Clarkson's band

The worst thing they did was to start playing their garbage when the PA guy was tryin to announce the other scores.

[Q]Brian Deerr Wrote:
Through my four years as a Cornell percussionist, I don't think I've ever heard the Clarkson band being up to anyone's standards. I'd put them at the bottom of the pack for other bands in the league (with the possible exception of the SLU(t) rent-a-band incident). RPI has had a good band in recent years, as has Yale. Harvard checks in a little bit below them. I've played with the RPI and Harvard bands at Placid/Albany and they've been good musicians and people in general. The Yale band gets the nod for their full length version of November Rain and for the fact that their percussion section calls themselves Kappa Banga Banga.
[/q]

Clarkson used to be good. From what I heard last night, they should be ashamed of how far they've fallen. I don't care if it was a thrown-together Spring-Break band, it sounded pathetic. The mooing horn was unacceptable. There was a time when some Clarkson bandie would have gone up, taken the horn away, and told the fan to leave the music to the band. What a sorry bunch of hacks.

The ranking used to be:

1t.   Clarkson
1t.   Cornell
3.    RPI
4.    Brown
5.    Harvard
6.    Colgate
7.    Vermont
8.    SLU (guy with a keyboard who had the melody wrong for #7)
N/A   Yale, Princeton, Union, Dartmouth

Vermont was a pathetic, miked, half-townie band whom we seriously outplayed in their own rink. Colgate didn't travel and were somewhat in awe of our presence. Harvard was their usual, blazer-wearing, crappy-Underbone-playin' selves. (They showed up to Placid in '96 with their trumpets and little else.) Brown skated and sounded good at home during an otherwise disappointing season for their team. RPI was noisy but unmusical.

Lake Placid '96 was a battle of the bands, and I can guarantee it wasn't between Harvard and Vermont. After years of subpar performance, our band was drilled into shape by a certain couple of phenom Fall conductors. (My vision at the time was to move the band back towards the sound and playlist of the late 80s and early 90s, which I associated with going to a game as a townie kid.) We had absolutely *drilled* In the Stone, Soul Man, and other classics that had fallen out of the folders. No band in the ECAC ever has had, or will have, something that compares to Pinball Wizard. Both the trumpets and trombones of our band were at their local maximums, the tubas were solid even after some losses to graduation, the percussion was strong-willed but sometimes brilliant, and the woodwinds, well... they were there. (Anyone who tells you that a pep band is much more than a brass band with percussion is fooling himself. Sorry woodwinds--I'm just being honest. We still love each and every one of you, and you're all very important for "social" reasons...)

Clarkson had been pretty dominant since the early 90s, when our team (and band) fell on some hard times. The trumpets, percussion, and (damn) electric bass of the Clarkson band were something to be reckoned with. The battle at Placid went back and forth, back and forth, eventually coming down to Pinball as our response to their Russian Sailors Dance, an arrangment that probably couldn't even be attempted by their current band. Anyone who was there and didn't hear the battle through Carnellian-hued glasses would call it a tie. Thankfully, the result on the ice was quite different.

And the Clarkson band was great to party with at the time. Oh, I have stories...

After those years, however, something happened to the Clarkson band, probably having to do with Cheel's poor acoustics and antiseptic nature, and they became terminally un-fun. As far as our band goes, the playlist has mutated from '97 and, I think, for the better. (Though it certainly screws me up when I sit in and expect to just play all the stuff I memorized.) The band is still a bunch of "Hooligans with Horns," and I, for one, am very proud of the hand I had in creating that reputation.

Since '96-'97, the Cornell Pep Band has been the best ECAC band, hands down. Long may we reign.

Were you guys even at the same game we were? When a group of fans/band members/alums try to put something together OVER SPRING BREAK of course we aren't going to be as good. We knew it, you knew it, nobody's denying that we weren't up to our usual standards. Playing after puck drop was a problem by BOTH bands and if you didn't notice, you obviously weren't paying attention.

As for attractive girls at Cornell, I pray to God you aren't talking about the girls in the front of secton A Saturday night. If someone from Clarkson calls a girl ugly... it HAS to be bad. And they were UGLY.

Don't like it when we play our songs? Good. We're not there to make you happy, we're there to support our hockey team, and if we piss you guys off, good, makes it more fun for me. I seriously haven't encountered more poor sportsmanship than I did at that arena after Saturday's game. What kind of idiots taunt a Clarkson fan while he's trying to take a leak? That's just horrible -- not to mention 12-year-olds throwing water and crap at us and the arena staff doing nothing, along with all the gloating fans walking by us and reminding us that we lost. I'm not saying we wouldn't have done it had we won the series, but it wouldn't have been to that extent. Mostly because the poor sports in the Lynah crowd would've threatened us with violence (not that they weren't already)and might have actually followed through.

