I love feeling high. Yes, that’s right. There is nothing better than the feeling of ecstasy, happiness, joy and laughter. It’s addictive, natural, exhilarating and something we all seek. Imagine if you could tap into that everyday of your life…imagine if you could feel that good without a hang over the next day.

You know where I’m going with this. Maybe I shouldn’t have given it away in the title. Why don’t you try using dance as a drug? Set yourself a challenge. Do yourself a favour. Make our tag line your mantra: “Why move when you can groove?” It’s all about doing stuff that you would do everyday, but with groove.

Challenge yourself to see how far you can take this mantra.

Go to a club completely straight. A little word of warning: you may not like what you see. But that’s half the fun. Now keep going. The music is pumping and your body is moving to the beat. You start heading towards the bar. STOP! Turn around, head to the dance-floor. You can do it. “But”, I hear you say, “there’s no-one else on the dance-floor”.  Exactly!

It’s even better if there’s no-one on the dance-floor. Think of the rush you’ll get by being the first one to start. There’s your first bit of natural exhilaration: the adrenaline pumping through your veins. It’s doing its own dance in your body. Your heartbeat drums louder as you move towards the dance-floor. It’s probably easiest to start grooving as you head there, as opposed to walking there and then starting to groove. It’s smoother, you’ll look cooler.

You’re now at the centre of everyone’s attention. Don’t worry though, no-one will remember because they’re all off their faces anyway! Now: let it all out. Close your eyes if you think it will help, and think about how many barriers you’ve broken through to get there. You’re proud of yourself and actually, you’re having a great time. You open your eyes and there are others dancing around you. Yes! You started the dancing for the night. Congratulations! Now keep going because soon you will move from adrenaline to natural ecstasy. And if people approach you asking you for the drugs that you’re on, you can tell them where to get them.

Feeling more adventurous? Try our tag line on for size in situations you normally wouldn’t even think about dancing. I do it at home all the time and admittedly it’s a little harder to do it in the light of day when other people around you are going about their boring lives, but imagine the rush! The supermarket is a good place to start. You can put the “Shopping Trolley” move to the test. And depending on how far you want to take it (I always encourage extremes), you can end your performance with the famous power-slide in Starsky and Hutch. And if you’re wondering, yes, I have done it. [Join our forum discussions on "Ultimate Finishing moves" to brag, share or dare others.]

If you’re at the stage where taking drugs or drinking yourself into a stupor is not appealing anymore or you’re simply looking for a more healthy and less expensive alternative, then dance is the perfect prescription. Get high off the groove!

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Picture this: a fantastic party atmosphere, great music, people showing off their moves and having a laugh. Where the bloody hell are you?

I’m guessing there are many people who really want to get into dance, but just don’t know where to start. Most of the dance-based TV programs make dance seem inaccessible, as though it’s only for those who’ve danced out of the womb. A myriad dance styles, tens of local dance schools all vying for your attention and no-one to go with. Boo hoo. Snap out of the blues and get into the grooves!

The message that uBERgroover.tv delivers is: dance is for everyone, dance is easy and dance is so much fun that when you start, you wonder how you ever did without it. It becomes your social outlet, your exercise, your fun, your connection with others and best of all your connection with yourself. Look at it as an adventure.

I’ve had my fair share of frustration in choreographed dance classes. When the dance instructor first shows you what moves you’re about to learn, your immediate reaction is: “Pffft, yeah right”. Before you have a chance to rebel, the music is on, the class is moving and you get carried into the dance. What seems difficult to begin with becomes enjoyable as you get it. Your moves turn into grooves and although you may not be nailing the routine, you know what move you’ll be practicing at the next party.

I remember finding the “body roll” incredibly challenging – I just couldn’t get it and I wanted to…BADLY! So when I was at my next party, I planted my body against the wall and practiced the isolations that are critical in making this move a success. Now it’s my favourite uBERmove.

