Taylor Hicks IS Pee Wee Herman in... AI Re-cap 3/21
Welcome back folks for 20 minutes of the greatest show on earth spread across two hours. Ryan Seacrest is in the back of the audience parading his tie while a woman who is wearing a souvenir Chris Daughtry goatee watches, admiringly.
Ryan once again lectures us sternly about voting and tonight I’m actually home on time, so I will be picking up my phone for those who deserve it, which already leaves out five of the eleven contestants. Ryan has a weird eye thing happening tonight. One eye is larger than the other, like Shannen Doherty only less masculine. And sober.
The Main Street Electrical Parade of Idolers trots out, starting with Mandisa (meaning that the practice of reversing the order of who goes from the week before has been tossed out the window in favor of blatantly pimping TPTB’s favorites in the latter positions.) Mandisa has a big ol’ MacArthur Park cake hair-do. Bucky is next and looks like he was just picked up after a hard day moving furniture. Then comes Paris, who rented “Lady Sings the Blues” this weekend and is dressed accordingly. And in the following order, Chris, Katharine, who is wearing a dress purloined from the wardrobe of Stacked, because even her ample sweater puppies can’t fill the bust out, Taylor, who is dressed like Liberace’s gayer brother, Lisa Tucker, fresh off a twenty year old Lionel Ritchie music video, Kevin, who’s hoping to get this over with fast cause he has an audition for Beauty and the Geek 3, Elliott, Kellie Pickler, who walks across the stage dead-eyed until someone flips her hick switch mid-way through and she lights up like one of the Country Bear Jamboree washtub players, and Ace.
The judges are introduced and Simon gets booed. Randy says he thinks the ‘50s motif will be easier than last week because the music is straightforward and there aren’t as many opportunities for runs. Expect Katharine to shoot down that theory. Ryan asks Paula if she thinks the contestants are up to the challenge. Paula stares into space for a full three seconds, then speaks in a hesitant staccato, as though her stomach were being pumped for each word, along with the excess Tuinals she swallowed. Ryan tells Simon he saw him on Larry King and asks him about his prediction that Taylor, Kellie and Chris would be the final three (without naming them, of course, Ryan is nothing but diplomatic). Simon says it is not too early to start naming the good from the bad and he doesn’t care how the other eight contestants feel. This, to me, is what undermines this show more than anything and really exposes it more and more as a fraud. Simon was supposed to pick the 24 best singers and he’s done nothing but complain about ¾ of his choices every single week. So then why should we listen to you now if you’re basically telling us you didn’t know what you were doing then?
Calling all middle-aged, unmarried, delusional secretaries with thyroid troubles who own at least two cats and live in Hallmark stores to the television set!!! Your Idol is on. Yes, it’s time for a tribute to Barry Manilow. America’s favorite punchline in between Liberace and Boy George is given the AI retrospective. The 11 remaining Idols are flown to Vegas to meet Barry in between his show. I’ll bet no one cries this week. Well, except for Pickler once someone tells her it’s what Carrie would have done. We pan the kids while Barry is telling them about the ‘50s style and Kevin rolls his eyes, Chris pretends to listen and Ace stifles the urge to raise his hand and ask Barry all about the times he played piano for Better Midler in the Continental Baths. Afterwards, Ace is going across the street for a private tutorial with Siegfried and Roy.
We’re starting with Mandisa and she is singing a Dinah Washington song called “I Don’t Hurt Anymore.” We see her working with Barry and it just struck me that Manilow and Rod Stewart could be Doublemint Twins, or Viagra Twins, considering their ages. Barry says Mandisa is one of a kind and has no range, which makes no sense, but he’s the man responsible for Copacabana, so what do you expect?
This is a crappy choice of song in that it’s terribly unmemorable. Mandisa gives it her all, but she’s flat in places and I liked it, but I’m still not blown away like I was weeks ago. Mandisa is almost always a solid performer, but I really want to have another jaw-dropper with her. I’m bummed because I have so few people on here to root for anymore. The audience is going nuts for her. Randy is loving her up and giving her all sorts of mad props. The camera cuts to a two shot of Randy and Paula and Ms. Abdul looks peeved as hell at Randy’s comments and I can’t figure out if she hates Mandisa or if she’s pissed because Randy took all the good adjectives. It’s just the meds (stupid me) because Paula likes Mandisa and manages to come up with a few new ways to praise her. Simon tells Mandisa she is blossoming and her performance was very sexy and I’m sorry but after he basically promised America on Howard Stern that Mandisa would not win Idol, I can’t take anything he says seriously. Mandisa does look pretty tonight, despite an ugly-designed dress. I tried voting for her but only got through once, the phone was constantly busy.
Bucky is next and singing “Oh Boy,” by Buddy Holly. He does his song for Barry and Manilow’s reaction is “It’s long.” He throws in a few key changes for Bucky, some brass, a couple flutes, some chintz curtains and dandy bowl of fruit. Before you know it, Oh Boy has turned into “I’ve Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts.” Careful, Barry, they shoot guys like you where Bucky comes from. That stylist who did his hair last week hasn’t been heard from in four days. Barry describes the beginning as an “oooooh” moment and Bucky visibly shudders.
