"In life, the microphone passes your lips but once... You had better be ready to sing." That's a little bit of inspiration courtesy David Foster. I'm not sure exactly what it means in this context, but let's look at some idiots. Those crazy ladies Mary Roach and Clay Aiken remind you what the show is all about, and then there are hugging cowboys, and that guy dressed like Lady Liberty, and the big yellow crazy lady with the boobs, and Kelly Pickler and that guy Chris who broke this show, and then Fake Clay before he was gay, and my boy that hugged Hasselhoff, and the Brittenums, and Carrie handjiving "I love you" to A-Fed (right in time to the music, which right now is "What A Wonderful World," again for no reason), the Crying Sanjaya Girl, Sanjaya the Crying Girl, William Hung the original Sanjaya, that Fran Drescher girl I liked so much, toothless diabetic guy and his dead mom, Sparks, Hicks, Ruben, and finally you know the montage is ending because it's Carrie, Kelly and David, the only legit people ever on this stage. And then there's the sucky Dunk, and then lots and lots of different versions of Ryan Seacrest's hair.
God, I've missed Ryan Seacrest. I wish he had other jobs so I could see him more than just on this show. They show that hilarious video of the Archuleta fans shitting themselves when the real David won, and then some meaningless words from him, and then another montage. Mostly just people screaming, and then a bunch of people saying inspirational shit about how this show is so awesome, ranging from ghetto to gorgeous to... Yikes, you guys. Daddy picked the wrong day to switch to HD. I forgot about how teenager skin makes you feel sad inside.
Eight cities, 100K auditioners and I'm sure 90% of them are mentally ill or developmentally disabled, I guess we'll find out. There's a crazy girl crying and hugging Paula Abdul and then a bunch of people committing suicide on Paula Abdul's lawn, a crazy gay cowboy, the building coming down on them, a girl kissing Ryan and then both of them throwing up for different reasons, a girl shitting out her own heart upon getting no golden ticket, a gay in a hat, dudes in a pool... Then Ryan standing in the Grand Canyon like he's about to hang out with Earl the Angel, and my God, let's see... EIGHT fucking minutes and it's time to start the actual show. So of course let's watch some commercials first. I forgot so much of the bullshitty things about this show and just sort of let it be a horrible shitty cloud in somebody else's third-world polluted country but now I have to think about the actual carbon footprint of all this stuff and count how many Styrofoam cups they're using.
Phoenix Arizona, where I spent some of my tweenhood and where I first looked at a solar eclipse through a paper plate, read lots of Elfquest and cooked up complicated marital situations for He-Man and his sister She-Ra with Jennifer Hardin, learned how to domesticate those boys that could turn even a cotton ball into a pretend gun, dealt with Mormons, and once punched a mean dog in the face on the way to school. I didn't have a concept for bad-assery then, being a gentle child, so mostly I just felt guilty about it for weeks, but like: the thing was between me and school, growling, and I was on a deadline. Phoenix is a hard-assed motherfucker for a seven-year-old gay kid who can recite half of Romeo & Juliet but couldn't even walk by the see-saws without brutal self-inflicted injury resulting, and you grow up fast.
Crowds of the screaming untalented, cute dancing guy, cute hipster dude, Gila monster, guitar dork making everybody feel uncomfortable, a cactus. Because it's Idol, the inspired background choice is "Summer In The City"; because it's the inspired Randy Jackson, his only thought is about how hot Phoenix is. Not a word about the vacation He-Man and She-Ra (or as we called them, "Randy" and "Alexis") spent in the upstairs bathroom sink, listening to "Careless Whisper" and wondering if Punky Brewster could possibly have made it on her own.
Paula Abdul wanders the desert talking about Jordin Sparks, and Ryan finally introduces the fourth judge, gorgeous Kara DioGuardi. She's a hitmaking machine -- Jewel, Cake, PCD, and Celine Dion -- who chose to avoid the threat of Michelle Branch and Vanessa Carlton, and just make her millions off ASCAP instead. I love her. Paula Abdul, far from the pre-season buzz that she would go apeshit on her... Just kidding, you know Paula's going to go apeshit on her. What you might not have predicted is that the apeshit would take the form of drunken sorority faux-lesbian creepiness.
