Crown vs. BD this year

[jjeffeory]

 

I think this is a valid topic.

There's a notion that BD shows are so layered that you get more and more out of it each time you watch. But I felt Crown just put it all there on the surface. There's usually no more than one or two things happening on the field which is even less than normal I think. So the more I watch crown post season, the more things I find wrong or banal with the show. It's very bland and happy throughout, there's no tension, just constant release.

There are a lot of reasons I could go into, but I feel that the show should have been out of top 3 on the drill alone. Am I going crazy when I just see mistakes and inconsistencies everywhere? Not in the kids necessarily, but in just the writing of dots? I think even Phantom or Bluecoats had more imaginative and polished drill writing wise. If you took a screenshot for all the rectangles Crown made, you'd have about 12 pictures all with crown in the same-ish block with the same intervals on the same-ish part of the field.

And other than that, I really could rant for quite a bit about how little attention to detail and care there was in writing the drill. I would argue there's more scatter in this show than any BD show because every single line to box type of move is pretty much just scattered to. Because it looks like the drill writer just highlighted some performers and pressed the "put them in a grid" button on pyware, there are a lot of drill moves that are essentially set, scatter, set, scatter, set. At least BD's scatter is deliberate and not used as a band-aid (I'm looking at you galaxy to galaxy scatter at the end of the "energy part II"). There are other things too, kids dots seem to switch, patterns established in some members aren't followed or even straight up contradicted in some parts (look at infinity sign to grid to pods in beginning). There's a part where all 80 or so of their brass is doing three man parallel pinwheels (choosing to do 3 person pinwheels a questionable choice to say the least in an 80 person hornline but it works kinda) except for 9 tubas. Whole corps going one way, 9 tubas in the back going a different way. Those are three big examples, but nearly every visual idea, there's a moment of "wait, what? why are you making them do that? why are they doing that?"

And lemme just talk about 3D drill real quick. It's an illusion people! It's lines passing through each other and intervals compressing, aka normal drill. It's a drill writer's trick with a few subsets. It's not even something that's "never even been attempted" or whatever other exaggeration you find strewn about the webz. The illusion of 3D in drill (playing with your depth perception) is something cavies and BD have been doing for years. Even phantom had a 3D book opening up this year and that one was a changing axis! Crown's pyramid was horns down, 16 counts, on a fixed axis, and was based on a single kid doing a true 4-5. Compare that to the rotating cube. If you're still crossing your eyes staring at those .gifs of rotating shapes, you are a sucker! Especially with the pyramid.

The only real 3D drill is stuff people have been doing for years, ramps and platforms, chairs and other props, not that it matters.

Did anyone else find it weird that the EotB show called E=mc2 (with that logo being abundant on the field in the drill, costume, and drum) had maybe two ideas from the source material expressed through anything other than the pit (brass). I mean, they play the Gm, F, Bb chords in the beginning and during the first Lovatt-Cooper piece, and then brass soloists for the ballad, but that's kinda it. Everything else is the (amazing when not a recording) voice work and (not so amazing) choreography and some pit/synth shtuff. And then everything else is just something else, The Abyss, some Lovatt-Cooper pieces, one of which shows up at the end out of nowhere. Remember that Crown won because they won GE because they won music GE because they got some 20s there. BD beat them in vis GE, Vis overall and Music overall.

BD, it seems to me, had a really good semis performance and simply got royally screwed on the sheets. I mean I think people on this forum were calling dci out that night that top two corps' spread swapped with a difference of .8 pts. Has that ever even happened before that dramatically? Go watch Crown's semis performance, they drag, they phase, their ritardandos and rubatos were a mess. I think BD got spooked with that point shock and had a remarkably terrible finals performance (chipped solos, phasing, that sort of thing) totally their fault. But still nothing like Crown the week before at allentwon, who were that night still only .2 down from devs. man that video is quite embarrassing.

Not trying to put down their win or say anyone got robbed Saturday night, but no one else got the jumbotron shot of the corps name and logo in their multi cam as they introduced the corps and there has been no apparent attempt at taking down the numerous crown finals and encore performance vids from youtube. Non of these opinions have to do with the kids, it's all the design.

 

All I can say is LOL!

That's a pretty deep hate session on Crown's drill and design.

[George Dixon]

   

All I can say is LOL!

That's a pretty deep hate session on Crown's drill and design.

