ccameron05

I saw your standstill in Modesdo, I love the music, half the time I turned around to watch your drum major, especially the end of the ballad, he really gets into it! hah

No but thats all I saw on the field, cause I performed earlier that night and watched drumlines in the lot.

He's talking about this: Uhhh, the new drums are pretty cool looking, I didnt really notice a difference in the sound quality both in the lot or on the field. Well no I take that back. In the lot, I could feel the ground I was sitting on shake when every impact. But nothing different soundwise realy. On the field, their sound will probably cut more once they get comfortable playing and marching. They look pretty cool, but its just different of course. It doen't shine as much, it looks like those yamaha's with the flat black color that doesn't shine (hope that make sence) it looks almost like paint on wood, not a shiny plastic. But I do like it better than their "fools gold" finish from last year. Nothing wrong with SCV getting new drums, they just pass their old ones down to SCVC or sell them. Overall, they look tight, but I havn't noticed anything dif in their sound.

Yeah the show is musicly remnant of 03, but once u see the drill you'll be like, holy crap......

Just got home from the two shows in No.Cal and Ive been looking around here on the boards and see people asking lots of questions about SCV and BD and scores and such so I guess I can share what I know. Vanguard was dissapointing, and by that I mean, they blew me away at their first performance last year and this year I wasn't as amazed. Their brassline is smoking, but the drums and colorguard are their weaker sections. This is prolly because the percussion staff had some changes this year, AND the drumline had a lot of age outs last year. I think there were somthing like 5 or 6 returning members, not to mention the snareline is experimenting with matched grip versus traditional. The drums are playing their normal groovy stuff, and are still very entertaining in the parkinglot to watch, but as for putting that on the field, they have a little work to do, as do every corps. Some other things technicly speaking involving the drumline is some the electronic stuff for the PIT hasn't quite been worked out yet, so once they get all that stuff working right, it will be better. As a side note, I think its cool how there is a female in every section except the tenor line. Thats ######, especially in the cymbal line! The colorguard is lacking because they dont have all their work done, AND they dont have their costumes yet. They performed in all black, some wearing tshirts, others wearing tanks, and some people wearing underarmour. So these things may have come into play, but I can tell both the drumline and the colorguard will improve greatly as the season progresses. I wouldn't count SCV out yet. As for the show itself, it almost sounded to me like the show isn't done. And this is partly true. A friend of mine who marches there says they are pretty much revamping the entire closer this week, so look for a new and improved SCV next weekend in So.Cal. Okay, BD's turn. I definitly liked this show better than Vanguard's already, and thats simply because its designed to be a winner. Its as if the staff took elements of winning shows of the past and threw them together. The point spread between BD and SCV was deserving, because BD's show is just flat out better. It has way better drill, WAAAAY better, and it is also much cleaner, which is the norm for BD out the gate. Watching the show, the drill was blowing me away, I was repetedly saying "#### this is some sweet drill" as I watched. As for the narration, yes its there, its not rumor. The show is a "dance derby", so the guard is 20 gals and 20 guys and they are paired up from 1 to 20, and its like a "dance off" and the narration serves the purpose of the host of the contest. When I heard the narration, I at first said "oh god ur kidding me" but at the end of the show I realized it was quite minimal, there is I think 3 maybe 4 spots where he talks but it is quite brief. The other thing is, as he spoke, I was looking around in the PIT for someone speaking into a microphone, but I couldnt' find anyone and I assumed it was prerecorded or somthing. I found out later that a member of the PIT had a wireless mic on his head and he was narrating and playing PIT stuff at the same time! I dont care what u think of narrations, but thats talent right there. The corps gets into the "dance derby" mood at a few points where they will end an exciting movement and all just kinda heave a big sigh and relax and slump over as if they were tired of dancing all night, its actually pretty cool, I dug it. The drumline is playing a lot of notes as usual and they do it well and consistantly from lot to field. The guard is on fire like usual as well, and that combined with the corps really really really cool drill is giving them big points visualy. It will be interesting to see if SCV can get their show up to par with BD by the time they return from Europe. I havn't seen Cavies or Cadets at all but this could be BD's year. Their show is designed to win. GE wins. Well I think thats quite enough out of me, let me know if theres any more questions about SCV BD or no.cal at all. I will put a link to some pictures when I post them! Lata....