Tuan Nguyen: First auditioner, a Michael Jackson-inspired freakazoid with giant (GIANT) hair, a pretty cute face, not much control over his emotions, some yipping sounds, a not-entirely intended key change in the middle of "The Way You Make Me Feel," and then some scary and not-entirely committed dancing. Also, Kara D should not sing along with the song if she does not know the words, but I'd rather look at her than just about anything here. Randy takes a Paula tip and tells him his hair is crazy instead of talking about the mess he just made, and the rest of them stare. You know, it's marginally entertaining (in a yucky nicotine-stained way) when the people are gross or seriously fucked up or otherwise mindblowing, but this? This is just nervous untalented spazzing of the sort we've seen one billion times on this show and in real life, with great big hair on top. Unless he freaks out on them, it's going to be a sad showing indeed. Even Randy can't think of a way to make this entertaining, and literally goes, "Wow. No." Kara tells him it was the "not so good" kind of amazing, Paula agrees, and Simon OMG they just started playing "Careless Whisper"! Of all the psychic powers I never wanted, this spiritual link with Ryan Seacrest is both the most upsetting and the most tenderly treasured. Anyway, Tuan walks away across the parking lot and you can hear his tap shoes, which is sort of awesome, if less a bang than a whimper.
Emily Wynne-Hughes (21, LA), meet her mom, meet her faded pink Stefani-esque hair, meet the thousand tattoos and fucking piercings everywhere including that stretched-out earlobe problem that tells you to avoid the person at all costs. Then she says, and I am not kidding, that she got her million stupid Ed Hardy-looking tattoos so she would never be "forced" to sit in an office. That's like saying, "I had my face surgically removed and replaced with a picture of the Killing Fields because getting laid is soooo generic." What an ass. If you want to be unemployed and unlikeable, just be yourself. You don't need to spend money on fancy things like tattoos and stretching your lobes until you can keep a beercan up there. Skunking quietly to your face.
Emily sings in an all-girl (OF COURSE) rock and roll band (when she's not doing roller derby, I bet you one million dollars) and will be singing "Barracuda" (OF COURSE) and will be doing this in a fake stupid red vintage dress with giant white buttons and polka dots and a couple of bandannas and some broaches. She's like the youngest daughter in a family of Suicide Girls who just sort of went with it. And, of course, she is beautiful and has the startings of a pretty good voice, because those girls are always beautiful and then just decide that's not good enough because boys don't get past the third date because they're so boring, so they wreck shop on themselves in every way possible to become interesting, and then date downward, usually heading straight to bartending pothead pussies that all look like DAUGHTRY.
Making her salable in every way, because the true secret of Edward Cullen is that having no personality of your own means you're the sexiest thing around because I can just put all my stuff on you and it'll automatically stick. Simon likes her, Paula loves her, Randy's into it, Kara thinks she's "serious," which compared to most people in LA she is. Which is the tragedy, because she's every girl in Austin TX who forgot to get a personality of her own and went prêt-a-porter, which after all in LA is twice as far as everybody else has gotten yet. She cries a bit about how this is all she has, of course, and they play "Alone," of course, and she gets through. Oh, and there's her DAUGHTRY boyfriend now, with a coyote-howling-at-the-moon t-shirt and a tiny little soul patch, watching her get smaller and smaller on the horizon as she tries desperately to become the girl version of DAUGHTRY.
Meet Randy Madden (27, Moorpark, CA): Butterfaced thin-haired greasy lonely guy five years older than everybody else at every party with a keg, huge Bret Michaels bandanna, who informs us that he looks like a rocker. He doesn't look like a rocker, he looks like science teacher. Then he cries eleven times and begs people to tell him he's awesome. I think maybe he is on shaky ground, emotionally or perhaps mentally, and should he drinking some soup on his couch instead of being douchey on TV. He tells the judges that he's a "rocker in a box" because he has one of those hateful "jobs" Emily's so much better than, and then he sings "Livin' On A Prayer," which I used to think personally was a pantydropper but from now on will just kind of make you feel wistful about Randy Madden. It's tryhard in that jacked-up teeth way of the aging rocker who hasn't yet mastered shaving or the other finer points of personal grooming.
