I don't have him prejudged at all. I had no problem with his first performance I don't believe. I was rather fond of his Hollywood performance. However, I got nothing from his Imagine performance. My wife didn't either. Wade's fiance did. I am not trying to say David is not talented or that he was not vocally superior last night to the rest of the group. I believe (feel free to quote me if I've forgotten something I said) that all I have said is that he butchered Imagine by taking the feeling out of it, in my opinion.

I'm sure I'll love future performances and I too liked him in his previous performances.

I do, however, thing he needs to can the "aw shucks" very quickly - just like Melinda. You're good, you know it, don't act like you're shocked every time they continue to tell you that you're good.

Watching on delay...

Kudos to whomever introduced Brooke to conditioner and a hairstylist. Very cute look for her tonight.

I could have flipped this off after Carly and been happy. I'm hoping we can lose Amanda this week, I just don't think there's anything there, not even comic relief.

Carly - great song choice and strong leadoff.
Ramiela - I liked this performance, she nailed a few of the bigger moments here.
Alexandrea - controlled and solid. simple and melodic.
Asia - she hit the high parts of the song quite well...
Alena - solid performance of a really good song. I think it fit her well. Judges were unneccessarily harsh.
Kristy Lee Cook - I love the song she chose but she didn't nail it.
Brooke - unimpressive. didn't hit the big moments
Syesha - very average, good on the finish
Kady Malloy - She picked a power song and bunted.
Amanda - creepy. Reminds me of someone brett michaels would have gotten rid of on the first night

The two that go home tomorrow have to be from the group of Ramiele (#4), Amanda (#6), Alexandrea (#8), or Asia'h (#10)

I'll give Kady (#9) a pass, but she's starting to wear thin on me too.

I get the feeling it'll be Alexandrea and Ramiele.

I think Ramiele's performance is the most forgettable of the evening, and nothing really sets her apart from the other contestents.

Alexandrea was just bad and knew she was bad.

I think Asia'h will be close, but she'll likely get enough of the sympathy vote for getting sick and being the last one to perform is an advantage (whether good or bad).

Quick thoughts:
1. Brooke - i was wondering if i was the only one who noticed her passing off the bigger notes in the song to the backup singers.
2. Irish McLassie - Much better than last week, but she just irks me in an "I'm the Leprechaun" sort of way.
3. Syesha - I honestly don't remember her, which is probably good, since after the first 2, it was absolutely horrible.
4. Alaina - I didn't think she was bad, just boring... but totally jailbait if not for the gap-tooth.
5. Polynesia - She was much worse than last week... and her pants were about to explode.
6. Kady - She wasn't good, but she wasn't the worst this week.
7. Horsegirl - She looks totally hot in a baseball cap, but barely average glammed up, much like her singing.
8. Alexandrea - A confusing name for a confusing performance, totally butchered the song. If you're outsung by Chicago, something is wrong, she just needs to sing the lipgloss song... but otherwise, I totally loved her last week.
9. Asia'hhhhhhhhhh - Horrible, she may have been sick, but horrible.
10. Scratchy - Kill her and Archuleta, please.

My voting off:
Kady and Scratchy, though I wish they could just take one of the boy's spots out the door for Kristy

This may have been the worst night in reality television history...just horrible performances from start to finish.

I thought Kristy Lee Cook's clingy silver shirt gave a bravura performance...

I probably won't get to watching the girls tonight. :(

I wanted to be one of her horses and go neighhhhhhh

well the second half of the show was pretty awful and the first half was only above average for me, not great. I actually like Kristy the best tonight-not the best voice, but I liked the attitude and confidence in the performance. I'd put Brooke, Carly, and Syesha (I really liked the way she sang the words Me and Mr. Jones, not so much the rest of the song) a notch below her.