Bucky sings the song and those key changes seem to have gone out the window like the chintz because I don’t hear them at all. Bucky is the only person I have ever heard who can sing flat and you kind of don’t mind. It’s not good, but it’s Bucky, gol’dangit. Bless his pointed little head. Randy loves him some Bucky and the audience agrees. We cut to a shot of Bucky’s kin and then to a man in the audience who has decided to model himself after his new hero, Taylor Hicks. He has the same haircut, color and triple chin. I wonder if this is going to take off nationally, like those girls from Fast Times at Ridgemont High who all dressed like Pat Benatar. The Taylor-ette brought his date for the evening, a twelve-year old girl with geek glasses and pigtails who looks like a trailer trash version of Melissa Gilbert in Little House on the Prairie and who’s just using him so she can get close to Kevin Covais. Randy is right, however, it wasn’t a perfect vocal, but it was a great choice of song for Bucky. Paula steals a glance at Randy’s blinged out watch like she’s gonna try and boost it during Taylor’s performance because she’s seriously behind on payments to her connection, who’s waiting downstairs for her in the green room. Paula asks Bucky how it was working with Barry Manilow and I swear she almost nods out during his answer. She is heavily medicated tonight. Simon gives Bucky a reality check and says it was nothing more than bad karaoke. Taylor-ette’s date gets all Jerry Springer on Simon and starts booing him. Simon calls it a “So what” performance and I guess I have come to expect so little from Bucky that I’m going to say not only was it his best performance yet, but I actually enjoyed it. Paula interrupts Simon and starts braying and even Bucky is like- fuck, she’s trashed. And he knows from trashed.
Oh god, it’s time for Paris. She’s singing “Fever,” by Peggy Lee and I wonder if we’ll get to see the bitch fight between her and Katharine over who got to do that one this week. Paris says the song was recorded 30 years before she was even a thought in anyone’s mind. By anyone, she means God, of course, because Paris is his Goodwill Ambassador, newly appointed ever since those nude photos of John the Baptist’s wife showed up all over the internet and bounced her ass right out of a job. But John, I was told they’d be in silhouette only! You can’t multiply fish, so how were we supposed to eat?
Barry says Fever is a very mature song for a 17 year old to be doing. He tells Paris Peggy Lee was very cool, but that Paris is very hot. Maybe it’s because she’s wearing a winter coat, scarf and one of the Cosby kids’ hats (possibly Weird Harold’s) onstage in under hundreds of lights. Everytime we cut back to Barry talking about one of the Idolers, he has more and more spray tan caked across his face. By the time we get to Ace, he’s gonna look like a cork board with eyes.
Paris sounds okay, but this is the wrong arrangement for this song. It’s not supposed to have runs all through it. Paris does sound good (though it’s sometimes hard to hear her over that loud wig she has on) but if I can Cowell it for a moment, it’s like watching a little girl playing dress-up vocally. It’s all the glitz with none of the sophistication. She doesn’t have the experience to pull off a song like this and it just looks like someone pretending to be a mature woman. This is finally an example of what the judges were saying to her all those times when they told her she looked like a fifty year old teenager. So of course they won’t say it now.
We see Constantine in the audience next to Ryan Cabrera, who could stand to borrow one of Paris’ wigs. That dude has the nastiest hair I have ever seen. It always looks dirty and unkempt. It’s the Baby Jane Hudson of hair-dos. He never washes it clean, he just keeps lacquering on hairspray on top of hairspray.
Paris stands back and waits for the adulation. Somewhere in Purgatory, John the Baptist’s wife is washing the floors and giving Paris the finger. Randy tells her he was reminded of when she first sang for them, because, of course the two numbers didn’t resemble each other at all. I get the idea neither Simon nor Paula were too enamored of it, but they’ve been told to pimp, so they give muted superlatives. Ryan interviews Paris and the sound of her speaking voice makes me long for the halcyon days of Macy Gray. Or just a handful of Halcyon.
Back from the break and Ryan is talking to the girl who didn’t get the Welch’s grape juice commercial and trying to sell some phones. Her name is Sammy and she says her favorite Idol is Ace and it’s all Ryan can do not to whip around and yell, “You and me both, sister.”
Chris is up and he’s singing “I Walk the Line,” by Johnny Cash, perfect to wrap that increasingly monotone vibrato around. Barry is like, oh, that song. Great. Where’s the tanning lady?? After I hear Chris’ version of this song, I’m going to scour the internet, because I’m sure he probably cribbed it from a tribute album featuring Staind or System of a Down. Chris hasn’t got an original bone in his body.
Chris starts out shaky but then you close your eyes and you’d swear you were sitting in a bar listening to a Live tribute band. (Live- the band, though this is pretty dead on arrival.) Chris picks up the eye-boinking torch from Constantine this week and backstage, Ace is giving a pep talk to his peepers, all but threatening them with a gouging if they don’t stare soulfully into the camera for at least a minute-thirty. This is just dull and un-melodic. It’s like Paris’ performance. He’s going through the motions and it all sounds okay, but there’s no life behind it, no clue what he’s singing and no feel for anything remotely connected to the music.
Paula is all but shaving her bush in excitement, waving her imaginary lasso like Wonder Woman if she had been one of Charlie Manson’s girls. Randy says that he loves how Chris knows exactly who he is every single week. He sure does, he’s Ed Kowalcyzk. Paula is clapping like a seal and balancing her diaphragm on the end of her nose. Paula tells Chris that he stays so true to who he is and he never abandons that yet he grows and he grows every time. How does he grow, Paula, if he never leaves his little box that says late ‘90s power rocker? Simon completes the tongue bath and it’s a good thing Chris shaved his head because it just grew too big to house his hair. Ryan gives a shout out to Constantine and Ryan Cabrera in the house and tells Chris they were both rocking out during his performance. Hell, the nest of birds in Cabrera’s hair even popped out to sing along. Chris has come a long way from when he sang The First Cut is the Deepest that first day in Hollywood, and I for one wish he’d get back there.
Ugh, it’s Katharine and her spokesmodel bullshit. Ryan asks Katharine to pimp herself for a few minutes and McPhlatulence is always ready to do that. She tells us she got up this morning to see an interview with Simon by his girlfriend and Simon couldn’t remember Katharine’s name. She upbraids him for that. “After all, I’ve only been in the competition for a few weeks.” Don’t hassle the man because he’d rather forget. So would I. She says Simon called her Katharine McVee but says as long as it’s McPhever, we’re all good. Even Paris is backstage going ‘Shit, check out the ego on that honky bitch.” Katharine will be singing “Come Rain or Come Shine,” and she is so fake-showbizzy with Barry that she makes Gwyneth Paltrow look genuine. Barry’s like- See this tan, Kat? It’s more natural than you are.
