When DJ Unk dropped “2 Step” back in the oh-sev, members of the Stanford Authentication team were bewitched. Dance floors up and down the Bay Area burned as the newly formed crew blew threw the stepping forces of Cal, UCSF, and Foothill, and the Ivies began to wonder if this prowess could spill over and threaten their longstanding dominance of the waltz market. But, just like the Foxtrot, the electric slide, the Cupid Shuffle, and that Soulja Boy thing, the days of this dance craze were numbered from the outset. By the fall of 2013, when speakers blared with the classic “Now watch me two step!” most members of the Stan4d Authentik8rz shrugged a passive shoulder and offered an existentially troubled, “Why?”
The group’s problems, however, would soon be resolved by a question that has proven just as multifaceted and troubling, a query pervasive and disquieting enough to challenge a generation of hood rats and suburban wanna-be’s alike; a single sentence with the interrogative force of a freight train. We refer, of course, was the simple, elegant, and yet bafflingly impactful: “Can you teach me how to dougie?”
One member of the crew, who go by Bubba, recounts, “I mean, I aint’ from Dallas, but I D-town boogie. Or rather, I can now. We were at such a low point- demoralized, lost, and stuck in a cycle of self-doubt, we had so many questions for which we simply couldn’t find an answer. The two step? Balderdash! Gangnam Style? Poppycock! Will Smith’s daughter’s hair whippy neck hurty thing? Why? Why? Why?! Like sand, a good answer seemed to be always slipping through our fingers. And then, one day, it just came so elegantly: teach me how to dougie. That was it. Why? Cause all the bitches love me! It was that simple all along! Nowadays, all I need is a beat that’s super bumping before I find myself putting my palms out front, leaning side to side, and sounding a barbaric yawp of joy!”
If eyewitness reports of the team’s recent resurgence are true, this is no exaggeration. A Flipsider in the field described a scene at SAE last weekend in which the crew’s lively dancing not only made the party shine bright when it got all gloomy, but where, once their moves were showed off, the team found that errybody was tryna do them. Indeed, it seems like this is one bubble-gum beat we’ll be chewing on for quite some time.