And the rest except Amanda in a pick your own spot for the "best of the mess." Amanda deserves the bottom spot all to her own and will no doubt be the subject of the "vote for the worse" site. She goes home for sure, and I wouldn't be disappointed to see any of the "best of the mess" go home except Alaina. I'll go with Alexandrea though.

I hope Kady gets it together. She is extremely likeable and obviously has talent in there somewhere.

Oh right and she's hot.

a) shes cute
b) shes like 4'5
c) shes asian

WHAT MORE COULD YOU ASK FOR TO SET SOMEONE APART

Kady is much hotter than her comparable half, Alaina

Anyone who doesn't agree with me has the Danny Noriega gene

Subby has my poxy. :D

Girls were not great tonight. Amanda bombed, which is sad because she does have an interesting voice. She should be gone unless she gets that "keep her in to make the show bad" vote. I can't put a finger on who else really should go. A number of bad performance, but I still say the girls have much better talent than the guys overall. It was just not a great week for several.

I will say that so far none of the girls have really had a "wow" song yet. Usually by this time you've had at least one that impresses you. David so far has been the only memorable performance this season. Carly has to be the favorite on the girl side, but she's not way over the other girls like David.

Who's Scratchy? I haven't watched since they got to Hollywood.

Tonight's column is up. Ugh. Hard to do the rankings when there wasn't a lot to pick and choose from.

http://www.solecismic.com/frontierblog/?p=237

Overall: A night where nearly everyone struggled, and descended into a mosh pit of pedestrian performance art. Poor song choices abounded, and too many of the girls confused random pacing for individuality.

Well, duh!

Look, we'll just agree to disagree here. Obviously, music's effect on people is a personal thing. I know people who get emotional at hokey patriotic country songs, too, and the only reaction they get from me is eye rolls. I don't even remember what I said about his first performance, if anything. He's a very good singer. I just don't find his performance style to be genuine, but that's my problem, not his.

I'll stick to my opinion of his performances and end up buying his records for my girls, and you can quit your day job and manage Amanda's budding rock star career. Deal?

BTW, I don't mean to pour salt into the wound, but I'll be damned if Amanda didn't exceed every expectation I had of her when I saw what she was singing and her look for the night. She was the complete package of flaming horribleness, and proved that she is really nothing more than a Joplin impersonator. She has absolutely no voice outside of the Joplin Wail. And worse yet, she looked a bit like Rosy O'Donnell at Glamour Shots.

Quite possibly the worst, most limited top 24 contestant ever. I appreciate her authenticity, but she is so overmatched it's somewhat sad. But funny, nonetheless.

I concur.

Also, my favorite girl is Asia'h. Love her voice, and she's cute when her hair is short & curly, not so much like tonight though

If Brooke could choose a Tori Amos song one week, I'd be extremely happy. I don't hear the Melissa Etheridge thing that Jim mentioned, at all. She has that adult contemporary, slightly off-kilter, independent, brainy thing going on. She looks like she works in an independent book store and plays coffeehouses at night. Totally wrong for this competition, but probably the best of the girls.

Hilarious to see that joke that was Amanda finally exposed. Ludicrous that she was put through (and I said as much every time I saw her).

Best tonight:

Carly, Brooke, Syesha.

After that there were a couple of also rans and a lot of bombs. Kristy and Alaina were aight. Well, Alaina. Hmm. She did miss pretty badly a couple of times. Still she seems like she could hit a homerun at least once so you get the urge to keep pitching to her.

Amanda and are gone for sure. I dunno, Alexandrea? Ramiele? As good a guess as any, I suppose.

I spent most of the night punching my dog from that and the worst performance by an Arkansas basketball team I've ever seen.

See, I knew you and I could find common ground! :D

Agreed about Asia'h, I'm also a fan of Syesha in those departments, both those two resemble each other alot in that they are always smiling

I thought the first 2/3rds of Asia'h's song was terrible, but she finally found the right notes towards the end. I don't like her voice, though. Too husky and hoarse. Even when she's not sick, she has a difficult time singing the beginning of lines - her voice is just not there. It's almost like it has to "warm up" for a couple of notes in each phrase before sound will come out.

