power combos
such as mixing flares, windmills and headspins.
Also, windmill and 1990s were really difficult and high level moves to get down.
Maybe airtracks were the hardest for me to master out of all the moves.
Back then In Korea there was an expression called "All King"
used when a bboy could do all the 5 main power moves.
Those 5 moves were Flares, Windmills, Headspins,
Tracks/halos, and ...
the last one .... right now I can't recall the name ...
Ah, 1990s. Yeah.
So if you could do all these 5 moves
you would be called a powermoves master
and know all the moves. I mastered these moves up until some level.
After airtracks came out,
they were the most difficult for me to master.
So airtracks were the most difficult for me to master.
Hmm,... well...
The dance scene is constantly changing.
New moves and styles were developed.
From what was once the old school breakdance battle culture, known as "showdown" in Korea.
came the creation of the Korean battle scene
What was once club and street culture
has now changed into dance culture learned at academies and indoor studios.
Also popping, rocking, Krumping and house were rare in Korea.
However, they gradually later on became commonplace.
In the old days in Korea,
In a cypher circle, popping was called Gak-gi back then.
Dancers who were good at standing dance
or had great break dance
All danced together in the same circles and cyphers.
Nowadays, Most bboys do toprock and footwork in a cypher.
However, back then, we started with popping moves.
Then did toprock, and ended it up with locking.
That was how it went. Now, it is all divided into different dance genres
Also, the battles became shorter. They are bit more fun as well.
Overall, battles became more professional.
In the past, there were only crew battles.
Now it has expanded and has come to include much smaller categories
So you have crew battles, 5v5, 3v3, 2v2, 1v1
In the past, there was no such thing as 1v1 battles.
Also, we couldn't even image such a thing as a 1v1 battle
because they were so difficult.
After one round you needed rest after your round.
So we just thought a 1v1 was impossible.
Later on, after RedBull BC One and similar events,
1v1 battles became more popular and frequent than before
Now, currently,.. the situation is that
more event promoters and companies are interested in the bboy culture
Before, people used to say bboying is like a hobby for the young and adolescent.
Now it is more professional and not a fad.
Now, It's a part of Korean hiphop culture as a whole.
Too much.
Long ago, I had a few bboy influences.
Bboy Easyrock
Also, Muaritzio.
Tuffkid. Benny.
Actually, there were so many OGs.
To be honest Ken Swift, Poe-1, ....
There were so the many bboys
that gave me a lot of inspiration
and in other ways they are like my teachers
I also got inspiration from Korean bboys like Expression Crew's Lee Hu-song.
There were so many. It is hard to name them all.
When I first started dancing,
I started by learning power moves
so that people used to get surprised by watching my moves.
As time passed, I started to focus on style
and the appearance of my dance.
I took time to craft my fashion.
My appearance (expression).
A little bit later after that, I more focused on music.
Musicality and while I danced I tried to be rhythmical.
I guess I can say that at the beginning I was more technical.
Now, I'm trying to dance to music and let it be my motion.
In 2005, I met Bboy Focus in Finland.
I watched as Focus was dancing
and realized how bboying can be so closely connected to the music
through feeling.
So, I restarted my approach to dance.
Now Bboy Virus is a bboy that is very closely linked to the music.
There are really so many.
I will say two that most of the people would agree with me.
One, I would say ... 2001 battle of the year.
That was the first time I went to represent (overseas) with the Korean team.
I was with Visual Shock
It was Visual Shock vs Havikoro
but not the main stage battle.
It was the day before the main event.
A cypher battle.
Maybe,... it lasted for 1 hour or 90 mins.
It was pretty intense.
Korean bboys were really frightened by the battle
because even though Korea was good
the USA team was also very good.
So we said to each other
"We came to Germany for this event."
'So if we have to battle anybody, let's find and battle (call out) the best team here."
So we thought; America is the most famous team here.
So I said, "I'm going to start it so just follow me".
So we asked them to battle (called them out).
and they accepted the battle.
We started first and Lil John responded next ... and it went off from there.
The next most memorable battle was The 2007 UK Bboy Championships World Final.....
that was one of the battles that
If you won it you could say that you won one of the best bboy battles in the world.
At the time TIP crew had a lot of energy and power.
TIP crew recognized me as the main leader.
and all agreed there being one leader and the team as a singular unit.
It was run in a very Korean style.
Actually, I'm not sure if it's Korea's own style of running crews.
I heard that many crews in other countries are different and don't have a leader.
However, most of Korean teams have a leader
and under leader's direction, members practiced all together.
I guess the motivation was…
in some ways,...
It seems that there was an understood necessity to do it.
However, members did not complain about it and just follow the leaders orders
and thanks to them what was the main driving force.
Nowadays, most of bboy crews practice once or twice a week
just like enjoying dance in a club.
However, In a week, we trained about 5 or 6 times
and practiced almost all day.
So maybe those harsh training sessions was a driving force of our success.
Long time ago, the Korean dance scene was like 20 years behind than U.S one.