It's someone's opinion. Not "hate"

I also agree / thought Crown should have been 3rd, BD winning and Cadets 2nd

The show lacked much originality. It was like the greatest hits of past Cadets/Star/Crown shows. They were dirty and the drum line was (IMO) overscored.

Crown's drill was the simpliest of the top 3, and the dirtiest. Again all IMO. Obviously the judges and masses disagreed.

The purple pants did a good job hiding dirt though - so I guess there was that.

[jjeffeory]

It's someone's opinion. Not "hate"

I also agree / thought Crown should have been 3rd, BD winning and Cadets 2nd

The show lacked much originality. It was like the greatest hits of past Cadets/Star/Crown shows. They were dirty and the drum line was (IMO) overscored.

Crown's drill was the simpliest of the top 3, and the dirtiest. Again all IMO. Obviously the judges and masses disagreed.

The purple pants did a good job hiding dirt though - so I guess there was that.

It's not what was said. It was the delivery that sounds a bit like sour grapes. If we're going by personal opinion, I think SCV was the best.

I'd be hard pressed to believe that BD's visual was the best. I watched the show several times in a row and followed a trumpet soloist for the whole show. Not much demand there. Very well designed to minimize demand while maximizing effect.

Cadets were pretty good, but I didn't care for the musical arrangements compared to previous arrangements of the same music. The props were god awful dirty most of the time. It wasn't my type of show either.

I can agree with you and the other poster about some of the Crown comments, but none of the corps this year had perfect designs or performances. To me this year will not be remembered as one of the better years in drum corps drill or design. Still, I feel Crown was more worthy than either Blue Devils or the Cadets despite the flaws. The best designed show (SCVs) was a show that I knew the judges weren't going to put higher than third this year; maybe next year though... ...and even SCVs show could have been made more interesting if they had built a little more demand into the visual part. I bet they didn't because they Weber learned some lessons from the previous few years that allowed SCV score to climb more this year.

So, forgive me, I thought the delivery wasn't the best and I also disagree with a few of the comments on the visual design that are subjective.

It's also funny to me that when BD wins, the minions come out to praise the design and execution to no end. This year, some people don't like Crown 'cause they too much like BD or whatever was thrown out there, and their design doesn't make sense. Just is amusing...

Edited November 11, 2013 by jjeffeory

[TESB]

   

All I can say is LOL!

That's a pretty deep hate session on Crown's drill and design.

lol i know. What can I say? I lead a very interesting life. At least I backed it up.

Vanguard was a little young it seemed. Whenever various shows throughout the summer would come online, I would check them out and say 'wow, hopefully that's clean by finals' and it never got clean. And for whatever reason, Vanguard has this bizarre tendency to jump up from their normal 4th or 5th in feet some random nights and I think semis was one of those nights. Like there's a judge or two out their who really dig their bendy leg stuff and did the same thing last year.

Vanguard's show music was cool and all, but I gotta say I'm not fond of useless propage to hide the band in order to hide the band. I'm probably not so observant and they actually do something with them right? Because I see an awful lot of them in a couple rows.

Yeah, I did notice the one trumpet soloist, idk how much he himself marched, but it wasn't much at all. It's a little, just a teeny tiny little bit misleading to assign the minimal demand to max effect based on the one trumpet soloist, especially when that was probably the reason they were at times 4th in GE. I implore you to check out the tempos in the shows. BD is at least 200 or 210 for 75% of the show. Cadets (their major flaw) was a solid 130-160 most of the show, the obvious exception being the closer. Crown's faster movements seemed to fluctuate from 176-190, but never for long, and the rest was either half time or laying down pretending to write on a chalkboard, so they were paced pretty well. But a lot of dirt I've found in BD's show could come from a limitation of the pole props, they just seemed to get in the way sometimes. And it's difficult to tell the genuinely dirty drill from the drill where they're dodging poles, which is a problem. I liked the poles though, I got it, but clearly there was that limitation.

And lemme just say Crown didn't win this year because they were imitating BD. I think there are parallels to be drawn, but Crown's show is just too saturated with their own, Cadets, Star, and BOA elements. Dada was an art movement that you learn about at school...and this is another Academic-ish show. The wormhole gimmick at the end in how it looked and the way they did it is taken straight from Through a Glass Darkly. But there were just so many things that this show stole from past Crown and BOA that all y'all saying they're too much like BD is a bit of an insult to BD.

Edited November 11, 2013 by TESB

[jjeffeory]

lol i know. What can I say? I lead a very interesting life. At least I backed it up.

