Wednesday, March 26, 2008

American Idol Recap: Top 10 Edition

Theme: Songs From the Year You Were Born

Before I get started let me mention just how smart Kristy Lee Cook was in picking "God Bless the USA" last night. Now, you know I'm no fan of hers and that pick was the most shameless song choice I have ever seen in the entire run of American Idol, but Kristy Lee knows just exactly who she's singing to (in this case, the I-support-the-troops-no-matter-what rednecks) and picks accordingly. Never mind that she was as awful as ever, singing like some small town pageant winner, she gets mad props from me.

It was another pretty meh week on Idol. The only real highlights were Kristy Lee's balls (see above), Michael Johns finally showing some ability (other than speaking with that lovely accent) while performing "We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions", Syesha tearing shit up finally on an okay song and David Archuleta turning a truly awful inspirational song (I don't even know what it was called) into something magical. I swear that Archuleta kid is some kind of miracle worker rivaling Annie Sullivan. I realized something about Archuleta last night that's kind of disturbing for me. I love the kid to death and think he's a great singer, but I don't know if I would buy his album. Since he's so young and innocent, I don't know if I would buy him singing about love and I definitely wouldn't believe him singing about sex. So what does that leave? Inspirational ballads? No thanks. But, you never know, he could really surprise me.

The usual suspects all were as bad as usual. Jason did his whole mellow hippie thing again, Chikezie tried a ballad again and it was such a disaster that I was actually praying for a hoe-down again. And Ramiele Malubay had the audacity to try doing Heart's "Alone" with her weak-ass voice and somehow expected it to be good. I still don't understand the appeal of this troll.

Brooke started off strong with "Every Breath You Take," another smart choice for her voice, but it went nowhere fast after the band joined in. Carly Smithson certainly had the voice to tackle "Total Eclipse of the Heart" but, for some reason, it didn't fully work. Maybe it's because the song is so overused on this show (didn't someone already pick this song during 80's week?). David Cook tried once again to be cool and turn a random pop song into a rock ballad, this time with Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean", and this shtick is getting old quickly. Next week he just needs to sing a song straight through without trying to change everything all the time.

I'm interested to see who leaves tonight because, for once, I'm not predicting Kristy Lee; after that brilliant move she's going nowhere. I'd say it's between Ramiele and Chikezie, but since people love Ramiele for some strange reason, I'll go with Chikezie to go home.

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