wishbonecav

Thank u :)

Is it time to expand the trophy order to include Silver and Bronze medals at dca? Top 3 DCA is a strong achievement ..even if its a faux color on the end of a red ribbon... Anything wrong with adding a member "extra" to: (a) commemorate a run at the title, (b) dangle a piece of hardware to shoot for; © not cost too much to add to the list of member takeaways, (d) represent excellence And i'm talking about a real, tangible, one for each member, touch-it-with-your-hands, hang it on your neck medal. Hand out the Gold to the Champ on the field at Finals retreat..like we've done. Photos and so forth with the red ribbon showing on the winners only. They earned that exclusivity. Give the Silvers and Bronze, one per member, as they pass in review at Finals; before the Champion's encore. Just a thought. Input? (and yes I used Starting Line....its a figure of speech)

This kind of commentary comes up consistently. Fusion's brass is no longer becoming a dca mainstay....it is one. GE tape on steroids...and was a real good read front to back...sincere appreciation and kudos to a vet who took the time to create and share. Awesome. And thumb down to me for interrupting it b4 you were done !

It's been the top 4 advancing in recent past... Do top 4 make Finals in Class A? If so, 14 corps, 2 championships, plus the USMC and Mini-Corps winner at Navy-Marine Corps Stadium is a strong lineup.

Prediction (because i started the thread and like to go out on a limb to be controversial): C2 surprises in a few captions (esp drums) and either knocks on the door or actually places ahead of one of the traditional Open corps.

1990 in Buffalo, big (and enthusiastic) crowd for A/A60 Finals...Railmen were the highlight imho. It might not be a "big" draw, but if Cavaliers can draw 400 for a REHEARSAL in Orlando on a weeknight, surely a championship can draw more than 600....especially one featuring four of the top 25 corps. It isnt the venue....its the day of the week. Saturday PRELIMS/FINALS AM/PM...weekend just prior to DCI week...call it an extended DCI week....Saturday to Saturday....and we'll think up a few more Monday/Tuesday performance opportunities for some or all of the corps. I will grant you that DCI did an EXTENSIVE D2 tour in years' past, with 10-15 corps per contest, that fairly stated, did not draw. But we are talking about one contest. And its a big one: DCI Finals. My earlier post/suggestion of having the Open Corps do an East Coast Championship combined with the DCA corps (AL Nationals for both?) didnt get much traction (for obvious reasons already debated on DCP)....but the top DCA corps are a big draw at their traditional venues and the Open Corps would certainly add an overflow/sellout atmosphere to the equation. One thought: adding WC's to the slate as special guests; but that kinda defeats the point. Why outshine your champion on championship night? Another thought: having the Open Prelims/Finals as an add-on freebie to the WC ticket packages might get a few more fannies in the seats...then again, it's hard to have a lot of enthusiasm if you dont have any skin in the game...."yay...I'm here, but just because it was free"....however..... Final thought for comparison: MINI CORPS at DCA IS a freebie and it is a standing room only happening that fills the convention center to the rafters. Free doesnt mean "lame"...Mini Corps is a riot. it costs DCA for the venue etc, but there must be an ROI in there somewhere, or they wouldnt do it. Is there an idea here? Could the I&E winners be part of the night's festivities? performing in the concourse, for example? could there be a YEA type workshop as part of the day's activities with comps to the local bands for that event? This is a tough conversation....25 years worth of ideas and discussion havent made a dent. And i'm not so self absorbed to believe these ideas havent been brought up somewhere before.

Regardless of the official announcement....let's all "think" whatever we want so we can stir up the pot on Drum Corps Planet. What a fun group. Criticize, diminish, cut to ribbons....as if there arent people in the equation doing a good job somewhere. Can we all apply the same level of scrutiny to ourselves at our own jobs and so forth? Wont that make for a fun world to live in. Everyone's incompetent, nothing is "true", everything is questionable and shady, Blue Devils suck, the numbers arent real, the judges are corrupt (that one really ###### me off) and this whole activity is going to hell in a handbasket and will be lucky to hit the field at all next year. Great.

It's the NFL blackout rule. And, to a degree, it makes sense. Within a certain radius, you either go to the stadium, or you miss out. On the other hand...

i had this conversation this morning with my ex wife :)

For Thursday night, DCI ranked above Ted and Spider Man in revenue and ahead of Dark Knight and Total Recall in per screen average; in fact it was #1 in per screen average...by almost double. Not an opinion. http://boxofficemojo.com/daily/chart/?sortdate=2012-08-09&p=.htm And of course the per screen attendance will go down if more than one theater in a municipality decides to screen it. Its not like Home Depot expects their business to double in a town when they add a second store...or a third; one cannibalizes the other to a degree, but they get the benefit of a net increase in customer base and a degree of scale. Not that business sense or a discussion on economics has much to do with making sense on DCP :)

The movie houses dont commit to screening it without doing their homework. 500 commitments is a big deal. DCI must have done something right to distribute it to more and more venues each year. And the venues must have found value in it in return. Who paid whom to have it shown? DCI ? ("pleeeease put this in your theater...WE'LL PAY YOU!") or the movie houses ? ("that sounds like it will draw and history shows it will....let's come to an agreement on that") The big dogs liked it...Regal, AMC, etc. its nothing but a good thing. and it saves me the trip to Indy on Thursday...the theater is down the street.