She was a big disappointment, because of how off-key she was for pretty much the entire first part of that song, and the fact that she wasted the prime performance position.

BTW, has anyone else picked up on Simon's strange "half a moose antler" thing he does while talking this season? It's driving my wife nuts for some reason. He leans his one arm on Paula's chair, puts his thumb on the side of his head, and his hand hangs out there like antlers while he talks. Between that and the microphone issue (which it appears they thankfully fixed this week), my wife has been going crazy. They changed the judges' mics this week, but the last couple of weeks you could hear a slight bang every time one of the judges put his/her arm or hand down on the table. It was driving my wife crazy.

If Amanda's still around, and it's only early songs, then I guess Helter Skelter is out. Which is about the only thing she could probably pull off...



American Idol’ to feature Beatles songs when Top 12 finalists perform
“When the Top 12 sing for the first time this season, it will be the music of Lennon and McCartney,” he told Seacrest. “We’ve given them a list because it’s all of the early songs — from ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ to ‘Got to Get You Into My Life.’ These fantastic songs. It’s one of the few areas that everybody knows.”

Idol’s ability to secure the songbook’s usage apparently happened fairly quickly. During a December conference call with reporters, Lythgoe said Idol still didn’t have the rights to the songbook.

“If that Lennon/McCartney songbook were open to us, I would love that,” gushed Lythgoe. “At the same time, I would really like it when we have got our best singers. I would hate to ruin Beatles material. I really would.”

During his conversation with Seacrest, Lythgoe allegedly that the talent level of Idol’s seventh-season contestants is the reason why Sony/ATV made the songbook available.

Holy moly...the DialIdol predictions are, um, interesting.

I wonder how she'd do Tom's Diner or What I Am.

Yes, that Edie Brickell song would work for her, too.

If they were working overtime, wouldn't they have done more for their "guy" choice the day before?

Just so I don't get accused of spoiling anything...

Local radios around here are saying someone in Indiana is selling nudie pictures of Amanda Overmyer to the highest bidder... haha I am not kidding. Also she has had several DUI's etc, etc.

Talk about a fucking spoiler. No way I'm eating lunch after reading THAT!

How many get voted out tonight? 2 or 4?

She's a triple threat. A 'BBB' if you will.


Big
Biker
Bush

Four - 2 of each.

Same next week.

Yeah, those numbers are hard to explain. I think it's pretty obvious that she's the least talented/able singer of the current 20. One-trick pony, melodically inept, etc, etc, etc.

My first thought was that there might be a disproportionate number of DialIdol users who are VFTW adherents, but that was squashed by their "guy" predictions.

My latest theory is that a significant % of Idol voters didn't bother to vote due to a lack of inspiration on the part of the female options - unlike the day before, when Archuleta's performance (and the judge's subsequent promotion of it) was far more likely to inspire a large "turnout", if you will. It just seems to me that the guys are a lot more dynamic (though I would still argue that this is the weakest Idol cast in several seasons).

Dola



Is there any way we can restrict the words "nudie" and "bush" from appearing in close proximity to the name of a non-hottie? At least during mealtimes? There are some mental images that should only be conjured up by more deviant forums imo.

look on the bright side. odds are that she doesn't have vd.

I'm just catching up, but I hope so as well. Also, I think she was in the bottom 2 of the girls last night and deserves to go based on the composite performances of the last 2 weeks. I agree with Ksyrup that she has her fans and probably won't go, but she deserves to. My wife wants Kristy to go. I don't think she liked my reaction to her initial dance when they introduced the top 24..



Agreed. I think he sings with emotion and is a strong performer. I think this kid is going to be a huge star.

Yes, I've picked up on that and it is also annoying me.

