Hey, Idol famalam! Your gracious host, Claire Zulkey, is traipsing around Europe on a reality-show fact-finding tour, so she's appointed me to step in and cover everyone's favorite non-Eurovision televised singing competition until she gets back. And it's a great time to do it, because this is my favorite part of AI — the final 24 have been selected and we start getting the individually judged performances. I love this stage, because the performances start to have consequences, and we really get a sense of how good the singers really are. And, to top it all off, we finally know people well enough to hate them!
Tonight, it's time to go girl crazy with the Dictators, er, judges! Yes, it's time to start cutting down on the ladies, who Simon says are a special crop this year. I think he means that none of them are fat. Kara is dressed like 1982-era Toni Basil; Randy gives some stupid advice to the singers; Ellen points out that Randy's advice is stupid and seems to have some trouble finding the camera; and Simon is made the subject of fun in a comedy sketch, which this show should never, ever do again. Still, her Simon-wants-me jokes are funnier than Ryan Toothpaste's. The theme this week is Billboard hits, so I'm looking forward to hearing someone sing "Indiana Wants Me". Let's get to it:
Page Miles, "All Right Now" (Free). Page is exuberant, by which I mean that she is fat. This song is a bit of a rocker for a smooth soulful type like her, but she sells it well enough and doesn't do a bad job despite letting the backup singers do some of the heavy lifting. Simon says she has the best voice of all the girls, but picked a "cheap" song. Kara and Randy disagree, but are both wrong.
Ashley Rodriguez, "Happy" (Leona Lewis). Ashley does that thing were she whispers the hard passages instead of singing them. I don't think much of her and her silver satin baseball-jacket-looking thing; she's one of those first-round performers who isn't terrible, but isn't that great either. Randy says "You did a pretty good job of her, but not really you". I don't know what that means.
(Aside: I'm loving the commercials this time around, including the stoned guy who used to have CDs cluttering up his car until he bought a Ford, and the PSA that urges teenage girls to avoid pregnancy by bouncing on a trampoline. Also, the Coke cups are back!)
Janell Wheeler, "What About Love?" (Heart). I thought Janell was pretty decent in Hollywood, but there's something about her personality that rubs me the wrong way. Maybe it's that she's the boyfriend of Tim Tebow, or maybe that she's wearing an off-the-shoulder purple number that looks like what Kara's wearing. She sings at the same level throughout instead of busting out some volume at the peaks, which is the wrong way to approach the song; the judges agree. Simon says she gave it "100% effort and 65% execution". Ellen likes her, but I suspect Ellen might be thinking with her dick.
Lilly Scott, "Fixing a Hole" (The Beatles). First of all, "Fixing a Hole" was not a Billboard hit. Anyway, Lilly says it's a struggle to support herself, and yeah, I bet it can't be all that profitable busking in downtown Denver. However, she makes a good song choice, and does interesting things with it; I like her a lot, and she's got good stage presence too. Kara says she's "believable", which is an odd compliment.
Katelyn Epperly, "Oh Darling" (The Beatles). Okay, seriously, Idol, the Beatles had like a hundred Billboard hits, and so far you are zero for two in picking them. This is one of McCartney's big Motowny numbers, so it needs a belter, which Katelyn tries to pull off in a sort of sub-Bette-Midler way. It's the kind of performance that makes Ellen bust out the word "interesting". Kara says what we are all thinking, which is that Kara is a bitch.
Haeley Vaughn, "I Want to Hold Your Hand" (The Beatles). Is there a rule that every female competitor in this season has to put some kind of crazy doodad in their hair? Anyway, this was an actual hit for the Beatles, and I actually really dug Haeley's performance; it was all over the place, but she pulled it together big at the end, and her version was actually unpredictable, which is rare for this show. The judges thought it was too messy, though. Simon: "verging on terrible". Audience: "boooooooo".