"[We] make the calls, [we] call the shots," Ryan reminds us. Joe says that the reason we're having extra Results night on Thursday because they don't want to hurt Bono's feelings by having an elimination during IGB, but man. If they boot somebody this week after giving those bitches last year amnesty, I'm going to freak out. Let them twist for an extra twenty-four hours and then screw them? That would be so vile.
Speaking of vile, tonight's theme is "inspirational songs."
Michael, in a little ill-fitting monkey vest and yet another stupid cravat and some hideously preplanned "I'm rocking out so hard" faces, will be hitting the deck with "Dream On." A song which has inspired me to shoot up heroin and drive really fast into the oblivion of the setting sun, but not to help starving people. Ah: "Dream until your dreams come true." That's all it takes, folks.
And then the screaming. The fucking stupid-ass bad-sounding falsetto screeching. I had no idea Steven Tyler had a talent besides spawning beautiful creatures, but apparently there's a way to make those awful sounds that is better than other ways of making the horrible sounds. His face looks nice, but it's dressed up all in bullshit.
Randy tells him that he sounded screechy and uncool, and that he needs to start singing the soul songs that he has never, ever sung that Randy always, always thinks he used to sing at some point in the imaginary past. And instead of just nodding and praying that nobody notices his goddamn stupid-ass cravat, Michael backtalks and says that, I'm only barely paraphrasing, Randy is wrong, because America is wonderful. Yeah, that's what he said. I blame the Colonel.
So the stupid shitty crowd goes wild about America, of course, but then Randy gets pissed and tells him this show is not about DREAMS, it is about SINGING, and then gets very fussy. Very fussy, like, somebody just fucked up Merv Griffin's egg-white omelet amounts of fussy. Randy cracked! Randy never cracked before! OMG he is pissed! This is beautiful! "It's not about dreams! We have discovered that this show is about singing, we have finally gotten to the bottom of it, and it's not dreams!" He's going from zero to Brittenum faster than anything I've ever seen before. Wow. Wow! Randy kind of sucks!
And then Paula interrupts and tells him that the opposite is true, and it's not actually about SINGING but about DREAMS. Which, for her it is, I'm not popping that balloon. But like, five minutes and twenty-five seconds into the episode, everybody's nuts. And Michael didn't suck that bad, except for the end. He sounded all right. And we still haven't gotten to Simon, and Sinbad is in the audience, which makes me sad because he looks so old, and Paula tells MJ he looks hot, and that the high notes will summon Chihuahuas to him. Randy agrees. Simon is like, "Both of my co-judges are stupid, but I liked the performance." However, it was an "impersonation of a rock star." That's the perfect expression of it, exactly. "A little bit wannabe-ish," also. See, tell me the diff between David Cook and Michael at this moment, please.
("Tell me that part about the Deftones again, Grampa."
"No, it's getting late, and my old bones need a rest. Go to bed, Shorty. I'll catch you on the flipside."
"Grampa, what are you talking about?"
"I'll holla at you in the morning, little playa.")
So I don't know if you know this band at all, but that voice that Cook is faking every week? Basically the lead singer of Our Lady Peace. He does a great impression, and I'd rather hear that voice than, say, a really good Rob Zombie (or heaven forbid Rob Thomas, Jason Castro). So even if you've never heard the original version, now you kind of...have. I won't speak for anybody else, but knowing the song, my issues with this performance are easy: he starts out way too low and sounds stupid, and then goes high but not high enough, so he sounds stupid, and then in the chorus he kicks it to the backup at first in that throaty froggy way of singing way too low, then he sings against them, then he changes keys again, and then wanders out into the audience once again to act like a goddamn wizard like he always does, and then in the last note he slowly...unfurls...his fucking...hand...on which somebody has markered, "GIVE BACK."
And the Earth opens up, and swallows him. And then spits him the fuck out. Earth says, "Thanks, but I'm going to have to GIVE this right BACK. Sorry, but it just tastes like smug asshole."
