American Idol: The Girl is Suffering House Withdrawal Edition
All the young dudes think that they deserve to be America’s next pop singing sensation. Most of them are wrong--so wrong--and they will spend the next two hours proving my point.
Simon wants personality, originality, and good singing from this group of karaoke all stars. Which means he is probably deeply disappointed every time he comes to work on American Idol--feeling whatever shred of artistic dignity he ever had being stripped slowly from his body with every missed note, longing hobbit glance, and whiny, boy band singer that goes by.
Poor bastard.
Aside: I can’t quite get my head around the MacBook Air. I mean, there is an obvious techno-lust thing going on, especially for the SSD version. But without a DVD, without an ethernet port, and without a couple more ports, how useful would this thing be to me? I’m guessing that the answer is not necessarily much.
But the techno-lust still fills me with longing.
David Hernandez goes all gospely on us and doesn’t sound bad. If you’re looking for Future Lounge Singers of America, I mean. Certainly, the boy can sing and his voice could even be described as pleasant (with the exception of some seriously missed notes at the end), but he’s boring. Bland. Nice enough, though.
Randy liked him more than I did. Paula offered him verbal hugs. Simon was reasonably nice--and he was right. The beginning bit was the best, the kid needs to loosen up, and there wasn’t much distinct about it.
Chikezie isn’t really well-known enough yet to have just one name, is he? I’m having a hard time with that--and with the salmon-colored suit. Beyond that, his vocals started weak and only got a little better as the song went on. And what was up with that arrangement? Didn’t do him any favors at all and, for the second song running, the back-up singers sounded lazy as hell. This was a little disappointing; I thought he would sound better.
Randy was nicer than Chickezie deserves. Paula calls him a throwback to great R&B--which is a huge overstatement. Simon screws up the name and then dumps on the performance in typical Simon fashion (including seconding my opinion of the suit). Again, Simon was right. Chikezie does his best to be a good advocate for himself, though, which I approve of; if you can stand up for yourself without sounding combative (and I don’t think he did), you’ll win a few more votes.
Aside: How many of these performances will people really want to download from iTunes? I’m afraid that the answer might be: more than enough to buy Steve Jobs another personal jet.
Another Aside: McCain wins Wisconsin. Not exactly surprising, eh? I’m far more curious to see the results between Obama & Hillary--my guess is that Obama wins. But by how much?
Colton does look like Ellen. A lot. I mean, he’s a ringer. Wow.
David Cook is likable. I want him to do well. Really. But I wish he had picked a rockier song that might suit his voice and style a little more. He’s a marginal singer and his charm comes out when he kicks up the vocals to rock star level instead of pop star levels. Bad start, decent end.
Randy loves him with the power of man love. Paula blah blah blah. Simon offers the eminently reasonable, “You almost made it believable.”
Aside: Like I said: Obama won. Still don’t know by how much, though.
Another Aside: Does anyone want a free Xbox with games and some other stuff (like the remote control)? Since Girl got me the 360 for Christmas, the old box has been sitting unloved in a nifty little bag. So, if you’ve been yearning for an old Xbox--that also doubles as a surprisingly good DVD player--leave a comment. I’ll choose someone worthy at the end of the week. Okay, it’s been bestowed upon a Blogger Bash semi-regular. I feel good about that.
Jason Yeager has an adorable kid. He also tends to be a little campy in the vocal performance, if you ask me. “Moon River” so fit his looks and vocal style that it’s hard to argue the choice. Still, is that the way to stay in a contest where huge numbers of voters are in that tweenager zone where a “huckleberry friend” isn’t necessarily something that they’ll understand? And, anyway, the vocals were just okay, with some really distracting pitch problems here and there.
Nice guy and I want him to do well, but I can’t see myself voting for him. That said, I actually adore that song, but it’s hard to pull off well.
Randy was, again, nicer than the performance deserved, but offered good criticism. Paula pretty much seconded America’s First Dawg. Simon calls it “very cruise ship” and wonders what kids will be thinking, too. Again, he’s right.
I don’t like Robbie Carrico. Pretty much that simple. He looks the part of a rocker, but he sounds like he should be singing in a Christian band. All look, no edge. That said, he sounded good singing one of my favorite 60’s songs, “One is the Loneliest Number.” Not great, especially if you compare it directly to Three Dog Night, but pretty solid.
I still say that rock is a pose for this guy.
Randy liked it well enough. Paula loves the song choice and thinks he’s all authentic and stuff. Has someone been coaching her in the ways of sobriety? If so, this year could be sort of boring. Simon was very kind and liked it; although he’s questioning the image, too.
David Archuleta is my personal un-favorite. Go back to school, youngster. “Better Shop Around” sounds like something from a Disney production about the 60’s when he gets through neutering it. Of course, he’ll be safe for some time to come because, no matter how much he sucks, he’ll set 13 year old hearts aflutter.
And, anyway, he’s better than Sanjaya.
Randy called it a “mature” performance. Proving that he might be taking over the role of Paula for the evening. Paula won’t give up without a fight--"confident, older soul,” she says. Simon wants to get into the Who Wants to be America’s Next Paula? game, though, and calls it the best of the night.
