Reading Review (long)

[vaguardguy]

Hello again DCP, I got back from my weekend foray into PA yesterday afternoon and am finally getting around to writing my review of the Reading, PA DCA show. As for introductions/biases/etc. for which people around here clamor, you can read the beginning of my Westminster, MD DCI review found here.

My friend Luis, with whom I'm seeing shows this summer, and I left from NoVA around 1:30PM in his Audi Twin-Turbo - a sweet ride to corps shows if you don't mind my saying. After completing a few errands, we were on our way to PA to pick up two friends, and lovely young ladies I might add (must be something in the Harrisburg water), in the environs of greater Harrisburg adding on an additional hour or so of travel time. We drove past Reading, PA with about twenty minutes to spare before the show and suffered a few directional mishaps. Sor, there is no excuse for one city to have a Penn St., Penn Ave., and Mt. Penn exits all in the course of a few miles. I know he's the state's founder and all, but it's awfully confusing as a motorist. Ten minutes remained for the 7PM start time when we arrived at Exeter HS and tried to park. Sadly, the parking was a mess. I don't know if the HS had a parking lot available for cars, but it seemed like everyone had to try and find parking spaces along the sides of the roads in the surrounding neighborhood. We ended up parking a good six or seven blocks away from the HS. As bad as the parking was, at least the weather was absolutely perfect for drum corps. The temperature was pleasantly in the 70s with a very slight breeze. It got chilly enough at night I wish I had long sleeves, but other than that the weather was flawless (it didn't tick once :P ).

After passing by a few warmup areas and wishing some of our friends good luck, we went to the ticket box and bought a sit-anywhere-you-can-find-a-seat ticket for only $12. What a deal compared to the Westminster, MD DCI show where sitting inside the 20's was $20, and even more inside the 40's. Entering the stadium only minutes before the Star Spangled Banner, there weren't many good seats left. We ended up walking back and forth in the stands until we found Glen Paisley, former tour director of LVK. We joined him and took our seats about four rows up on the side-A 40, not high enough to see the drill well, but just right to have our faces blown off from the loudness. I do miss Albright Stadium, having performed there for the Reading show the three years previous, but it was nice to not have "the pole" obstructing the view.

A member of the Buccaneers Alumni played the Star Spangled Banner on mellophone to commence the show. It was a beautiful rendition, much better than playing a recording of the Anthem over the intercom. There was a sketchy moment or two, but his tasteful flourishes more than made up for them.

Now on to the corps:

Sunrisers - A very young corps, but you could tell they had a lot of "heart" (har-dee-har-har). I don't know if they're Open Class or Class A, but they have Class A numbers and I think they'll do well there. Their show was "The Tell-Tale Heart", and you can tell many heart references throughout the show from the opening bass-drum "heartbeat" and the heart on their jacket (though the heart really should've been on the other side of the jacket, closer to where the heart is actually located). One of the best parts about their program was they were the only corps present with a complete show - complete as in having all their drill and all their guard work. The show was designed well to meet their abilities. The guard book was easy, but well-performed. There was an older gentleman in the guard who was excellent, out-performing the rest of the guard. The weakest section of the show was the singing portion. It was almost inaudible for such a small corps, and they clearly had no vocal training. It was pretty bad, and should probably be taken out until they can add both numbers and training. It was still a very interesting show, well-done for such a small, young group (I remember thinking that even their DM didn't look legal).

New York Skyliners - This is another corps that, given their numbers, should consider Class A. Again, this was an entertaining corps, but clearly on a different competitive level than the remaining four corps. I remember there being four drum majors: two men in white cadet-style outfits, and two ladies in black dresses and white gloves. For a corps with less than 60 members, this seems a little excessive (though one of the older gentlemen drum majors had a lot of flash - was fun to watch). They had a big backdrop of supposedly the NYC skyline. Though I personally cannot stand backdrops, I think they're alright for small corps to limit the perceived field size and make the corps appear relatively bigger. I won't talk about the visual program because there isn't much to talk about (drill, guard, etc. was simply blase), but musically this was a fun show. They had a drum rack a la BD '03, but with trash can parts instead of cymbals. Right now, this was the most embarrassing part of the show, being unreadably dirty. They either need to remove that section, or rehearse it into the ground. Other than that, this was a fun show in which to listen.