Barry tells Katharine to pick someone in the audience to connect with when she’s singing the song and McFart tells us she did pick someone, but she won’t reveal who it is. Pffft- we all know you chose yourself. Duh!
Right out of the gate and McPhee has already managed to give the word “or” a slight run. Buckle up, kids, this ride gets bumpy. She does a little Slim Whitman action with her head voice/falsetto and it’s not pretty. And I got it on the money, she’s definitely singing this to herself because she isn’t making one single connection with anyone in that audience. McPhee takes us up one run, down the other, around the reservoir and through all twenty six miles of the New York marathon with the last word of the song. I think she’s still singing it, actually. Everyone always talks about how good Katharine is because she has a voice teacher for a mom, but I want to know whose idea it is every week (almost every week) for her to ruin every single performance by hanging ugly gypsy curtains all over it. Just sing the goddamn song, don’t dress it for a Quinceanera.
Randy and Paula kiss McPhee’s ass and Simon says tonight Katharine has turned into a star. She gave the same performance she’s given every week but tonight it’s just registered for him. Someone got into Paula’s coke cup.
Back from the break and McPhee is still adding a few more syllables to the word shine. Taylor Hicks is next and he decided that he would greet Barry Manilow by serenading him with “Mandy.” Barry grimaces, but is polite. Christopher Cross called him last week and warned him…
“Oh man, Barry, there’s this creepy guy from Idol who was stalking me last week. He followed me into the john and sang ‘Ride Like the Wind’ while I was trying to take a piss. I flushed the toilet to drown him out, but then he broke out the harmonica and started playing ‘Arthur’s Theme.’ I was driving home and I thought my car alarm was broken. I opened the trunk and the kid was lying in there, yelling WHOO! over and over.”
Since the theme is ‘50s night, Taylor decided to dress like Eugene, the nerdy guy from “Grease.” He’s doing the most godawful dance steps and once again, they are detracting from his performance. These aren’t his usual tics, this is something he actually thought up and choreographed and it’s dreadful. I can’t concentrate on the singing because Taylor is jittering and skipping across the stage like he’s auditioning to play Freddie the Frog in “The New Zoo Revue.” He missed a few notes and was flat here and there, but how do you critique the vocal over and above the backup singers drowning him out, the saxophone player and Taylor’s own labored breathing after running out of steam while doing a dance even Baby Bop wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole. For fuck’s sake, people- JUST SING!
Randy and Paula manage to massage Taylor’s ego while ignoring the elephant in the room- that the vocal part of the performance was kinda blah. Paula even goes so far to tell Taylor someone ought to have shot the performance (uh, sweetheart, that’s what all the cameras are there doing) to turn it into an exercise video. How many more embarrassing things have to tumble from this lush’s mouth before she gets shitcanned?
Simon tries to tell Taylor the truth, but is first booed down by the audience and then when he tells Taylor is was like some hideous party performance, Paula starts repeating, OCD-like that Simon can’t dance. Simon has to shush her a good dozen times. She’s still going on when Ryan takes the stage and he wonders aloud what has happened to his once normal family. Go to an Al-Anon meeting, Ryan, and you’ll find out. Simon is clutching a green plastic bic lighter in his hand and I’m hoping he’ll just flick it once in front of Paula’s open mouth so she’ll spontaneously combust.
After the commercial, Ryan has Lisa Tucker onstage and he asks her how she has been able to take the fact that she was in the bottom three last week and use it to strengthen her performance. She says she comes out every week and does the best she can and that’s all she can do. She’s excited about ‘50s week because she has always wanted to sing “Why Do Fools Fall in Love,” which proves she learned nothing from last week’s debacle. Lisa, you have never sounded good, but you were able to fool the audience better when you sang ballads. Stevie Wonder week was a disaster for you. Ryan asks her if she was familiar with Barry Manilow’s music before she met him. Lisa looks at him like the ‘tard she knows him to be and says “Uh yeah. Everybody knows ‘Mandy.’” Backstage, Kellie Pickler is saying to Ace, “Like duh! She’s that girl whose boyfriend I blew during Homecoming.”
Barry calls Lisa a powerhouse, but someone forgot to pay the house’s electric bill because Lisa starts off weak and shaky and never strays too far from it. Even Lisa’s own grandmother can barely muster more than a golf clap for her once it’s over. Randy is biting his lower lip which means he’s either trying to find a way to say YOU SUCK in a nice way or Paula got the munchies during the last break and stole his hoagie. Paula thinks she looks adorable and youthful and says this week is her favorite week. That means she’s back on Vicodin. Simon has learned from his Melissa McGhee mistake of two weeks ago and damns Lisa with faint praise. Lisa is definitely going home this week and that’s good.
It’s Covais time! Kevin will be singing “When I Fall in Love,” and I think he’s going to do a decent job of it. It’s a great choice from him, so unless he screws it up massively, he’s just earned himself a spot on the Idols tour.
Every time we go to Seacrest in the audience tonight, he looks more and more like Ed Sullivan, with the hunched over posture, the deadpan delivery and the hands clasped together in front of him, low.
During the rehearsals, Kevin was belting and Barry had him take it down some, exposing the vulnerability of his voice and the song. This was a huge mistake, because Kevin’s voice isn’t strong enough to sustain such a vocal. He needs to shout out his weaknesses. Already he sounds worse than he did in rehearsal. He should have belted. Still, it was no worse than Lisa Tucker and Kevin actually has a following. All Lisa has pulling for her is Timon and Pumbaa. Randy and Paula dote on him like proud parents, while Simon is catty old Uncle Arthur. Still, it will be enough to send him through another week.