They must have been passing the crack pipe around during the commercial break. Just sayin’.
And, for the record, Ryan: I’m not so sure that David likes that the ladies love him. He might be traveling an entirely different direction. Anyone who breaks out in spontaneous Irene Cara songs is automatically suspect.
Danny Noriega has an unfortunate name, doesn’t he? Just sayin’.
He has the same problem with me that Archuleta has: too young and a little too neutered in his performance for my taste. But he isn’t nearly as annoying to me, and he gets bonus points for doing “Jailhouse Rock.” It isn’t exactly convincing, but I enjoyed it in spite of myself.
Personality matters and Archuleta makes me want to hit someone in the face. Noriega brings out the paternal in me.
Randy calls it ”kinda hot” and Paula talks enough that I stopped paying attention. Something about colors. Like a rainbow bumper sticker, I imagine. Simon says it was verging on the “grotesque” (I imagine he means it in the “outlandish, bizarre” sense and not the “abnormal, hideous” sense, although I could be wrong). Ouch. Simon and I seem to diverge on the youngsters, though.
Aside: I have a crush on “Sarah” from the Ford Edge commercial. Bonus points for obsessing about the architecture of the city.
I don’t know what I think about Luke Menard. Good looking guy, nice sense of style, and he can sing. He’s got a decent personality, too. But his voice does just about nothing for me. “Everybody’s Talkin’ At Me” also deserves a straight, earthy performance; Menard’s take not only misses some notes, but also oversings it, too. If I’d never heard “Everybody’s Talkin’ at Me” or knew about its connection to Midnight Cowboy, maybe you’d have a different view; I can’t hear it outside of that, though.
Randy didn’t like it and really, really wants to keep it real. Powerful, man, powerful. Paula says it was bad, but she says it nicely. Simon says he was boring. I think that’s a bit true, too.
Colton is yet another annoying kid who admits to singing the Teletubbies theme song when he gets nervous. That’s not endearing; that’s just weird.
Singing Elvis is always a good choice for me. Sadly, I can’t hear him since the sound seems to have dropped--ah, there it is. “Suspicious Minds” sounds decent, but not great. Okay, I"m already forgetting it and it’s not over yet.
Okay, aside from looking like Ellen, he also looks a little like a young Dennis Leary. Strange.
Randy says it started rough, which I, you know, wouldn’t know. Paula says not too much, but strokes him like a little puppy dog. Simon hits him for sounding like a “young kid who might have a career in musical theater” instead of a contemporary recording artist. He calls it “very karaoke.” I think Colton will be crying backstage.
Aside: For a great song, listen to Fred Neil’s “Little Bit of Rain.” He’s the guy who wrote “Everybody’s Talkin’ At Me” and made a mint off the song. But “Little Bit of Rain” is just gorgeous--and it points out what I meant about not over singing his songs. A lot of the beauty is in the simplicity. Great song.
Garrett Hailey. Wow. I thought he was a girl. Decent voice on the kid, a little whiny but, generally, not unpleasant. Apparently, he’ll be bringing us the majority of the longing hobbit glances while he’s in the show this year. Aside from the hair, though, does anything stand out about this guy? Does anything shout “pop star” to anyone? He is the most mediocre of the mediocre--not bad in a Sanjaya way, but not actually good.
Randy wants him to be more interesting and watch his pitch problem, calling the kid boring. Paula offers useful criticism while, essentially, agreeing with Randy. Simon thirds the opinion but also takes shots at the hair and pallid skin. Poor kid. Garrett actually seems like a good kid, but I don’t think he’ll be in it for long.
Aside: How the hell did they end up with Noriega and Castro on the show this year? That’s just freaky. “Danny” isn’t “Manuel”, but I figure it’s just sort of a step between that and Danny Ortega in a history of Latin American creepy strongmen.
Jason Castro has progressive hair. Doobie smokin’, no meat eatin’, Kucinich votin’, Republican hatin’, thick ropes of progressive hair. And he looks constantly stoned. I like that he’s playing a guitar and going it alone, though. Nicely done and true to the spirit of the song--he looks it, he sounds it, he feels it. It isn’t exactly my personal taste, but it was the most real performance of the night and I enjoyed it. At least until the end where he sort of got, vocally, off track.
Randy isn’t thrilled, but doesn’t have much to complain about. Paula is “blown away"--and then keeps talking. Which is a shame for all of us. Simon says it was “in the top two performances of the night"--loves the song choice and the performance. Indeed.
Michael Johns is the new love of Girl’s life. Luckily, she’s wandered off and won’t see his performance tonight. No need for jealousy, then…
Doing a Doors song is such a good choice. Fits his voice, fits his looks, fits his style--and, honestly, it should be a better choice than “Bohemian Rhapsody”, which I still say showed up his vocal shortcomings. Unfortunately, he pushed a bit too much, missed some notes, and wasn’t as solid as he was on the Queen song. It isn’t his best vocal performance, but it’s real enough and his overall performance is good enough, that he’ll definitely be staying. Girls will vote for him, scream for him, and in a strange twist on the Sanjaya legend, cry in cringe-inducing and dignity-destroying ways.
I wonder if he’ll be the winner?