For as long as I can remember I’ve always been interested in global street dance styles: dance moves and trends started by small groups of folks in their respective geographic areas. Over at my chimatli blog I’ve posted lots of DIY Youtube videos of various urban styles like Kurdish Halay/Govend hip-hop, Duranguense, Tecktonik, Kuduro and Jerkin, to name of few. In this tradition, I was pleased to come across these videos of a new music style and scene coming out of Texas called Tribal which mixes Banda/Cumbia with Techno. While the music is pretty straightforward, it basically sounds like a good mixture of the two music genres, it’s the fashion that goes with this scene that’s pretty remarkable – namely, the boots. These aren’t any old kind of botas, these are the kinda boots that would make an Aladin genie or a fanciful fairy proud. The tip of the boots are long, pointy and exaggerated, so much so that I wonder how they are able to walk in them as the point stretches out sometimes two feet in front of their shoe. “How do they climb stairs?” a friend wondered. Frequently the boots are decorated in a mega-Ed Hardy style, bedazzled and often shocking pink or leopard print.

photo courtesy of Chuntaritos

I’ll be the first to admit, they look pretty ridiculous and perusing the Chuntaritos site where photos of these “botas exoticas” can be found, has providing me with lots of guffaw entertainment. But I appreciate that this is a homegrown style and the Mexicano/Chicano youth of San Antonio and Dallas are not looking to the New York catwalks or the super absurd 14-yr old Tavi Gevinson and her granny styles for fashion inspiration. We did wonder though, if some of the O.G. extreme bota kids had picked up an old copy of Leningrad Cowboys Go to America at the local swapmeet and decided pointy was the way to go.

The funny thing about these boots is that it makes it difficult to dance face to face with your partner, unless your girl likes pointy things up her skirt…but don’t even go there, cochinos. So they’ve developed a line dance style to accommodate the botas. Line dancing has been popular among Chicanos and Mexicanos in the past. I remember non-country inspired line dancing at weddings when I was a kid, especially when some of the Tex-Mex Nortenos were played. Perhaps it’s a continuation of this tradition, who knows? Just be careful in those Tejas nightclubs, you never know what might be poking you from behind.

Anyone spot these super botas in Los Angeles yet? Or do you have cousins in Tejas who are part of this scene?

Thanks to El Chavo who first shared the Chuntaritos site with me after he saw a Chespirito decorated pair.

Those are some extreme boots! photo courtesy of Chuntaritos