ZZ Top is right in David Cook's wheelhouse. He can make a good living for a long time doing songs like that.

So they let him perform the entire Sharp Dressed Man, but they give him 2 minutes to perform World I Know for the actual final?

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

MIKAYLAH GORDON!

I wasn't paying too much attention to Castro's performance tonight. His one from before was not atrocious. It's always been a song I've liked, so it wasn't just that for me. I heard him tonight kind of distractedly and my initial impression was that it wasn't anywhere near as good as his original performance of it. Can't be terribly certain, but that was the feeling I got. Should be easy to find the first performance on youtube or dailymotion or something, though.

Also, Bryan Adams blows.

I'm confident enough in my masculinity to admit that I owned every Bryan Adams album through Waking up the Neighbors. And yes, that includes the Robin Hood - Prince of Thieves soundtrack.

Holy crap, the season isn't even over yet and Cook's already got a Guitar Hero commercial? Uhhh...He's gonna be big.

I owned that soundtrack, too. But the for the rest of it, not for the effing Bryan Adams song. Michael Kamen ruled on that score.

But not as big as Archuleta Sings Barney.

What the eff is this crap on the stage???? I missed the intro. Good god.

Who is on right now?

There was no intro. He said they needed no intro and then they started.

Jesus that was the worst thing I've ever heard. I see no difference between those guys and these "bad auditions" they are showing now. Wow.

Funny you should bring up bad auditions.....

Well, this is still pretty much better than what was just on.

He has to be my favorite bad audition. That song could be a big hit.

I have it on pause on Tivo so, I'm lagged by 15 minutes, but.. you just saying that I would imagine the 'YOU ARE MY BROTHER!!!" dude was on?

You guys are my brothers. My best friends forever.

I mean that.

I stepped out of my hotel room...was it the Jonas Brothers? My daughter loves them.

We have a winner!

Liked him better at the audition, though...

Who is this on now - the too late song? Never heard it before. I should miss this show on purpose from now on.

One Republic? Never heard the name before.

Nah, Mustang got it. It was the "You are my brother" dude.

I think the Jonas Brothers were on, though. And I think that's who MJ4H and rjolley were talking about, since they said "them."

Yeah, the "who are they?" was about The Jonas Brothers.

The best bad audition was the "I Am Your Brother" dude.

Yes they said later it was the Jonas Brothers. That was seriously the worst musical act I've ever seen that apparently has been successful????

Unbelieveable.

It's nice to see Carrie come out and lay down the fucking LAW.

Damn!!!! I'll be seeing that outfit in my dreams, and what good dreams they'll be...

Jonas Brothers are a Disney act that's marketed to tweens. They aren't exactly math rock.

OK time is running out are you seriously going to tell me Miley Cyrus isn't showing up?

Also lol at Archuleta in the same exact Guitar Hero commercial that Cook was in earlier.

Oh lord, Archie doing the Tom Cruise bit? That was...not credible.

Miley has been laying low since the porn/incest-looking pics were released by Vanity Fair.

Cook looks really nervous

Yes! I was hoping he would win but I did not think he would.

Nice to see the most deserving performer win

The only thing more perfect right now would be a shot of Archie's dad being restrained and dragged out of the studio by 3 bouncers.

Figured that was going to happen after Simon backtracked his comments from yesterday.

NO SPOILERS!!!

I would so hit that.

Worst DVR ever-

The 2 hour taping ends at exactly this

"Your Americal Idol is..... DAVID-"

And then it cuts to Cook singing about 8 minutes over the scheduled recording. So I figured out he won.

thats why I always set my DVR to record extra for live events. Especialy finales

I still don't get why DVR/Tivo doesn't record the "show," not just the time slot. This happens a lot during football season, too, when shows run off-schedule. Seriously, they don't have the technology for that? If you set it to record a show, it should record the show.

I got..."David Cook!" Then off. Would have been pissed if I missed that.

I did the same thing. I turned back just as he was crying and Seacrest said something about his brother so, curious what happened.

On another note, if you look at the raw numbers at dialidol, it had Cook over Archuleta 57-43.. they announced 56-44 so, pretty damn close.

Okay. Uhm. Remember a long time ago when George Michael had one of the more powerful and beautiful male pop voices?

Glad to see Cook won.

Someone won? All I remember is Carrie Underwood.

I was so rooting for a wardrobe malfunction, but alas! it was not to be.

Felt the same way

I actually somewhat enjoyed the finale - esp the Hero song, Cook joining with ZZ and Archie doing the One Republic song. And man, I can't believe how old Bryan Adams and George Michael look/sound. Ugh, I was a huge fan of both growing up. Seeing them sing in that state was like my dad telling me how depressing it was to watch Willie Mays muff fly balls in CF for the Giants.

As to the Castro performance, if you watch it his hands were shaking like a leaf for the whole song. His first version was 100-times better than that one. Glad to see Cook won and I will be interested to see what his first CD is like. Hopefully, it's more in his wheelhouse than this Taylor Hicks/Reuben/Clay crap that usually comes out first for the winning male artist.

Cook + ZZ Top was amazing, and the David Cook Guitar Hero commercial made me laugh out loud, but the entire rest of the show was pretty forgettable in my opinion. I thought that Carly + Michael Johns was going to be amazing for The Letter, but they did the Joe Cocker version, and I'm not a very big fan of that arrangement at all. Everything else was very meh.

My DVR recording said David C... and then cut off. :)