Dance is not about remembering routines. Your mind and body work perfectly together to register moves that you enjoy and you will start to incorporate these moves into your regular nights out. Plus, there is evidence to suggest that we learn a lot during our sleep, so trust that you will be processing the moves while you sleep, work or do something completely unrelated until it clicks and BAM: you’ve got a move ready to unveil at the next dance-party or indeed dance-off!

FIVE TIPS FOR DANCE-STARTERS

(1) Practice at home. Put your favourite music on and groove when you’re doing every day actions. Do you think I’m just sitting here and typing? No! I’m doing it with groove. Hang on, I’ve just perfected the side-to-side body roll! Clean up with loud music and groove, dance with your clothes when hanging them up. Play around, move, get those juices flowing.

(2) Take your home grooves out for a test drive. These are a great ice-breaker. Combine them with classic moves such as the “sprinkler”, do them until you stop caring what everyone else thinks of you and then break into your own rhythm.

(3) Join a dance class. You might find that a bit of structure is exactly what you need. If choreography is not your bag, join a class that focuses on the ecstasy one feels through movement and music. Kundalini dance is a great example of this (see Webisode 5), as are any of the dances that fall under the banner of “Ecstatic Dance”. Start with a no-commitment casual class and see where it takes you!

(4) Drag a friend along to a class or to a dance event. Dancing is a lot more fun when you can laugh with each other.

(5) Watch uBERgroover.tv webisodes every week to get some inspiration.

That should be enough to get you experiencing the natural ecstasy that is dance. Do it. Don’t think, just dance your way to ecstasy!

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The first thing I used to think about at the mere mention of Hip Hop were rough, unapproachable characters dressed in baggy clothes and backward caps, interested only in break-dancing in exclusive groups and spraying ugly graffiti at every bare fence.

The Platform 1 Hip Hop festival broke through all of my preconceived notions. The “rough” characters were actually approachable, friendly, articulate people with a contagious enthusiasm for their art.

I saw art in the dance, style in their clothing, masterpieces in the graffiti and passion in the people. They are not only fantastic dancers, they are artists who just want to share their culture and not be judged according to stereotypes. Classic stuff.

The origins of this culture, however, seem so heavily influenced by the US that I can’t help but wonder whether we’re selling out. I understand that Aussies want the best of other cultures, but how much are we defining ourselves through this culture and creating something original versus copying and extending on what we see in the US?

That goes for the grooves, the graffiti and the gear. Speaking of gear, one thing I love about the outfits, is that there are no high heels in site. Now I can rant about the fact that I think heels are the most ridiculous shoe invention, designed for the discomfort of wearers and neighbours alike. Have you ever tried dancing in heels and have you ever had your toe jabbed by one? Hooray for heel-free hip-hopsters!

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Hey groovers, it’s Tribal T in da blog!

On the off-chance that a DJ plays great music when I go out, you will see me migrate between the dance-floor, the stage and the water-station. I don’t know whether it’s my afro’s gravitational pull, my crazy dance-floor antics or simply my enthusiasm that gathers crowds. Whatever it is, I’m usually the first one on the dance-floor and typically the last to leave. And I can’t help but wonder: if I’m having so much fun dancing, why aren’t there more people – specifically men- on the dance-floor?

A typical night out in Sydney night-clubs is akin to watching a night-nature documentary. I distinctly hear Sir David Attenborough’s voice categorising the various breeds of male dancers:

• Groin grinders. They predominantly move in packs of two and attack two unsuspecting women at a time, having placed dibs on their preferences. Their tactics usually include separating the women and rubbing their groin onto their chosen victim, marking their territory. Every girl is a possibility, but their strike rate is low until about 2am, when some girls are drunk enough to accept their advances

• üBERgoobers. See blog on “üBER” terminology and join the forum discussion for tactics on dealing with these guys. http://www.ubergroover.tv/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=

• Drunk guys. Yeah, you know the ones: slurring, swaying and spilling drinks. They line the perimeter of the dance-floor, as though dancing is a spectator sport. They watch girls dance, entertain the thought of dancing for a millisecond and then take another swig of their beer before mimicking the moves of their favourite tools, like the lawn-mower, the whipper-snipper or the chainsaw

• Trained dancers. These guys have clearly been dancing for a long time and their ego makes them so serious that they won’t even contemplate dancing with women unless their skill is equivalent.

