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All time shows: Blue Devils


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2 hours ago, MikeN said:

I forgot about '92!  That one goes in my honorable mention list as well.  Cuban Fire was just an awesome set of charts to play, and of course the closer...

(And I thought 2005 was a great show!  The narrator totally sold it - he had the perfect voice for what they were trying to do.)

Mike

Agreed on the narrator having a perfect voice for it. But the back-to-front structure of the story they're trying to tell just...doesn't work. And it's an iffy visual package at best.

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Faves:

 

84 -- like THAT was unexpected!

76 -- gotta go with the one that set the standard for sooo many following it.

86 -- Need one say more?

90 -- Such a good program all the way around.

06 -- I AM of Sicilian descent, after all.

 

Least:

83 -- a rehash of 83 for the most part.  Great performance, and my preferred version of T.O., Paradox, and One More Time....but a rehash.

98 -- BD and WSS??   Just, no....

05 -- As for 86, need one say more?   Aside from "yowza," I mean?

02 -- Didn't hit my buttons

10 -- As said above, not really listenable musically for me.

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Wow... I listed 3 really cool shows... 12 or 13 I also liked... and only one I detest, and one I dislike.

 

Let's start with the "no's."

 

Start with the Post-Modernist 2003 show. Yowza, Yowza, Yowza, NO, NO NO. I asked my friend to please find a gun shoot me while watching Quarterfinals. I begged him. The Emperor was buck naked out there.

 

The 2008 show was basically poking fun at itself with the theme. They Risked Absurdity... and finally the panel called them on that risk big time when it counted, thank God.

 

Man, I jam to a lot of this stuff in the car or watch videos when I feel down and need picked up.

 

The top ones:

 

1986: The ultimate expression of what BD was to that time. Beautifully paced, exciting, swaggering, bad-axx. Remember standing on the bleachers at East prelims jumping up and down on them for the last minute of the show. Prolly the best thing that happened for me in 1986. Dark, dark times.

 

1980: Beautifully paced, great, memorable charts... and Dindi. :inlove::inlove::inlove:

1982: Saw this at Finals, they just showed everyone how to do it, beating  strong Cadets and Vanguard performances. the "Love Theme from the Competition" might be one of their underrated charts.

1993:  Don Ellis, Hank Levy... great technical brass book, maybe the best ever at that time... marvelous Bari solos...

1999: The Rhumba... the way the brass could shift from style to style with no effort throughout the program, the drive... Vanguard was lucky to tie, and I love that Vanguard show a ton as well.

 

Honorable Mentions!

 

1975, 1976, 1979, 1985 (This show has grown on me over the years since I first saw it. Is that the staff yelling "DON'T SUCK!" in the one part of the ELP Piano Concerto?), 1991 (close one here for top 5... Dear God, the tenor feature in the opener, Bela and Bird... some really obtuse but cool stuff), 1995, 2003, 2010, 2012 (yes, I love Dada, and enjoyed the repartee concerning this show here on DCP with a couple of nice folks. "You mean if I boo and jeer, this is what they WANT?" "Yes. Dada is meant to provoke a reaction, ANY reaction, the more reaction whether positive or negative is better." I think some of those folks had a near permanent facepalm after that...) and 2014, a really elegant and pretty show. Tilt went for the heart, the "Felliniesque" was more subtle.

 

 

 

 

 

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I found this article from the Smithsonian's website several years ago.  In it, there is a link that takes you to a section of the 2014 Felliniesque show.  Listening to that small section was what re-introduced me to drum corps and made me a fan again.  The last drum corps show I had seen was in the 70's in the Philadelphia area.  Thanks, Blue Devils!

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/researchers-look-what-happens-brain-when-music-causes-chills-180959481/

 

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Favorites

1980 (peak 70’s style Blue Devils)

1986 (peak 80’s style Blue Devils)

1994 (peak early 90’s style  Blue Devils)

1995 (just a really cool show that I think should have won)

1999 (peak late 90's style Blue Devils, great music)

 

HM: 2011 (love the music so give the visual which was deeply flawed a pass)

HM: 2013 (I got it and like it, the ending was horrible though and it killed the entire show, wasn't a fan of the metal guitar patch)

HM: 2012 (their best music book since 1999 but I hate, hate, hate the visual, just wanted to credit the music and best use of voice ever)

Least Favorite: 2005, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2015 and 2017. I fell out of deep-like for this show, it loses on DVD repeated plays, their GE was performance based and it doesn’t translate on the media. I like the opener (even the dirty snares) but then it bores me until the full ensemble hit in the ballad to the end. Bumble Bee doesn’t fit, it’s academic and ostentatious, never got clean enough for me and the visual is a snooze. I like the idea of a long song ballad build but their music and all the solos lost me, would have preferred a different song. Their visual did nothing for me in the ballad either. The show's resolution is great, too bad about the edit

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16 hours ago, RetiredMusTeach said:

I found this article from the Smithsonian's website several years ago.  In it, there is a link that takes you to a section of the 2014 Felliniesque show.  Listening to that small section was what re-introduced me to drum corps and made me a fan again.  The last drum corps show I had seen was in the 70's in the Philadelphia area.  Thanks, Blue Devils!

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/researchers-look-what-happens-brain-when-music-causes-chills-180959481/

 

Imagine if they could've written the article a year or so later, and used the ballad, and last half of the closer from 2017.  Goosebumps for me every time!!!

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1994! 

Any time I'm in the gym and I feel like I don't have any energy left, I just hit play on 94 BD and I'm ready to throw an 18-wheeler over the East River.  

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