My boy Elliott is up next and rocking the goatee again. Elliott says he was not a fan of Barry Manilow until he worked with him. Barry tries to teach Elliott, who is singing “Teach Me Tonight,” how to phrase words more subtly and tell a story with the song. Has Barry ever seen this show? That might go over well with me and three other people in the audience, but everyone else is just going to say it was pitchy. This show is all about runs and belting. Elliott takes Barry’s advice. The performance was good to my ear, though off in some spots because it’s a technique of singing Elliott hasn’t quite mastered but I think if he had just done it straight out, he would have won over the audience more. Using Barry’s advice is great when you have a few weeks to rehearse, not when you’re trying to win a competition judged by The Flintstones. Happily, the judges loved him and I’m really glad for that. I went back immediately after and listened to it again with my eyes closed and Elliott still didn’t tell a story with the song as Barry tried to get him to do, but I liked the song even more on the replay.
Well shucky-darn, ever’body! Slap the hogs and call me Lulu. It’s the Kellie Pickler Show! Starring Kellie Pickler, Misty Rowe, Roy Clark, Sonny Shroyer as “Enos” and Rocky Covington as “Geech.” Brought to you by proud sponsor Crisco. Crisco’ll do you proud, ever’time!
When Kellie heard it was ‘50s week, she called Grandpa up and once Mr. Haney was done using the party line, ol’ Gramps got on the horn and told Kellie she ought to do her some Patsy Cline. Kellie was excited because she didn’t know Patsy was from that era. In fact, she’s been waiting for the new Patsy Cline album to be released in stores.
Surprisingly, Manilow is not familiar with “Walkin’ After Midnight,” because there’s no such thing as a Patsy queen and Bette Midler never sung any at the baths. Pickler sounds good during rehearsals, but we all know how that turned out for Lisa Tucker.
The arrangement is horrible and you can tell Barry didn’t know the song. It sounds like Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass go country. After being told by Barry that the song is about a woman who’s sad because she’s been left by the man she loves, Pickler struts out onstage like she’s about to belt “Black Velvet.” Thick as a brick, y’all. Cue Geech and the smellhounds.
Kellie continues to sashay across the stage as though she’s trying to get enough tricks so her pimp won’t beat the shit out of her. She’s taken a Patsy Cline song and turned it into “Bad Girls.” Someone finally learned the definition of minx. She does a weird affectation with the words midnight and searching that some country singers and beauty pageant contestants do when they don’t know any better. It’s very annoying. Some parts are a’ight, some parts are flat and some are so sharp I need sutures. After the song, Kellie walks through the front row picking up dollar bills without using her hands, then hurries back to the stage to await the judges’ comments. Paula has the scariest fake smile plastered across her face and you know she’s just dying to ask how much I costs to go around the world. Randy tells her how good she was and Kellie tries to answer back but the person who has just become my new hero has turned off Kellie’s microphone. Simon tells her not to talk, just listen. This doesn’t faze Kellie, she just shouts over the din. Simon welcomes her back to the competition, then asks for change for a five. Ryan tries hard to get some cornpone schtick going, but Kellie’s like, fuck that shit, I slammed it tonight, I don’t need the Hee Haw crap.
After spending the entire decade of the ‘50s watching this crap show tonight, Ace is finally bringing it home with “In the Still of the Night.” That can only mean one thing- more falsetto. He wants to do a jazzy, urban arrangement and Barry wrinkles his nose at the idea of this. Or maybe at just at the idea of Ace.
Ryan is still vamping with the Sammy, the Welch’s brat who looks like she was fathered by Frankenberry. Talk about a five-head. Get that kid some bangs, now.
Ace takes the stage and is going to accompany himself by playing his abs. He trimmed his hair this week and left in the setting lotion. Ryan Cabrera is heaving a sigh of relief because he no longer has the worst hair-do of the night (well, worst natural hair-do. Paris always wins with whatever weave she has). Ace has some weird left side lip action happening and I’m guessing Bell’s Palsy. He keeps pointing out into the audience, probably to show us where all the ducks flying over the studio are dropping dead after hearing him sing. Ace gives us a boink-stare into the camera and we cut to a shot of a bow sliding across and up over some strings, rising, rising, rising. Metaphor, anyone?
Boyfriend strikes about six different Jesus Christ poses and I’m hoping that’s foreshadowing for the crucifying he’s gonna get from the judges for that performance. But not before he stares into the camera for another soulful retina scan. Oh yeah, Ace, do it to me. Oh yeah, baby, that cornea is so big and hard. Don’t worry about contact lenses, I’ve got protection. Ooooooh, yeaaaaaah.
Randy loves him some Ace and Paula tells Ace she counted 34 signs in the audience asking Ace to marry them. And 33 of them belong to Ryan. Paula’s starting to slur very badly, so it’s time to go. Byrd drew the short straw this week, so she’s stuck carrying Paula to her car. Simon says it wasn’t the best vocal of the evening but miles better than Ace’s performance last week. I’ll agree.
Ryan reminds us again to vote and Taylor is right next to him, having re-applied his cheek rouge and doing that dumb-assed applause-o-meter hand gesture. He looks like a complete and utter dick.
Manilow was fun tonight and the songs could have been more painful than they were. Check the sky for flying pigs, because Bucky is in my top three performances for tonight and here they are 1-11.
1- Elliott
2- Bucky
3- Mandisa
4- Chris
5- Paris
6- Kevin
7- Katharine
8- Ace
9- Kellie
10- Lisa
11- Taylor
Who should go: Lisa
Who will go: Lisa, with Kevin and either Bucky or Mandisa in the bottom three.
