Thursday, March 28, 2013

Idol Top 8: Performance Night


Top 8 week of American Idol Season Meh pretty much stayed true to form. Girls shined, guys were pathetic, yada-yada-yada... can we just drop the 3 remaining sissy boys and get the real competition started with the Top 5 girls already?

Anyhoo, on to the performances and my rankings.

1. Candice Glover - She's been the class of the field every week, and this was no exception. She took the tired, overplayed classic "Heard It Through The Grapevine", and transformed it into a fresh, jazz/blues/soul hybrid with a rock edge. Candice has now established this sound as her own, and she absolutely owns it. She knows who she is as an artist, and understands throttle management; perfectly grasping when to lay down the hammer and when to softly caress. She's a true pro with big time talent, and if she stays with this sound she's cultivated on the show in her post-idol career she can count me in as a big fan.

2. Amber Holcomb - Maybe the best chops to grace the Idol stage in... I don't know how long. Incredibly gifted with insane vocals, and very attractive, Amber is also coming into her own style as a performer. Once again this week, she chose a song not as commonly known ("Lately") and completely owned it, hitting incredibly tough notes with grace, power and ease. The one problem I see for Amber is the interwebs are filled with viewers who don't care for her personality, and find her a bit cold, which explains her bottom 3 last week after a great performance. I happen to think she seems very sweet and likable, but if quite a few others see it differently she could be in for a premature elimination. I wouldn't be surprised if despite her great performance she landed bottom 3 again, but really hope she at least makes it to the Top 5. It would be a travesty for that much talent to go home early.

3. Angie Miller - Guess I'm quite the contrarian when it comes to Angie, because she's been praised as the greatest contestant to ever live nearly every week, and I've found her to be a thin-voiced, overly dramatic phony near the bottom of my list. This week, she got blasted for being a thin voiced phony, and I absolutely loved her performance. I think she took a much needed break from worship songs and cheesy ballads and rocked the house with an edgy rearrangement of Shop Around. She showed us some much needed sex appeal and sass, and picked a song much more in her vocal wheelhouse than the big diva ballads that drowned her in previous weeks. Hope she's rewarded by voters more than she was by the judges and message boards, because I thought she was great.

4. Kree Harrison - Kree did fine. She capably performed "You Lied" (though not nearly as well as Kelly Clarkson did in Season 1), and is now in the holding pattern of good, not great performances that don't really excite anyone. Like many others, I keep watching and waiting for her to just blow us away with a spectacular performance, and all we keep getting is "yeah, I guess that was pretty good". Pretty good is fine and dandy for many, but not a front  runner. I could see Kree slipping into the danger zone if she doesn't deliver a wow performance next week.

5. Janelle Arthur - While Kree seems to have stagnated, the Janelle mojo is clearly on the rise. This week, she took "Keep Me Hanging On", completely rearranged it to fit a folk/country vibe and brought out the 6-string. The judges LOVED it, the message boards exploded with praise as the "wow" performance of the year, and I absolutely remain the contrarian who thought it was boring as shit and didn't go anywhere. The arrangement lacked melody, and had just an OK vocal. Props for originality, but I enjoyed her previous two performances much more than this one.

6. Burnell Taylor - His "My Cherie Amour" was bad, but not train wreck bad. I thought his tone would perfectly fit this song  but he crackled multiple times like an adolescent, and still sings disconnected to the lyrics like an amateur. Some parts were good, but he's not in the same league as any of the girls. Being the best of this group of sissy boys ain't saying much.

7. Devin Velez - All he does is bore the shit out of me, but usually delivers a smooth vocal. This time he tried to sing off the beat to mix it up and all he did was fuck it up. Very unpleasant and awkward to listen to, and he remains disconnected emotionally to every word he sings. Meh, bleh... he is in deep doo-doo this week.

8. Lazaro Arbos - Well, if it's any consolation he was not quite as bad as last week. That said, he was again the bottom of the pack, and it's becoming painful to endure. The saps who keep voting for him out of stuttering pity and cuteness need to cut the shit, because Lazaro just does not belong in prime time. That said, we know he's made of teflon, and will survive to torture us with more terrible singing and whiny excuses for at least another week.

BOTTOM 3: Amber, Burnell, Devin
GOING HOME: Devin

What say you?


~ Kenny Poo

4 comments:

  1. Okay, I agree with your top 2 choices (and bottom 2 too) and then you jumped the tracks (too much Scotchy Poo me thinks).
    Angie was all over the place, I think you were over joyed she wasn't singing a ballad and the leather pants drew your attention away from the sounds that were coming out of her.
    I think Burnell ranked higher than Angie but the other 2 schlepps were tied for last.
    I wouldn't be surprised if Janelle made top 3 tonight either.
    If you haven't seen The Voice, check it, there is a set of twins on(from Rochester who tried out for Idol once upon a time) and did get picked up on Team Blake. Lets just say they have nice attributes.
    ---nevrbluffs---

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  2. LOL Sir Poo- I absolutely can't tolerate Angie- and this week was no exception. I wouldn't be surprised if she is in the bottom 3 tonight, because she looked incredibly uncomfortable last night. As far as I am concerned, they should give Candice the win and call it a day.

    Take anybody from the top 20 of Idol season 10, and they would beat any one of this crew hands down.

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    1. I would disagree that the Top 20 of AI10 were all better than the Top 5 girls of this class. Not by a long shot.

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  3. Well, I called it: Devin bites the dust. Ryan pretending to be shocked by the non-save was hilarious.

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