Indianapolis, Vol. 1

[ChicagoFan]

I've attended finals since the 80s, and have only missed only a few. I was not pleased with the Indy experience for several reasons:

1. The sound in the stadium was poor, at best. From my vantage point, I had a very difficult time hearing anything other than a muffled roar.

2. Sound aside, I was not impressed with the ammenities of the building. For a brand new facility, I found it rather lacking. The concourses were rather narrow and crowded, food choices were limited, and access to the various levels was restricted to only one escalator.

3. The terraced nature of the seating design doesn't contribute to feeling part of the crowd. In the 500 level where I was seated, there were only 5 rows of seats. We felt very isolated

3. Even though I pre-purchased my tickets over a year ago and paid top-dollar, my seats were on the 20 yard line. Everyone in my section had the same complaint.

4. Indy is a perfectly nice city, with everything centrally located, but it doesn't offer much in the way of entertainment. By Saturday, I was bored. Plus, the area around the stadium more or less shuts down at 5:00. After Thursday's show, we searched in vain for a drugstore or convenience store to buy snacks.

On the plus side, Indy is an easy drive from Chicago, there are plenty of hotels within walking distance of the stadium (mine was about 5 minutes away), and you don't find the exhorbitant prices of a tourist city such as Pasadena or Orlando. However, in my opinion, the negatives outweighed the positive.

[Ed Boxer]

hell they already hit my card for next year an i emailed them and told them i wasnt looking forward to it and predicted if it was as bad as i am reading, they may ban me for life

You know, this one really gets me. Its as if DCI knew they weren't opening the roof all along, knew the sound was really awful, but wanted to get you to renew BEFORE you found out you'd been scammed!

How was Indy:

Stadium - C - Big decently designed and laid out. I understand some people found that the front row sats in their sections were blocked by 3 feet of plexiglass.

Sound - D- its awful - drum corps in a tin can.

Have serious doubts about renewing FDCI and tickets for Indy next year. I'll take the excellent sound in Allentown and call it a day.

Not really a whole lot to do in Indy. Great that you can walk, but very little worth walking to.

[iSop]

Dumbest, most WGI-y, immature entrance to the field for scores. This alone was enough to make me want to leave the stadium immediately. This is not WGI, BOA, etc. This is Drum Corps. Turn off f'ing 'Lady GaGa' and let the corps enter the field without smoke effects and horrid pop music echoing all of the place.

I lol'd.

[Jeff Ream]

Not sure why that would be, and the discussion of BOA in a DCI thread is indicative of something in itself...

NO ONE has expressed anything better than grudging "acceptance" of the sound quality in the stands. Maybe that's why the slogan for this year was "Feel the Music", there was apparantly litttle concern for hearing it.

Ticket prices and seat locations, food prices, weather, parking and traffic are going to be considerations with any venue.

When accoustics take a back seat to anything, as related to the Championships for this activity, I fear DCI has lost it's way.

I agree. I heard great things about the city. but really...how much time does one spend in the city and how much time does one spend at the stadium?

whats more important...sound quality and the venue, or what's outside?

[dcsnare93]

SCV Brass Arranger Key Poulan's designer commentary on the Fan Network for the San Antonio show indicated that SCV's show this year was exactly that. Designed for the domes they would be competing in - and with Indy specifically in mind too. I think it was a sign that SCV's design team was actually thinking ahead and anticipating how the show would sound in these boomy venues. Especiallly with the final show - that is so important - being in a boomy dome.

While I understand that every show is not inside (the only times I got to see SCV were outside), I think you HAVE to take the "dome reverb" into consideration because so much hinges on a judges perception of the show. The guys in the green shirts are stuck in the dome trying to sort out the sound they are hearing - and the corps has to be taught how to play in that venue. And the show was brilliantly design for that... in my opinion.

From where I was sitting, SCV was definitely one of the best sounding corps of the night. I suspect more corps will change their show designs to account for an indoor finals.

