In March of 1984 my family moved to KS, briefly staying in Manhattan. I was only there a week or so when a guy in the lunch room caught my attention because he looked similar to me; one glove, spiked belt, Jheri curl…ah, the 80s. I went up to him and found that Warren Curry also had just moved there from Germany like me, and was a Hip Hop fan.
In my week there, I had already become “popular” because, although “Breakdancing” was starting to spread thanks to Flashdance (Beat Street and Breakin’ were a few months away still), only a few people were breaking in the school, and even with my minimal skills, I was slightly ahead of the pack. I was even featured in the school paper right away for my dancing and signature one leather glove, that I think I got from the automotive department at Venture.
Warren had been doing gymnastics for years, but wanted to get into Breakin’ so I offered to “teach” him some things. Truthfully, I wasn’t good enough to teach anyone, I basically just encouraged him, and a week or two later he was the best breaker in the school.
I was the only MC in the school at the time, and Warren was also interested in doing that. I decided to revive my first group name from Germany, Devastating Two, and become a duo with Warren, soon dubbed MC Capri. To teach him how to do routines I had him learn the KK Rockwell parts to “Stoop Rap” from Wild Style, and this is a recording of us recording this with a cheap Radio Shack microphone (that actually shorted out while recording this), while sitting one my front steps (stoop?) in Manhattan, KS.
Capri moved to Fort Riley before me, and found out about the Fort Riley Breakin’ Patrol at the youth center, and we both joined, forming a group called Action Crew, and we competed in some state championships, and we featured in the Newspaper (PIC 2). The pic of us (F-B) is Jamie Jackson (the best dancer in town!), me, Garret, Darrell Green, and Warren (PIC 3.
