Allison impressed Randy with her "pipes," but he was annoyed by her awful personality and her Ashlee Hoedown dance, which she may or may not be reprising on live TV right now, to Ryan's starry-eyed wonder. She's even dressing like Kelly Clarkson now, that's awesome. The song is... pretty much what I thought it would be, although a little more melodic, but surprisingly I'm not loving the vocal. It sounds tired and breathless, like she's at the end of a whole concert and not at the beginning of her one single song. Maybe it's just pitched too low; whatever it is, yucky. I mean, it's Allison and she's always great, but I expected more. Also, at the end of the song her spit drips off the mic, which makes me want to barf.
The judges love all up on her about it, vociferously if fairly unclearly. Simon calls it "tuneless in parts," and detected something like a struggle with the lyrics -- she denies the latter, saying she's loved it since she was eight. He thinks she's precocious, but doesn't deny her talent or skill. That other guy says something so stupid it makes me want to punch myself in the nuts, and meanwhile out in the audience Randy Travis is sitting with a woman who looks like she would cut your throat over a land deal. That's a compliment.
Kris will, of course, be singing Garth Brooks: "To Make You Feel My Love." (If everybody takes Garth then how can Danny Gokey sing "The Dance"? Because the assumption that he would sing that started the second Ryan said "Grand Ole Opry." Also, I hate that it's called the Grand Ole Opry. Being an American is a mixed bag a lot of the time and dealing with that's part of the fun, but frankly Kountry Korner Krap like that makes me feel taunted.) Of the performance I can't say much: it takes five seconds, he's adorable, his voice is perfect but there's nothing there for me personally this week, nice falsetto at the end, no guitar. I just forgot it as it was happening. It made me sleepy and happy, like a warm blanket. I predict he will do incredibly well tonight.
Paula tells him to watch his pitch on the low notes, but loved his vulnerability. Simon thought it was terrific and stripped-down, and a great choice; he calls it the first time where he thought Kris had a shot at doing really well in this competition. Kara loved it, and calls it "very Kris Allen." I like that. He's so pleased by this, and Ryan says it's always hard with Simon because you're waiting for the "but," and this time the "but" never appeared. ["The immature 13-year-old boy in me laughed for like five minutes about Ryan waiting for Simon's butt. I really should be more ashamed about that." -- Angel] It's nice, and boring, and takes five seconds just like the whole thing. I don't know, man. There's something I'm not getting this week, I guess.
Kara's like, "This is what Adam doing country music looks like, yes." The audience laughs about how weirded out she is by all of this business, which makes me wonder if America can even handle him this week, but then goes, "It left me confused and sort of happy," which is exactly how I feel every week. (Simon, quietly: "Just like Paula." Zing!) There's this awesome gay version of Maroon 5 with a bleached bouffant sitting with Adam's mom. Paula references "Kashmir" by Led Zeppelin, which is savvy in that it makes the whole thing seem less weird, like, "You bought Zeppelin forty years ago, and the Beatles, and honestly if you look back now without taking drugs, that was also a fucked up time in the life of America." A cuddlier kind of apocalypse.
Simon's like, "But what the hell was that?" Randy Travis giggles with quasi-hateful glee and vindication, but then shrinks back and gets pretty disgusted and bummed when Simon further implies that if Adam goes to Nashville he will be gay-bashed. Good on Randy T for feeling yucky about being co-opted into at least one of the ten bullshit things he's been co-opted into. Adam and Ryan agree that Nashville will not welcome them and will not be visiting, and then Ryan giggles about "Remember Taylor Hicks?" I feel like my hatred of the Taylor Hicks thing was actually a time capsule sent back from right now, and my frustration about Constantine and Nadia and Carrie/Taylor was just impatience to get here, where we are now. Because right now, the show makes sense to me. ["Which is exactly why I voted for Adam repeatedly last night. I should probably be ashamed of that too. -- AC]
Predictably, due to the heartwarming-believe in yourself-blow up your house nature of Martina McBride, Scott will be singing "Wild Angels," which Randy T secretly thinks is a terrible idea. He tells Scott to speed up the chorus, and Scott immediately goes wild on the piano in response, which surprises Randy for reasons we don't need to get into. Then: Scott looks the hottest he's looked yet, which is fun, and his voice is much more involved in the song than it has been of late. I don't know the song, but I bet I know exactly what it's all about... And it is. The chorus gets all loud and fast and the stage lights up, which is probably exciting for the audience but just seems sort of disjointed from here. Altogether, even though I'm not in love with the song itself, it sounds pretty much perfect, and exactly what I've been missing from Scott.