• üBERgroovers. This is a very rare species. This man has great moves, dances with everyone around him, will pay special attention to women who dance on his level and is generally unobtrusive and polite. Picking up comes naturally, but it’s not his main intention. He only comes out once a year, or so it seems.

Unlike the leopard, I believe male breeds of dancers can change their spots. So how do we entice more Australian men to dance? I think the secret lies in understanding why they’re not dancing in the first place.We have Wayne the Aussie bloke telling us how it is, but can anyone else give us their perspective?

Perhaps we should emulate Sir David Attenborough’s hidden camera tactics and put some in the men’s bathrooms (urinal cams?). If I see any üBERgroovers getting bashed by drunk guys, I will know where to start my hunt.

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Does Australia have dances representing its modern culture? To put this into context, Greeks have regional folk dances and Latinos have everything from the salsa to the tango. What do Aussies have? The sprinkler and the drongo? Oh that’s right, whenever we feel inclined to bond with our dance-floor neighbours, we chuck on the Nutbush and the Macarena, usually in succession, just to keep the group spirit flowing.

Granted, we’re a young culture. But we do have a diverse selection of ethnic cultures here that have something to teach us. Plus we have a few trademark moves of our own, like the sprinkler which can easily be incorporated into a group dance. So to answer this question, we reckon Australia does not have dances representing the diversity and richness of its modern culture, but that it is possible to create some…or at least one. This warrants in-depth exploration and is the premise of the show.

On our search to cover dance forms taught in Sydney, we came across numerous traditional dance classes from all around the world. However, a quick search for classes in Australian indigenous dance revealed no results! We have a rich indigenous heritage, yet we can’t actually learn any of the indigenous dances, because they’re sacred and can’t be performed without permission because we’re not part of that culture. Without intending any disrespect, is this doing the indigenous culture a disservice? Is it keeping them too isolated from the rest of the Australian cultures? I can’t help but feel that if we were allowed to immerse ourselves in indigenous dance, our sense of how we express ourselves as modern Australians would be far more inspired.

We do not propose to create Australia’s ultimate “üBERgroove” in the first series of üBERgroover.tv. What we propose, on a pseudo-technical level, is to collect a whole series of established and improvised dance moves based on our culture, our slang and our environment, including distinct indigenous representations, such as the “emu” or “kangaroo”. We then ask you to decide: should any of these moves be part of Australia’s üBERgrooves?

On a more social level, we would like to initiate a conversation about dance…starting in Australia and radiating towards the rest of the world.

Explore these ideas and start conversations on our forum: uBERgroover.tv/forum

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We’ve been bandying a few “üBER” terms around, so in case their meanings aren’t obvious, here are our explanations to get you in with all the “üBER” talk.

“üBER” is a German word meaning “super”, “over”, “above”. Therefore, anything üBER is above average. With this in mind, here are our definitions:

üBERgroovers are super-groovers who feel no inhibitions about expressing themselves through dance; in essence they encapsulate and spread the spirit of groove. Whether or not they’ve taken dance classes, they have funky moves, a contagious dance spirit that gathers crowds, generates dance-offs and a lot of sweat, exhaustion and exhilaration.

üBERgoobers, on the other hand, are exceptional characters entirely in their own worlds. It takes them a while to get onto the dance-floor to strut their stuff (it usually takes a few drinks) but when they do, their uBERgeekiness usually astounds the majority of groovers.

An üBERmove is a dance move, typically contagious and super-fun.

An üBERgroove is a fun dance that everyone can enjoy performing alone or in a group; and Australia’s üBERgrooves are dances that represent modern Australian culture which are created, enacted or adopted by Australians.

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