[Q]daredevilcu Wrote:
Don't like it when we play our songs? Good. We're not there to make you happy, we're there to support our hockey team, and if we piss you guys off, good, makes it more fun for me.[/q]
I agree. As a counterpoint, though, I love it when fans from opposing teams come by and compliment the Cornell pepband on our playing. We've gotten that a lot this semester.

[q]I seriously haven't encountered more poor sportsmanship than I did at that arena after Saturday's game. What kind of idiots taunt a Clarkson fan while he's trying to take a leak? That's just horrible -- not to mention 12-year-olds throwing water and crap at us and the arena staff doing nothing, along with all the gloating fans walking by us and reminding us that we lost. I'm not saying we wouldn't have done it had we won the series, but it wouldn't have been to that extent. Mostly because the poor sports in the Lynah crowd would've threatened us with violence (not that they weren't already)and might have actually followed through.[/q]
That's rotten. I'm always pleased and often a little surprised by how helpful and responsive the rink staff at other venues is to me and our band (okay, the Harvard rink staff was dumb, but they did try to fix their mistakes), so it sucks that our staff doesn't treat you guys as well as we get treated elsewhere.

[q]Were you guys even at the same game we were? When a group of fans/band members/alums try to put something together OVER SPRING BREAK of course we aren't going to be as good. We knew it, you knew it, nobody's denying that we weren't up to our usual standards.[/q]
Seems to me I've got a full, well-balanced roster of regulars ready to go for the roadtrips to Albany and the NCAA regionals, which fall on the weekends of our spring break.

[Q]daredevilcu Wrote:

Were you guys even at the same game we were? When a group of fans/band members/alums try to put something together OVER SPRING BREAK of course we aren't going to be as good. We knew it, you knew it, nobody's denying that we weren't up to our usual standards. Playing after puck drop was a problem by BOTH bands and if you didn't notice, you obviously weren't paying attention.[/q]

I was paying attention, and I'm not just seeing through red-tinted glasses here (or whatever the audial equivalent would be). I've also paid attention to other bands that have come to Lynah over the past few years. By far, this weekend's Clarkson band committed the worst violations of the no-play-during-play rule that I have ever seen/heard.

[q]As for attractive girls at Cornell, I pray to God you aren't talking about the girls in the front of secton A Saturday night. If someone from Clarkson calls a girl ugly... it HAS to be bad. And they were UGLY.[/q]

I can't account for the girls of whom you speak, since I couldn't see them from section E. It's entirely possible they weren't pretty. But Cornell has some pretty nice quality women for the most part. Not the hottest I've seen overall, but still pretty good on the whole.

[q]Don't like it when we play our songs? Good. We're not there to make you happy, we're there to support our hockey team, and if we piss you guys off, good, makes it more fun for me. I seriously haven't encountered more poor sportsmanship than I did at that arena after Saturday's game. What kind of idiots taunt a Clarkson fan while he's trying to take a leak? That's just horrible -- not to mention 12-year-olds throwing water and crap at us and the arena staff doing nothing, along with all the gloating fans walking by us and reminding us that we lost. I'm not saying we wouldn't have done it had we won the series, but it wouldn't have been to that extent. Mostly because the poor sports in the Lynah crowd would've threatened us with violence (not that they weren't already)and might have actually followed through.[/q]

I apologize for those rowdy fans. I assure you, those people are NOT representative of true members of the Lynah Faithful.

[Q] The battle at Placid went back and forth, back and forth, eventually coming down to Pinball as our response to their Russian Sailors Dance, an arrangment that probably couldn't even be attempted by their current band.[/Q]

Sadly, Scersk, it was attempted by the Clarkson Band this weekend. And as you may have guessed, we didn't exactly need Pinball wizard to mount an approriate response to it.

That said, I am still glad that they brought a "band" this weekend...it definitely makes the crowd more "electric" than a game without an opposing band. Funny how bad music helps to get the crowd into the game better than good music does...

Some random responses:

Gee, I wonder why it is that so many of you seem to know SO MUCH about raping cows?

As for the quality of the music the past two nights, it certainly wasn't what it normally would be. I don't know why Clarkson schedules spring break 3 or 4 weeks earlier than they used to back in my day, but it makes it tough to get a band with decent instrumentation. Many of us alumni (at least half of the band) only play once or twice a year. I'll be the first to admit I am far from the musician I used to be. The object of our being there, though, was not to win a band competition, but simply to be a strong presence for our team and their fans. When you are a very small group among a huge, boisterous crowd in the opponent's building, you do whatever it takes to be heard. Based on the comments we received from fellow Clarkson fans, from our hockey players, and certainly from the many posts on this thread, I say, "Mission accomplished."

