Cappybara

Wow I really enjoyed this analysis. I really enjoy watching Gaines' drill with the Cavies from the 2000's but I can't help but feel like it hurt their brass performance. I never realized BD's drill was staging focused but that could explain why they sound so phenomenal. I noticed you said May tends to write spaced out drill. from hearing other corps, spaced out drill seems to hurt the sound output from many corps (take the Cadets closer from this past summer as an example). I wonder why that's never happened with Crown.

Better is completely subjective of course. A synthetic sound < actual contras, to me.

The drill is absolutely amazing from all those awesome Cavies shows. Like seriously the closest I see to that type of great drill nowadays is some from SCV. Their percussion sounds great to my untrained percussion ears. Their guard complements the visual program really well (I particularly liked 08's guard). However, their hornlines have consistently been disappointing and have left a lot to be desired. In that area, they don't come close to BD 14

If that was a tame show, the Cadets need to put out more tame shows.

Technically its been dead since bugles were taken out of use. The concept and spirit of the activity, I think, still remains the same.

Why? Side by Side is by far the best thing the Cadets have put out musically since 07 in my opinion. 2013 WAS a masterclass in performance and musical writing.

Uh what? Replacing contras with a synth is not the equivalent of replacing cymbals on the field with actual cymbals in the pit... A synthesizer sounds nothing like the sound of an actual horn. As for Madison 2010, I wasnt fortunate to watch it live (or 2011 for that matter which I believe had the same large contra line) but I can hear a pretty large difference in sound. Especially in the opener for both openers. THAT was a good low brass sound. Sounds like we both have very different ears.

I usually make these topics so that I can check out people's suggestions on the fan network. Most impressive low brass lines from... 2009-2014: 2000-2009: 1990-1999: 1980-1989:

I guess it's all about the type of person you are (brass/guard/pit/percussion). I'd notice the difference in adding 5 more powerful contras than 5 cymbals. Cymbals are background noise to me. Can't the pit use crash cymbals anyways? Wouldn't that have basically the same effect? (forgive me for my percussion ignorance)

Id just prefer a larger hornlike than more percussion.

Were we watching the same show? SCV's drill was beautifully designed, but there were so many interval issues it wasn't even funny. That was due to the nature of the formations though.

Uhh...

I really don't think you should be the one criticizing people's reading comprehension considering every comment that comes at you hits hits your forehead and peels off. Read back to your original post. As someone pointed out before to you already, the way it was expressed wasn't tactful at all and came off as attacking/belittling rather than thoughtful commentary.I'm not sure what point you were trying to make in the previous post with your sarcasm because there's one big difference between my criticism of your post and your "criticism" of my post: I actually have an explained reason for being upset with the nature of your post, you on the other hand did it for the sake of doing it.

That may or may not be true but I'm not talking about the degree of how "impressive" the creativity is.

You'd think they'd understand it after it's explained to them the first 30 times.

Lol. The Madison Scouts thread was an absolute embarrassing mess this year. Don't even.

Heh that one was me.

Well... It's kinda hard to express life and death in a drum corps show in a crystal-clear-even-if-you're-dumb kind of way unless you want to be painfully blunt (guard members rising from the ground at the beginning, guard members dying and falling to the ground at the end). I think phantom's approach of entering from one tunnel and exiting from the opposite one is a lot more tasteful.

Check the post I quoted in my previous post. It's right in the middle of that paragraph.

Well of course DCI isn't going to be where "new" happens anymore. There are so many rules suppressing what corps can and cannot do (though admittedly it's opening up" that it's hard to find innovation now. Then take into account the many hundreds of high schools there are, less regulations on what can be used/put on the field, and you end up finding that a lot of innovation is coming from high school bands rather than DCI.

Interesting the very different standards people have for certain corps. Phantom Regiment is CONSTANTLY criticized for using shows with storylines. And yet here we have someone complaining about the LACK of a cohesive storyline. It just shows everyone has different preferences/opinions. And as this IS a discussion board, those opinions are of course allowed to be expressed. Criticizing is okay. Everyone has a right to an opinion. But there is a very big difference between criticizing a corps and ATTACKING/BELITTLING them. You, unfortunately, seem to fit in the latter.

I'm curious why you felt that the show lacked any sort of clear definition? Was it because it lacked the actual storyline of animal farm?

Tarps and props are a part of the show (as a general statement). The only times props can be considered distracting, in my opinion, is when it blocks view of the performers or when they are very obviously misplaced on the field from a drill standpoint. The cadets are 0/2 in these two criteria for me in the past 2 years so I can see where your concern comes from, but I'm always confused when people consider props to be a distraction.

That sounds a lot harder to do in time than having each person play the whole run. You have to take into account intonation and dynamics of all the players so that each part of the run sounds the same. And then the obvious timing issues that can arise from players being spread farther apart on the field when such runs happen. It may be easier in that the individual player has to worry less about having enough air to play the run, but at the same time it adds a whole different level of complexity.

Oh god, I hope not. I haven't gotten a chance to enjoy winter yet!