Why do you keep dancing? This is a party, you're supposed to stand there and drink. Do you seriously feel justified? It makes you feel good to be the center of attention? Oh... I see, you seriously feel Justified, as in the album.
Dancing rules. It rules harder than anything else that can legally be done in public. It rules harder than Vigo the Destroyer, who sat on a mountain of skulls in a castle of pain on a throne of blood. Dancing rules everyone at a party or a rock show because at any party that's worth your time, you should always be defined by dancing. The dancing mindset says, \You can't just dance on any old pole, you've got to be selective,"" and then proves itself wrong (Shroeder, 22).
Something rules when the act of doing it makes you look cool and dancing is certainly that kind of act. Thus: With the possible exception of compulsive ecstasy-based dancing, dancing rules. My associate once said, ""Even if you are homeless and about to die, you see a man who can really dance and you say, 'That man is the shit!'"" (Grotte, 5). That man is the shit. But why is he so cool?
The movie ""Shag"" tells us that dancing takes getting over oneself, humility if you will, in order to look cool, have sex and win contests. Even bad dancers are at least given the status of non-wallflower, of getting live. When elbows are flying at awkward angles, the white boys are dancing like Beck and girls are grinding on one another and drinks are getting slowly spilled to the beat, anyone can get over themselves. Once you're there though, it's easy to start jocking yourself, because you are hot shit.
John Travolta is a humble guy and is also generally commended for dancing cool. Travolta dances because the point at which humility mingles with egotism is the locus of good dancing. To get there, the first step is forgetting that anyone is watching. The second step is believing that everyone is watching. A good example is the ""I Need a Girl, Part One"" video, in which Usher achieves a transformation from heartbroken cutie to burning hot piece-of-man by dancing up a storm. He begins the video in his bathroom, dancing alone. By the end of the video, he's the star of a party. And it's a major league party, with Puffy and everything.
Another pertinent piece is the Timberlake/land video. Being alone and ignored is the central theme, and yet the dancing is directed at the person the song is for. The dancing would fail if no one saw it, it would be less than fulfilled, an un-felicitous performance. Putting it all out there is always about humility and egotism. Timberlake truly believes that not only is he brave and humble in putting his pain into his music, but that his pain is attractive. He's right. That's how things work. After ""Cry Me A River,"" you can start over by forgetting about it, and you get to ""Rock Your Body."" ""I Need A Girl, Part One"" achieves and describes that transition.
Of course, humility and egotism work to describe other things, too, like lyrics from Omaha. Think about this, though: Justin and Britney had a dance-off in a club. It must have been like a wine-drinking contest between Ryan Adams and Courtney Love, a performance completely done for themselves and completely done to show each other up in front of others. How much would you give to see that dance-off? I would give my left nut.
scavenberry@hotmail.com.