I agree with a previous post that it was a shame to see such poor sportsmanship directed toward us after the game. I don't mind a little good-natured ribbing, but so man of your "fans" were downright nasty with their taunting comments, not to mention the verbal threats and the snowballs. What it all boils down to is that the #1 team in the league beat the #9 team. BFD! You were SUPPOSED TO do just that! I know many of those people were probably relieved that history didn't repeat itself this year. OT games can usually go either way, and a Clarkson win would have made for a very interesting game 3. But in spite of that, there is no excuse for some of the behavior. That said, it is only fair that I acknowledge those who were decent to us. Some people offered words of encouragement for our future or apology for their own fans who lacked class. To those people, I say thank you.

Even though we went home without a W, I was glad I made the trip. I will definitely be back to annoy the masses...

[Q]Beeeej Wrote:

Most of the Tech trolls are probably too busy making plans to go snowmobiling in Moose Rectum, Ontario next weekend to bother checking in here anymore.

(With all due respect.)

Beeeej[/q]

So that's where YOU went after last year's QF series, eh?

hey clarkson people -- get your own forum.

[Q]j Wrote:

hey clarkson people -- get your own forum.[/q]

Like this one, j?

[www.goldenknightshockey.com]

I know engineers try to avoid the evil Daystar (...it burns...it burns) but try walking around the ag quad in may (hmmmm....tank tops) or a gorge in august (hmmmm....bikinis).



Or maybe they've gotten uglier in the last 5 years... but between my wife and our other XX friends, they were always plenty of good looking women about.

The Arts Quad from May to September is nice too, and fairly well populated.

[Q]Will Wrote:

I apologize for those rowdy fans. I assure you, those people are NOT representative of true members of the Lynah Faithful.[/q]

That's nice of you to apologize, but as someone who sits in section N I can tell you that I was apalled at the gutter mouths in Clarkson jerseys and hats we had to endure. It's nice to know that Clarkson folks have a deep appreciation of the the F word. It didn't seem to matter that there were some kids sitting around them (not that it should be any different if it were only adults). It didn't seem to matter to them that we had to spend more time in the beginning of the game trying to get them to clean up their language than we got to spend watching our own team in our own building. It also didn't seem to matter to the Clarkson folks that some jackass keep blowing that obnoxious horn -- which does not qualify as an instrument and can't possibly be a part of the pep band. I think it's great that the opposing band comes to Lynah and shows support for their team, regardless of whether they suck or not. I thought they showed poor taste & sportsmanship throughout Friday night's game; but I thought that was insignificant to the poor taste and lack of decency shown by many of the Clarkson fans. That being said, I doubt these few ignorant, and probably drunken, knights truly represent the majority of Clarkson fans. Or do they?

Lastly, as someone who spent some undergrad time at Arizona State and San Diego State I can tell you that Cornell women are as beautiful as they come and, yes, maybe that has something to do with the fact that they're among the most brilliant in the country.

I suggest we all quit, and those of us who are moving on can now find ways to dump on UVM. In fact, since they have chosen to leave the ECACHL, maybe all of us can unite and dump on them.

[Q]Jim Hyla Wrote:

I suggest we all quit, and those of us who are moving on can now find ways to dump on UVM. In fact, since they have chosen to leave the ECACHL, maybe all of us can unite and dump on them.[/q]

Time to make (recreate?) those "Out of Your League" signs.

[Q]Jim Hyla Wrote:

I suggest we all quit, and those of us who are moving on can now find ways to dump on UVM. In fact, since they have chosen to leave the ECACHL, maybe all of us can unite and dump on them.[/q]

Sage advice. I must remember, please don't feed the animals.

[Q]Scersk '97 Wrote:

The ranking used to be:

1t. Clarkson
1t. Cornell
3. RPI
4. Brown
5. Harvard
6. Colgate
7. Vermont
8. SLU (guy with a keyboard who had the melody wrong for #7)
N/A Yale, Princeton, Union, Dartmouth[/q]

The Yale band has really impressed me of late, both in person in the 2002 quarterfinals and by reputation. How can you not respect a band that plays "Uncle Fucka"?

Yale's marching band had a good sound back then, but their band was hockey MIA as far as I remember. 98 and 99 seemed to energize their fan base. From what I heard from the @ Yale game this year, though, it seems like their band and fan base might even be able to make it through a horrible year like this one.

[Q]RichS Wrote:

Beeeej Wrote:
Most of the Tech trolls are probably too busy making plans to go snowmobiling in Moose Rectum, Ontario next weekend to bother checking in here anymore.

(With all due respect.)

Beeeej[/Q]
So that's where YOU went after last year's QF series, eh?[/q]

Well, sure. Save up enough Rectum Receipts, your sixth moose is free!

Beeeej

P.S. Seriously, Rich - "Ha, ha - you lost last year!"? Ask me if I care.

 

___________________________
Beeeej, Esq.

"Cornell isn't an organization. It's a loose affiliation of independent fiefdoms united by a common hockey team."
- Steve Worona