Achin' for Akron/Cinecast

[Slingerland]

What did I just read?

Either a terrifically witty sendup of current whack job thinking, or the convention speech of the next Governor of Alabama.

Edited June 24, 2014 by Slingerland

[2000Cadet]

Just got home from the show, and here are a few thoughts:

Cadets are crazy good and deserved the win....(but, for the first time in my life, I saw a Cadet with a goatee....facial hair?!) :) Neither the narration nor the big stage bothered me. At all. The kid was great and the narration is entirely appropriate for this show.

Crown is great, but I don't think they'll catch Cadets this year. And BD?? idk

Bluecoats had a better show than Crown imo, and at the very least should have been much further away from Regiment than they were. AND, THEY GOT RID OF THAT TERRIBLE MARCHING TECHNIQUE OF THE PAST COUPLE YEARS! WOOHOO!

Phantom' show is vintage Phantom.....I have no complaints with it and I like the uniform change in the corps proper.

Madison's show seems to be weaker than the rest from a construction point of view, but they continue to connect well with the audience.

Cavaliers are far improved over this time last year. I like their show and it's nice to see their guard dressed the way they were--the suits...

BAC has a whale of a show which I know they will modify and clean as they know how to do. I personally like this vehicle for them, and with some obvious visual collisions on screen tonight, they know what they have to do. I still see them scraping and clawing into 6th or better by August.

My theatre (Cinemagic Grand in South Portland, Maine) had ear-splitting volume and crystal clear HD...awesome!

You know, in regard to this, after watching the video on FN, it just occurred to me. I only saw one member with a goatee (although I could be wrong given how the camera angles constantly changed). But it had me thinking. In the military, there are some of us who get ingrown hairs due to shaving. The medical department usually gives those of us with that issue permission to shave once every 2 to 4 days depending on the severity of the issue. It had me wondering that if there is only one member who has a goatee (and again, I could be wrong about how many actually have it), maybe he is having the same issue with ingrown hairs. Perhaps they allowed him to keep facial hair just so he wouldn't have that issue. But I'm just speculating. Although I guess it wouldn't really justify having a goatee.

[Jeff Ream]

ok wait...I wasn't at the theater tonight...Boston has a G7 drill set?

Really?

classic!

[geluf]

I laughed out loud in the theater and some people looked at me like I was insane.

[Jeff Ream]

I laughed out loud in the theater and some people looked at me like I was insane.

oh I need a picture of this

[DrumManTx]

oh I need a picture of this

[Precious Roy]

Quickly becoming the most famous drill set since last year's "Van [guard]"

[thewsquared]

ok wait...I wasn't at the theater tonight...Boston has a G7 drill set?

Really?

classic!

There's a picture of it over in the Boston Crusader page. It is NOT subtle at all! I love it!

Edit: Ooops someone already posted it here! My bad

Edited June 24, 2014 by thewsquared

[N.E. Brigand]

Boston's "BAC" drill comes at about the 2:00 mark, and the "G7" drill comes at about the 10:00 mark. Someone else already identified Boston's theme, correctly I think, as "all corps are equal, but some corps are more equal than others." In Orwell's book, the animals rebel against a tyrannical farmer, but some of the animals themselves become tyrants. If the show theme is meant to be DCI's history in 12 minutes, then perhaps the "BAC" should read "DCI," but either way, it works.

(If they can clean this show, wow. It seems much more fully conceived than last year's.)

[ShortAndFast]

Sadly not too many people in my theater in Portland, OR.

Cavaliers - I think there's a lot of potential here. I enjoyed the guard's portrayal of the undead and sort of followed the story. We could actually hear the euphonium solo this time - played well, and the subtext of "play a non-traditional brass instrument, get your soul ripped out of your body" is kind of funny. You can definitely see some solid Cavie moments in the drill. I think there's potential for 6th place here if they clean it up.

Madison - I liked a lot of the music, although they played too many tunes to really develop any of them. The trombone feature was a non-event after all the buildup. Visually, I didn't think they achieved what Mason described in the interview at all. It came off as a whole lot of white and gray without many real visual impact moments.

Boston - Well, give them credit for trying something. I liked that they are portraying and suggesting, trusting the audience to think about what they are seeing, rather than beating you over the head with the theme. There are moments where it almost works - the ballad was probably the closest - and you can see the potential. All that said, there's some great music that gets chopped up pretty bad in the service of a theme that doesn't really communicate yet. And it's clear that they are really struggling with the visual difficulty right now. I will watch with interest to see what this evolves into.

Phantom - I thought this was a solid performance tonight. The non-Tchaikovsky music is pretty unmemorable, but I thought the beginning and end were musically strong. You can definitely follow the visual transformation - although I couldn't figure out why they made a big reveal of the guard members in the black tubes in the same black outfits we've been watching for a couple of minutes. Ultimately, the biggest downside here is the feeling that we've pretty much seen this before - it's another run at a PR formula that's pretty familiar by this point.

Cadets - Compared to the PR black uniforms, man, the Cadets looked super-elegant on the field. I thought this was a great performance tonight, and hands down deserved the win. I think the Lincoln and Kennedy parts of the show are the strongest - the Roosevelt section has a lot of different music and different emotions, and doesn't seem to hang together as well. Musically - well, it's probably the first DCI performance of Appalachian Spring since '87 Garfield that seems like it might live up to that high standard. The narrator continues to impress - the only part I find awkward is when they cut direct between him and a recorded speech. I think they should just give all the text to him. Cadets got the first applause of the night from my theater.

Crown - They've obviously set themselves a big challenge here. The "liftoff" part of the show is awesome and felt every bit like a champion's show. But it lags in the middle sections, and the closer isn't really communicating very well at all yet. While the "out of this world" elements are all used - trampolines, "floating" members, frisbees, it doesn't yet feel like these things are generating much effect. I really enjoyed getting to see more of the guard work in the theater - there's some really awesome material although I find the "welding masks" as puzzling as Rondo and Dennis did.

Bluecoats - Wow, surprise of the night. Musically this is my favorite show of the year, hands down. You can really tell that, like their program coordinator said, the design is driven by the music book. It's a delight. The Bluecoats are totally the poster child for how and why to use electronics in DCI music books. And in terms of theme, Tilt works pretty well. It inspires the visual design and it gives them license for some really cool moments (dressing forms on the fake sideline, marching over the ramps, bending the pitch) without bogging down in trying to communicate a complex narrative. I thought the placement was correct, but I have hope for this show as the judges get more exposure to it and the performance levels tighten up. It could well be their best year ever. Bluecoats got the second applause of the night in my theater.