hornandsoccer

I told them "short of a public mea culpa and a commitment to hire a real sound professional" that they would not receive my money again. Fat chance.

Christ, this is an exercise in the inane and arcane. Yes, OP, France and the US will be going to war over a painted, stylized interpretation of a French flag. Exactly. To those denigrating this as a classless gesture, you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

This is enraging.

Holy Oregon. This is a supremely confident and competent drum corps. I'm really hoping the horns have a couple more gears, because if they can turn it up, I can really see this being a "play on repeat" show in my car, which is I guess my yardstick for awesomeness. Fans seemed to buy it.

Green feather. Eights and Eights. Stars. Aussies. Cymbal line. Excellence.

edit: disregard.

same.

Nice. :)

They've always been a top-heavy hornline, 24 euphs who can PLAY can cover the difference, and given their liberal use of the synth ooze, why spend four members on tubas when you can put them in the guard, or have a couple extra conductors? Different strokes, etc.

I think some of it is that the field is "plain jane" as the visual staff would call it - the absolute minimum markings DCI requires. They're better when they have full turf markings. One of the tradeoffs of the dot system is that when you begin to rely on markings which are, increasingly, nearly always available even at rehearsal sites in BFE, it's a different thing when you have to do the show without them, especially with the way Peter Weber writes. I imagine that Gaines drill may be slightly easier to translate to plain jane, given how orderly it is vs. Pete's curves and clusters, which all require 0.25 sometimes 0.125 dots. In any case, there's only a few shows left on plain jane fields anyway, and none of them are absolutely critical.

Agreed, I've always been confused by the Blue Shades bit.

Just a guess on what's going on with the bleachers, but I think there's a "high school senior about to get drafted and go off to Vietnam" vibe. I could be crazy, but I'm sensing a tension like that of the anxiety of the draft, the volunteer vs. get drafted dynamic, the high school sweetheart who's scared out of her mind because her hotshot quarterback boyfriend is about to go to basic, etc. That could be way off, but if that's what they're going for, they might try being a little bit more explicit about it. I'm probably not right, though. Divining what a show is attempting to communicate is really difficult, especially for concept shows.

1. Bluecoats 2. Madison 3. Vanguard

I really hope that 'Secret Society' patch is dead and buried, because whatever they did in that hole tonight was MUCH better. Just leave it as it was tonight. Much better run.

Ok, either SCV brass is way sharper in person, or the processing seriously messed up the pitches. EDIT: Just ran the file through Audacity and lowered it by 47 cents to get it back together. DCI audio engineers, I love you guys, but you might want to check this out.

I hear what you're talking about with that 06 quality. Actually, this is one of those times that synth HELPS! At the very least it kind of orients the sound spectrum, so you can get a rough sense of where things are relative to that. That makes a lot more sense in my head than it probably does written out. Basically, relative pitch.

Yes he does. 2012 Weed: "Yo, snares, man, I just can't tell you how good that snare sounds. I mean, wow. It's so good." x all of pretour

ok.

Some thoughts: Theater's probably not the best environment to judge the electronic ooze, but I only really noticed the Bluecoats synth. Boston: The show is about as dull as their coats are grey. The Whitacre was nice, but that's all I can remember. Seriously, I'm watching it on FN right now, and I don't remember any of it. Spirit: Love me some Boerma. Lots of visual demand, but not so much that they can't get there Lots of drum demand, and they will definitely get there Nice ballad hit Closer was genuinely entertaining. In June. Cavs: It's June, and it looks like 3/4 of the hornline can't buy cigs yet. Yeah, I think that's all I have to say about that right now; nothing nice, don't say anything, etc. Sidebar #1: Did tuning tenor heads become optional this year or something? Phantom: Jamey Thompson, have my babies, please. Pearl = yes. There is exactly one person in the world who can make a Dynasty snare sound good, and that's the guy who built it. I dig it. Probably my favorite since 07. Sidebar #2: Blooing during the last two minutes of someone else's show should be a penalty. A harsh one. Absolutely unacceptable. Bloo: That caveat aside, the show's cool. Jon Vanderkolff is a big upgrade. Rarick delivers yet again. I dunno about 2nd in drums again, but I guarantee I'm gonna watch 'em regardless. Not sure I like, or am just ok with the uniforms. I think I like 'em, probably just need some more time. I like electronics, but seriously, there should be a ban on two digit Hz effects. Cadets: Dear BD/SCV - guess what, you're not leading the country in drums right now. Dear Crown/BD - you might be leading in brass, but it's June, so don't start engraving that plaque just yet. When I heard they were playing Barber/Bartok, I thought 'well, they better deliver if they're gonna play that' - and they're doing it. It's very clearly a Cadets interpretation, late 90s early 00s vintage. False closer is false. Which is good, because Medea is dreadful right now. No problem, though, it's clear as day it's being rewritten. For the love god put the #### stripe back on the pants. Even Crown figured out that straight cream pants do not look good, and it only took them, what, 15 years?

Great review, but one little thing: Boston did Les Mis in '11, not '12. EDIT: Also, I absolutely agree on the down ending thing.

Man, much as it sucks that the lights blew out, that standstill was crazy fun. I almost felt bad for the lady and her daughter about a foot from my bell, but they got into it. Here's hoping for some on-field action this year.

Heads up if you're planning to watch SCV do their run through this afternoon - you can't, unless you pony up some serious cash. It's only open to those who donate at a certain level. Only run through that's closed all year, generally speaking.

I think they switched suppliers for this year, so we'll see. I could be wrong about that, though.

Her brother marched 5 years in the Cavs bassline. It runs in the family.

I wear glasses, but my first three summers I went without them for the summer (except for non-prescription sunglasses). By my fourth year, my vision had become worse, so I wore glasses for shows and non-sunny days. World of difference. I know a lot of folks like contacts, and that's fine, but I don't think I would ever switch. Then again, I wore an aussie, and I don't think I could have worn the glasses with a shako.