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2022 Season Predictions


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15 minutes ago, mjoakes said:

I agree and like how you said this. There is much in DCI that I don't understand as well as others understand, especially all the music selections and nuances. That doesn't prevent me from just enjoying entertaining shows. Maybe my comment about inaccessibility was more accurately saying I'm usually just annoyed by the hype and - what to me seems like needless - posturing around a lot of the themes. Just play and march (or run and dance) and thrill me.

I agree with you and Cappybara. I find things to enjoy in shows despite the fact that I don't ever understand the theme, well almost never, but I don't bother trying to understand it either. I just want good music and good visuals.

The part I have a hard time with is the music. Madison for example - If I wasn't such a huge Chess fan, I wouldn't have noticed they are playing One Night in Bangkok. Why not just play One Night in Bangkok the way the B's in ABBA wrote it, because they certainly wrote it better than Madison's arrangers? Answer: because all music today has to be a big technical exercise to score well. It's the same reason why Bluecoats did a Beatles show without any Beatles music in it 😀

Edited by queenanne_1536
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 There have been lots of movies over the years where I thought the actor's performance was stellar, but the movie itself was subpar, confusing, unappealing its its plot/ theme or in the end, in some manner unsatisfactory. Did I enjoy the performance by the actor nevertheless, all by itself, in such ? Yes..  Would the experience for me had been better had the movie itself however had a plot, theme, messaging, ending, etc that was stellar as the actor's performance in it ? Oh, without a doubt. 

So yes, I can enjoy a performance by the performer in a movie that is a miss for me.  But that does not mean that I  dont wish the performer performed in a movie that wasnt such a dud of compehension of the movie's intent for many of the public, including myself.

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2 minutes ago, Boss Anova said:

 There have been lots of movies over the years where I thought the actor's performance was stellar, but the movie itself was subpar, confusing, unappealing its its plot/ theme or in the end, in some manner unsatisfactory. Did I enjoy the performance by the actor nevertheless, all by itself, in such ? Yes..  Would the experience for me had been better had the movie itself however had a plot, theme, messaging, ending, etc that was stellar as the actor's performance in it ? Oh, without a doubt. 

So yes, I can enjoy a performance by the performer in a movie that is a miss for me.  But that does not mean that I  dont wish the performer performed in a movie that wasnt such a dud of compehension of the movie's intent for many of the public, including myself.

But that’s the thing. Movies inherently tell a story. That is their sole purpose. If the story is a dud in a movie, that will naturally make the movie not as enjoyable. 
 

DCI shows have never, across the board,  had a concrete story. Yes every year there will be shows that do have one, but it isn’t inherent to a show for there to be a story of greater meaning to be told. This seems like a very incongruent comparison 

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15 minutes ago, Cappybara said:

But that’s the thing. Movies inherently tell a story. That is their sole purpose. If the story is a dud in a movie, that will naturally make the movie not as enjoyable. 
 

DCI shows have never, across the board,  had a concrete story. Yes every year there will be shows that do have one, but it isn’t inherent to a show for there to be a story of greater meaning to be told. This seems like a very incongruent comparison 

That's it. Exactly. Movies are a whole different thing entirely. While I can appreciate the quality of the performance in drum corps, I feel like it's a "make everything as hard as possible to get the most points" thing which is to the detriment, HUGE detriment of the music.

Thank God no one is playing Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Schubert or Haydn on the field (well if they are I can't recognize it, Thank God) because I would flip the F out having to hear botched arrangements of these, my favorite, great composers.

We've lost musicality in drum corps because the writing is geared towards creating the most demand and content. It's a huge flaw in the judging system and it's a detriment to the fans as well. Then we have corps playing 8-10+ pieces all within a 10 minute show. That's ridiculous. There's no build, there's no sustained melody, there's no musicality. It's all rush rush rush to the next.

Go listen to Regiment's opener from 1996 and tell me there is anything as good as that, from a musicality standpoint, on the filed today. There isn't. I could list a 1,000 other examples in addition to '96 Regiment.

Again, I enjoy today's drum corps for what it is, but I go to be awed from a technical standpoint now rather than to be entertained. That's the reason why, if you're under 6th place and I don't like your show, I'm just not bothering with you, and if you're under 12th place, forget it. I'm not going to waste hours on something that bores me to death. At least, with the top corps, I can marvel at the technical wonder they present and appreciate that. With the lower tier corps, there is nothing there for me. Sorry, I'm being blunt and brutally honest here, but DCI has really crapped the bed when it came to their scoring system.

So far, hands down, my favorite show of the season is Regiment, then probably followed by Madison.

I'm even off my beloved Vanguard. We'll see if my opinion changes over the course of the season. I do think it's better than 2019, but that initial excitement has worn off, it's just meh to me now.

Edited by queenanne_1536
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32 minutes ago, Cappybara said:

But that’s the thing. Movies inherently tell a story. That is their sole purpose. If the story is a dud in a movie, that will naturally make the movie not as enjoyable. 
 

DCI shows have never, across the board,  had a concrete story. Yes every year there will be shows that do have one, but it isn’t inherent to a show for there to be a story of greater meaning to be told. This seems like a very incongruent comparison 

Michael Bay movies...

 

Terrible stories, but wonderful special effects.

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1 hour ago, jjeffeory said:

Michael Bay movies...

 

Terrible stories, but wonderful special effects.

And I love those stupid movies like Independence Day, Deep Impact, etc.... horrible movies but great special effects.

I guess that's a good way to look at drum corps today - special effects galore and little substance. 

