If You’re Fresh To Death Then I’m Deceased

[Post title refers to: Slum Village featuring Kanye West, "Selfish"]

Yippee, a bhangra history lesson! For those of you that have lived this bhangra past with me, it won’t be a lesson so much as a walk through memory lane. Lace up those sneaks and let’s get to strolling.

Competitions
One of the first major bhangra competitions in the US was Bhangra Blowout. This competition, now in its 18th year, is put on by the students of George Washington University. Another early competition, Dhol Di Awaz, lovingly known as DDA, started in 1998. This was put on by the students of Cal (what I like to call the “other” blue, since I went to Michigan). In the early days, competitions were filled with what today’s competitors call “modern bhangra,” which is essentially code talk for “they didn’t what the heck they were doing and they were just making whatever up as they went along.” (I mean, you can look at my old team, MBT, in 2002 for a perfectly good, and perfectly terrible, example of that.) I have no issues with self criticism, for the record.

So part of that making stuff up was doing crazy stunts. And when I say stunts, yes I mean stunts. Like cheerleading stunts. See Cornell circa 2002 where a tall dude (Clint) weaves a shorter girl between his legs like a basketball. Nope, I am not kidding. I wish I could hyper link to that video but I cannot seem to find it. If a Cornell person is reading this, please post! So the late 1990s and early 2000s were filled with “modern,” “hyper,” “stunt” type bhangra, according to us current competitors looking back. A lot of today’s “Bollywood” dance scene still does this type of “primitive” bhangra, stylistically speaking (minus the stunts). Watch this awesomely hilarious video about Bollywood movies for a quick note from us bhangra dancers and how we feel about bhangra in Bollywood.

Aside from DDA, the other major competitions included Bruin Bhangra, thrown by the UCLA team, and Bhangra Fusion, thrown by Hype Productions in Detroit. Of course, I am omitting some details (okay several details) but I got a blog to write, people.

Eyebrows and Smiles > Stunts
Around 2003-2005, things started to change a little bit. The influence of teams like Gabroo Shokeen taught dancers that there were other, more graceful ways to do bhangra. We all envied Steve’s smile and eyebrow. Those around the scene at the time or those who watch videos know exactly what I am talking about. And then along came Khalsa Junction, a team that revolutionized the scene (video). They combined some elements of what at the time was considered “traditional” bhangra with a modern flare . This, in turn, encouraged other teams to follow suit. Khalsa Junction led a movement in the bhangra community. Movements in the scene will be the topic of another blog post. Stay tuned.

Contemporaneously, teams began to push the envelope further and further, more teams popped up, and more competitions arose. Teams like UBC Girlz, Phulorida, Sher Foundation, Rutgers, Boston, Duniya, Punjabi Soormay, DRP, Irvine and Riverside fiercely competed to take the title of best bhangra team.

Internet Warriors!
After every major competition and after ever bhangra event, everyone went to one central online source to discuss the performances, the teams, and the drama. Enter punjabonline.com. Punjab Online was the ultimate go-to place for information on who was who in the bhangra scene—what teams mattered, what teams were loved, what teams were hated, and who deserved to be recognized. Punjab Online is a gold mine for hilarious, dramatic conversations. Some non-competitors made themselves famous in the bhangra community just through their commentary (Hi Vik!). Go check it out if you get a moment. Run a quick search for me if you’d like some confirmation that I’ve been around for as long as I say I have.

Today, thanks to the internet stylings of a certain current Michigan Wolverine (Hi Saleem!) we have a new online forum that has revolutionized the way we talk about bhangra: bhangrateamsforum.com. This online forum is genius-there are moderators, organized discussions and resources all in one place. People talk about team performances, who “top dancers” are, whatever that means, what competitions are good and bad, etcetera.

But Bhangra Teams Forum (BTF) and Punjab Online (POL) would have been largely useless without the influence of another major factor-Gabroo TV(insert cheers and applause here). Since most of the bhangra competitions are spread throughout the US and a lot of the competitors and the people posting on these sites and don’t have the time/money/energy to go flying around watching them all, we rely completely on Youtube (previously other file sharing mechanisms) to watch performances. The man behind Gabroo TV, Harjot Hundal, revolutionized the bhangra video upload. He made the videos sing. SING. Not literally. But they became more accessible and just plain old more beautiful. Beautifuller. The man is a saint. We in the bhangra community owe him big time. As you can see by the videos I link to above, there is a huge difference in both quality and quantity of videos, largely due to the influence of the one and only Mr. Hundal.

That brings us to into the last four years or so. And there are just way too many teams for me to talk about, or even mention, that have had a hand in the scene. I can say that in recent times, more and more teams have begun to push the envelope. After 2004, Canadian teams started to storm the scene. Teams like Duniya Allstars, AVA, PCBCA and PANJ, Nachdi Jawani and SGPD had and have a huge role in the changing scene. They have revolutionized the notion of creativity in bhangra and brought a uniquely competitive edge to the scene. Moreover, teams like VCU, Drexel, Bhangra Empire, APD, SMD, AEG, Heeray and Virsa de Waris have dominated the competitive scene. I’m sitting on an airplane writing this fearing that I am leaving someone big out. I know that I am. Don’t hate me. We are still friends. This is just the preliminary post to get you interested. I hope it is working.

So, that’s the quick and dirty on the scene. Obviously, several details have been omitted. But hopefully this is enough history to keep you interested and for us to keep it moving.