I chaperoned a school dance Friday night. I had far more fun than I would have expected. I mean, there were times when I had to pay close attention to see what was going on, and I had to tell a few couples to put some daylight in there, but overall, everything was nice. All that said, I think I had the most fun watching them dance when Crank Dat came on.
Now dig: you will probably never hear a ringing endorsement of Soulja Boy from this corner, so don’t trip. I’m not renouncing my avuncular ways. I’m old-school for real-for real. Even my peers know: to judge by cultural artifacts (pop cultural artifacts, at least) I’m closer to having graduated in 73 than having been born in 73. All that notwithstanding, I can’t hate on these little dances. Seriously. At my high school dances, we did the “running man” and the “roger rabbit.” As far as trendy dances go? I’d call that a draw. Only thing is, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen the roger rabbit in a ballet class like this here…
November 12th, 2007 at 12:52 pm
I’ll cosign on that “no Soulja Boy” fan. BUT… at my son’s school (cultureandlanguage.org) they play music after Morning Affirmation, while the whole school goes into the building for class, as sort of a “get hyped ” about class tactic. They play everything from rap to r&b to jazz. One day they played “Crank Dat” and they damn near lost their minds!! I mean from PreK to 8th grade they were all scootin’ to side on one leg. LOL. All I could do was laugh. The lyrics are debatable (superman that ho? Or Ooooo as my son says) but I must admit all the parents were cracking up. FYI… my son is 5 and NEVER hears any Soulja Boy . My radio stays on XM’s old school station (Groove 64) or Oprah and Friends or NPR. I guess if I hear it somewhere then so does he because he knows the lyrics, or what he thinks are the lyrics.
November 12th, 2007 at 2:40 pm
My wife (also a teacher) reports the same thing. Last school dance the kids insisted on teaching her the moves to that dance. I can’t pick out much of the lyrics ‘cept “watch me crank dat soulja boy (up?)!” it’s good fun.
November 12th, 2007 at 3:40 pm
Yeah, they taught me how to do it when we went to camp last month. Since it was their dance, I didn’t bust out the clark kent, but should an emergency arise, i can, in fact, superman that ho.
November 18th, 2007 at 10:10 am
I’ve got this song on my phone, didn’t much like it when I first heard it, but it kind of grows on you.
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