Though it's often been suggested that the fundamentals of dubstep descend from a lyrical prophesy in Morris Day and the Time's 1984 hit "The Bird," in which Day intimates that "you don't need no finesse or no personality/You just need two arms and an attitude," in practice dubstep is somewhat more complicated than that "Chicken Dance" variant. Really, the movements are more akin to a robot turtle trying to escape a coral reef.
Confusing? It is. And if you're going to keep up on what the kids are doing these days, you're going to need some help. That's where we come in, with this video tutorial, where we've compiled the best dubstep videos on all of the internets and broken them down into layman's terms.
Step 1 Remove everything from your apartment and turn off the heat. Although this clearly experienced dubstepper wears a heavy coat, beginners are advised to wear as little clothing as possible, as the limbic stiffness that comes with the onset of hypothermia will allow you to mimic the style's exaggerated sluggishness. Then get rid of all the possessions you took out of your apartment, because you just found your calling, man.
Step 2 Once you've mastered moving as if you are trapped in an aquarium filled with Vaseline, the next step is to take that behavior and speed it up. Since many of the effects used in dubstep sound like farting noises, sometimes it helps to imagine yourself in a slow-motion wind tunnel -- no, not a wind tunnel of farts. That's disgusting. Don't be disgusting.
Step 3 Now you're ready to work on your technique. Dubstepping generally involves some degree of roboticness, so to truly refine your personal style of dubstepping, you need a robot mentor; this fellow has chosen Transformers protagonist Optimus Prime. Note that the mentor is only for inspirational purposes, though -- obviously, the actual Optimus Prime would neither rub his chest quite so suggestively, nor would he be hanging out in his sister's bedroom.
Step 4 An excellent example of the inclusiveness of dubstep, this fellow takes a spiritually influenced approach, recalling the many-armed god Shiva while simultaneously proving that even the disabled can dance, as his unfortunate case of scurvy demonstrates. Handicapped? Make that handicapable.
Step 5 A central component of dubstepping is to jerk your body violently on the downbeat, as if being physically assaulted by it -- as if, in fact, that downbeat slipped something in your drink, accosted you after let-out and left you pantsless and bleary in the alley behind the club. This woman's interpretation of that theme is so convincing even the camera got roofied.
Step 6 Like Ralph Macchio in The Karate Kid, the true dubstepper must practice the basics of dubstep until they become innate, ready to be called up in an instant, almost instinctively. Here, these two young British gentlemen demonstrate how to incorporate "hustle" into your daily routine, which is basically the dubstep equivalent of waxing Mr. Miyagi's car.
Step 7 Conversely, it's also possible to use the banality of everyday life as dubstep inspiration -- incorporating your daily routine into the dubstep, as it were. This fellow may look as if he's just moving to the beat, but if you pay close attention, the astute observer will note that he's also miming out his job at the berry-picking farm.
Step 8 In the 1950s, a style of film acting emerged wherein actors strove not so much to play their characters, but to become them, to know their flaws, their desires, their innermost secrets and pain. They called this process "the method," and dubstepping is similar; it is not enough simply to dubstep -- the true dubstepper must possess what flamenco dancers would call el duende (roughly translated: the soul) of the dance: That at a fundamental level, our expression wells up from our pain. To get in touch with this concept, try having a friend chuck a tennis ball at your nuts.
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At this level of dubstepping, you're more or less a superhero, so you should probably get some sort of mask. Then, set up your secret lair at the mall right next to the FootLocker, where Sam Goody used to be.
Step 10 As the karate expert defeats his opponent by striking with less effort, this dubstep jedi demonstrates awesome skill without even getting up off the floor.
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