Blue Devils in the Details 2023

[wilme861]

1 hour ago, Brass Lover said:

This is why the hype over the Allentown scores was laughable. This was always going to be the result come finals week.

I wouldn’t say it was laughable. I mean until tonight Crown was keeping things interesting with Allentown, Pittsburg and the Prelims show and that was all in the last 7 days. Am I surprised BD is looking like they are headed for #21? Definitely not. Their visual program alone will win it for them (Bluecoats have a great one too but unlucky BD has this program this year).

Just remember, a win tomorrow night will be BD’s first EVER three-peat. They may have 20 wins under their belt but they also have 12 silvers to go with it. It’s obviously very wise to bet on BD, but you will lose that bet every now and then…

Random question, has BD won without winning a caption award before? Going into finals, I thought it could happen this year but they’ll have some hardware. I honestly can’t remember the scores and can’t be bothered to look them up right now but the Brazale must be theirs as will the Angelica as well (maybe others too). Seeing them a few weeks ago, I thought Crown or Boston could upset BD in the Brazale (Crown and the Ott is BD and the Brazale). But wow, night and day difference in those couple weeks! Those feet are CLEAN!

[Chief Guns]

To my fellow BD Honks..........

Ok guys here we are, finals night where our beloved Devils could capture another title. 

So you know what that means if BD can slam the door shut on the competition.............here come the trolls, whining, complaining, crying, and the rest of same regurgitated stuff from previous years from certain people. We all know it's coming, we all know what's going to be said, we need to be ready. 

Let's make sure we look out for one another and don't allow each other to get sucked into some trolls trap. Some of these trolls have upped their game and they are good at getting a negative reaction from us to drag us down to their level if we aren't paying attention. And as I learned last night, it can happen to any of us.

After the Mandarins semi-finals run, I had a laspe in judgement that could have gotten me banned from DCP as I allowed a troll to get under my skin. It hits differently when your kid is in the corps, but I have to be better than that, and I have learned from it. 

Check your supply of Industrial Strength "Troll Be Gone" Repellent, and I am sure @Cappybara has bottles of Haterade in all different flavors to dish out to the haters who come passing thru. 

Let's have a great evening, and enjoy The Cut-Outs one final time!

DO IT UP DEVILS!

[theonlyfizzle]

15 minutes ago, Chief Guns said:

To my fellow BD Honks..........

Ok guys here we are, finals night where our beloved Devils could capture another title. 

So you know what that means if BD can slam the door shut on the competition.............here come the trolls, whining, complaining, crying, and the rest of same regurgitated stuff from previous years from certain people. We all know it's coming, we all know what's going to be said, we need to be ready. 

Let's make sure we look out for one another and don't allow each other to get sucked into some trolls trap. Some of these trolls have upped their game and they are good at getting a negative reaction from us to drag us down to their level if we aren't paying attention. And as I learned last night, it can happen to any of us.

After the Mandarins semi-finals run, I had a laspe in judgement that could have gotten me banned from DCP as I allowed a troll to get under my skin. It hits differently when your kid is in the corps, but I have to be better than that, and I have learned from it. 

Check your supply of Industrial Strength "Troll Be Gone" Repellent, and I am sure @Cappybara has bottles of Haterade in all different flavors to dish out to the haters who come passing thru. 

Let's have a great evening, and enjoy The Cut-Outs one final time!

DO IT UP DEVILS!

Definitely Chief. 🍻

[lawdn]

21 hours ago, theonlyfizzle said:

Yeap. Its nothing new really lol..

BD have had undefeated season in the past, where they have gotten beaten on finals night. That time and now is totally different on few factors, plus the design is too smart to let that happen again. I think they keep singing that song believing lightning will strike in the same place. They are not truly being objective to applying the logic of all the factors needing to line up for BD not to win, and even all those factors is really unlikely to line up.

Whatever way the judges sees fit, then we have to accept it, either in favor of BD winning or losing. We should still trust the judges, there's multiples of them and scores are not decided by only one, even if we think one or two judges might not be scoring fairly.