Simon calls Randy out for being unconvinced -- and how can you do anything but live your passion when you're wearing a scarf as a belt? -- and then tells him to shut up and stop being a drama queen because he's not actually talented. Randy tells him he wants to do some mealymouthed "connecting with people" shit, and Simon explains that no, actually he wants to be a rockstar and he will never, ever be a rockstar, so he should... Paula tells him to start a cover band, essentially, and fall into that bottomless black hole, and Kara D tells him something we won't ever know because Paula starts snarling lamely and throwing shit at Simon in a desperate bid for attention, and then gives him a speech so lame even his hair-trigger emotions find boring, and Simon's eyes glaze over, and she randomly throws Simon the finger -- which is sort of awesome -- and then Randy comes out looking for a blowjob from Ryan Seacrest, and his thousand identical friends watch him cry and wonder if they should hug him, and at some point -- maybe it's the farewell heel-click -- it just starts seeming like David Wain is having his comedic way with us once again.
JB Ahfua (16, Taylorsville, UT) has one of those gigantic I Can't Believe It's 16 voices, which he belts at them. Simon and Paula both make eyes at him, Randy and Kara are more reserved but overall pleased. Simon tells him to chill, Paula tells him he's lovely, and it's unanimous. He's mildly pleased. Ryan's tan explains to his family what the golden ticket means, like they don't know, and then calls JB "bro," and JB cries for awhile and the piano in the background is like, "No seriously, you care."
Michael Gurr (17, Mesa, AZ) is scared, and adorable, and clearly about to barf crazy all over everything. He talks about how he might barf, and then enters the judges' room to the thundering sounds of terror. Turns out, this is all with good reason, because he sings like a fucking freak. Through the nose, overly breathy in that Britney way, with some of that weird noise Jewel and Shakira sometimes make. And they all feel weird about it because he's so fucking cute and clearly in the weeds, and he clutches at himself and clasps his hands, and then just to be dicks they let him lisp another song, and he stops almost immediately because Randy's got the church giggles, and Kara D -- not yet jaded by all this -- is like, "Randy, did you know he's a human being?" That's adorable, Kara. I can't wait to see this show break her spirit like it's done all of ours. Outside, Michael Gurr goes into a catatonic Cameron state, plopping down in the middle of the floor and staring into space. I hope he lives.
Off-topic sort of, but during commercials I have to tell you a very special story that happened to someone I really care about, today. That person was me. The thing that happened to him was that I got an email from a S4 auditioner who was so troubled by what I wrote that he has completely changed his image and started bodybuilding. Yeah. I know. But so the kicker is that he was in Playgirl last year. He even sent me a (censored in MSPaint, which is the sweetest detail if you think about it) photo of the page on which he is featured. And yes, there has been drastic and discernible improvement in many areas; in fact looking at this Playgirl profile makes the future so bright that I almost feel I should be wearing those proverbial shades you get when you hope too hard.
Do I consider myself a hero? Hmm, good question. Not really. I made a difference in someone's life, and that's something special. I made a difference in a stranger's life, and we'll always be connected by that, and now he's been in Playgirl, and I can't take really credit for it, but I am proud of him. I mean, the work was all him, you know? That's humbling. So, if for just a moment those footprints on the beach happened to be mine, I just hope he pays it forward. I guess what I'm trying to say is that basically, what I do changes lives.
Will Kunick (17, Garfield, NJ, Music Student) does an impenetrable version of Tears For Fears' "Mad World," but really I think it's just Michael Gurr from a second ago with longer hair. He's got the same button-cuteness, eyebrows identical to those of The Piemaker, and the same whispy weird lispy nose-singing as we just deal with.
Celine Dion's "It's All Coming Back To Be Now" is performed by the effortlessly dorky DJ Bradley (22, Seattle), who has... You know that graphic designer thing where you make lemonade out of your tragic face using quirky vintage suit jackets and square glasses, and it makes you seem hot from far away? Like suddenly he could get you a really good table at the bottle lounge just by texting somebody, and his underwear costs more than your entire outfit? He's got that thing almost under control. Another couple years, his hair will work itself out and he'll just look vaguely European, and all the things working against him will be part of the overall mystique. All his furniture will be black and low to the ground, and he'll actually be hot. Until then, he just seems like a secret furry who went straight from here to his D&D game.
From Dion to Dionne (and straight into John Donne) we go: "I'll Never Love This Way Again" is performed, by one Shawn Vasquez (20, Oakland, "musician"). And Shawn, oh, let me count the ways. Gender dysphoria is not a term to be tossed around lightly because it is a medical diagnosis, so I'm going to have to stick with a giant, luxurious W T F. Sparkly fake-bling star earrings the size of a fist, what looks like the World Wrestling Federation logo shaved into his head, the slightest hint of eyeliner, and a weirdly stained XXL buttondown that's been glitter-painted with TRUE STAR. Randy's like, "Fuck all of this."