Paula yells at Scott to stop at the edge of the stage, which throws him for a second and it's sort of terrifying, and then she calls the piano a crutch. Awesomely, he says if the piano is getting between him and the audience, they should just move the piano closer, but he knows what she's about. Simon thinks that's a "bit of a stupid thing to say," which pisses her off, and brings up Elton John. She starts yelling about Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder -- both of whom are known for their fancy footwork -- but the problem here is that Simon just hit her where she lives, which is in a place where the nicer she is to Scott the better person she is, and if everybody knows that she's the nicest to Scott, then she... wins. I don't know what she wins. She finally impresses Jesus or something.
By calling Paula out for telling Scott to do an ill-advised thing, Simon's making her feel insensitive to the blind, however logically irrelevant that is. Which, she's insensitive to everybody because she's a sociopath and an addict, but it is intensely important to Paula's self-image that she is a "good person" and buying all the greeting card bullshit morality stuff she can, as loudly as possible, which means not only can Simon not intimate that she fucked it up somehow, but also that she must be nicer to Scott than anybody else. Which is gross, but she's always been like this, so you're dumb for starting any kind of shit anywhere near the Scott Area, because it doesn't matter who's right when you're dealing with the unconscious emotional scaffolding that shores up your ego. Trust me, you will take major heat for even lightly touching the areas of a dimwit's imaginary moral superiority, because they will lash out violently, because what you're doing is questioning the core of who they are, as far as they know, because it's the parts of themselves they like the best, so they get the most attention.
And I get the same uppity way about the things I think give me the moral upper hand, and so do you, and so does everybody we know. It's how things work: dimwits is what we have to be, because it keeps our personalities intact. Which is why there's always going to be a joke about retard rape, and there's always going to be a joke about Danny Gokey's fucking dead wife, and there's always going to be a joke about Scott's creepy blind eyes, because I figure if you're the type to send freaky emails to strangers on the internet, you might as well wear yourself out screeching early enough in the season that I won't have to deal with it later when I start to hate the show and need all the positive reinforcement I can get. (That, and not even going near the obvious trailer-trash material Country Night affords us, because let me tell you that, as a group, ignorant white people seem to feel really oppressed in 2009 for some reason, and desperately need my inbox to know that it is personally responsible.) But Simon has not learned this basic Paula lesson yet, and is paying the price.
He gets backup for it, because it's not reeeeally necessary for Scott to "mix it up" in this way, but her point wasn't totally invalid, and now that it's gone to personal attacks -- even though neither of them actually know that it has, which is a very important lesson to remember time you're so pissed you can't see straight, because I guarantee you the fight is happening somewhere other than the fight you think you're having -- it's getting sort of ugly hereabouts. For Simon's part, he says the song choice is too similar to last week, and that he's not choosing the right songs. Scott admits that he's been losing the lottery and other people are taking his songs; I think somebody needs to keep an eye on Gokey during that process, frankly.
Simon's point is that his songs aren't good enough, and Kara tells him that he needs to up his game. Ryan points out that he's all about arranging the songs super intensely, and he talks about that for quite a few time, and Scott says one day he's going to do without the piano. Simon tells him not to worry about getting out from behind the piano, and Scott says he's not worried about it. He's pretty awesome, is Scott. Ryan finally kicks it to commercial after noting how incredible tense things just got at the Judgery, and how well Scott dealt with it, and we're off.
Alexis Grace is dressed like yet another crazy auntie, and talks about how much fun they have offstage, and Ryan asks her about the horrible Paula/Simon fight, but she didn't see it. She loves country music, as do all people from the south she says, and then we see her talking to Randy about his songwriting, and chooses "Jolene." Yes! Randy is blown away by her more than anybody else, which blows her mind and is additionally really amazing to see.
Her arrangement is closest to my favorite, with the serious banjo picking in the back, but her phrasing is pure Alexis. You could almost forget the white-hot power of Brooke, almost. She still does the funny little dramatic Chicago moves, but busts into pure vocalization a few times -- like Adam did -- in a really effective and less unnecessary way. This is definitely one of the best all night, I can see why Randy T had tears in his eyes at the end. Damn, girl. Maybe a little too far off the beam, but the judges are going to freak out on her.
Yeah, Kara says she's lost her edge, and wanted "Before He Cheats," which is what I assumed she'd be singing. I think that's an issue with expectation, though, because I thought she did an amazing job. Not the first time I've strongly disagreed about her. Paula says really nice things about, and they talk about the vulnerability and range she's trying to show here. Simon sort of makes fun of that, but says it's a little bit "soundalike," which he explains to her. He says it was forgettable, but I don't agree, I think it'll be talked about this week. She tells Ryan she should have put more dirty in there, like Kara said; Simon's expression at this is unreadable but I think he would agree with this on reflection.
I could be wrong because I don't know the Johnny Cash version well, but I do know the Elvis one, and that seems like the common ancestor here. Anoop totally freaking rocks it, even with the annoying reverb they've got turned up to 11 and the glacial pace of it at the beginning, but dang. Why couldn't he have been this awesome the last two weeks? I mean, he admitted that he's upped his game considerably because Simon told him he didn't deserve to be in the Top 13 last week, and I remember thinking that would be a good thing. I just had no idea how good. And I think as of this point I officially hate less of these people than I love.