That said, I think most of the posts, so far, have summed it up pretty well. While the stadium was great, the sound left a lot to be desired. Indy was nice, though I can't see myself wanting to return here every year. It's disappointing to think championships will be at this venue for another 9 years!

[iSop]

SCV Brass Arranger Key Poulan's designer commentary on the Fan Network for the San Antonio show indicated that SCV's show this year was exactly that. Designed for the domes they would be competing in - and with Indy specifically in mind too. I think it was a sign that SCV's design team was actually thinking ahead and anticipating how the show would sound in these boomy venues. Especiallly with the final show - that is so important - being in a boomy dome.

While I understand that every show is not inside (the only times I got to see SCV were outside), I think you HAVE to take the "dome reverb" into consideration because so much hinges on a judges perception of the show. The guys in the green shirts are stuck in the dome trying to sort out the sound they are hearing - and the corps has to be taught how to play in that venue. And the show was brilliantly design for that... in my opinion.

Yea and that show in particular placed 5th also. If Lucas Oil sounds anything like the Georgia dome, I wouldn't sound too happy either. Don't get me wrong, the atmosphere is always great at the southeastern championships but dome acoustics flat-out suck.

[k1001001]

As everyone has mentioned, the stadium was very reverberant. I imagine the back curtain helped control the slapback echo, but they should have also done an acoustic ceiling as well. The Georgia Dome used to be the worst about echo until they put the fake ceiling up this year. The stadium sound wasn't so bad in the first section on the 40 yard line though.

One thing I did notice were the poor stadium electronics. There were many times were wireless mics were dead, and other times when audio from the intermission videos would be scratchy. For such a venue, I would imagine they would have much more professional audio than that.

Other than that, I don't like Indianapolis. There's not much to do in downtown save for the museums. There are also very few food/drink choices around the stadium. Basey's (across the street from the stadium) had extremely overpriced food and beer, and the waitstaff were astonishingly rude. Bloomington seemed to be a much better venue for finals, and I hope DCI will consider it again in future years.

[Bydloyoho]

I know I'm only judging it from APDs but, seriously, how can you enjoy music when you can't hear articulation, staccato, etc.

The stylistic changes necessary for a corps to change their sound to be heard in Lucas Oil basically mean two things:

1. Quick changes of volume are pointless when it's loud to soft.

2. Drumcorps will a totally different entity soundwise in 9 years time.

There's gonna be some impactless shows in outdoor venues a couple of years from now let me tell you.

[StarGazer]

There's gonna be some impactless shows in outdoor venues a couple of years from now let me tell you.

I'm going to suggest to you to do something you're not going to like to do. I'm suggesting you look up some Indiana marching bands. Yes, marching bands. State Finals has been held in an indoor facility since the RCA Dome opened in the mid 80s. State Finalist bands play effectively outdoors and indoors. There are slightly different design considerations taken into account, such as in ballads after "the big moment" that there are a few counts of rest added in to let the echo of the chords die away before continuing.

I've gotten used to indoor stadiums after having been to ISSMA State Finals and BOA GN. You have to listen differently. It's not outside. There are echoes.

All that being said, I liked the curtain in the back. It looked great and did it's job of absorbing/deflecting some sound back to the fans. The temp was great inside. I enjoyed myself greatly and will be back for Finals next year.

[Turnadot]

LOS has only been open for one year, so the BOA designers only heard what their show would sound like in there a few times. The RCA Dome and LOS are not comparable at all. The sound in the RCA Dome was much worse then in Lucas Oil Stadium. Percussion sounds much better in LOS then the RCA dome. The RCA dome did have a very nice backfield washed out echo sound though that doesn't exist in LOS. I think the drum corps sounded better then the high school bands did for BOA because the corps are so much louder then a high school band is. LOS stadium really swallows up small groups. Probably less chance of the roof being open for BOA because it's in November. I sure would have liked to hear what a corps would have sounded like with the roof and side open though.