Outside, overenthusiastic hottie Aundre "X-Ray" Caraway (20, Phoenix) is playing his guitar and acting foolish with his giant awesome teeth and talking about how he hopes hot Kara (or whatever her name is) will be impressed. He sings something called "Cactus Baby" with a lot of jive turkey moves, a half-glove, and a complete lack of seriousness about any of this that he tries to sell as personality but just comes off as annoying as shit. There's some uncalled-for "lawdy lawdy" and a breakdown where he just sort of claps like a seal all over the place and goes "ork ork" and the judges, thinking this wasn't going to be so stupid, realize they spent too long on this already. Then he throws some stupid Pootie Tang word noises at them, and everybody just acts really embarrassed and hopes he leaves without incident. These hopes are dashed, and he tries some more, and Simon is like, "Seriously, we're done with your ass." The rarely seen bouncers make an appearance, because geez, and he finally leaves.
comes a girl who wants to "pay it forward," just like I just wrote a few paragraphs ago, because Ryan and I have a bromance that puts Brody Jenner to shame. I don't really know what she's all about, this girl, because it's really boring. She's all about singing to old people, or abducting them, or something sweet as pie like that. Arianna Afsar (16, San Diego) has a nice voice in the Taylor Swift area, is pretty much gorgeous, and will be eaten by this shit in one bite like a prosciutto-wrapped stick of butter left just outside a tiger cage. Her phrasing and the way her lips work with her teeth and chipmunk cheeks is reminiscent of early Janet Jackson, but she's obviously really, really young so we don't have to worry about the weird Janet shit for a few years at least. Simon likes her voice, Paula says she's beautiful, they're still not letting Kara talk really, and Randy sees the money vibes coming off her. Unanimous yeses for Arianna, and then my second-favorite song by my second-favorite band, bangin' date-rape anthem "Shake It" by Metro Station, who are the older brothers of the Disney channel. And that's Phoenix Day One: Nine golden tickets including Emily, Arianna, a grip of gay guys (or wait, that's Emily and her boyfriend again), and a lovely tiny little argyle weirdo we'll be seeing again for sure.
Cute blonde hipster guy from the opening montage welcomes us to Day Two, where Kara's wearing something sexy and Randy's wearing something stupid, and Paula's dressed sort of like Blair Waldorf. Then there's a montage that's so suddenly, so without-notice horrifying that I had to rewind like seven times to understand Ryan's justification for it, which is "here are some people who sing off-key, in preparation for somebody singing even more off-key," but my golly the awful people they picked. There's a white doughboy who sings like a lady from S4 that I sort of remember, that absolutely terrifying S6 schizophrenic redheaded ogre that was ten feet tall and missing teeth who I still dream about, that high-voiced piccolo fetus-looking freak from last year that sang about the "frosty mountains." Then there's a thyroid case that talks like Ray Romano's TV brother whose voice I can barely understand but I bet it sets off car alarms. He sounds like the voice of the mountains and their history. He sounds like Treebeard but in real life.
Elijah Scarlett (22, Phoenix) will be singing "My First, My Last, My Everything," and will be singing it in a key you've never heard of unless you went to Hogwarts. Perhaps he will free Tsathaggua with this voice, or cause the Big One along the San Andreas. We shall see. Oh, no. No, because he sings like Goofy from the cartoons, but super-slowed down. Have you heard this evidence about how if you slow down Kylie Minogue to some specific esoteric number, she is Rick Astley? It's amazing. And you know, I've never seen them in the same place. I feel bad about Rick Astley and what happened there. Simon goes for Elijah's jugular about how he fucked up even thinking he should audition, and then Paula tells him to go be in a movie "with monsters in it." Kara's amazed at them, but she's so innocent! These are softballs. Talk to me three cities from now when Simon's calling them bush babies and Paula's handing out rusty trombones just so she can feel something.