I did not watch the TV Guide Idol show tonight. I’ll catch it tomorrow and if there’s anything worth talking about, I’ll re-cap it along with the results show.
Seagulls out.
Ryan once again lectures us sternly about voting and tonight I’m actually home on time, so I will be picking up my phone for those who deserve it, which already leaves out five of the eleven contestants. Ryan has a weird eye thing happening tonight. One eye is larger than the other, like Shannen Doherty only less masculine. And sober.
The Main Street Electrical Parade of Idolers trots out, starting with Mandisa (meaning that the practice of reversing the order of who goes from the week before has been tossed out the window in favor of blatantly pimping TPTB’s favorites in the latter positions.) Mandisa has a big ol’ MacArthur Park cake hair-do. Bucky is next and looks like he was just picked up after a hard day moving furniture. Then comes Paris, who rented “Lady Sings the Blues” this weekend and is dressed accordingly. And in the following order, Chris, Katharine, who is wearing a dress purloined from the wardrobe of Stacked, because even her ample sweater puppies can’t fill the bust out, Taylor, who is dressed like Liberace’s gayer brother, Lisa Tucker, fresh off a twenty year old Lionel Ritchie music video, Kevin, who’s hoping to get this over with fast cause he has an audition for Beauty and the Geek 3, Elliott, Kellie Pickler, who walks across the stage dead-eyed until someone flips her hick switch mid-way through and she lights up like one of the Country Bear Jamboree washtub players, and Ace.
The judges are introduced and Simon gets booed. Randy says he thinks the ‘50s motif will be easier than last week because the music is straightforward and there aren’t as many opportunities for runs. Expect Katharine to shoot down that theory. Ryan asks Paula if she thinks the contestants are up to the challenge. Paula stares into space for a full three seconds, then speaks in a hesitant staccato, as though her stomach were being pumped for each word, along with the excess Tuinals she swallowed. Ryan tells Simon he saw him on Larry King and asks him about his prediction that Taylor, Kellie and Chris would be the final three (without naming them, of course, Ryan is nothing but diplomatic). Simon says it is not too early to start naming the good from the bad and he doesn’t care how the other eight contestants feel. This, to me, is what undermines this show more than anything and really exposes it more and more as a fraud. Simon was supposed to pick the 24 best singers and he’s done nothing but complain about ¾ of his choices every single week. So then why should we listen to you now if you’re basically telling us you didn’t know what you were doing then?
Calling all middle-aged, unmarried, delusional secretaries with thyroid troubles who own at least two cats and live in Hallmark stores to the television set!!! Your Idol is on. Yes, it’s time for a tribute to Barry Manilow. America’s favorite punchline in between Liberace and Boy George is given the AI retrospective. The 11 remaining Idols are flown to Vegas to meet Barry in between his show. I’ll bet no one cries this week. Well, except for Pickler once someone tells her it’s what Carrie would have done. We pan the kids while Barry is telling them about the ‘50s style and Kevin rolls his eyes, Chris pretends to listen and Ace stifles the urge to raise his hand and ask Barry all about the times he played piano for Better Midler in the Continental Baths. Afterwards, Ace is going across the street for a private tutorial with Siegfried and Roy.
We’re starting with Mandisa and she is singing a Dinah Washington song called “I Don’t Hurt Anymore.” We see her working with Barry and it just struck me that Manilow and Rod Stewart could be Doublemint Twins, or Viagra Twins, considering their ages. Barry says Mandisa is one of a kind and has no range, which makes no sense, but he’s the man responsible for Copacabana, so what do you expect?
This is a crappy choice of song in that it’s terribly unmemorable. Mandisa gives it her all, but she’s flat in places and I liked it, but I’m still not blown away like I was weeks ago. Mandisa is almost always a solid performer, but I really want to have another jaw-dropper with her. I’m bummed because I have so few people on here to root for anymore. The audience is going nuts for her. Randy is loving her up and giving her all sorts of mad props. The camera cuts to a two shot of Randy and Paula and Ms. Abdul looks peeved as hell at Randy’s comments and I can’t figure out if she hates Mandisa or if she’s pissed because Randy took all the good adjectives. It’s just the meds (stupid me) because Paula likes Mandisa and manages to come up with a few new ways to praise her. Simon tells Mandisa she is blossoming and her performance was very sexy and I’m sorry but after he basically promised America on Howard Stern that Mandisa would not win Idol, I can’t take anything he says seriously. Mandisa does look pretty tonight, despite an ugly-designed dress. I tried voting for her but only got through once, the phone was constantly busy.
Bucky is next and singing “Oh Boy,” by Buddy Holly. He does his song for Barry and Manilow’s reaction is “It’s long.” He throws in a few key changes for Bucky, some brass, a couple flutes, some chintz curtains and dandy bowl of fruit. Before you know it, Oh Boy has turned into “I’ve Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts.” Careful, Barry, they shoot guys like you where Bucky comes from. That stylist who did his hair last week hasn’t been heard from in four days. Barry describes the beginning as an “oooooh” moment and Bucky visibly shudders.
