One of the Sops

Sam, you're now the Mitt Romney of Drum Corps - sacrificing your own ambitions for the betterment of the cause. I wish you the best with En Garde Jr. Corps.

The quantity of virgins in L.A. is grossly underestimated! Sometimes, the brightest of virtues are most easily found in the darkest of places.

Hey Folks, There is a really KEWL website that allows you to catalogue your DVDs online. It just lets you keep track of what you own, what you've watched, loaned out, your wish list, etc. They have tens of thousands of DVD titles of all genre cataloged in their database. But, of most interest to people here is that they have dozens of DCI and DCA DVDs. You can see the cover, read a synopsis and read other details about the content. They have the entire DCA Legacy Collection cataloged as well as most of the championship DVDs since 2000. The DCA DVDs go back to 1998 and include a smattering of titles from the Finals, Prelims and Alumni Classic. There is also a Contribution System that lets you add whatever you've got that they don't have in their database yet. So now, if you want to keep track of your DVD collection online, you can also include all your drum corps DVDs. Go to www.dvdspot.com and search for "DCI" or "DCA" and you can see what they have.

Hey, Phil! What happened to your plan to play funerals in it? You know, Taps at the funerals? It would look really official.

That sounds like a great idea, and one which should "sell" well to the players. The other thing I'm thinking, too, is that a player with the range of a lead would need to play high at least once in a while to keep his range up. I'm looking forward to Sept. 22nd.

Thanks for the sample pic. It definately whets my appetite for what's coming tomorrow.

:blah:

What the heck!

It's been great! I'm spoiled now. Even if I joined a 65-man hornline after this, I'd feel like I was in a tiny little drum corps until I (hopefully) got used to it. Gives ya chills! :)

I think looking up and waving is precluded under our "military bearing" requirements, but I'll tell you what: just for you, I promise to hit my spot in the company front at just the right time. ^_^

And we in the hornline at that moment thought the crowd was cheering for our 160 bpm pinwheels... Yep, those 6-inch cumberbunds wrapped tightly around the cadet jacket and pants were the next best thing to fusion surgery. Thanks mucho for all your kind comments, but you'll need to come on Semi-Finals night to see us. We'll be sitting in the stands at Finals. B)

Hey, Sam. At least they can't blame you for the .4 penalty this year. Uh, they can't, can they? You didn't go charging over a boundary line or anything did you? :P

Oh, that explains it, then. So, are you going to don the wristbands and watch the rest of the show when (and if) it resumes later? Of course, the last corps might be going on at 2 a.m. Maybe you could visit Wal Mart and get some rain ponchos before you go back out there. A good rain poncho got me though the downpour during 2004 Prelims in Scranton. No problem at all.

That's awesome! It sounds like you guys are really having fun. BTW: You brought your laptop into a hurricane so you could post live updates from the audience????!!!!!

Actually, Jester had NO guard. I mean, zero, zilch, nada. It was sad to see because I ran into most of their guard members in the bathroom at a show a couple of years ago and they were the nicest girls you'd ever want to meet. One of them even happily loaned me a mirror that I could lay flat to put in my contact lenses. Perhaps it was only a temporary, one-show absence due to, I don't know, maybe the Color Guard bus broke down, or there was a wardrobe malfunction, or I don't know. Does anybody know?

Maybe it's a drumline thing, but - what in the world is a gussek piece?

w/Stp: Yep, one spot per night over two nights. Now, if only there were another seven nights...As they say about some sports teams: they don't lose, they just run out of time. B)

I just navigated my way through three crashed drum corps websites (this one, DCI and BD). I'm on a painfully slow dial-up system. I finally get a page to load... and you yank my chain... haha...ha...haha

I just navigated my way through three crashed drum corps websites (this one, DCI and BD). I'm on a painfully slow dial-up system. I finally get a page to load... and you yank my chain... haha...ha...haha

Of course, the good side of that is that we can now buy their show on the much cheaper 13-24 DVD. ^_^

Oh my gosh! They had the Cabs Alumni at DCI Semi Finals?! b**bs Of course people went nuts! That's real drum corps!

Thank you for this great idea - showing how each corps went up or down from last night. That's great. I always like to analyze that stuff too.

:sshh: Sshh! Don't give away all our secrets, or everyone will want to move here. B) In all seriousness, I was at TOC last summer in the top row near the 50. The bad news is that you do have to be in the top couple of rows to get a decent angle on the forms. (Angles were much better at Qualcomm.) The good news is that the Rose Bowl is so freakin' big, it can probably fit 1000 people in the top row. (Just a guess)

Rabbits... cold weather ... hills ... dirt, dirt, dirt ... bad lighting ... "millions" of loud frogs and toads.Finally! The truth about Southern California is revealed. Readers of this thread will never be able to think the same way about it again. B)

In Alhambra, California the audio feed went out for about 30 seconds early during (of all corps to have this happen) the Cavaliers' show. At the same time, the theater lights partially came back on and there was much booing, hissing, restlessness and trepidation until the audio came back on and they lowered the lights again. Everything ran smoothly after that - we dodged a bullet. My own highlights of the event: Madison: Their last note was clocked at 25 seconds. What other way to top that incredible, slow motion company front/wheel. To borrow a popular drum corps adjective, they were "awesome." Cadets: The petite woman-in-a-tutu I imagined would play the role of "INFAMOUS BATON TWIRLER" turned out to be a burly, hairy-armed guy in a sleeveless shirt. (He dropped the thing, which is only allowed in parades.) Magic of Orlando's Pirates of the Caribbean show: The Contra/Drummer fight takes the prize for best imitation of a hockey game. Carolina Crown: To their credit, their most memorable moment was NOT the DM mooning theater-goers nationwide as he put down his shako. For me at least, the most memorable moment was when the hornline drowned out the singers and took back the field for drum corps. Boston Crusaders: Their show began on the left and ended on the right. That's downright "old skool"! If they keep this up, next year they'll be playing G bugles again (I own one of their old sopranos) and teaching the Color Guard to march. On the other hand, how many corps can you say had props so big that the stadium had to remove seats to get them in? Moment of irony: After one of the "amplified narration corps" finished, the post-performance interview was delayed for lack of audio from the DCI interviewer's microphone. Capital Regiment: For the first time in my life, I realized The Doxology is a fanfare. It will, no doubt, be played that way in Heaven. They also had one of the most nicely blended and balanced horn chords of the night. Even to a casual observer such as myself, I could tell they had been the best of all up to that point. The 2-point lead they took at the top confirmed it. Glassmen: Their hornline bowed down and disappeared at the end of the show. Somehow they pulled that off without even having any props to hide behind. Blue Knights: Finally, for the first time in at least three years, the Color Guard has a decent uniform. Blue Devils: Brass earned a perfect 20! Changing the subject, I predict that next year's Color Guard, after a season of sticking their faces in each others crotches, will take it to the next level and bring live sex to the field. The resulting GE points will give the Blue Devils another championship. Santa Clara Vanguard: I and the crowd in my theater were cheering on these guys, but I was disappointed that their marching didn't look as clean as I would have expected by now. I loved the big banner that covered the Color Guard at the end - nice touch for Finals week. Troopers!!!: I loved your brief highlight - wished I could have seen more. Keep the faith. Pacific Crest, Mandarins & Esperanza: You're getting better every year. Keep up the good work. This idea of putting it in theaters, I like even better than PBS or pay per view. You get to watch with hundreds of fellow drum corps fans even if you can't be there. Nice.