Paula tells him it fit him like a glove, unlike last week, and talks about how tender and sweet and heart-touching it was to hear him sing so slowly that he could stretch out so much and go nuts. Simon says he went from zero to hero, and turned in one of his favorite performances of the night. Me too! He takes back the kicking he gave Anoop last week, and praises him for not whining about the advice, just taking it and delivering. I am really proud of him, and you can tell Simon is too. Simon and Ryan both welcome him back to the show, and now there's Megan making some fucked up Muppet face and waving her hands like a spaz. Dude, I cannot handle Megan Corkrey. She's the cutest girl up there this year, so she'll probably be here forever, but God. It's so disrespectful to your cuteness when you are this cute and act this moronic. Allison at least has the dual excuse of being a teenager and being a moron, but I can see no good reason for Megan's behavior.
Every time I see a commercial for Fringe I'm impressed by how much shittier it looks than it did in the last commercial. How do they do it? It's a mystery of science. I have no idea if it's good, I bet I would like, but those commercials are mindblowingly unappealing. Randy T pretty much climbs all over Megan like a Rottweiler until he finds out that she's singing "Walking After Midnight," and then his ardor cools. And man, I should have called that one. Those gross tattoo girls always love Patsy Cline, which is where I think my irrational hatred of her started. She sings a little bit of it for Randy T with her whole Holliday thing, and both he and the pianist change their tune radically, because it's totally original and pretty. That's nice! I'm glad it won't be stupid. Also, I keep forgetting to tell you that Randy Travis says the word "lick" ten times in every video package, which equals 110 times; he uses the word like the Smurfs use "smurf" but just like that word, you always know exactly what he's talking about.
(And meanwhile, how fucking horrible are those Bioré commercials that are like, "Too old for zits and too young for wrinkles?" Rather than being a celebration of how that means you have the perfect skin that all other age groups hate you for so keep doing what you're doing and always use SPF and stop smoking now, they just openly say, "Don't feel left out of the consumer cycle of making everybody feel bad about their skin so they buy crap instead of just keeping their shit clean! Now you too can buy stuff even though you don't need it! We're pretty sure there's something wrong with you even though we can't tell you what it is because it doesn't exist, so go buy stuff! Now! We made it just for you, you perfect-skinned trash! Never feel pretty!" It's like those Dove ads never happened.)
Matt G -- who's playing last, so you know he's going to bust this thing open -- impresses the hell out of Randy T with Carrie Underwood's syntactically challenged "So Small." At first balking because Matt's a boy and Carrie's a girl and the world is ending, Randy's jaw actually drops when he starts into it. And then -- between Simon and Paula massaging Ryan and then Paula smelling Simon's arm -- Matt knocks it out of the fucking park. It's the same setup as last week, blue light and Matt on piano, and once again it's like watching somebody who should not be here doing something he should be doing for a lot of money somewhere else. What a fucking performer this kid is, really. You can't really apples-to-oranges this crew -- Adam Lambert and Matt Giraud for example are taking place in entirely separate universes -- so it's hard to say he's outclassed everybody. But if you take these eleven performances as though they're all the same in some way, he's just ruined the curve for the second week in a row.
Kara is struck dumb by him, Paula goes aphasic in that way she has where her point comes across better than if she were speaking English, Simon tells him he doesn't get enough credit for his vocals because of Danny and Adam, but that this week he outsang Danny and got to a Bublé place. It was, it was like watching somebody who already won come back and sing a little bit of a song. That's so amazing. And then that other guy makes the good point which is who else could you ever feel comfortable comparing to both Bublé and Timberlake, and have it make sense both ways? If you tried to imagine somebody who split that difference you would just see nothing, but now there's Matt.
So. Sarver drinky-drunked around, Allison forgot to be awesome a little bit, wooby Kris is coasting on his beauty, Lil did her usual boring perfect job, Adam Lambert is the ambassador from Planet Glitter Sex Parasite, Scott continues to sing feelgood songs nobody could ever care about, Alexis gave a nuanced and passionate performance that once again risks getting lost in the shuffle, Danny Gokeyed his pants again, Anoop finally realized he's on American Idol, Boobs McGee distracted once again from her own distractingly weird performance, and Matt G ruled the world for the second week in a row. Tomorrow, there will be much filler and the POV will rear its head, Megan will find herself a fucking bra God willing, and who knows who's going home -- Sarver and Corkrey have voter base, I think, and Scott's memorable no matter what crap he sings, which makes me worry about Alexis and maybe Allison -- because this season is turning out to be really good... Which is weird.
Find out where these contestants will end up post-Idol.