Bucky sings the song and those key changes seem to have gone out the window like the chintz because I don’t hear them at all. Bucky is the only person I have ever heard who can sing flat and you kind of don’t mind. It’s not good, but it’s Bucky, gol’dangit. Bless his pointed little head. Randy loves him some Bucky and the audience agrees. We cut to a shot of Bucky’s kin and then to a man in the audience who has decided to model himself after his new hero, Taylor Hicks. He has the same haircut, color and triple chin. I wonder if this is going to take off nationally, like those girls from Fast Times at Ridgemont High who all dressed like Pat Benatar. The Taylor-ette brought his date for the evening, a twelve-year old girl with geek glasses and pigtails who looks like a trailer trash version of Melissa Gilbert in Little House on the Prairie and who’s just using him so she can get close to Kevin Covais. Randy is right, however, it wasn’t a perfect vocal, but it was a great choice of song for Bucky. Paula steals a glance at Randy’s blinged out watch like she’s gonna try and boost it during Taylor’s performance because she’s seriously behind on payments to her connection, who’s waiting downstairs for her in the green room. Paula asks Bucky how it was working with Barry Manilow and I swear she almost nods out during his answer. She is heavily medicated tonight. Simon gives Bucky a reality check and says it was nothing more than bad karaoke. Taylor-ette’s date gets all Jerry Springer on Simon and starts booing him. Simon calls it a “So what” performance and I guess I have come to expect so little from Bucky that I’m going to say not only was it his best performance yet, but I actually enjoyed it. Paula interrupts Simon and starts braying and even Bucky is like- fuck, she’s trashed. And he knows from trashed.
Oh god, it’s time for Paris. She’s singing “Fever,” by Peggy Lee and I wonder if we’ll get to see the bitch fight between her and Katharine over who got to do that one this week. Paris says the song was recorded 30 years before she was even a thought in anyone’s mind. By anyone, she means God, of course, because Paris is his Goodwill Ambassador, newly appointed ever since those nude photos of John the Baptist’s wife showed up all over the internet and bounced her ass right out of a job. But John, I was told they’d be in silhouette only! You can’t multiply fish, so how were we supposed to eat?
Barry says Fever is a very mature song for a 17 year old to be doing. He tells Paris Peggy Lee was very cool, but that Paris is very hot. Maybe it’s because she’s wearing a winter coat, scarf and one of the Cosby kids’ hats (possibly Weird Harold’s) onstage in under hundreds of lights. Everytime we cut back to Barry talking about one of the Idolers, he has more and more spray tan caked across his face. By the time we get to Ace, he’s gonna look like a cork board with eyes.
Paris sounds okay, but this is the wrong arrangement for this song. It’s not supposed to have runs all through it. Paris does sound good (though it’s sometimes hard to hear her over that loud wig she has on) but if I can Cowell it for a moment, it’s like watching a little girl playing dress-up vocally. It’s all the glitz with none of the sophistication. She doesn’t have the experience to pull off a song like this and it just looks like someone pretending to be a mature woman. This is finally an example of what the judges were saying to her all those times when they told her she looked like a fifty year old teenager. So of course they won’t say it now.
We see Constantine in the audience next to Ryan Cabrera, who could stand to borrow one of Paris’ wigs. That dude has the nastiest hair I have ever seen. It always looks dirty and unkempt. It’s the Baby Jane Hudson of hair-dos. He never washes it clean, he just keeps lacquering on hairspray on top of hairspray.
Paris stands back and waits for the adulation. Somewhere in Purgatory, John the Baptist’s wife is washing the floors and giving Paris the finger. Randy tells her he was reminded of when she first sang for them, because, of course the two numbers didn’t resemble each other at all. I get the idea neither Simon nor Paula were too enamored of it, but they’ve been told to pimp, so they give muted superlatives. Ryan interviews Paris and the sound of her speaking voice makes me long for the halcyon days of Macy Gray. Or just a handful of Halcyon.
Back from the break and Ryan is talking to the girl who didn’t get the Welch’s grape juice commercial and trying to sell some phones. Her name is Sammy and she says her favorite Idol is Ace and it’s all Ryan can do not to whip around and yell, “You and me both, sister.”
Chris is up and he’s singing “I Walk the Line,” by Johnny Cash, perfect to wrap that increasingly monotone vibrato around. Barry is like, oh, that song. Great. Where’s the tanning lady?? After I hear Chris’ version of this song, I’m going to scour the internet, because I’m sure he probably cribbed it from a tribute album featuring Staind or System of a Down. Chris hasn’t got an original bone in his body.
Chris starts out shaky but then you close your eyes and you’d swear you were sitting in a bar listening to a Live tribute band. (Live- the band, though this is pretty dead on arrival.) Chris picks up the eye-boinking torch from Constantine this week and backstage, Ace is giving a pep talk to his peepers, all but threatening them with a gouging if they don’t stare soulfully into the camera for at least a minute-thirty. This is just dull and un-melodic. It’s like Paris’ performance. He’s going through the motions and it all sounds okay, but there’s no life behind it, no clue what he’s singing and no feel for anything remotely connected to the music.
Paula is all but shaving her bush in excitement, waving her imaginary lasso like Wonder Woman if she had been one of Charlie Manson’s girls. Randy says that he loves how Chris knows exactly who he is every single week. He sure does, he’s Ed Kowalcyzk. Paula is clapping like a seal and balancing her diaphragm on the end of her nose. Paula tells Chris that he stays so true to who he is and he never abandons that yet he grows and he grows every time. How does he grow, Paula, if he never leaves his little box that says late ‘90s power rocker? Simon completes the tongue bath and it’s a good thing Chris shaved his head because it just grew too big to house his hair. Ryan gives a shout out to Constantine and Ryan Cabrera in the house and tells Chris they were both rocking out during his performance. Hell, the nest of birds in Cabrera’s hair even popped out to sing along. Chris has come a long way from when he sang The First Cut is the Deepest that first day in Hollywood, and I for one wish he’d get back there.
Ugh, it’s Katharine and her spokesmodel bullshit. Ryan asks Katharine to pimp herself for a few minutes and McPhlatulence is always ready to do that. She tells us she got up this morning to see an interview with Simon by his girlfriend and Simon couldn’t remember Katharine’s name. She upbraids him for that. “After all, I’ve only been in the competition for a few weeks.” Don’t hassle the man because he’d rather forget. So would I. She says Simon called her Katharine McVee but says as long as it’s McPhever, we’re all good. Even Paris is backstage going ‘Shit, check out the ego on that honky bitch.” Katharine will be singing “Come Rain or Come Shine,” and she is so fake-showbizzy with Barry that she makes Gwyneth Paltrow look genuine. Barry’s like- See this tan, Kat? It’s more natural than you are.