You know, ugly-crazy is one thing. It's sort of funny because it's tragic, and it's always okay to laugh at ugly people because it's what is on the outside that counts. But I can't handle pretty-crazy at all, because it gets annoying so much faster. At least with ugly crazy you can zone out on their mindblowing appearance. But take this girl Lea Marie Golde (16, LA), who is absolutely lovely, with her pretty red hair and absolute level of comfort making fucked-up faces, which is usually a good thing. But she's wearing all pink, and a felt cowboy hat with a big silver conch buckle, and she's unable to stop whooping and yelling and hollering and talking. She's got a killer body, and she's been waiting her whole life to be sixteen, so she can audition. Already you kind of get this Tracy Flick vibe from her like maybe she makes it hard for people to like her at school even though she's got everything going for her. I can see her with a clipboard demanding money without shame, yelling "point of order!" and stuff like that.
Lea Marie goes, "And now it's happening!" and then sort of waits for the cameraman to be as excited as she is, and then stares blankly for a sec, and then she's off again, tossing her hat in the air and dancing insanely and talking about how she's a cross between Hilary Duff and Madonna -- both "daring" and "fun," sort of dancey -- and that's when you see the crazy eyes, and then she does that stomach-rolling thing that gives us all the heebies, and more screaming, and some "grooving," and then a bunch of insane twirling right into the camera (awesomely) and she's written 100 songs, and she's obsessed with Kara DioGuardi. She's brought her notebook of all her songs, and she will be committing suicide on Kara's lawn basically, is what she's telling us. Then she... sort of does.
Kara reaches out and demands to touch her "flesh," for some reason she doesn't explain, and I think I'm in love with Kara DioGuardi. But not as much as Lea Marie, who sings some dance track. There's something off with her tone, she's got a good tone sort of like Jodi Benson, but it's a little nasal and note-averse. Sometimes people just can't sing. They can almost sing, but not all the way. They love her songwriting passion but not her voice. Paula tells her to pull the voice together, and Simon calls her horrible and annoying. Kara calls her a baby-voiced theatre dork and tells her much lovely shit about her songs. Simon's like, "Why don't you listen to all of her songs?" And Kara is obliged to say she might.
Lea Marie, who has been shooting them intense Tracy Flick bitchface the entire time, is like, "You're on the fence about me. I can tell." The true hallmark of an Idol whackjob. Simon's like, "I am not on the fence in any way," and they vote no, because she can't sing. She bugs them and bugs them, and just to be cruel he makes Kara give the third no. She handles it really awesomely. Kara's already crept up there with Simon and Ryan in terms of the joy of watching professionals be amazing at their job and she hasn't even done anything. Somehow, I wonder if the credit for this doesn't really go to Paula, but I don't want to think that.
Stevie Wright (16, Phelan, CA) was named for Stevie Nicks and may or may not be pretty. Ryan really likes her, which is a good sign. There's also an intense dorkiness to her dancing in that little post-interview blue box, which generally is also a good sign. Ryan sends her in with quite a pep talk, and Paula loves her name. Kara, of course, loves Stevie Nicks because she's a great songwriter. Yeah, I'd say she's pretty; she's got a huge face and a sort of Jessica Biel vibe. She sings "At Last," which is one of those songs that's always a mistake unless it isn't, and this time... It isn't, really. I mean you could conk out listening to it, but that's how the song works. Stevie herself is measured and rich in tone. I love the Jordin Sparks thing going on this year, with all these youthful sixteen-year-olds getting all preternaturally Dakota Fanning on your ass.
What's nice about this audition is that you can see the moment when they make up their minds about her -- it's about ten seconds in, because that's what the X factor is about -- but what's brilliant about this audition is that Stevie sees it, too, and then just goes on singing without even a slight hesitation. I like this girl. Simon asks her if she can compete at all, and she equates this with being "mean." Now, you and I know that this is because she's a 16-year-old girl, and has been trained her whole life thus far not to be "mean" in this way, but the only one of those Simon understands is of course Ryan, and even that is on a nonverbal level, so he's flummoxed by this reply and tells her to grow a pair. Then they play a happy Stevie Nicks song, and her family crowds her, and Ryan almost cries and lets his nervous little fists relax. Inside, Kara and Paula compete over who loves her more and who will get credit if/when she becomes the Kelly Clarkson. Seriously, that's awesome.
up is a side of serious Grade A named Michael Sarver (27, Jasper, TX, still famous ten years later for murdering people of color in horrific ways) who's a roughneck on oil rigs, and he tells us how dangerous this is, and how he wants to be on Idol for money because he has of course one million blonde children who will grow up prone to obesity and racism. I ask again: how come trashy girls are just trashy, but trashy guys get a hotness bonus? It's so gross and unfair. Or maybe there are guys who are into gross girls like that and I just don't know any men of this nature. Anyway, Michael -- Ryan's polar opposite, according to Simon -- sings... "Grateful" by Kelly Clarkson! Interesting. His voice is no great shakes, but nice. Randy says it was better with his eyes closed, because the voice is thinner and higher than his looks would suggest. It's unanimous, with an extra wink from Simon. Lose the choker and we'll talk. Lose the choker and the shirt and we'll talk. You can keep the jeans.
