Block cyphers go viral on TikTok

The summer of 2021 was when the dancers stopped being anonymous. TikTok's algorithm caught a series of phone-shot cypher clips — the now-iconic Church Avenue and Mother Gaston footage — and broadcast them to an audience that didn't know what Brooklyn drill was but knew the dance was special. A handful of dancers from those clips picked up management. Most didn't. The scene split between the people who chased the exposure and the people who stayed at the block cypher.