Tekneek

I would like the requirement to be that they march with a corps that has not finished in the top 6 within the past 5 years. My idea is to help people that aren't looking for a championship from the start and will help build up a corps that, perhaps, isn't having its doors knocked down with more prospective marchers than they could possibly handle. If everybody in the top 12 is getting a ton of interest, perhaps make it a corps that has not been a finalist over the past 5 years then (or even one that has never made finals).

And what qualifies you to determine that?

Oh yes. I know everybody in every single corps worked very hard this summer and I will always appreciate that. If I ever do not like a particular show, I know that is a reflection upon the staff/creative team and has nothing to do with what the members are doing everyday. From Pioneer to BD and all points in between, those kids busted their ##### all summer and I'm glad that all of them got the experience. I was also impressed by the talent put on display by The Cadets. Any problems I have with the show entirely come from the design of the show and is not, and has never been, a reflection on the members who are working as hard as they can to sell the concept that was given to them. The design may have limited my enjoyment, but it did not lessen my respect for what you did with those horns and drums (and let's not forget that guard either!).

I kept wishing that they would, and still do, although it seems it will never happen at this point. I don't want to see another corps go away, but I sure wish The Cadets would stop forcing the kind of shows they've done the past few years upon us. Knowing the kinds of shows this corps has done in the past, it frustrates me to see them appearing to go out of their way to be unappealing. Maybe drum corps is finally reaching a point of no return with me, where I will only be able to enjoy a handful of shows (at best) from now on. I've tried to give this amplified voice thing a chance, but to this point nobody has done it in a way that doesn't seem to detract from the show. Nobody has done it in a way that is memorable, in a positive way for me, to the point that I would want to watch or listen to the shows in the future.

No, I specifically mentioned that calling them "all types of names" is just as bad, or worse, than what they were doing. I did not say speaking out against booing was exactly the same. I did earlier say that people who freak out over booing aren't much better than those doing it in general, which is true. If you're dealing with people acting like children, don't you think that giving them any attention at all is more than they deserve? Getting into a shouting match with them is not demonstrating that you are any better than they are. Whining incessantly about some childish behavior that was witnessed is not a mature way to deal with it, either.

No. Calling people "all types of names" is not the high road in any situation. You should calmly and politely ask them to stop and then report them to the ushers/security if they persist. Write letters to DCI in complaint if nothing is done about it. Verbally assaulting people is not the right resolution anymore than booing a corps because you disagree with their show concept. If anything, verbal assault is more wrong, since calling people "all types of names" could be a crime in some areas.

You know how that works. If the judging appears to be in line with their beliefs, it is correct. When it differs from their view, there must be something wrong with it.

Which is why the "everyone else" would be no better than the "booers." You aren't the educated and civil bunch if you jump down in the muck with the cretins. You're just another group of cretins taking a contrary position.

They should not have yelled that, but there have been lots of jokes made during and about that particular aspect of their show all summer. While some are probably harsh, the dialogue itself was a little over the top for many and so their reactions went a little over the top as well. You could draw the conclusion that you not recommend any students to march with any corps, or you could decide that the show designs of The Cadets alone are not producing the environment you would like them to be in. If the problem were entirely DCI and its fans, wouldn't all of the corps have been treated the same way? It appears clear (to me, at least) that there was something specific to The Cadets that caused this reaction. It could be that the excessive reaction was due to a corps that they felt was being excessive. It appears that both sides were within the confines of the rules since The Cadets were not disqualified and, to my knowledge, nobody was removed from the Rose Bowl stands either. If it is the apparent tolerance of this crowd behavior that upsets you, then maybe you are on the right track. I just feel that when you really look at the context objectively, you will see a show that seemed to be pushing the limits that resulted in a fan reaction that pushed the limits. Nothing more than that.

You mean the booing of a corps, right? Or does this apply to the booing of scores as well?

