The Top 13 Perform - 3/10/09

[The4thJudge]

Tight Black T

So, there was a lot of awkward on the first night of the real deal. First, we had some funky announcer guy introducing the judges as they made a grand entrance down a long staircase. Then Ryan followed them out. My viewing companion said, "wouldn’t it be funny if he fell." Yeah, she's got a mean streak. Anyway, this grand entrance idea came from Simon. It figures. Simon then announced that two people would be going home on the results show tonight. He later mentioned that there will be another surprise tonight. According Ken Warwick, interviewed on Ryan's radio show today, they will introduce a new rule, one that was tried on the French version of Idol. Apparently, the judges will get veto power, meaning they can save one contestant during the whole season. So, after the contestant is eliminated, the judges have a meeting and decide if he/she is worth saving or not. If they decide he/she is worth saving, they give him another chance and the following week they start the show with the same contestants. Weird. We'll see how this plays out.

As far as Michael Jackson week was concerned, the contestants did much better overall than I expected, covering the full breadth of his songbook. The instruments came out for Scott MacIntyre, Kris Allen and Matt Giraud. Both Scott and Matt shone at the piano, seeming much more comfortable having the security of the keyboard. While Kris may have been more comfortable with his acoustic guitar, it was very out of place for his song choice, "Remember the Time." We saw great command of the stage in Lil Rounds and Allison Iraheta, though in my opinion, Allison's vocal was the superior. Jasmine Murray and Megan Corkery were just plain awkward. Both choose Jackson Five songs and did not do themselves any favors. Disappointing performances of the night came form Michael Sarver, Anoop Desai, and Jorge Nunez. Michael's performance was forgettable, Anoop's a disaster, and Jorge's confusing. Adam Lambert and Alexis Grace fall into the category of "they thought they were better than they really were." Both performances were way over the top and neither one saw a thing wrong with it. And finally, Danny Gokey. I was a little concerned about Danny and Michael Jackson week. And when I heard he was singing PYT (Pretty Young Thing), I swallowed hard. What ended up happening was I held my breath and had my hand to my heart the whole time because the boy kicked some ass. His raspy vocals and the passion of his performance just did me in. I thought he channeled both Taylor and Elliott last night, and in my book, that is a very good thing.

Who's going home tonight? Hell if I know, but I guess I need to make a prediction: Michael Sarver and Megan Corkery.

Lil' Dawg

Lil Rounds: Great, as usual.

Scott MacIntyre: The piano really brought out his personality. Not the best vocal, but you could tell he was enjoying himself.

Danny Gokey: Me gusta. GAH!!! I can't speak. Hmm. Yea.

Michael Sarver: Not his best performance. I didn't think he hit all the notes . . . apparently Kara thought he did? We'll see what happens for the rest of the show and maybe he'll be back next week.

Jasmine Murray: Incredibly boring. "Robotic" as Simon says.

Chris Allen: Weird. Okayish vocals, but the guitar probably wasn't good for that song.

Allison Iraheta: Very different girl and very different voice. Great stage presence, great performance, and great vocal.

Anoop Desai: I agree that it was karaoke. But I still love Noop Dawg.

Jorge Nunez: Eh . . . not a great vocal, but I think Michael Jackson week gave him trouble.

Megan Corkrey: Please . . . stop . . . singing.

Adam Lambert: I continue to dislike his voice . . . greatly. "You hit notes I didn't even know existed." – Kara THAT'S CUZ THEY DO NOT EXIST!

Matt Giraud: I'm having less and less hope for Anoop. Matt added to the many good performance tonight.

Alexis Grace: Over the top a bit?

Leaving us this week: Megan Corkrey and Michael Sarver


Seacrest's Hair hates everything this week.

We are experiencing mood difficulties, between the Daylight Savings Time adjustment and some persistently crappy weather on the east coast. And then we forgot to change the VCR to comply with DST... oops. Luckily, we were reminded that we could watch all the performances on MJ's and all was saved! Except not.

While this was an unusual week in that nobody technically screwed up a song (melody/lyrics), it was pretty boring overall and made us even crankier than we already were. We also are starting to wonder if we share a brain with Simon.

Lil Rounds will probably be this year's surprise early vote-off (but we think the judges will save their "rescue veto" for either Danny Gokey or Adam Lambert). She is looking good, despite Simon's comments, having completely ditched the "mom" clothes for a softly sexy pastel ensemble. Her song choice, "The Way You Make Me Feel", was a very safe choice in terms of melody, but gave her the opportunity to bring her family-friendly version of "dirty" to the stage. Also, Paula, women do not have a falsetto, it is called soprano. Don't make us say it again.

Scott MacIntyre continues to be visually impaired. Just so you know. He played piano and Josh Groban-ed the hell out of "Keep the Faith". Not to continue being a bitch about it, but a blind musician is really common and much less inspirational than, say, a blind ballet dancer. Or a blind oil rig guy... roughneck... whatever.