After a quick montage of boring bad singing, there's a bunch of dummies in bikinis. Or no, it's the same one but her hair is sometimes blonde and sometimes brunette. Maybe she's Jem. She's naked like Hannah Montana, and she wants to marry Ryan and make out with him later. This causes him to babble uncomfortably and try to stop her from talking as charmingly as he can. Which is very, of course. The judges are all grossed out by her bikini-clad entry and deal with it in their own ways: Randy giggles weirdly, Simon pretends he's got a boner, Kara -- dripping with hatred -- tells her to do a little twirl for the guys, and Paula, I don't know and I am done with this anyway. Paula plays Jenga at this point, let's say.
Katrina Darrell (20, Chino "ew" Hills, CA) is a model who will be singing "Vision Of Love." Will she be singing it well? Not really, because it's not a song you should be singing on this show, bikini or no. So they make fun of her for awhile and Simon eye-gropes her for awhile, and the camera travels slowly up her backside, and Simon lets her through... And Kara calls total bullshit. Here we go. Randy gives another yes, and Kara shits a brick. Kara explains that she's not about to hate on the girl for being a dummy in a bikini, and then sings the song how she should sing the song, and instead of understanding her point -- that a certain amount of emotional involvement is somewhat necessary for a performer -- Katrina offers to sing the end of the song. Which is sort of like doing the opposite of what Kara told her to do, because the singing is all bombast and runs and whatever.
But now suddenly it's gotten very ugly, because Katrina's whooping and hollering the end, and Kara gets drawn into a sing-off with the girl, which is bad poker and sort of makes Kara D look asshatty, if only because you gain nothing from doing this and end up looking like the jealous bitch you just said you weren't trying to be. And I mean, there is nothing special about this girl. At all. There's no reason to get weird about it. And yet suddenly it's like Katrina's a hot guy and Kara is Donald Trump trying to show everybody his penis and how much money's in his wallet, and it's really gross*. Kara tries to explain that "singing just like Mariah Carey only less so" is not a marketable skill and she doesn't have the chops to sing a Mariah song. Katrina informs Kara that her demonstration of the song was no better than hers, and the fact that she can't tell the difference is the entire conversation they're still unable to have, for the same reason you don't let a dog choose the paint colors for your den.
So now Paula is all up in arms, Kara's singing angrily, Paula's screaming at the girl for being a bitch and screaming at Kara that she doesn't need to prove anything to this dipshit, and Kara's just going off on her, and the girl stares at the chaos she's unleashed with this pitch-perfect Mean Girl grin she's been perfecting since the third grade when her mom went on Paxil, and Randy is of course laughing uncomfortably and loudly, and everybody's like this Picasso horror of their worst sides showing all at once, and Kara says she doesn't care what her name is because all they need to know is her bikini top and bottom, which turns Kara right back around to awesome again, and the girl rolls her eyes hatefully, and then Paula puts her through so the nightmare can end, and Kara spits, "time just come naked."
And that, kids, is How I Met Your Mother. Kara DioGuardi, Ryan's going to have to scooch over a little bit, because you just claimed a place in my heart forever.
*(On further reflection, in fact, I think that right about here are some minutes we didn't see in the edit, because you know Katrina's one of those "women just don't like me, it's soo weird" people and was almost certainly tossing bitch vibes at Kara from the moment she walked in. If you can read a room you can tell something in the air has changed at this point, and it makes Kara's ensuing snarls a good deal more understandable. Or I am in love with her and must therefore give her the same wide berth I give Simon Cowell.) So after being called a whore more eloquently and more times than I have ever seen a person be called a whore at one sitting, they make her jump up and down -- for real -- and Kara finally gets her to turn around so they can check out her ass. Then Kara drawls, "I have to admit, she has a nice derriere." And OMG the girl thanks her! In that fake sorority way where she knows they're both being bitches but she can't quite figure out how.