I am sorry. After last week, I wanted to be in a good mood and whatever, but that is fucking unsuitable. It's funny to pretend to hate him and secretly love him and all that shit, but: the fuck you're gonna write that on your hand and then slowly unveil it at me with that shit-eating serious business face on your stupid gigantic melon head. It's like he took a look at poor Syesha -- who doesn't even know she's doing it -- and decided to just blow her out of the water with the fans of condescending pandering patronizing bullshit. Who don't exist. I had had it, previously, up to about here with Cook's drama queen scene-setting every week, but now I would officially place it more around right here. It's like we're in his bedroom watching him, at the age of eight, imagine what it would be like to be a rockstar. Except it's twenty years later and he's actually in public, so it's embarrassing.
The judges aren't too horrified, although Simon points out that it was -- like every week -- "pompous," stupid song choice ...How come nobody's mentioning his totally shitty vocals? He sounded like hell, nobody wants to mention that? I don't hate Cook, I hate his instincts and I hate the way he sang that song, but I don't hate him. Maybe I love him, I don't know. I do know that I kinda of hate Paula, who reminds us all how "inspiring" that shit is with his stupid hand-marker insult to the entire world. Which, to be fair, even David Cook seems to have figured out was regrettable. He also agrees with Simon that it was one of his worst performances ever, so I don't even know what I'm bitching about.
Oh, right: Carly Effing Smithson. Who is singing the Queen song "Siomusdewan," apparently, which is about getting "knocked in the road" and how you have to use your moments to make your moments count. I have no idea how much of it is her stupid accent and how much her stupid brain, but I admit that it could be mostly my inability to care what the girl has to say. She also lies that she watched Live Aid and knows who Freddie Mercury is. I sure hope she's wearing Traci Scoggins hooker makeup for this...and she is. In addition to a fat suit, apparently. Maybe she's training a women's self-defense class after this or something. Ah, "The Show Must Go On." Enunciation is so unimportant when you're singing words, what was I thinking? So, you know I'm not really a Queen fan, I need to ask: does this song suck? Or Carly? Because you know I despise Carly, but I don't want that to bias me against the song. You know how I try to avoid irrational hate at all costs.
Carly screams and blandly shouts and tosses her hair and makes it all sound like the fake-scary Disney attack of the Wooden Soldiers. Randy and Paula agree that Carly, herself, sucks, and that continues to be her problem. Not the singing, not the fucked-up looking tattoo of an ugly lady on her arm, just: her excruciating demeanor. Her concave charisma. Paula says her voice is "perfect," which is nearly true, but the problem for Paula is that Carly is awful and unsympathetic in many, many ways. Simon tells her she oversang and lost control of the song, and seemed schizophrenically and inappropriately angry. Which: Carly's entire problem is that she doesn't seem to get people things, or how people do things. She wouldn't be half as off-putting if her body language were anything like normal. So it makes sense that she would try for "strong" and end up at "homicidal." That makes total sense to me. So while he's telling her this very true information, somebody goes nuts out in the audience, distracting Simon and Paula. I hope it is a tattooed family member going nuts. I really do, that would be awesome. Then Carly tells the judges that she sucked because she saw Simon's face. Shut up, Carly. "I felt like the judges were judging me, so I decided to sing bad, and be fundamentally unlikable." Good plan.
Ryan and Archuleta talk about nothing of consequence, David A. talks through his nose for a while, and then in the video he's like, "It was way hard to figure out which inspirational song was the very gayest, but then I was like, 'Angels' -- a song I have performed hundreds of times -- is both inspirational enough for this show, and childish enough for my fake personality." Nothing about just stumbling upon it or anything like that: just saw it on the list, and picked it. He plays the piano, kind of, but you can't hear it anyway, and starts out way low, and generally is all over the place. Perhaps he's distracted by the piano, which again we cannot hear at all, but the whole thing is set so low for him that it's just about boring. Also, his father looks like a Village Person this week.
Then Carly Smithson, whose continued presence here has been mystifying -- and disgusting -- me for about a thousand weeks now, giving the Idol equivalent of, "No, it's not just because of my boyfriend, I really do enjoy playing Dungeons & Dragons. I play an Elf Druid!" or whatever, and she's telling the truth. Which is to say, hauling all her real-life dorky shit right up on stage for us all to stare at. And David Archuleta, who has no real-life shit, which has become his real-life shit, which is sad. And Brooke White, finally pulling out of her nosedive, but maybe not soon enough.
Amnesty! GIVE me BACK my Brooke on Thursday! I'll write it on my hand if I have to! That's exactly how far I'm willing to go to make a difference!