Vanguard was a little young it seemed. Whenever various shows throughout the summer would come online, I would check them out and say 'wow, hopefully that's clean by finals' and it never got clean. And for whatever reason, Vanguard has this bizarre tendency to jump up from their normal 4th or 5th in feet some random nights and I think semis was one of those nights. Like there's a judge or two out their who really dig their bendy leg stuff and did the same thing last year.

Vanguard's show music was cool and all, but I gotta say I'm not fond of useless propage to hide the band in order to hide the band. I'm probably not so observant and they actually do something with them right? Because I see an awful lot of them in a couple rows.

Yeah, I did notice the one trumpet soloist, idk how much he himself marched, but it wasn't much at all. It's a little, just a teeny tiny little bit misleading to assign the minimal demand to max effect based on the one trumpet soloist, especially when that was probably the reason they were at times 4th in GE. I implore you to check out the tempos in the shows. BD is at least 200 or 210 for 75% of the show. Cadets (their major flaw) was a solid 130-160 most of the show, the obvious exception being the closer. Crown's faster movements seemed to fluctuate from 176-190, but never for long, and the rest was either half time or laying down pretending to write on a chalkboard, so they were paced pretty well. But a lot of dirt I've found in BD's show could come from a limitation of the pole props, they just seemed to get in the way sometimes. And it's difficult to tell the genuinely dirty drill from the drill where they're dodging poles, which is a problem. I liked the poles though, I got it, but clearly there was that limitation.

And lemme just say Crown didn't win this year because they were imitating BD. I think there are parallels to be drawn, but Crown's show is just too saturated with their own, Cadets, Star, and BOA elements. Dada was an art movement that you learn about at school...and this is another Academic-ish show. The wormhole gimmick at the end in how it looked and the way they did it is taken straight from Through a Glass Darkly. But there were just so many things that this show stole from past Crown and BOA that all y'all saying they're too much like BD is a bit of an insult to BD.

Haha! Thanks for the response! It's all good, and I think you've made some good points too.

Just FYI on BD soloist drill... I also sampled some other members too. They were higher demand than the trumpet/flugel soloists, but it wasn't what I was expecting for all the credit they get.

Good posts though, made me smile!

Edited November 11, 2013 by jjeffeory

[George Dixon]

Haha! Thanks for the response! It's all good, and I think you've made some good points too.

Just FYI on BD soloist drill... I also sampled some other members too. They were higher demand than the trumpet/flugel soloists, but it wasn't what I was expecting for all the credit they get.

Good posts though, made me smile!

I thought the same guy played all the solos?

[burgerbob]

I have to agree with the first post.

I really liked both shows. I am biased towards BD with many friends there, but I really did like both and either could have won.

However, I do find that Crown's show just kind of gets stale. It's great, but after a viewing or two you've seen it all. Of course, that's probably good for the average viewer.

I even downloaded the Crown brass recordings. I listened to them a few times and haven't since then. They sound great but it just seems flat after a few times.

Edit: I forgot to mention. SCV was also pretty flat for me. I don't much like the source material (not a huge musical fan) but it really didn't do anything for me. I liked 2012 much more from that perspective.

Edited November 12, 2013 by burgerbob

[FTNK]

I'm going to post more, but for now, an analogy by way of film: In terms of innovation, Crown was like Independence Day. BD [edit: in the last few years] was like 2001: A Space Odyssey. To expand: ID4 was a very well made, extremely entertaining classic alien invasion film. 2001 redefined the sci-fi film.

Edited November 12, 2013 by FTNK

[jjeffeory]

I thought the same guy played all the solos?

Does he? I think so, but I haven't watch the show again since I did the sampling.

[N.E. Brigand]

I'm going to post more, but for now, an analogy by way of film: In terms of innovation, Crown was like Independence Day. BD [edit: in the last few years] was like 2001: A Space Odyssey. To expand: ID4 was a very well made, extremely entertaining classic alien invasion film. 2001 redefined the sci-fi film.

In light of your analogy, it may be worth noting that three of the top film critics working in 1968, Stanley Kauffmann, John Simon, and Pauline Kael, critics usually at odds with one another, all said that 2001 was dull and pretentious. Kael for instance: "2001 has that new-techniques look which combined with 'swinging' or 'serious' ideas often pass for motion picture art ... no more than trash in the latest, up-to-the-minute guises, using 'artistic techniques' to give trash the look of art ... not honestly crummy [but] very fancy and takes [its] crummy ideas seriously."