Once again, last night, my wife says in the middle of Kristy Lee's performance - "She's really pretty." That was at least the third time. I immediately said, "OH YES SHE IS," and kept staring straight forward, eventually doing one of those slow head turns about 10 seconds later to see her glaring at me.

"What? I was just agreeing with you!"

My wife usually makes comments like that about pretty girls, but she hates Kristy. Like I said, I may have overreacted to her opening dance.

Also, those predictions from dialidol are insane.

The one chick I can think of that my wife absolutely hated and I kept egging her on about how good looking she was, was that Janelle chick from Big Brother. Oh the fun I had watching that show!

from tmz


Amanda Overmyer pleaded guilty to DUI back in October 2006 near her hometown of Mulberry, In. She received a suspended sentence of 60 days and was placed on 180 days probation, which ended in August 2007.

Why is that breaking news? Who gives a shit

Because DUI is a totally uncool thing to do?

I think shorty means who gives a shit because she's about to be eliminated in an hour.

Shocking results so far.

Edit: I've never seen Mrs. E actually angry at the results before this. She really liked who just went home.

Yeah, that one chick was totaly losing it. That was nice of the pther girls to help her. Women can usualy be caddy bitches.

dola= shocked Amanda didn't go.

did anyone see Dany Noriega bawling after Alaina got the axe?

Right on one, but wrong about the other. However, my reasoning still holds true. The girl who left was just plain forgettable.

Nah. I think she may even be this year's Sanjaya.

Remember, what gets you eliminated in this round is not lack of talent, but lack of being able to stick out.

what males were eliminated?

My wife had the same reaction. She was furious. I told her to vote next time.

It was far too early for her to go, though.

Right, and unfortunately a shit ton of people have had it happen to them. It's not like it said "Breaking news: Amanda molested a child in 1989!"

Now I'd give a shit about that.

DialIdol seemed messed up on the guys, so the guys who went made sense even though they placed highly on DI. And DI had Amanda as #1 (believe it or not) and Alaina dead last, so that didn't shock me. Lushington was in the middle, and none of them got a lot of votes, so I really wasn't shocked by her, either. The voters eliminated one of each of the similar couplets - Kady/Alaina (Kady's hotter), and Lush/Asia'h (Lush's look was horrible and Asia'h's got the better backstory).

I hope at this point anyone who thought Amanda deserved to be here has changed their opinion. She was even horrendous during the group sing tonight. She just flat-out cannot sing, period.

great UIC there...

Best vocal by far. In fact, much to my wife's dismay.. I think he could EASILY win this thing.

Oh, I definitely will be shocked if he DOESN'T win at this point. Doesn't mean I buy into him.

I'm still holding to my Disney/Hannah Montana demographic theory - he's been placed in this competition to create the male brand equivalent to Miley Cyrus. Between HSM and HM, that demo is exploding and spending tons of cash. So much so that HM's 3D movie put U2 on hold it was making so much cash. He solves the AI problem of having winners who are commercial failures.

Finally watched the girls. Amanda is fucking terrible. I too agree with everything MJ4H (and the rest) have said about the girls.

My wife and I were trying to guess who would be the second girl out, and I figured it would be one of the blondes. She agreed, as they were too similar. So we weren't surprised when they narrowed it down. What is funny is that when they said who would go home and there was no clear reaction from either girl, we went to each other: "wait...which one is that again?" :)

Kady... you'll be staying

Yea Kady's expression of sadness looked like she had just been sent packing

I think she really thought she was going home. She most likely had prepared herself to that fact and was shocked like hell when they told her she was safe. By all rights, she should have gone and she knew it.

The chick went home because she was TOO MUCH like Carrie Underwood. People don't want another Carrie Underwood. They already made a girl like that win.

The Filipina is going to last until the final 3 or 2 women, just based on Filipino votes alone.

well even though I predicted Alexandrea would go home, I'm saddened she was the one to go when it was just down to her and Amanda. Amanda is definitely another Sanjaya in the making it seems, but Sanjaya actually had a decent singing voice at least at times. I liked Alexandrea after week 1, thought she had a nice vibe to her performance, but completely lost it this week with a bad song choice. So not too shocked she went home, just shocked she went over Amanda.