Barry tells Katharine to pick someone in the audience to connect with when she’s singing the song and McFart tells us she did pick someone, but she won’t reveal who it is. Pffft- we all know you chose yourself. Duh!
Right out of the gate and McPhee has already managed to give the word “or” a slight run. Buckle up, kids, this ride gets bumpy. She does a little Slim Whitman action with her head voice/falsetto and it’s not pretty. And I got it on the money, she’s definitely singing this to herself because she isn’t making one single connection with anyone in that audience. McPhee takes us up one run, down the other, around the reservoir and through all twenty six miles of the New York marathon with the last word of the song. I think she’s still singing it, actually. Everyone always talks about how good Katharine is because she has a voice teacher for a mom, but I want to know whose idea it is every week (almost every week) for her to ruin every single performance by hanging ugly gypsy curtains all over it. Just sing the goddamn song, don’t dress it for a Quinceanera.
Randy and Paula kiss McPhee’s ass and Simon says tonight Katharine has turned into a star. She gave the same performance she’s given every week but tonight it’s just registered for him. Someone got into Paula’s coke cup.
Back from the break and McPhee is still adding a few more syllables to the word shine. Taylor Hicks is next and he decided that he would greet Barry Manilow by serenading him with “Mandy.” Barry grimaces, but is polite. Christopher Cross called him last week and warned him…
“Oh man, Barry, there’s this creepy guy from Idol who was stalking me last week. He followed me into the john and sang ‘Ride Like the Wind’ while I was trying to take a piss. I flushed the toilet to drown him out, but then he broke out the harmonica and started playing ‘Arthur’s Theme.’ I was driving home and I thought my car alarm was broken. I opened the trunk and the kid was lying in there, yelling WHOO! over and over.”
Since the theme is ‘50s night, Taylor decided to dress like Eugene, the nerdy guy from “Grease.” He’s doing the most godawful dance steps and once again, they are detracting from his performance. These aren’t his usual tics, this is something he actually thought up and choreographed and it’s dreadful. I can’t concentrate on the singing because Taylor is jittering and skipping across the stage like he’s auditioning to play Freddie the Frog in “The New Zoo Revue.” He missed a few notes and was flat here and there, but how do you critique the vocal over and above the backup singers drowning him out, the saxophone player and Taylor’s own labored breathing after running out of steam while doing a dance even Baby Bop wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole. For fuck’s sake, people- JUST SING!
Randy and Paula manage to massage Taylor’s ego while ignoring the elephant in the room- that the vocal part of the performance was kinda blah. Paula even goes so far to tell Taylor someone ought to have shot the performance (uh, sweetheart, that’s what all the cameras are there doing) to turn it into an exercise video. How many more embarrassing things have to tumble from this lush’s mouth before she gets shitcanned?
Simon tries to tell Taylor the truth, but is first booed down by the audience and then when he tells Taylor is was like some hideous party performance, Paula starts repeating, OCD-like that Simon can’t dance. Simon has to shush her a good dozen times. She’s still going on when Ryan takes the stage and he wonders aloud what has happened to his once normal family. Go to an Al-Anon meeting, Ryan, and you’ll find out. Simon is clutching a green plastic bic lighter in his hand and I’m hoping he’ll just flick it once in front of Paula’s open mouth so she’ll spontaneously combust.
After the commercial, Ryan has Lisa Tucker onstage and he asks her how she has been able to take the fact that she was in the bottom three last week and use it to strengthen her performance. She says she comes out every week and does the best she can and that’s all she can do. She’s excited about ‘50s week because she has always wanted to sing “Why Do Fools Fall in Love,” which proves she learned nothing from last week’s debacle. Lisa, you have never sounded good, but you were able to fool the audience better when you sang ballads. Stevie Wonder week was a disaster for you. Ryan asks her if she was familiar with Barry Manilow’s music before she met him. Lisa looks at him like the ‘tard she knows him to be and says “Uh yeah. Everybody knows ‘Mandy.’” Backstage, Kellie Pickler is saying to Ace, “Like duh! She’s that girl whose boyfriend I blew during Homecoming.”
Barry calls Lisa a powerhouse, but someone forgot to pay the house’s electric bill because Lisa starts off weak and shaky and never strays too far from it. Even Lisa’s own grandmother can barely muster more than a golf clap for her once it’s over. Randy is biting his lower lip which means he’s either trying to find a way to say YOU SUCK in a nice way or Paula got the munchies during the last break and stole his hoagie. Paula thinks she looks adorable and youthful and says this week is her favorite week. That means she’s back on Vicodin. Simon has learned from his Melissa McGhee mistake of two weeks ago and damns Lisa with faint praise. Lisa is definitely going home this week and that’s good.
It’s Covais time! Kevin will be singing “When I Fall in Love,” and I think he’s going to do a decent job of it. It’s a great choice from him, so unless he screws it up massively, he’s just earned himself a spot on the Idols tour.
Every time we go to Seacrest in the audience tonight, he looks more and more like Ed Sullivan, with the hunched over posture, the deadpan delivery and the hands clasped together in front of him, low.
During the rehearsals, Kevin was belting and Barry had him take it down some, exposing the vulnerability of his voice and the song. This was a huge mistake, because Kevin’s voice isn’t strong enough to sustain such a vocal. He needs to shout out his weaknesses. Already he sounds worse than he did in rehearsal. He should have belted. Still, it was no worse than Lisa Tucker and Kevin actually has a following. All Lisa has pulling for her is Timon and Pumbaa. Randy and Paula dote on him like proud parents, while Simon is catty old Uncle Arthur. Still, it will be enough to send him through another week.