Just got home from the two shows in No.Cal and Ive been looking around here on the boards and see people asking lots of questions about SCV and BD and scores and such so I guess I can share what I know. Vanguard was dissapointing, and by that I mean, they blew me away at their first performance last year and this year I wasn't as amazed. Their brassline is smoking, but the drums and colorguard are their weaker sections. This is prolly because the percussion staff had some changes this year, AND the drumline had a lot of age outs last year. I think there were somthing like 5 or 6 returning members, not to mention the snareline is experimenting with matched grip versus traditional. The drums are playing their normal groovy stuff, and are still very entertaining in the parkinglot to watch, but as for putting that on the field, they have a little work to do, as do every corps. Some other things technicly speaking involving the drumline is some the electronic stuff for the PIT hasn't quite been worked out yet, so once they get all that stuff working right, it will be better. As a side note, I think its cool how there is a female in every section except the tenor line. Thats ######, especially in the cymbal line! The colorguard is lacking because they dont have all their work done, AND they dont have their costumes yet. They performed in all black, some wearing tshirts, others wearing tanks, and some people wearing underarmour. So these things may have come into play, but I can tell both the drumline and the colorguard will improve greatly as the season progresses. I wouldn't count SCV out yet. As for the show itself, it almost sounded to me like the show isn't done. And this is partly true. A friend of mine who marches there says they are pretty much revamping the entire closer this week, so look for a new and improved SCV next weekend in So.Cal. Okay, BD's turn. I definitly liked this show better than Vanguard's already, and thats simply because its designed to be a winner. Its as if the staff took elements of winning shows of the past and threw them together. The point spread between BD and SCV was deserving, because BD's show is just flat out better. It has way better drill, WAAAAY better, and it is also much cleaner, which is the norm for BD out the gate. Watching the show, the drill was blowing me away, I was repetedly saying "#### this is some sweet drill" as I watched. As for the narration, yes its there, its not rumor. The show is a "dance derby", so the guard is 20 gals and 20 guys and they are paired up from 1 to 20, and its like a "dance off" and the narration serves the purpose of the host of the contest. When I heard the narration, I at first said "oh god ur kidding me" but at the end of the show I realized it was quite minimal, there is I think 3 maybe 4 spots where he talks but it is quite brief. The other thing is, as he spoke, I was looking around in the PIT for someone speaking into a microphone, but I couldnt' find anyone and I assumed it was prerecorded or somthing. I found out later that a member of the PIT had a wireless mic on his head and he was narrating and playing PIT stuff at the same time! I dont care what u think of narrations, but thats talent right there. The corps gets into the "dance derby" mood at a few points where they will end an exciting movement and all just kinda heave a big sigh and relax and slump over as if they were tired of dancing all night, its actually pretty cool, I dug it. The drumline is playing a lot of notes as usual and they do it well and consistantly from lot to field. The guard is on fire like usual as well, and that combined with the corps really really really cool drill is giving them big points visualy. It will be interesting to see if SCV can get their show up to par with BD by the time they return from Europe. I havn't seen Cavies or Cadets at all but this could be BD's year. Their show is designed to win. GE wins. Well I think thats quite enough out of me, let me know if theres any more questions about SCV BD or no.cal at all. I will put a link to some pictures when I post them! Lata....

Its funny you should mention "Ya Gotta Try" because, right now I march with the Academy, Div 2 outa Arizona, and before we were a "corps" we were just brass/perc ensemble. And a couple of years ago the brass/perc ensemble played some "oldies" if you will, Mullombo, When a Man Loves a Woman, and the next year, the year I joined, we played Cadillac of the Skies and you guessed it, Ya Gotta Try. DAAAAAAMMMNN... I think our percussion arranger kept the spirit of the 80s in our parts cause they were the hardest tenor parts I ever played :) Yay tenors. I bet you would love to hear a 2002 rendidtion of a song done over 20 years ago! :) Ill see if I cant find a recording... we had some sick parts my friend...

DCI.org has posted thier review of the shows in California this weekend. Check it out...