Disappointed Alaina went home over Kady. Kady has shown nothing in her two performances, Alaina showed some potential in her first one at least. But song choice doomed her this week.

Jason leaving for the guys was expected, its too bad in a way, I thought his "going away" performance was a lot better than the first time he sang that song. A bit surprised Robbie went over Luke, but again not being able to reach that rocker image he wanted doomed him. And the rumors are that long hair of his...is a wig.

Then explain Pickles, in the next season no less.

I guess she had calamari, and this chick had OCD?

I think they all expected Kady to go home, and when Alaina got sent home, I think it was that shock that caused her to breakdown like she did. She probably didn't feel totally safe, but if she had been up there with Carly, I doubt she would have been as unprepared for what happened as she was.

Yeah, TMZ quoted one of the backstage people as saying his hair was the "blonde elephant in the room."

Is it just me, or have the last two weeks been wholly without suspense? They just started off with SO many mediocre singing talents and forgettable characters that you could have axed half of them almost at random (set aside 2-3 of them) and not diminished my interest one bit. Indeed, I'd have been grateful they saved me a few weeks. :)

I'm glad Kady stayed over the forgettable blonde (Alaina). Kady's got that "I am the devil" evil look and her video clips are highly entertaining.

This season is no different than any other. They could axe 18 people the first night and we wouldn't miss much, but they wouldn't get 4-5 months of ratings out of it, either.

I'm going to miss next week's performances, so I guess that's the bright side of Amanda coming back.

Fillipinos have like...eight phones per capita! Imelda Marcos had over 500!

hmmm...or was that shoes?

Couple pieces of info from the "oh boy!" department:

Ruben Studdard is back on “American Idol’s” radar.

The Season 2 winner will perform the “farewell song” used to play off contestants as they are eliminated from the top 12. This year, the song will be a cover of Kenny Loggins’ “Celebrate Me Home,” in a new version produced by Terry Lewis and Jimmy Jam.


We can now confirm the rumors that have been swirling about Blake’s return to American Idol…he will in fact appear on the March 6th results show to perform his new single, “How Many Words.”

Shoe phones.

After tonight's batch, Luke needs to go and Danny, but I doubt Danny will go anywhere given the VFTW crowd so it will probably be Chickezie (sp?).

David Cook made me actually not hate that song.

David A really needs to do something other than a ballad, I agree with Simon about the whole gloomy thing. Plus, I'm watching AI, I don't care about any social commentary really.

I thought this was one of the better whole episodes in a good long while. I was not completely displeased with anybody...



David Hernandez - he's got bigtime game and he brought it tonight. I think this is by far his best and he's in the lead thus far
DavidC - by far most original of night. He "put his own stamp on it". No major flaws and changing it that much buys you a lot of latitude.
DavidA - bigtime voice, pacing a bit weird but he's got pure natural skills.
Mike - Great Song again. Not his finest work but I could still see Judd NElson in detention
Gen Noriega - Great song and I actually thought he pulled it off which is a rarity for him.
LukeM - lacks the force - are we in a rush here? Voice sounds better than it has but he's butchering the song
JasonC - C might stand for C ya later. That song is so distinctive and I think he failed on it. Major difference for me and the judges here. I love the song so maybe I'm biased.
Chikeze - average and tonight average won't do.

Who originally sang "Tainted Love"?

I agree. By far the best night for the guys. I think they just all made good song choices (except for one, but I have a feeling no one is going to agree with me). A true break-out performance by David Cook. He has a good rock-voice, but he is still a poor mans Daughtery. He just doesn't have the charisma he needs to really pull it off. I think he needs a band.