Logistics points to BD wining either the scores be widen or tighten.. It might be a close finish, but it's clearly in BD favor. The show is just that strong.. Captions are captioning strongly lol. The judges varies on opinions but Bd still come out on top each time. I am more watching the captions to see who gets what. It's really nail biting for me lol.

 

In DCI if you don’t trust the judges you will go crazy. When I reconnected with DCI in 2013 at Stanford it was the start of the season-long duel between BD and Carolina Crown. I loved both shows immediately but connected more with BD’s jazz idiom and the artistic audacity of what they were doing with the show. My partner fell in love with e=mc2 and it’s still his favorite show to this day. Of course I was cheering for BD, but when I discovered DCP and tried to learn more about where drum corps was in that day, it was really depressing to see the hate for BD and the anger at how well they were scoring vs a quickly beloved show from a beloved corps. I really just wanted people to see how amazing BD’s show was, beyond scores and placements. Some did, of course, including notably Michael Boo. Sadly, I got caught up in the competitive aspects and only looked for flaws in Crown’s wonderful show. I was fortunate to go to finals and after having stood and cheered for every show, I was aghast at the hostile reception BD’s show got. I stood and cheered along with everyone else for Crown, their victory run included. 

With time I fully appreciate Crown’s accomplishment and the justice of their win. I did it faster with Bloo in 2016 and was onboard from the go with SCV in 2018. It is my goal to appreciate and love every show, and it has pretty darn easy in 2023 especially at the top. I still try to understand why the scores are what they are, approaching it with curiosity. I would be fine with Bloo, Crown, or BAC winning with their magnificent shows. Sure, I am cheering for BD but I am not going to miss out on the fantastic performances given by every corps. And I love BD for their commitment to sane excellence - they have cracked the code on teaching and supporting MMs to excel while giving them challenging, rewarding shows capable of winning.

Nothing lasts forever. Folks would be so much better off appreciating BD’s magnificence for what it is, while we have it, rather than to say it is not magnificent or getting caught up in scores and placements. 

Wishing a great Finals night to all and great runs to every corps. I am so amazed by BD yet again this year but not surprised. Thanks to the Blue Devils for taking us on a superb journey of art, beauty, determination and the triumphant human spirit this year.

Edited August 12, 2023 by lawdn

[Vuitton]

10 hours ago, Brass Lover said:

This is why the hype over the Allentown scores was laughable. This was always going to be the result come finals week.

It's TOTALLY laughable and stupid. I mean someone claimed Boston was 0.3 down from BD from comparing scores on different nights. 

DCI is stupid. Sorry, they are. And because they are stupid I never buy into something just because DCI says so.

I got ripped apart in the Allentown threads and in the end I was right and no one ripping me apart came back and said, "I'm sorry, you were right."

[Rylan]

1 hour ago, Chief Guns said:

To my fellow BD Honks..........

Ok guys here we are, finals night where our beloved Devils could capture another title. 

So you know what that means if BD can slam the door shut on the competition.............here come the trolls, whining, complaining, crying, and the rest of same regurgitated stuff from previous years from certain people. We all know it's coming, we all know what's going to be said, we need to be ready. 

Let's make sure we look out for one another and don't allow each other to get sucked into some trolls trap. Some of these trolls have upped their game and they are good at getting a negative reaction from us to drag us down to their level if we aren't paying attention. And as I learned last night, it can happen to any of us.

After the Mandarins semi-finals run, I had a laspe in judgement that could have gotten me banned from DCP as I allowed a troll to get under my skin. It hits differently when your kid is in the corps, but I have to be better than that, and I have learned from it. 

Check your supply of Industrial Strength "Troll Be Gone" Repellent, and I am sure @Cappybara has bottles of Haterade in all different flavors to dish out to the haters who come passing thru. 

Let's have a great evening, and enjoy The Cut-Outs one final time!

DO IT UP DEVILS!