Danny Gokey goes uptempo with "Pretty Young Thing". His family is mental. We also wonder why they're top-loading the show with the "locks". His jacket looks way too big for him, and yeah, the dancing was awful. We just cannot get into his voice and were nowhere near the heart attacks that everyone else seems to be having. We need to find new websites to hang out on, apparently.

Michael Sarver is going to spend a lot of time "showing off his sensitive side" in this competition. (You don't see Adam Lambert showing off his manly side, though, do you? Double standards...) Sarver sings "You Are Not Alone", which is overall pretty good but the ending is incredibly cheesy and cliched. Simon finds him passionate, but we felt it was not as dynamic as it should have been.

We have hope for Jasmine Murray, based solely on the fact that she reminds us of Diana DeGarmo... but so precisely like Diana that she is similarly not connecting with the audience while turning in technically proficient performances. She's very cute in looks, but needs to make it a personality, engage the audience, and get the votes rolling in. Also, wasn't that a shot of a middle school in her package??

What Paula thinks is adorable and sexy, we think is "annoying d--chey guitar guy at a frat party." It infuriates us that Kris Allen has a beauty queen-hot wife and still gets girls to scream for him. Seriously? His guitar sounded out of key and just didn't seem appropriate for the song -- it was a prop. He also spit into the mic on sounds that shouldn't cause spitting. We found it messy and at least as irritating as his plaid shirt.

Next up is our youngest contestant, Salvadoran Allison Iraheta, whose father really didn't require captioning. He speaks better than Jorge Nunez... Anyway, Allison is quite certain that she wants to be a dark, dramatic rocker grrl in the vein of Heart and Pat Benatar. What we really love about her is that she can be that rocker on stage and then is a complete dork when she talks. She's a real girl, and she doesn't even cut herself! Her rendition of "Give In To Me" is entirely her own, in a good way.

Anoop Desai, the potentially infamous Contestant #13 (although he's 8th tonight), makes a huge judgment error with his song choice ("Beat It"), his wardrobe (what the hell?), his dancing (uh, no) and his attempt at singing and covering the stage at the same time (really didn't work). We love his parents, though! His mom is so cute! Have we said that before? We'll say it again -- his mom is so cute! Can she sing?

Jorge Nunez is doing a lot better with the accent thing, although he still lisps through "Never Can Say Goodbye". The judges are really starting to annoy us by claiming he's had to "learn English". Everyone in PR knows English, some just have an accent (Jorge) while others don't (Tatiana). Anyway, it was pretty good but nothing great, and we wish he'd added in some Latin rhythms and really made it his own. And we still can't stand to look at him.

Megan Joy Corkrey chose "Rockin' Robin", and we really can't write our initial reaction here. The quantity of profanities might cause the entire Internet to turn permanently blue. Additionally, she wore a hideous (robin?) red dress with white lace straps, flapped her arms all over the place, and ACTUALLY CAWED LIKE A BIRD AT THE END. Please, please, America. Vote her off. The judges are retarded, except for Simon.

Adam Lambert shows that he actually has the ability to sing quietly at the beginning of "Black and White". We appreciate the restraint shown in his lack of crotch-grabbing, too. He sings rather like Cher this time, screams the middle and keeps it up through the end, but will still do well with the "Twilight" crowd no matter how flamingly homo he is. Simon actually likes him, which is odd. We want to take Simon's temperature now.

Matt Giraud, who we can never remember until we see him and then say "Oh, the guy that looks like Timberlake", sang "Human Nature." In his package, his parents were so weepy and talked about "so glad to have this time with him" and "so glad he has the chance to share his gift", that we are wondering if maybe he has cancer. Anyway, he was at the piano, but we couldn't hear the piano in the mix. He was dull and his falsetto was strained. Again, just not seeing what other people are.

Alexis Grace is really embracing this "dirty" thing, and we appreciate her tight little outfit. Her rendition of "Dirty Diana" was indeed dirty and strong throughout, although the ending seemed to get away from her. It wasn't as good as some of her past performances, but should be plenty to keep her in for another week. She got shorted on judge commentary since Ryan (Seacrest, not her daughter) had to tease the new rule that will be revealed tomorrow... or, y'know, all over the Internet today.

If there's a God, Megan will be gone this week; Anoop may also be toast, but we're hoping it's Jorge.

[keb]

Thanks 5th Judge. I agree that Megan must go and if we believe Dial Idol it will be her and Jorge.

Seacrest's Hair you and I will need to find another web site because I do not like Danny Gorkey and think he is a "Taylor Hicks wanna-be" but no where near as good as the original.

However I do like Adam he is all 80's glam rock to me and I love his stage presence.

Hope Scott and Anoop get to stay I like them both.

[mari]

Kathy, I read the reviews at AVClub.com and the commenters there call Danny "DWG" for "Dead Wife Guy". They rip on him like crazy.

Does anyone else think Matt Giraud is closeted?

I go back and forth on Adam. I'd love to see a total faggy-fag queen win (I say those things in the fondest way possible), but he's not my cup of tea musically. (AVC calls him "Fall Out Man". )