I had been thinking the same thing for a while, but the last fixes to it seemed to finally put that thought to rest (for the most part). I still say that VK could take the same exact dialogue and allow people to have a completely different reaction when freed from the supposed obligation to take it seriously. The way the dialogue went early in the summer was so amazingly over the top I simply couldn't believe it was actually happening.

They never made a big deal about any of it, so that side of the story didn't really come out. Bill Cook, himself, gave lots of financial and other support to many corps and DCI during his time in the activity, but never really made a big deal about any of it. Only years later did I learn of his involvement with some corps that actually kept them on the road when they otherwise might not have finished tour. One night when our truck had a failure, Star fed us after the show. No questions asked. I've always remembered that. I don't exactly believe that booing is representative of a decline in western civilization, unlike others, but I have never booed a corps. I just didn't do anything if I didn't care at all for what was presented. I'm not sure that you can claim the "kids" have complete innocence on the situation. If you have marched with The Cadets over the past few seasons, or seen/heard them at all, you definitely know what you're getting involved with. In some way, that is a vote for doing those kinds of shows. Does that mean they should be booed? Perhaps not, but to say they were surprised when Hopkins came out with a show designed to test the restraint of a segment of the audience, you're trying to tell me they know nothing about the recent history of the corps. I find it hard to believe that more than a few (at best) of the members are ignorant of that.

They appear to have been deficient in some way since three nights in a row they did not beat BD. Unless there was a vast conspiracy to make sure they did not win?

Not a fan of that at all. Just about everything I remember about retreat has been tossed from the activity, it seems.

I'm not going to argue for booing, because it is pretty clear to me that those who want to boo vociferously and those who freak out over it are both quite a bit over the top.

Given that this edition of The Cadets was not the first corps to be booed, there is obviously some history of booing in the activity.

b**bs

She got hurt trying to show off her rifle tossing talents.

I didn't get the impression that they even left as corps units anymore. Doesn't Brandt just say that they are all dismissed? So they proceed to just mill about. Why they don't dismiss each corps at a time and have them march off is beyond me. They had them march onto the field to begin with, so marching back off sounds proper. Surely every drumline knows a cadence, so crank it up and get out.

Does booing immediately qualify someone as an idiot?

When each corps played and marched off of retreat, nobody had to yell for the field to be cleared. By the time the champion was the only one left, the field was ready for them.

I wish more corps would unleash it during their performances. Too much restraint out there! Let's blow some people back into their seat DURING the show! I also wish these encore shows were recorded.

Phantom and SCV were my favorites of this season.

Yes. I've said it many times. If they had just left the microphones on the truck, I would have been in love with the show. I wish DCI had some way to record the vocals on a different track so that an a cappella version, as played at the end of the season, was available to us. I would love to have that. I hate that I'd have to pay more than a regular APD and merge files together to have the show that way (and it would be from before tour). I also said in the beginning that I never could understand why they had to make some sort of statement with the show instead of just unleashing those talented performers on us. They were certainly good enough to sell any drum corps show on their own. :(

From the train wreck that I thought the show was at Annapolis, they really came a long way with me. The show was way more tolerable at the end of the season than I ever imagined it would be. Because of the talking, I don't think I will ever listen to or watch the show much, but they still cleaned up the narration so much that I could have sat through it by the end. None of this takes anything back from the actual performance of the players on instruments. I knew they were going to be awesome from the first show. It was the vocal gimmick/novelty running through the show that proved too much to overcome with me. I had a feeling that it would go like that. That Hopkins would hit me over the head with so much 'narration' madness early on that I might actually find the stuff left at the end mildly tolerable. The clincher was the changes made to emo-bando-guy, which was the most annoying part and was finally fixed to some degree for Semifinals. If they had started with the same talking at the beginning that they had for Semifinals, I might have had a different feeling about the show. Tremendous work for that staff to fix it as much as they did. Some might call it a backhanded compliment, but with the way I hated that show a good bit of the summer I think it is a great achievement. It's on par with almost turning lead into gold. :) Ultimately, I cannot imagine myself ever listening to recordings or watching recordings of shows with vocals throughout them. It's just not an aspect of the activity that can age well with me.