My first statement that will get me killed...Micheal just didn't pull that song off to me. He has been completely underwhelming to me. He would be in my bottom three (with Luke and Chikkie) and might actually be who I'd kick. His vocals aren't impressive to me at all.

Second Statement to get me killed...I really don't want to like Danny, but I do. He's just fun, or something.

Soft Cell

Originally Gloria Jones, but tonight was a cover of Soft Cell's version.

I wanted to say The Fixx, but it was Soft Cell.

S'ok, Randy apparently thinks Mike Hutchence was in Simple Minds

Yeah, that was pretty funny....or sad. Either way.

I think he was just comparing Aussies.

he really has a strong resemblance to Michael Hutchence, or I think so at least

David A sucked ass big time. He was off key most of the song and had no clue how to pace the song.

Gay boy Danny needs to go home!!! His whole demeanor is enough to make me sick.

David H and David C ruled the roost tonight, and the Ausie guy did well too.

what???

oh jeeeeeez

Cook & Castro FTW!

Column posted at the Frontier:

http://www.solecismic.com/frontierblog/?p=238

Overall: It was a solid night for the guys, with no disasters, and, as usual, the three Davids setting the mark. All three will be hard to beat down the road.

Wow, what a fantastic episode. Easily the best in a long while. Right off the bat, I would buy two of the singles from that show (David Cook and Jason Castro). Of course, I agree with Simon in that the Jeff Buckley version of the song is one of the better "lesser known" performances of all time. Here's the overall ranking:

1. David Cook - Great idea, nearly flawless performance and the sound was great with the arrangement.
2. Jason Castro - Very difficult song to nail and he did just that. The mood and band was setup perfectly as well.
3. David Hernandez - Another high degree of difficulty and he is beginning to grow on me (and no, it's not because I found out that he danced at a gay bar 40 minutes from where I live).
4. Michael Johns - The Michael Hutchence comparisons are somewhat legit. I was a huge INXS fan growing up, so he's certainly a "poor man's" version - but he has the same style and his voice could be in that mold. Still, I enjoy his performances and while he wasn't as technically strong as the top 3, it still was a solid job.
5. David A - Without last week, it may have been top 4. Still, he went to the well one too many times with the "lovers lament" crying ballad. He did a nice job and would have been a top performance on most nights, but it was just average tonight.
6. Chikeze - I actually like the Luther Vandross version of this song - so it was a good song choice for me. Still, he wasn't as strong as the others, but he should be good enough to be OK.
7. Danny - He did OK with it, but it was a little corney. Like with David A (but a few levels below), on some nights this would be a mid-level performance. But, tonight, it's bottom 2.
8. Luke - I liked him when he did Queen, it was a great song choice. Tonight was blah, especially when such strong performances followed him. Easily the worst.

Overall, I thought 6 of the 7 performances were not half bad (with 2 being very good). Good showing for Idol - I also think Luke and Danny should be gone. Still, I think Danny has a bit of a following and may end up pulling it out (with Chikeze sliding in his spot). My guess, though, is that it is Luke and Danny - which would be the right choice.

Best part of the night was when our signal cut out for 3 seconds. Gave me a chance to wipe the blood from my ears.

Honestly, if you didn't like tonight - why even watch the show? Morbid curiousity? I hate it to break it to you but there probably won't be a much better show for the rest of the season.

I like the show, but I really did not enjoy tonight's performances either.

When Noriega puts on one of the more masculine performances in, that really says something about the rest of the crowd. Two songs made popular by female artists (Celine and Whitney) and a song by Wham? Archuleta singing a Phil Collins song didn't fit well to me, either. I thought Cook was very good and I enjoy Michael Johns' voice and performance, but he is rough around the edges as a singer. I don't like Castro because he seems way too fabricated to me, but I suppose he did alright.

All in all, I thought the performances were brought way down by the song choices for the most part.

I almost shit myself when that wham song came on. All he needed was the Choose Life shirt. Man these people are morons.


Danny is just spectacular. He has to win.