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"HI, BILLY MAYS HERE, AND I WANT TO SHOW YOU THE AWESOME POWER OF THE TROOPERS! ARE YOU LOOKING FOR DRUM CORPS? WELL HAVE I GOT A DEAL FOR YOU!"

To clarify, I was actually two months old. I realized this was 1978 after the conversation.

"I like swords and hot chicks" LOL!!!! Now you need to invite him to a show!

Just got back from Bones' rehearsal in San Antonio. They ended the evening with the first full run of the season (closer drill is 5-6 hours old!). I am not about to make any predictions about placement, it would be dumb to do so. BUT, these guys sound like a drum corps again. Chuck's brass writing is great. Lots of stuff going on, not so "one dimensional" as the past few years. Beddis and Markworth have that drumline groovin again (thank God) and Rudy Gowern and his staff have done a GREAT job with the drumline. I've gone to check out rehearsal each year before they leave for tour. This is the only time since the move to TX that I haven't left feeling like I've been at a HS band rehearsal. The hornline can put out some SOUND and the drumline has some sweet beats. This will be a crowd pleaser, for sure. Good job, so far, X-Men!!!

It's a calf stretch

Even if it ain’t all it seems, I got a pocketful of dreams Baby, I'm from New York Concrete jungle where dreams are made of There's nothing you can't do Now you're in New York These streets will make you feel brand new Big lights will inspire you Hear it for New York, New York, New York! On the avenue, there ain't never a curfew, ladies work so hard Such a melting pot, on the corner selling rock, preachers pray to God Hail a gypsy cab, takes me down from Harlem to the Brooklyn Bridge Some will sleep tonight with a hunger far more than an empty fridge I'm gonna make it by any means, I got a pocketful of dreams Baby, I'm from New York Concrete jungle where dreams are made of There's nothing you can't do Now you're in New York These street will make you feel brand new Big lights will inspire you Hear it for New York, New York, New York!

But did it make national television?

you guys call me when the Bluecoats drop to 6th as predicted here twice. I'll keep my phone on Monday night.

Going to Orange Stadium Promenade 25 in Orange here in SoCal! I'm so excited!! :) Aaand I'm going to be bringing my parents with me to see their first performance of drum corps ever! They haven't the slightest idea about what drum corps even is, so I think this will be a good experience for them. They hear me yapping about drum corps all the time and never know what I'm talking about! I think it's a good idea to get them exposed to drum corps a bit so they know what it is that I'll hopefully doing in the near future :)

You must not have seen how strong they were last year, and that the design team, with Robert W. Smith replacing Jim Prime, is the same. The staff is virtually the same. Do you really think that having that type of consistency, plus incredible eligible membership retention, and a program that is brilliant is not going to be successful? I truly would LOVE to know where your thoughts come from. I'm going to go ahead and base mine off of what happened from 2009 to 2010. Maybe I'm wrong though.

One person's crushed brass instrument is someone else's piece of art...

When I first heard about this event I decided I wasn't going to support it (you know - G8 stuff and all that dookie) but the closer it gets I think I'll probably break down and go just beause I'm ready to see some #### drum corps!

So all this recent trolling that has been going on is actually against the guidlines?

[psa] "FAIL" IS NOT A NOUN. PLEASE STOP USING IT LIKE A NOUN. [/psa]

Fan Network - full standstill of the show as performed on June 10 at Conner Prairie Civil War Museum! (with a few gems at the end, too!)

scores at first show are more of an indicator of how you finished at finals the previous year he he

A boy comes home with a black eye after a date. His father asked him what happened, he says "Well Dad, you told me to be sure to compliment my date, so I told her, 'For a fat girl, you don't sweat much!'

Bawker is a chump is doing some things I'm not happy with. For example, this thread.

I did knock Sandra Opie's tape player out of her hand with the bell of my euph. one time.

Dudes! SCV 2010 was awesome!!!!

Paul Collins, who runs the Brass Shoppe mobile repair unit, can tell you some stories. He says the players learn a drill change, but the instruments don't catch on as fast.

Class is hard to define: SCV, Madison, and The Troopers come immediately to mind. I can tell you what definitely ISN'T classy: coming on to field wearing your championship ring(s) over your gloves!

In before close

I use my prison library computer after finishing my license plate polishing... usually just before my evening Vespers, and before the lights go out for the nite.

That does sum up the experience for some folks... Mike

I've been wanting a cummerbund added since last season! That makes all the difference in the world. I could live with this design! Now if they'd just do it!

