Tuesday, April 18, 2006

American Idol Recap 4/18/06

American Idol is ridiculous. After three consecutive lousy weeks, they concocted a way to make everyone look good, even Simon.

When I heard Rod Stewart was going to be on the show this week, it really pissed me off that Bucky was eliminated last week. How great would it have been to see Buck E. Fresh prancing around the stage in his Jessica Simpson hair, belting out “If you want my body, and you think I’m sexy”? Making matters worse, the young Idols wouldn’t be singing classic Rod Stewart songs. Instead, AI became an infomercial promoting the Rod’s new four disc box set “The Great American Songbook”.

Evidently the AI producers hadn’t listened to Rod’s ridiculous album of cover songs before agreeing to let him come on the show. During rehearsals, they must have realized that they would need Scott McClellan-esque spin to make these lame songs appear great. So, they called the style of music “The Standards” rather than “Boring Old People Music”.

In addition, the judges were ridiculously positive all night. Randy liked them all. Paula kept telling everyone they had what it took to go all the way. And phony praise oozed from Simon’s usually critical lips. Either the judges were trying to manufacture some quality or everyone had an incredible night.

Everyone except little Kellie Pickler. It started out well for her when she told Rod that he really “took a load off her chest”. Unfortunately, the audience was still laughing at her during the performance. Instead of following the judges lead and staying positive, she admitted that she “butchered” it. She’s not even close to the best singer, but, if there is ever a made for TV movie about Jessica Simpson, KP would be perfect for the part. It sounded like she channeled Jessica when she summed up her performance with, “When all else fails you gotta have great shoes”.

She won’t need great shoes to stick around another week, because Ace will be getting the boot. Ace tried a new look tonight in a desperate attempt to reinvent himself. Instead, he came off looking like Pat Riley and Steven Seagal’s love child. Apparently that’s the type of dude Simon is into, as he called Ace “charming”.

As usual, Chris performed very well. Although having the guitar player on stage with him kind of reminded me of that episode of Seinfeld where George tries to convince his African-American boss that he has a black friend. Chris was doing his thing on stage and all the sudden walked over and sat down next to the African-American guitar player, who was curiously positioned on the stage steps.

Surely it wasn’t really a Costanza moment, but it is interesting to compare the Idol voting to a presidential election. I think Chris and Catharine will win their primaries and become the final two. The last Idol standing could hinge on whether or not Catharine can take some of the country vote from Kellie or if Chris can take some of the geriatric vote from Taylor or the black vote from Paris.

Paris has a great voice and performed well tonight. Taylor Hicks also had a solid performance. Now that he’s big enough to be parodied on Saturday Night Live, he won’t have any trouble getting a record deal. Elliott was just okay. He has the voice, but not the personality. Catharine was outstanding.

But, they could have put Chicken Little back out there tonight and the judges would have raved. Tonight’s show was good, but the judges clearly attempted to manipulate the viewer into thinking it was a show for the ages. The two best singers were carefully positioned at the opening and closing of the show. America will likely fall for the hoopla and will be buzzing about Idol until they find out that Two Hit Wonder has just posted the first pictures of the new Cruise/Holmes Baby (if you don’t see the picture right at first, keep reading the entire page).

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