Connecticut Hurricanes - There was a big gap in quality between Hurcs and Sky, probably the biggest competitive gap of the night. They were the first corps to have a truly exciting visual package (moreso their drill than their colorguard - though there guard was leaps and bounds beyond the two corps previous). They had both very wide-open moments and very close-quarter moments. Some field visual moments still need to be addressed, with one gentlemen completely not roll-stepping the entire program. There isn't a consistent marching style from member to member, but when this is worked out they will have an amazing visual program for their size. The most noticeable aspect of their program was their drumline. These guys can play. What impressed me the most was how "senior" these ladies and gentlemen were as they passed in retreat. They were clearly the "oldest" corps I've ever seen (some members were clearly well over 60), yet they can play on the same level as the big boys. This was by far the most inspiring corps of the evening, and I left for intermission with "Magnificent 7" stuck in my head.

Intermission - The intermission was moved back to allow Bush to perform afterwards. We used this time to visit some of our friends marching various senior corps or wandering around the stadium. It was like a reunion, fantastic!

Bushwackers - Speaking of great visual programs, Bush had probably the most creative drill of the night. All around, this was a solid program - one of the best Bush shows in years. "Russlan and Ludmilla" was the first really loud part of the night, and this was such a well-performed, exciting piece. The whole musical program was great. There was singing in this program too, but was much better executed than Sun (it sounds like these guys received some vocal training). As great as their musical program was, I was far more excited about their visual program. This was the first solid guard of the night, displaying some great equipment technique (some of the most solid catches of the night). The silent guard feature was hotttttt (yes, it warrants all 6 t's). Most importantly, the drill here was well-written and made the best use of space of the night. There were moments where the corps was spread out all over the field looking huge, and other moments where there was such tight, fast, and close drill. I don't know if Bush studied Esperanza's 2003 show (the year they won DCI DivII), but the last 30s of drill was almost a straight rip. I doubt they studied DivII tapes, so I imagine it's just a case of great minds thinking alike (unlike another case later in the night). Their guard staging was best of the night. They didn't take Bucs approach of simply arching the flagline around the corps-proper, nor did they follow Cabs lead and stage the guard off to the side most of the show. The guard (including the flagline) was well-integrated into the show, and provided multi-dimensional visual support to the overall program. Serious accolades to the drill writer for this corps.

Hawthorne Caballeros - The numbers rumours made things sound awful for Hawthorne, but wow were they way off. Rumours also said this show wasn't "Latin" enough, but those were way off too. Sure, this might've been a "Journey to the Pyramids", but it could just as easily be any Cabs show. The Egyptian visuals were pretty good and well-integrated over the course of the show. The corps managed to take up a lot of space and look large for what I hear is one of their smaller hornlines. The guard had great technique, I just think their staging worked against them. The drumline was good, but I think they had a little too difficult a book (lots of notes). My only complaint was they were the only corps without all their drill. The last minute or so was a standstill performance, but at least the music was exciting. I know this is an "off" year for them, but it doesn't take away from the fact that this is still a very exciting show.

Reading Buccaneers - This will be my most critical review, but for a corps that's executing this well, it's warranted. Before I begin, let me preface this is an amazing corps. They are performing well, they are consistently executing, they are exciting, and they could very well be DCA champions (deservedly so). My biggest complaint of this show is from a design standpoint. I couldn't pick out the moment where I'm supposed to yell, "VANGUARD!!!" Yes, I know SCV performed three of the four pieces they used, and two of them in 2000; I just never expected them to take such a copy-cat interpretation. The arrangements were almost identical, the staging was very similar, they even used some of the same visuals (watch the tenor visuals with their sticks, and then watch a tape of SCV2000). Sor, this is drum corps and creativeness should be a prerequisite. Marching bands copy drum corps, and if drum corps as an activity wants to remain at the forefront of the marching activity they need to ensure a strong focus on newer, creative ideas within the limitations of the idiom. I hope they're being courteous enough to forward SCV some royalties, because this was far more of a rip than simply using some of the same music. I know the designers can do better, I've seen it. This is just an opinion, let it go because this really is otherwise an amazing show. At least they do a very faithful interpretation, and the effect is paralleled.

On to more positive things. For starters, they were huge and easily the loudest corps of the night. Every moment was edge-of-your-seat. "Farandole" (by far my favourite part of the show), was riveting, and "Adagio for Strings" was gorgeous (yes, they were able to duplicate the effect almost as well as SCV). They marched well, and the drill was very good (not very creative, but still good). The members were outstanding and deserve to have gold medals around their neck come September. The guard was great, probably the best Bucs guard I've ever seen. I liked their use of curved flagpoles in the ballad (for anyone who saw LVK's show last year, there's a little bit of pseudo-irony in that the instructor who wrote our curved pole work is now marching Reading and spinning those awful things herself now - what a performer and great job!). The guard was truly performing the show. This was the best show of the night; very entertaining and very well-performed. They deserved to win, and the members were simply amazing.