You got it, Chief 🫡

If my little 8-year-old self had known that this blue “marching band” on PBS was going to be the focus of a lot of bitterness in this activity, I’d have chosen a different corps to get obsessed about. But the heart wants what the heart wants. 💙

[NakedEye]

Meh. It's the same saggy sourpuss legacy crowd who moans each time. You can see their faces in the seating when the cameras pan the audience. But, they are on the way out...

From what I could tell, BD got a fantastic reception nearly everywhere throughout the regular tour, where there are many more younger people and more recent ageouts. They have been very smartly starting to create shows that resonate with these demographics, with the anime music and such. Such a great offering to have something so fresh and modern, juxtaposed with Joni Mitchell and Incident in Jazz. That really introduces kids to great material from both present and past. BD is in it for the long term.

Re:Rite of Spring, despite being brilliant, was a bit of a hard sell. But this year? Come on! It is the most fun, upbeat, jammin' show on the field. If some can't enjoy that because they choose to live in a crankiness bubble, well, bless their hearts. 

[Rylan]

3 minutes ago, NakedEye said:

Meh. It's the same saggy sourpuss legacy crowd who moans each time. You can see their faces in the seating when the cameras pan the audience. But, they are on the way out...

From what I could tell, BD got a fantastic reception nearly everywhere throughout the regular tour, where there are many more younger people and more recent ageouts. They have been very smartly starting to create shows that resonate with these demographics, with the anime music and such. Such a great offering to have something so fresh and modern, juxtaposed with Joni Mitchell and Incident in Jazz. That really introduces kids to great material from both present and past. BD is in it for the long term.

Re:Rite of Spring, despite being brilliant, was a bit of a hard sell. But this year? Come on! It is the most fun, upbeat, jammin' show on the field. If some can't enjoy that because they choose to live in a crankiness bubble, well, bless their hearts. 

Just go to the anime and JJBA reddit threads and you see a bunch of people who don’t know DCI want to see a drum corps show because of BD these past couple of years. I think that’s awesome!

[Cappybara]

7 minutes ago, NakedEye said:

Meh. It's the same saggy sourpuss legacy crowd who moans each time. You can see their faces in the seating when the cameras pan the audience. But, they are on the way out...

From what I could tell, BD got a fantastic reception nearly everywhere throughout the regular tour, where there are many more younger people and more recent ageouts. They have been very smartly starting to create shows that resonate with these demographics, with the anime music and such. Such a great offering to have something so fresh and modern, juxtaposed with Joni Mitchell and Incident in Jazz. That really introduces kids to great material from both present and past. BD is in it for the long term.

Re:Rite of Spring, despite being brilliant, was a bit of a hard sell. But this year? Come on! It is the most fun, upbeat, jammin' show on the field. If some can't enjoy that because they choose to live in a crankiness bubble, well, bless their hearts. 

I can’t stop laughing at that first part 😂 so true 

[DWW11]

2 hours ago, Chief Guns said:

To my fellow BD Honks..........

Ok guys here we are, finals night where our beloved Devils could capture another title. 

So you know what that means if BD can slam the door shut on the competition.............here come the trolls, whining, complaining, crying, and the rest of same regurgitated stuff from previous years from certain people. We all know it's coming, we all know what's going to be said, we need to be ready. 

Let's make sure we look out for one another and don't allow each other to get sucked into some trolls trap. Some of these trolls have upped their game and they are good at getting a negative reaction from us to drag us down to their level if we aren't paying attention. And as I learned last night, it can happen to any of us.

After the Mandarins semi-finals run, I had a laspe in judgement that could have gotten me banned from DCP as I allowed a troll to get under my skin. It hits differently when your kid is in the corps, but I have to be better than that, and I have learned from it. 

Check your supply of Industrial Strength "Troll Be Gone" Repellent, and I am sure @Cappybara has bottles of Haterade in all different flavors to dish out to the haters who come passing thru. 

Let's have a great evening, and enjoy The Cut-Outs one final time!

DO IT UP DEVILS!

And thanks, Chief, for taking us along on your journey with your son. Would love to see Mandies take fifth!