That guy's beard is the reason clean-shaven is a bad policy. Ideally: >inb4 someone points out how bad I am at photoshop

http://video.l3.fbcdn.net/cfs-l3-ash4/232065/582/10150213297212274_24343.mp4?oh=ccfa903fa67ba57c40735a0feaadd865&oe=4DFBF800&l3s=20110615174736&l3e=20110617175736&lh=070d2f37fb5275ac6d24f

Point of Order Ummm "ho" ready ? really ? Early lead because they "ho" themselves ? or as in 1/87th scale ?

Here is your latest update: Five days until the first show! Drill has been completed since Monday and the corps has been cleaning in preparation for the show in Indianapolis. Two parades this weekend in Libertyville and Elk Grove Village, Illinois.

Okay. There are 4 ties at Semi Finals, therefore 16 corps make Finals. That should appease everyone. 1st - TIE - Cavaliers, Blue Devils 2nd - TIE - Cadets, Bluecoats 3rd - TIE - SCV, Blue Stars 4th - TIE - Crown, PR 5th - Blue Knights 6th - Scouts 7th - Crusaders 8th - Glassmen 9th - Troopers 10th - Academy 11th - Spirit 12th- Crossmen

Spent a few days with the corps in Texas. I love the show and can't wait to see them July 7th in Akron, Ohio. They do however, have a few horn spots that just opened if you'd like to jump on tour with them. They also have a guard spot and maybe a tenor. Definitely a classic Crossmen show I think you'll enjoy.

That will rub out

Not really an ad hominem in the first place, but doing better than that would be pointing out that not only were those chords not power chords (not root-fifth chords), none of the mallet runs were chromatic, either (most of them sounded minor or perhaps octatonic). It's weird that there's people predicting it will be "too weird" for fans to get into and yet people claiming it will be "too standard." I don't think anything about this show is average. Also, the stigma attached to "intentionally dissonant" music is kind of disturbing. If you listen to the , you should find it listenable, especially because the tonality and musicality of it is reflected in a lot of highly-praised drum corps programming. Phantom '06 used Corigliano, whose large-ensemble music even I find a little hard on the ears, but I don't see many people saying that show was not fan friendly.

2007 marked the conclusion of a multi-year plan to build a more successful corps. The theory was that if you recruited younger members and provided an outstanding experience on and off the field, retention would be bolstered from year to year. In 2007, the Colts aged out one of the largest classes in DCI that season. Coincidentally, the Colts placed 10th in Finals after spending many seasons out of the Top 12. The trick to building a successful corps is offering a successful experience. Members leave a corps when that experience is less than satisfactory in many cases due to logistical conditions and perception of staff members. Because brand loyalty is harder to win in those corps who don't enjoy perennial celebrity status, more effort must be made to create that loyalty. The corps I returned to in 2009 seemed to be run with a more competitive philosophy. Many individuals left the corps after the 2008 season and went on to march in other more competitively successful organizations because their experiences gave them an edge in auditions. Had the 2008 season not fallen so flat after 2007 (on AND off the field), I suspect things would be different today. There is quite a bit of truth to the G8 category; those corps attract talent because of their successes. Non-finalist corps bleed talent to those organizations often when members reach their final year and want to finish their DCI career with their "dream corps." I've seen 2-3 year members leave for their age-out season and march with corps that are more attractive for a variety of reasons. I've seen members who could easily earn a top spot in any of those corps stay with a corps that struggles to stay in Finals range year after year. There are ALREADY many successful corps that don't need to bill themselves as training corps because they are already treated that way by their membership. Those corps can break that cycle through long-term planning and hiring individuals committed to that goal and fit well with the organizations philosophies.

Incidentally, congratulations to the Boston Bruins.

It's a joke, Mr. Cawthorne. Great work so far this season. Keep them coming!