Jersey Surf - What a difference a week can make (and if you want to know what their show is like, check out my Westminster review - this will be mostly focused on change since then). It's hard to believe this is the same corps I saw last Thursday. They cleaned up a great deal since mid-last-week, and improved on the show immensely. They added in more gags, and made some of the older ones more noticeable (I still love it when the guard boy walks off with the show near the opener). Things have improved a lot visually and musically. The guard, as a whole, is a lot better; though there were a lot of individual ticks (poor boy who dropped his sabre solo in the ballad) that will be ironed out with practice. By no means did they look bad going after Reading. They were easily comparable, and were a fantastic exhibition before retreat. This is the best Surf corps since 2000, no contest. I recall back in '02-'03, this used to be a judged show for junior corps. Whatever happened to this, and why did they become exhibition-only? Good job Surf, you will finish no lower than 4th this August in DCI DivII.

We didn't stay for retreat or encore (if there was one). We had to drop off the two girls, driving all over Central PA in the process. We stayed overnight at our ex-tour director's house and hung out the next morning before driving back to VA.

What a great show, Reading. Thanks for hosting, you truly changed my entire perception of senior corps for the better.

P.S. Thank you people for the kind comments on my last review. You know who you are. Thank you again and I hope you enjoy this one too!

Edit: for a punctuation/grammar mistake or two.

Edited July 12, 2005 by vaguardguy

[Jeff Ream]

i dont agree that Bucs is a copy cat, but i can see where someone would think that looking at the set list so to speak.

Sure Adagio is similar, but there's really only so much you can do to that song. the rest were, IMO, truer to the originals than to SCV

[SunAndrea]

Sunrisers (I remember thinking that even their DM didn't look legal).

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hey! I'm 19!! :P Thank you for the good review :)

And for the record, we are Open Class this year.

Edited July 12, 2005 by SunAndrea

[amysnook]

Thank you for making the long drive to Big Sounds and for posting a review of the show. To address the parking at Exeter, believe it or not, there were more than double the parking spaces in the lots over what we had at Albright. They filled up mighty fast and folks were left to street parking, just like at Albright. With construction at Exeter, some parking was taken up by construction equipment and vehicles. From the feedback I've heard to now, parking was our only major problem. If anyone has any comments about the show, good or bad, please email me at bigsoundsinmotion@yahoo.com.

Amy Snook, Chr.

Big Sounds in Motion

[JimF-LowBari]

Great review and welcome to DCA Chris, really sorry now I couldn't make the show. And know what you mean about all the "Penn" exits. I'm still looking for a good way between Reading and Harrisburg. At least you didn't have the "Is tonight Lewistown or Lewisburg?" problem, we used to have back in the day when both places had DCA shows. Anytime someone was late showing up at the stadium, we'd think "Oh ####, wonder if they went to the wrong place". :sshh:

[platypi25]

Surprised to see an LVK reference, then I saw who this was. Thanks for the review Chris, glad you enjoyed it

Sean McSean

Bush 96-97, 99-2003, 2005

Crossmen 98

LVK Vis Staff 2004

[ValleyKnights]

VANGUARD!

Sorry Chris, couldn't resist! LOL

Been a while since sitting on this side of the stands and really enjoyed it!

Great shows that night... haven't seen a DCA show or Finals since Allentown (on purpose). Certainly loooking forward to going to Scranton this year...

For what it's worth...

Bucs - When your hot your hot... very nice show. Love the change of uniform.

Bush - Probably the show with the most growth potential. Haven't been a big fan of their shows in years past, but certainly could appreciate what's going on out there this year. I'd think this may be one to keep an eye out for...

Cabs - Although I miss the rumps, I couldn't believe the agressiveness of this show. Very aggressive, there success will depend on how quickly they can clean that monster. I was suprised as they march by that they appeared to be so young.. You don't survive in Drum corps for 50 years for no reason.

Hurricanes - Very nice show... not to hot on their ending, (Mag 7) version, they have played better versions of it in the past. But looked very healthy.

SKY - Classic Sky... great show, great potential. I've seen great improvement since there year off several years ago... It was nice to see some familier faces :)

Sun - Again, stronger every year since they returned.... Some brass break downs, but will be cleaned up as they learn the show. I'm sure Brian will have these guys in finals shape in no time.