Comments on: Dragon House - Illusion of Choice

Dragon House - Illusion of Choice

gottabefunky — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 21:01:33 -0800

Illusion of Choice. A dubstep routine by the quartet Dragon House. Mind. Blown. [SLYT] [via]

Member Marquese Scott, previously (1, 2).

By: Tomorrowful

Tomorrowful — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 21:12:04 -0800

Well. I. Uh. Wub-wub?

By: vuron

vuron — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 21:12:10 -0800

Pretty cool stuff, there were bits a pieces where the smoothness of the dancing and synch with the audio made me feel like there was a bit of post production wizardry going on but overall it was really impressive.

By: ashbury

ashbury — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 21:15:45 -0800

Watch his feet at 3:44. Just wow. I've been more than impressed at what the main guy does, ever since that Foster the People dance. And now I know that there's three other guys who can do it too!

By: MeghanC

MeghanC — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 21:30:09 -0800

Marquese Scott is amazing. Also worth mentioning is this recent video in which he and pianist Lang Lang perform Chopin together--it's beautiful, and almost balletic at points. I wish that there'd been more to it, and maybe a split screen so that we could see more of what was happening, but it's still pretty incredible.

By: Foosnark

Foosnark — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 21:46:02 -0800

I think this is the first time I've watched people dancing and thought it looked like Lotte Reiniger animation.

By: phaedon

phaedon — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 22:09:17 -0800

turns out you can dance the charleston to daft punk

By: schroedinger

schroedinger — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 22:28:55 -0800

Ever since I saw this Key & Peele sketch any seriousness in dubstep has been ruined for me.

By: ocherdraco

ocherdraco — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 22:29:49 -0800

Meghan, that video's editing is bonkers! It felt like it never showed a full phrase of the dance. But the dancing was beautiful, yes.

By: effugas

effugas — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 22:53:11 -0800

Fantastic post. Best of the web.

By: happyroach

happyroach — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 23:03:48 -0800

Damn! Now THAT'S body control!

By: TMezz

TMezz — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 23:07:52 -0800

fluidity of movement, astonishing grace, supremely impressive melding of dance and mime. wild.

By: MeghanC

MeghanC — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 23:34:18 -0800

Ocherdraco, that's my complaint exactly, only worded better than I'd managed. The glimpses we get are beautiful and, I think, worth seeing even in their incompleteness, but I'd love to have been able to see the full progression of things.

By: orme

orme — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 23:34:45 -0800

I think this one was probably posted here before. First time I saw these guys.

By: Purposeful Grimace

Purposeful Grimace — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 00:00:48 -0800

Is this thread going to follow the other one where people claim that it's all editing trickery? It's not. Get out from behind your screens and go to a club spinning dubstep and watch LOTS of people moving with almost the same amount of control and grace. Might even do your ass some good to give it a shot yourself.

By: zippy

zippy — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 00:14:01 -0800

I think the dancing is pretty cool, but I also thought the stillness, I mean the absolute stillness, of the background was odd. I see leaves move as the dancers' feet step on them, but no branches or leaves or anything shift in the background. I was wondering if they might be dancing with a green screen about 10' behind them (but then I wondered "why would they do that?")

By: stbalbach

stbalbach — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 00:20:59 -0800

A dubstep routine Dubstep, according to Wikipedia, is a genre of music. Is this type of 'dance' also called dubstep? Yeah according to the Marquese Scott article they are calling it "dubstep dance" but no one has written an article, virgin territory. And an orphan. Seems like Marquese Scott owns this style.

By: rifflesby

rifflesby — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 00:42:42 -0800

Depends what you mean by 'owns'. It's natural progression from the stuff I used to see at raves in the late 90s.

By: surenoproblem

surenoproblem — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 00:45:07 -0800

Last time on Metafilter there was debate, with some people insisting that Marquese's dancing was the result of special effects--people thought his shirt didn't move properly or something. This is Marquese doing it live on Ellen.

By: rifflesby

rifflesby — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 01:03:55 -0800

(Not to make it sound like I'm downplaying these guys' skills -- Marquese and his crew are goddamn amazing. I just mean, they didn't invent this style out of whole cloth.)

By: mephisjo

mephisjo — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 04:53:14 -0800

I usually hear members of the crew call their dance style Animation. They also got some nice exposure on the last season of SYTYCD with a member making it to the finals (Cyrus, not one featured in this video).

By: Ice Cream Socialist

Ice Cream Socialist — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 05:19:25 -0800

That's what I call poppin'!

By: slkinsey

slkinsey — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 05:19:46 -0800

It's natural progression from the stuff I used to see at raves in the late 90s. Er... it's a natural progression of the stuff I used to see "breakdancers" do in the early 80s.

By: jammy

jammy — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 05:32:51 -0800

hell yes. thank you for this post.

By: 2or3whiskeysodas

2or3whiskeysodas — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 05:59:36 -0800

I've said it before and I'll say it again: breakdancing is the highest form of art achieved by humankind. I don't think I'm joking about that.

By: victoriab

victoriab — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 06:01:48 -0800

Awesome stuff. I love watching the SYTYCD auditions because I get exposed to so many fantastic variations of dance I never knew existed. I also enjoyed the backstory of all these guys living together and sharing resources to pursue their dreams. Good luck and I hope they find great success and satisfaction in their lives.

By: buffalo

buffalo — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 06:24:55 -0800

just offering another wikipedia link ... since i also remember the '80's (even the '70's, yo), in case you want a little history.

By: Runes

Runes — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 07:28:19 -0800

I'll just leave this here.

By: mediareport

mediareport — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 08:45:39 -0800

this recent video in which he and pianist Lang Lang perform Chopin together Oh man, that shows so many possibilities for the kind of dance I see at the American Dance Festival every summer - breaking out of the funk-free straightjacket of tradition (ballet & modern) that seems to limit so much dance. But yeah, I'm with ocherdraco: what an idiotic way to edit that thing. So fractured you can't even follow a damn moment. It's like it was edited in exactly the best way to cover up the beauty of what it's showing. Ugh. What horrible editing choices.

By: lohmannn

lohmannn — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 08:55:20 -0800

By: superelastic

superelastic — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 10:04:24 -0800

Just offering another wikipedia link ... since i also remember the '80's (even the '70's, yo), in case you want a little history. I remember the 70's too, but I think you have the wrong Wikipedia link. Try this one. :-)

By: obiwanwasabi

obiwanwasabi — Tue, 27 Nov 2012 02:40:29 -0800

i could do that foot spinny thing at 0:56 but i don't wanna