The Top 12 American Idol finalists took to the big stage first the first time last night and the results were mixed—ranging from unbelievable to embarrassing and everything in between.
The Idols selected from the seemingly endless supply of songs from the Lennon and McCartney songbook, so there was no excuse for poor song selection.
Up first was Syesha and her interpretation of “Got to Get You Into My Life”. In my preview leading up to this round, I noted that Syesha was a dark horse in the competition—and I still believe she can be. But last night she disappointed a bit by trying to “glam up” the song a bit—adding uneven phasing and pregnant pauses in very awkward places throughout the song. The judges were all over the board in their reviews (Randy and Paula were critical while Simon thought she did quite well) and she is probably safe, primarily because there were a few stinkers that will boost her performance.
Sporting a pre-St. Patrick’s Day Kelly green sweatband watch and an awful cardigan sweater mismatched with a lime green tie, Chikezie was up next with “She’s a Woman”—a song I don’t think I have ever heard before. He started off the song sitting with a bluegrass trio (a banjo, tambourine, and fiddle) and then danced his way to center stage and proceeded to ROCK IT OUT! Admittedly the dancing left something to be desired, but he tore the song up and showed a side of his personality that we haven’t seen to date. Looks like the R&B Chikezie gave way to the rocker inside and the audience loved it as did the judges who were blown away and I’m sure the voting public is going to launch him into round 2 next week.
Ramiele sang “In My Life” which was pretty much a disaster. I like the song plenty—it was used as the theme song for the show “Providence” back in the late ‘90’s early ‘00’s, but her execution (no pun intended) was off the mark. In addition to starting the song on the spiral staircase and making a less than smooth transition to the middle of the stage, she did nothing with the song and her vote count will show it. She also dedicated the song to the contestants who have already been shown the door—and she might join them and then they can sing the song together. Very disappointing performance, Ramiele!
Jason Castro dragged his dreads and his guitar to the stage to perform “If I Fell”. Like Ramiele, he sang the song well enough, but we’ve seen him do this act before and if he wants to go deeper in the competition, he’s going to have to change it up a bit and get out of the “guy playing a guitar and singing in a college dorm room” as Simon described his performance. I like this Jason, but he needs to develop an edge and I’m not sure he has one—after all, he is an Aggie from Texas A&M J (that was for my dad!)
Singing “Come Together” and showing us a totally different performer to what we have grown accustomed was Carly Smithson. The Irish import was a dynamo up on the stage and served notice to the rest of the competitors that she is more than just a power balladeer. All three judges gave her serious props with Simon going so far as to compare the performance to that of Kelly Clarkson from Season 1—very high praise indeed.
The first of our three David’s, David Cook, followed Carly’s strong performance with an awesome take on the Beatles classic “Eleanor Rigby”. David “rocked up” the song and really made it his own. And for the second week in a row, I think he hit gold with a song from yesteryear that could be recorded today and be a hit (he did a great job covering Lionel Richie’s “Hello” last week). The only advice I would give Mr. Cook is to do something with that hair!—it looks like an awful comb over and the dude it too young for a comb over, plus he doesn’t have Trump’s money, so he really shouldn’t rock that hairstyle ‘til he does.
Brooke White continued the run of great performances as she accompanied herself on the piano and sang “Let it Be”. Brooke had tears in her eyes after the song and as she listened to the judges praise her heart-felt performance. Brooke seems to be one of the few contestants who actually understands what it means to choose the correct song as she has done it a number of times leading up to and including this performance.
But all good things eventually do come to an end and that end was David Hernandez’ performing “I Saw Her Standing There”. David tried to work the stage, but I think he would have been better working the stage with a brass rail instead. The song is a classic, no doubt, but David made it sound like a night of bad karaoke in a college town bar. David definitely is going to suffer when the votes are tabulated.
The female rocker of the group, Amanda Overmyer, lent her vocals to “You Can’t Do That” which, as Simon noted, was only intelligible about 30% of the time. Amanda looked comfortable on stage in her black and white striped pants that matched her skunk-do, but her singing is just not that good. I’m beginning to wonder if she is this year’s Sanjaya—the beneficiary of voters who cast their ballots for the worst singer in the competition just to irritate those of us who really want to see the best singers perform.
One of my favorites in the Top 12 is Michael Johns who slowed the pace with his take on “Across the Universe”. I thought the native Aussie did a pretty good job, if not a bit safe. But the judges were a bit harsher on him because they wanted him to take a few chances with the song. But he’s likely safe and will have another chance to find that one song that makes him stand out more—and in Randy’s words to “Go Big!”.
Taking things to the opposite extreme was Kristy Lee Cook who intended to add a country twang to “Eight Days a Week”, but what she ended up with was turning it into a hillbilly version of a song that requires no changes. The unfortunate thing about Kristy’s performance isn’t that she has a good chance to go home tonight, but that we are going to have to hear it again!
Closing the show was the season’s early favorite, David Archuleta, who showed some cracks in his previously impenetrable armor with a very sub-par performance of “We Can Work It Out”—which he didn’t do (work it out, that is). The mistakes he made were many and often starting with him positioned on the spiral staircase (did he learn nothing from Ramiele’s performance), next he forgot his lyrics 3 or 4 times, and then to complete the disaster, he admitted to not being committed to the song—and it showed. He has built up a good enough fan base to stick around another week (actually several), but he was not in top form.
And so went last night’s show. The top performers were Chikezie, Carly, David Cook, and Brooke White.
The bottom three should be Ramiele, David Hernandez, and Kristy Lee Cook—and I predict that KLC will go home and we’ll be forced to endure the Beverly Hillbillies again!
I’ll be back with an elimination update and until then, I will continue watching TV so you don’t have to.
Charlie
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