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2 hours ago, queenanne_1536 said:

That's it. Exactly. Movies are a whole different thing entirely. While I can appreciate the quality of the performance in drum corps, I feel like it's a "make everything as hard as possible to get the most points" thing which is to the detriment, HUGE detriment of the music.

Thank God no one is playing Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Schubert or Haydn on the field (well if they are I can't recognize it, Thank God) because I would flip the F out having to hear botched arrangements of these, my favorite, great composers.

We've lost musicality in drum corps because the writing is geared towards creating the most demand and content. It's a huge flaw in the judging system and it's a detriment to the fans as well. Then we have corps playing 8-10+ pieces all within a 10 minute show. That's ridiculous. There's no build, there's no sustained melody, there's no musicality. It's all rush rush rush to the next.

Go listen to Regiment's opener from 1996 and tell me there is anything as good as that, from a musicality standpoint, on the filed today. There isn't. I could list a 1,000 other examples in addition to '96 Regiment.

Again, I enjoy today's drum corps for what it is, but I go to be awed from a technical standpoint now rather than to be entertained. That's the reason why, if you're under 6th place and I don't like your show, I'm just not bothering with you, and if you're under 12th place, forget it. I'm not going to waste hours on something that bores me to death. At least, with the top corps, I can marvel at the technical wonder they present and appreciate that. With the lower tier corps, there is nothing there for me. Sorry, I'm being blunt and brutally honest here, but DCI has really crapped the bed when it came to their scoring system.

So far, hands down, my favorite show of the season is Regiment, then probably followed by Madison.

I'm even off my beloved Vanguard. We'll see if my opinion changes over the course of the season. I do think it's better than 2019, but that initial excitement has worn off, it's just meh to me now.

I think one thing that gets tossed to the side or gets the benefit of the doubt a lot of the time is the arranging side of that, similar to you actually oftentimes I don’t feel like I can get into many of the bubble top 12 contending corps, and also even corps closer to the top 6 because of how sterile, thin, they feel sometimes. I honestly mean it where I feel some high school shows are more purposefully well-arranged to their source music and their actual marching members than some drum corps.

Edit: I felt pretty much the same way when I went to see the 2019 prelims in theaters, you just could tell there was a better of EVERYTHING in the music department, arranging, style differences, control, power in the top 6 and that’s when I really began to enjoy myself seeing consistently awesome music programs after another that wasn’t present for me in the previous six before them. Even though I did like some music programs in that bracket as well.

Edited by Vidal28Rdg
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2 minutes ago, queenanne_1536 said:

I guess that's a good way to look at drum corps today - special effects galore and little substance. 

I agree that there’s not much like PR 1996 today, but y’know, that was also true in 1996! Other corps were doing classical, but I think it’s worth saying that PR was pretty exceptional on that front in the ‘90s and ‘00s, skill-wise. Personally I’ve only grown more impressed with how ambitious the musical arrangements have gotten. I think there’s a ton of substance in the top corps, musically, but it’s a different variety of substance, if PR 1996/classical music is the standard. 

I think the avant garde jazz arrangements in shows like BD’s Rite of Spring or Bloo 2018 was unduly rich and complex for music that we were hearing on a football field. I’ve loved watching Bloo continue to experiment with Steve Reich-ish arrangements since their 2015 show. The darkness of SCV’s arrangements since 2017 have had a lot of variety and depth (and a brassline that was up to the task) that definitely, for me, amounts to more than special effects. A lot of this had no business being as thoughtfully arranged as it was, and listening to the source material has only made it more impressive for me. Mileage varies of course.

 

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16 minutes ago, saxfreq1128 said:

I agree that there’s not much like PR 1996 today, but y’know, that was also true in 1996! Other corps were doing classical, but I think it’s worth saying that PR was pretty exceptional on that front in the ‘90s and ‘00s, skill-wise. Personally I’ve only grown more impressed with how ambitious the musical arrangements have gotten. I think there’s a ton of substance in the top corps, musically, but it’s a different variety of substance, if PR 1996/classical music is the standard. 

I think the avant garde jazz arrangements in shows like BD’s Rite of Spring or Bloo 2018 was unduly rich and complex for music that we were hearing on a football field. I’ve loved watching Bloo continue to experiment with Steve Reich-ish arrangements since their 2015 show. The darkness of SCV’s arrangements since 2017 have had a lot of variety and depth (and a brassline that was up to the task) that definitely, for me, amounts to more than special effects. A lot of this had no business being as thoughtfully arranged as it was, and listening to the source material has only made it more impressive for me. Mileage varies of course.

 

I think you could put Madison's '88 Malagueña, '86 Devils Channel One, '87 Vanguard Russian Christmas Music, Garfield '87, Star '91 - and a million more examples that parallel Regiment '96. Back then it was about great music with great drill that reflecting what's going on in the music. I don't feel it's about that today, I feel it's all about scores. Not that it wasn't about scores back then, but the sheets have changed and the corps are playing to those sheets. That's DCI's fault, not the corps fault.

There are shows I've liked in recent years (2014 and 2019 excepted - liked no one those years). I loved Bluecoats in 2016 and 2017, Vanguard and Devils in 2017, Vanguard 2018 was the best show in more than a decade IMO. You get some shows in there, but in the 80s and 90s and even into the 2000s I could go to quarters, semis and finals, watch everyone and not get enough. In 2014 and 2019 I didn't even bother watching finals week, because I was so bored. But, most years there are 1-3 shows I like. That's sad, It used to be a couple dozen or more.

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