My boy Elliott is up next and rocking the goatee again. Elliott says he was not a fan of Barry Manilow until he worked with him. Barry tries to teach Elliott, who is singing “Teach Me Tonight,” how to phrase words more subtly and tell a story with the song. Has Barry ever seen this show? That might go over well with me and three other people in the audience, but everyone else is just going to say it was pitchy. This show is all about runs and belting. Elliott takes Barry’s advice. The performance was good to my ear, though off in some spots because it’s a technique of singing Elliott hasn’t quite mastered but I think if he had just done it straight out, he would have won over the audience more. Using Barry’s advice is great when you have a few weeks to rehearse, not when you’re trying to win a competition judged by The Flintstones. Happily, the judges loved him and I’m really glad for that. I went back immediately after and listened to it again with my eyes closed and Elliott still didn’t tell a story with the song as Barry tried to get him to do, but I liked the song even more on the replay.
Well shucky-darn, ever’body! Slap the hogs and call me Lulu. It’s the Kellie Pickler Show! Starring Kellie Pickler, Misty Rowe, Roy Clark, Sonny Shroyer as “Enos” and Rocky Covington as “Geech.” Brought to you by proud sponsor Crisco. Crisco’ll do you proud, ever’time!
When Kellie heard it was ‘50s week, she called Grandpa up and once Mr. Haney was done using the party line, ol’ Gramps got on the horn and told Kellie she ought to do her some Patsy Cline. Kellie was excited because she didn’t know Patsy was from that era. In fact, she’s been waiting for the new Patsy Cline album to be released in stores.
Surprisingly, Manilow is not familiar with “Walkin’ After Midnight,” because there’s no such thing as a Patsy queen and Bette Midler never sung any at the baths. Pickler sounds good during rehearsals, but we all know how that turned out for Lisa Tucker.
The arrangement is horrible and you can tell Barry didn’t know the song. It sounds like Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass go country. After being told by Barry that the song is about a woman who’s sad because she’s been left by the man she loves, Pickler struts out onstage like she’s about to belt “Black Velvet.” Thick as a brick, y’all. Cue Geech and the smellhounds.
Kellie continues to sashay across the stage as though she’s trying to get enough tricks so her pimp won’t beat the shit out of her. She’s taken a Patsy Cline song and turned it into “Bad Girls.” Someone finally learned the definition of minx. She does a weird affectation with the words midnight and searching that some country singers and beauty pageant contestants do when they don’t know any better. It’s very annoying. Some parts are a’ight, some parts are flat and some are so sharp I need sutures. After the song, Kellie walks through the front row picking up dollar bills without using her hands, then hurries back to the stage to await the judges’ comments. Paula has the scariest fake smile plastered across her face and you know she’s just dying to ask how much I costs to go around the world. Randy tells her how good she was and Kellie tries to answer back but the person who has just become my new hero has turned off Kellie’s microphone. Simon tells her not to talk, just listen. This doesn’t faze Kellie, she just shouts over the din. Simon welcomes her back to the competition, then asks for change for a five. Ryan tries hard to get some cornpone schtick going, but Kellie’s like, fuck that shit, I slammed it tonight, I don’t need the Hee Haw crap.
After spending the entire decade of the ‘50s watching this crap show tonight, Ace is finally bringing it home with “In the Still of the Night.” That can only mean one thing- more falsetto. He wants to do a jazzy, urban arrangement and Barry wrinkles his nose at the idea of this. Or maybe at just at the idea of Ace.
Ryan is still vamping with the Sammy, the Welch’s brat who looks like she was fathered by Frankenberry. Talk about a five-head. Get that kid some bangs, now.
Ace takes the stage and is going to accompany himself by playing his abs. He trimmed his hair this week and left in the setting lotion. Ryan Cabrera is heaving a sigh of relief because he no longer has the worst hair-do of the night (well, worst natural hair-do. Paris always wins with whatever weave she has). Ace has some weird left side lip action happening and I’m guessing Bell’s Palsy. He keeps pointing out into the audience, probably to show us where all the ducks flying over the studio are dropping dead after hearing him sing. Ace gives us a boink-stare into the camera and we cut to a shot of a bow sliding across and up over some strings, rising, rising, rising. Metaphor, anyone?
Boyfriend strikes about six different Jesus Christ poses and I’m hoping that’s foreshadowing for the crucifying he’s gonna get from the judges for that performance. But not before he stares into the camera for another soulful retina scan. Oh yeah, Ace, do it to me. Oh yeah, baby, that cornea is so big and hard. Don’t worry about contact lenses, I’ve got protection. Ooooooh, yeaaaaaah.
Randy loves him some Ace and Paula tells Ace she counted 34 signs in the audience asking Ace to marry them. And 33 of them belong to Ryan. Paula’s starting to slur very badly, so it’s time to go. Byrd drew the short straw this week, so she’s stuck carrying Paula to her car. Simon says it wasn’t the best vocal of the evening but miles better than Ace’s performance last week. I’ll agree.
Ryan reminds us again to vote and Taylor is right next to him, having re-applied his cheek rouge and doing that dumb-assed applause-o-meter hand gesture. He looks like a complete and utter dick.
Manilow was fun tonight and the songs could have been more painful than they were. Check the sky for flying pigs, because Bucky is in my top three performances for tonight and here they are 1-11.
1- Elliott
2- Bucky
3- Mandisa
4- Chris
5- Paris
6- Kevin
7- Katharine
8- Ace
9- Kellie
10- Lisa
11- Taylor
Who should go: Lisa
Who will go: Lisa, with Kevin and either Bucky or Mandisa in the bottom three.
I did not watch the TV Guide Idol show tonight. I’ll catch it tomorrow and if there’s anything worth talking about, I’ll re-cap it along with the results show.
Seagulls out.
posted by kieran at 2:20 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home