When did you start breaking?
I first started breaking when I was 8 years old. My sister was a B-girl so she taught me my first 6 step. At that time she was breaking as well as emceeing and went by MC Crystyle. My older brother dipped into breaking too with his friends just because it was cool. At all of our
house parties we would have DJs come through. There would be MC cyphers and I remember watching battle of the year on VHS. I grew up in Vancouver, Canada and the little
little city where I got introduced to hip hop was called Delta. I didn't take it seriously until high school when I started seeing breakers in the cafeteria. They were doing power moves and immediately I connected with it. I was like “Yo! I know some of this stuff” so as they were breaking in the center of the cafeteria I was in the corner doing a six step, the worm all across the floor and a chair freeze, trying to remember all the stuff my sister taught me. When I went home, I watched the one Run DMC video I remembered. It had a battle, girls vs guys and this one girl doing power moves. It was Asia One. At that time I didn’t now her name but I played every single one of her rounds - her six step to flare, head drill and windmills. She was the first woman I had ever seen do power and immediately I knew I wanted to do this.
"She was the first woman I had ever seen do power and immediately I knew I wanted to do this."
I liked physically challenging things in High school and was always about sports. I was very competitive and to see how much strength and power was involved in this dance I felt like I had to do it, so I started practicing at school. My sis had stopped breaking but I learned how to train by watching her discipline with battle rap. There were always rhyme schemes all around her room and she was always practicing writing and making music so I got that focus from her.
She was making a lot of noise at the time and soon she got connected with Fly Antics, the first B-girl crew in Vancouver. Eventually she told them about me and brought me to one of their park jams. That was when I met my mentor Invertabrat and the rest of the Fly Antics crew. Invertabrat invited me to take her workshop series and I started training with her as well as going to local practices and meeting the B-boys in my town Surrey. Not long after, I got put down with Fly Antics.
Who were your teachers and influences?
Everyone in Vancouver has truly contributed to where I am today. Invertabrat was my mentor, she taught me my foundation.
My boys from Surrey, when we were younger we were
The Floor Filluhs together. Even before I was with Fly Antics I was rollin with these guys. We were constantly doing shows together and small battles. They were my dance family especially when I was sixteen. Fly Antics were much older. They were in their late twenties so there was a huge age gap , plus living in different sides of Vancouver, Floor Filluhs and Floor Storm were the main dudes I kicked it and practiced with.
They helped me a lot with my power. I want to shout out Floor Storm and my boys from the Now or Never crew. Two of my Floor Filluhs (Savage Rock and B-Minus) that I was closest to also rep Now or Never crew, they pushed me the most. Before I could do battles with them, they told me that I couldn’t until I got my basic power moves: flares, swipes, baby mills and barrels and I was like “yoo! what the frig!” “Challenge accepted!” and I trained my ass off just to get those. Its because of them I have my power foundation and they did not give me easy props.
Who are the Bgirls that you saw when you were coming up?
In the east coast of Canada, Montreal, there is a crew of women called Legendary crew. These woman truly inspired and encouraged me in my breaking journey. Lynx, Cleopatra (founder of Tentacle Tribe), Radio, Bounce, KillaBee, Vicversa & B-nice truly motivated me and they continue til this day to represent. From Toronto theres Shebang crew and Candice of Dangerous Goods from Winnipeg. Lunacee from Edmonton was holding it down. Seattle was one of the bigger influences for me because you had JessFX & Genesis of Vivid Vixens That I would train a lot with. Also Naj and Bean from Fraggle Rock crew and Coty from Circle of Fire. I also found inspiration from ABgirl, Beta, Jeskilz, Anne Ngyun, Valentine, Movie One, Babyson, Tania The Hunter, Nadia, TFlow, Ayumi, Narumi & Defy.
What are some of your biggest accomplishments?
Pursuing my life as a full time dancer has been the biggest accomplishment. Since I started there were people who weren’t supportive about me pursuing dance full time as a career. Some people even said that by 25 I would be done, but I am still here. I got to be apart of my good friend's performance company called "Project Soul" doing theater shows and school performances. I’ve had opportunities teaching workshops with other companies, studios, as well as collaborating with different artists and performance groups that has kept me busy.
Being able to throw my jam SHINE hands down is also another big accomplishment. To see how I’ve grown in the Vancouver community and overall the Canadian scene is real cool. Receiving all the love and support from communities near and far is a blessing. Another thing I'm pretty stoked about is being part of the the Nutcracker show, touring the US with Kurtis Blow and an Allstar cast.
Also, my own tour called The Amplified Tour that I’ve been working through to try encourage and bring women together in each city by reaching out through workshops and initiating ladies nights or hangouts.
Have you trained other styles of dance and have they influenced your breaking?
Yea, I definitely love all styles. Popping, Locking, House are the styles that I generally go to. I absolutely love locking and popping I'll get down with when it comes to just partying and having a good time but I think locking has influenced my breaking when it comes to sharpness. Sometimes it’s House foot work that I use in my top rock and hip hop grooves too. One thing I'm trying to incorporate more is to use polyrhythmic movements in my breaking.
How would you describe your style? Are you more of a battle or cypher cat?
I get pretty detailed oriented especially when it comes to top rock and footworks. I love to do weird shapes and threads and stack my stuff. I’ll usually create a bunch of things and wind up not using them all in competitions. Out of six or seven combos I'd make, I’ll end up using only two. I love to cypher and get down but I love battling too. Depending on the vibe, I'll be a heavy cypher cat or not. But I'm constantly battling and challenging myself, It's a high every time. We’re constantly fighting our nerves no matter how long you’ve been battling, so to be able to push through those nerves every time is a victory. The competitions are such a game. We’re constantly learning how to be better how to stay humble in different situations and its often stressful. It's a love and hate relationship but at the end of the day it pushes us to be better.
How did you get your B-girl name?
So first off my real name is Jackie. When I was in school I had this teacher who kept saying my name wrong. He kept calling me Ja'kay and It got me so mad. That year when I created my MSN account I typed out how he would spell it Ja'kay and just took away the first “A” and changed the apostrophe to a dash, cuz you know it was for a screen name. When I went back to school everyone had seen the new name I had been using over the summer and they were calling me “J-kay”. People were digging it, so I stuck with the name and used it when I went to Outbreak 5 in Florida This was my first international high caliber event. I was cyphering hard and also made top 8. After the first day we piled into the shuttle with two big crews from Canada ("Filthee Feet" from Vancouver and supercrew from Toronto called "Rude Boi Posse") going back to the hotel and I was hype and kept going “braaat” making machine gun noises. The guys were like “yo Jay! you were smashing it in the cyphers! and you made top 8 you were killing it like an AK 47!” and then at the same time all the guys were like “JK47!!!!” At that time I didn't know what an AK-47 even was but it just stuck.
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