I swear to God this video brought tears to my eyes. I've only begun to, out of nowhere, look at the videos from the days when they mattered to me and as I went through some Michael Jackson, notably 'Jam' I remembered Heavy D & The Boyz. This was for me the signature video of the late 80s, at the time in my life when I partied like the only oxygen in the world was inside dance clubs.
If you ask me, the greatest spirit of hiphop is right here. Pure, energetic, upbeat, sophisticated, positive, novel and fun with a twist. This was my hiphop, in the days before gangsta, and already during this time period, decidedly logical against the hilarious yet grungy degeneracy of the Beastie Boys. You will notice that there is no irony in Heavy D. He is not playing against anything on the sly - he delivers the pure entertainment and his message is of self-ownership, an uprightness that works the system into beauty and pride. But in the end it's not about that - it's fun, it's a happy, even wacky goodness, a celebration of success that doesn't bite back at haters, talk down at suckers or beat down pretenders. It just glories at the top and it dances. It dances.
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