Then the bboy scene grew and caught up rapidly
The reason of this rapid growth was
that we learned bboying by watching foreign bboy's moves like U.S or Japan
and practiced harder and trained to beat them.
When Korea was on top of the world for bboying
a lot of American culture was finding its way into Korea.
So Korea bboys started to imitate U.S bboys.
This was not only copying their dance but also
tried to follow their life style,
their practicing way and methods.
Their mindset also.
It became really different.
So the way of Korean bboys practice has slowly changed
and became like American bboys
and now Korean bboys don't train as hard and as much as before.
In the past, there were so many great crews like Jinjo, Rivers. Korea really and so many great crews.
Drifters crew, Extreme crew, TIP crew, Last 4 One.
Fusion MC crew,.. There were really so many amazing crews then.
The common feature of those crews was they practiced hard on a daily basis.
Now, the new generation whose just came up in the Korean bboying scene
don't practice that hard.
They practice leisurely for 2 hours per day and only 2~3 days per week.
It's like they are not serious about bboying.
Maybe it is because of this cultural shift, that their skills aren't as advanced as those of bboys in past generations.
Also, along with bboying, other trends and genres rose in popularity in the dance world.
So the general interest in bboying dropped a little bit.
Recently, we are getting involved in dance (Theater) musicals.
It's a kind of non-verbal performance genre.
Also, a hiphop comedy performance.
We produced a performance piece called "B-School".
Now we are planning New performances and setting new goals.
In the past, the dream was to be a bboy world champion.
Now my desire is to create a world renowned bboy show / art piece.
It hard and tricky to do but that is our goal as of now.
Also, regarding my injury,...
Honestly, I haven't gotten any serious injuries from my bboying career. Almost none even.
My health is good and I think I been taking care of myself pretty well.
However, in my 30s, I got hurt at a winter performance at a remotely located school in the countryside.
It was the combination of the winter weather and the venue lacking adequate bboy performance facilities.
As I performed there in those conditions
my lower back muscles ruptured.
It causes discomfort now and again since then
and it sometimes restricts my movements compared to before the injury.
However, I still perform and practice everyday almost everyday.
So when was the biggest set back in my bboying life…?
When I had a slump…
To be honest, I've had so many times of slumps.
Honestly, I think I'm always in a slump.
The toughest time in my life came after winning the world competition,
when I won several time and got popularity.
And then,...
In past I was young, I thought that if I won a world competition
and become a world champion
I could have wealth and honor.
and I had a dream of changing my life.
So with than dream, I worked so hard for 10 yrs.
When after I won several times
I realized that my life basically had not changed at all
even though I got famous from winning the World competition.
Also, some members started to leave the team rather than working harder together.
Someone left and even gave up their life as dancers
The teamwork started to break apart a bit.
and reliable people around me were gone.
I think that time was the worst for us.
That was the hardest moment.
I was a lot to go though and was very difficult. In the middle of it all I felt very lonely.
For me, after the world champion goal was achieved and this goal faded with the ambition....
So now, regardless of the past.
My new dream is to strive to make world famous art.
I'm making the past hardships fuel for my future dreams.
Anyway, I started to focus on my own dream on making the world reknown show
and I'm trying to stay healthy and live my dream.
Now, there's a lot of talk about if bboying becoming a sport or not.
Some suggest it should be like an Olympic discipline.
I think if someone decided to be a pro-bboy,...
Whether pro-bboy or recreational bboy..
... and the concept and meaning of bboying is different for each person in this regard...
However, I think that if you are really serious about bboying
and if you really decide to be a pro and decide to spend your life and career on it
or to build your future life on it,
then, it would be a good reason for bboying to become an Olympic sport,
or some even bigger world competition that will be created to support this.
I hope that future bboys do not get stuck in a limited way of understanding hiphop culture
or stuck in certain ideas created by seniors and can keep evolving.
and create new things, not going to a same way that seniors already done.
Of course, I can't 100% say that if Bboying becomes an Olympic sport that one may have a successful life.
However, I hope they can live better lives than we do now.
and hope they become a new generation can inspire future generations.
It's Bboy Virus, who first started bboying with headspins and waves
because they looked so marvelous.
and loved the fashionable style and cool looks of the bboy culture.
Yes, I will always love the freshness of bboying.
After a while, I liked bboy who were rhythmical with the music.
Over time, I have come to appreciate bboys who have a nice personality (musical expression).
And even after, no matter how he is good at dance
If he's over 30
I took a look that person's bboy life.
Like his life level or what he's doing now to improve his life (dance and otherwise).
The reason is…
being a good dancer is not the only important thing.
If he is really responsible
as a member of society, not only as a bboy
He should be devoted on his work / community
and he should protect his family and manage his life responsibly.
Now I feel these things are really important
I want to say to bboys / bgirls.
Be a good person first.
Be the type of dancer who puts unity in the community, responsibility to family and the people you love first.
Ahead of the selfish trappings of fame through dance.
Dance happily.
Thanks for watching to my interview. Bboy Virus signing out.
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