The absolute greatest thing that happened to be on tour is when my fiance' "found" my corps one evening during a rehearsal day. She was on staff at Div 3 corps, me on tour as a member of a WC corps, and of course our corps competed at the same show exactly zero times. We were in the middle of planning our wedding that summer (we got married in December), so I talked to her as often as I could. This was all pre-cell phones, so I could only call her when she was at a certain place at the right time (i.e. the home she was staying in in the town the corps was based in/rehearsing). It was rough, but as the saying goes, absence definitely made the heart grow fonder. Anyway, my corps was rehearsing somewhere in Michigan (maybe in/around Ypsilanti), around the middle of the summer. It had been a rough one for us due some visual design issues, and competitively we were no where near where we wanted to be. As I came off the field after our final block of the night (after probably learning drill for the upteenth rewrite), a familiar voice yelled something that got my attention. After the long rehearsal day my brain was a bit fried, and coupled with the fact that in my mind there was no WAY my fiance' could POSSIBLY be around, I sheepishly turned to see the shock of the summer. It was awesome to see her and visit for a few hours. While that is probably the most extreme awesome thing to do for someone on tour, I was fortunate to have my summers (I marched two years of WC drum corps) full of my wife sending postcards, letters, and every once in awhile care packages of homemade goodies and other treats. Every once in awhile my parents would find me on tour when we went through my hometown, and they too would bring me goodies. It meant a TON, and while a simple letter doesn't seem like much, that little slice of care/love from old friends, family, GF/BF, fiance', etc means everything in the middle of a summer tour. Over the years I've tried to pay it forward by bringing simple pleasures to friends marching (favorite magazines I knew they liked, snacks, etc), and later on friends on staff. With staffers, I like to try to take them out to lunch or something, to give them a small respite from the routines of tour.

:worthy:

Now that you say that, they do. 08 had some pretty awesome stuff, like the bicycle moving at the end of the show, that was pretty awesome. And the closer dril from 2010, oh mai gawsh that was fast.

Gulp...

You mean... You wouldn't want to see 3' tall people march a drum corps show?

No Open Class corps will finish in the Top 12. Guaranteed.

Its called a thin sound.

Absolutely, without a doubt the worst looking things the Blue Devils have EVERY put on the field. Words cannot begin to describe how bad this is. Yes, I am old school. This is my 25th season following drum corps. No uniform, BD or any other corps, can come close to the classic open jackets. That look is BD. The 94-03 unis were tolerable and I came to live with them. 04-05 were pretty bad. 06-10, especially after they switched back to white plumes, were some stripes and a skirt away from being pretty decent. But now this. I am so demoralized by this uniform, my excitement over what was their most accessible and entertaining musical book in decades has largely been sapped tonight. Drum corps is not just the music - there is a visual element and the look can enhance or detract. Like I said...I realize I am in the realm now of old fogy, but as I noted, the most recent uniform was a few tweaks from being a nice modern allusion to the open jackets. But this...it looks like the whole corps will be wearing color guard uniforms. BD has the one of the richest and most storied histories and traditions in the activity. Why can this staff just not embrace that? Why must they be so bleeding edge for the sake of being bizarre? Retro is in in so many sports so why does a tradition-laden corps like BD thumb its nose at that very tradition? I am not just a naysayer. From what I heard on the pre-season recordings, they nailed the music this year. Absolutely nailed it. That show gave them every opportunity to come out of the gate in a modern take on the classic uniform given the era of the charts. One week ago I was so excited about 2011. I had planned to travel to DCI Minnesota in addition to my normal trip to Murfreesboro and DCI Southeastern in Atlanta, perhaps even Finals. Now, except for the fact that I was hoping to wrap a mini-vacation trip into the Minnesota show, I do not have a lot of interest in going to drum corps show right now. Hopefully, as when Georgia Tech dropped their traditional football uniforms in 2008, I will get over this change and focus on the very positive of the show. But I truly fear that see the corps march onto the field in these uniforms will be so distracting that it will make it hard to enjoy those positives. Am I ranting? Yes. But I really love drum corps and I love the Blue Devils, though I never marched anything more than high school band and one week in the Georgia Tech band when I was a freshman. That is why this matters to me because I see something that I have looked forward to every summer for a quarter century slipping away and turning into something that almost no longer interests me. Progress is one thing. But the changes in DCI in recent year have fundamentally detracted from what made it special and exciting to me as a huge fan. I wonder if the year that I have long dreaded has finally arrived - the year I stop caring and start counting down the days to football season now rather than the Sunday after Finals. We'll see how I feel in a week or so. :(

Double Gs are awesome. Three guys ripping double Gs are awesome. Three guys playing double Gs into a microphone, not awesome.

I predict that many posters in this thread will wind up in rehab very soon.

I like the Santa Clara Vanguard. I believe they are a well run organization. But this thread ( in my opinion ) was a lame attempt to puff up this Corps by tearing down another Corps ( Anaheim Kingsmen ). Even if the story was true, the BEST way to exude " class " is not to try and make a compelling case on why your Corps is " classy " by tearing down another Corps by the alleged rude actions of a single mamber of another Corps.... and from 44 years ago no less. In my opinion, this isn't a " classy " post at all by this former marcher with SCV. Far from it.