The thumping music died to a whisper upon Alien Ness’ request. As the veteran breaker — never "break dancer” — stalked and snaked around the room, his many rings caught the spotlight that illuminated the dance floor.
Alien Ness coached a few dozen amateurs — men, women, Black, white, Asian — during his footwork class before Red Bull BC One’s USA National Final, one of America’s biggest breaking competitions, held in August at the Fillmore Philadelphia.
"They say dance is a vocabulary,” Alien Ness said, exhorting the dancers to contort and pretzel their bodies to spell their names. He added, "If it feels like the letter, if it moves like the letter, then it is the letter.”