The two-day attendance total for Open Class events in Michigan City, Ind. (Aug. 6-7) came in at 1,308, up from 1,191 in 2011. Needs work. Suggestion: Championship the WEEKEND BEFORE instead of settling for this painfully small Monday/Tuesday audience. No, it doesnt have to be at the big stadium...rent makes that prohibitive anyway. Whatever....600 people at a Championship contest needs work. You have my suggestion. Discuss :)

1990 Star of Indiana. They had a little room in the snare line (didnt they?), but I dream of playing mellophone....in 1990....with Star. Shout out to Scooter & Co. :)

Contra worked in '99 because it was...a contra. It was, and always shall be....a contra. And Cadets will always be Garfield (everyone knows who I mean when i say it, even here). And may the Colts move back to Baltimore (or Canada) so I dont have to look at that goofy helmet in every Finals picture for the next 5 years.

you had the courage to write it, the courage to sign your name, the thoughtfulness to attach a poll to it (including degrees of acceptance) and the courage to open your comments up to review and criticism. Kudos...because this can be a rough crowd. I described the BD show to an enthusiastic friend of mine as "the marching software come to life - like watching a drum corps video game" and it included, amazingly, the precision in line and form that, geometrically, I thought might have been impossible to perform with human involvement. it got a wow from me in that respect. I went on to say that while everyone else is marching to keep up with last years' show, BD comes up with something new. The fact that they can go from chairs to mirrors to horses is mystifying in its creativity, let alone its execution. RE: the Op's post...I get where he's coming from. To have the field chase Devils...often POINTS behind...is disconcerting to a large degree in that BD's show style has somehow earned a consensus of approval from the adjudication panel....nearly everyone has them "up"...in Music, Visual and General Effect...from June to August. It is reasonable to conclude, then, that BD is obviously giving the judges what they want, and it, by extension, MUST be superior if the judges are all, or nearly all, in agreement. Having said that, did it really matter all that much to me? To a degree it did in that MY expectations of "best" did not necessarily jibe with contest results...so, from that emotional and interpretive perspective, the scores did not "make sense"...or mesh with my sensibilities (again, to a degree). However, as a fan, to have shut off drum corps for the OP's "BD reasons" would have been to miss out on the 2012 Cavaliers, Oregon Crusaders and Jersey Surf...(especially the last two) who invigorated my drum corps enthusiasm to an "off the chart" standard, reminding me that drum corps is the ONLY place you can listen/watch a musical presentation where it is common to leap from your seat, pump your fist, be moved to shouts or tears, clap so hard your hands hurt and buy a t-shirt at the end. Don't give up yet, Julian. In fact...I'm going to suggest trying something new. Go to the show, but dont buy a ticket. Find a rehearsal. Track down a parking lot horn arc. Pack an Arnold Palmer and spend an hour with a pit ensemble. It's still horns and drums and flags...like you remember. Recalling that flavor might stir a few echoes and mix in an ok way with what's going down today. If you are near by, I'll go with you (and the ice teas are on me)

I have heard you were ______ (fill in blank). Substitute your own name for the list of people whose names could be attached to your QUESTION and see how it feels. Since you are in the drum corps FAMILY, its a valid drum corps planet topic...therefore.....let's try that. It is a GARBAGE question and there is no reasonable discourse or justification that can undo it. It is no more than a veiled smear....IN MY HUMBLE OPINION. You need to change the title and offer these people an apology....EVEN IF YOU DIDNT MEAN ANY HARM. To question their integrity or to have to PROVE A NEGATIVE is freakin GARBAGE. And, yes, you touched a nerve. Thanks. I should refer you back to the simplest answer: My corps isnt getting a score and the judges are to blame. What a bunch of bull.

The title of this thread sucks. Or any thread that puts these kinds of words together as a forum "topic". Corruption is a garbage word. Attaching it in kind of a roundabout way to pros that have spent a lot of time building relationships in this activity and who support each corps with significant and helpful commentary throughout the season.... JUST PLAIN SUCKS How about attaching the word wife beater or child abuser to someone's name with a question mark and letting the people on the dcp thread debate whether they might be or not? Pick a name at random and they type "child abuser?" and let the crew here have a field day with it. Monitors, where are you when this sort of thing hits the board? You are hyper sensitive to snarkiness and "personal attacks", yet this kind of title just sits out there as if it is a "one off" so no one is getting hurt directly? Get rid of this crap. it serves no real purpose. there are plenty of other things to talk about. QUESTIONABLE is one thing..... we can talk about that all day...in fact, the pros are put on the spot to support their number face-to-face with the staffs. corrupt? you have to be kidding me.

Plenty of "if's", but the GE number from last night combined with new eyes on Guard and Drums.... ...if anything, it's gonna be intense.

when you don't hear the train coming.... objects in mirror are closer than they appear..... when you put 6 pounds of stuff in a 5 pound bucket and have two weeks to clean it.... shhhhh.... :)

Mike, What are your credentials?

Jersey Surf was "must see" drum corps that transcended the scoreboard. Not an easy trick. The authenticity in the musical score was so Bridgemen; the freshness of Shufflin' made it a Jersey Surf original. They matched so many Bridgemen percussion sounds in the opener....how cool would it have been to have the slinged snares with the plastic heads just for that piece? I think my head would have exploded just to see that tried. And, no, it wasnt hokey. Another hard-to-pull trick. "You GOTTA see JERSEY SURF!" How cool is that?