I want to buy Kara DioGuardi a drink right now, my God. It wouldn't take the Mentalist to notice that this girl is a totally fake dickhead from go, but it took a superhero to call her one, to her face, eleven times in a row, and barely get up from her chair. She goes through, and inside both Kara and Paula are like, "That girl is fucking horrible." I hope she gets to the Top Three so I can keep hating her ass so hard, and so Kara can find new ways each week to tell her to go jump in a lake. Katrina runs outside and jumps nervous Ryan by the pool; his lips almost crawl off his face to get away from her. God, that's uncomfortable. He asks snarkily what they "saw" in her, and tells her to go jump in the pool. Which means that he has a psychic bond with Kara DioGuardi, which means by the associative psychic power property I too have a psychic bond with Kara DioGuardi. She says hi.
Ryan hugs Kara backstage, and then there's a whole breakdown about how nobody can remember that her name rhymes with "oversharer" and "nearer and farrer." It's cute. Not cute? Eric Thomas (17, Phoenix) calling (and having had tattooed) himself "Sexual Chocolate." He's moderately hot, but that name is like a propeller-beanie sucking all the hotness out of him through his head and transmitting it into deep space where the stupidest aliens are. Nobody's impressed, and Randy babbles at him for awhile before he sings poorly in his very complicated jeans, forcing Simon to chew on the inside of his mouth and Kara to laugh openly at him. "Thank you, Sexual," Simon says to cut him off, and Paula reads that if he fails, his mother will get him a car. That's stupid, he's stupid, go home. Buckle your seatbelt. Drive to the clue store.
Crying girl, chubby angry drama girl, total dork in a fedora, Brooke White somehow. And then a very cute vicacious girl (hanging out with beefy Michael, because if Hollywood Week has taught us anything it's that the good ones seek each other out through a sixth sense) comes in to sing "Let's Hear It For The Boy." I hope Brianna Quijada (22, Tempe, AZ) does well: she's beyond adorable, and fun without seeming hyperactive and insane like most of the younger ones that come off as "fun" until you think a little harder about spending an hour in their company. Oh, she's great! They weren't kidding about cutting down on the awful auditions. I really thought some dark part of myself would miss the shitty ones and I was already planning on how to admit that, but this has actually been enjoyable. They aren't convinced and ask her to sing another song, so she asks where she should start "Killing Me Softly." Simon tells her to start at the end, and she whines, "Simie!" Cute, but you can tell he's snapped something very important inside her that is going to fuck the rest of this up, without even trying.
The girls build her up as Simon makes her more and more nervous, and Paula yells NOW and she does, just busts out into it, and the boys immediately yell at her to stop, and Kara and Paula get kind of disappointed as she degrades down into... horrors, basically. Regrettable. Kara tells her she's super fun, and she starts crying and its sad, and Randy says no, and Kara says not this time, and Paula gives her a yes, which makes her so happy that she just gives into crying and kind of stands there with nowhere to go... And then Simon puts her through! AWESOME! He gives her a big hug and she freaks out when Paula hugs her, and then there is much screaming. That was amazing. Even Ryan is like, "How... did she do that?"
I'm done. Why is there still so much show? Cute families, moms and grandmas and grandpas and families in color-coded outfits and mom supporting their gay kids, and some cute tiny guy, and then a pretty girl who's all alone. Deanna Brown (25, Louisville) has Pickler Mouth but it comes off cute instead of retarded, and she talks about how she borrowed somebody else's family to get through this because hers couldn't come. She's inviting enough I guess, with only marginal trash-face and unbearable eyeliner, kind of a mean, sneaky smile, but nice enough. She kind of has that bartender-girl thing where you wouldn't want to get too incredibly close to her as a new friend because there's a lot of screaming at her boyfriend-type drama locked up in there. Or maybe a... Yeah, maybe a baby.
The vibe is like one of those girls you know at work where on Monday her car dies and Tuesday her cat dies and Wednesday her waterheater dies and Thursday her grandmother dies and by Friday your heart has died and you can no longer care that she's broken up with her boyfriend for the eighteenth time and needs to talk to somebody on the phone about it for six hours and say the same things over and over and over, and then you meet the guy and he's so unbelievably boring that you can't imagine squeezing even one liquid ounce of drama out of him, much less the unending quarts she's been coming up with this whole time. So she sings that song about sitting on the dock of the bay that never fails to get my heart racing, through her nose like a Pussycat Doll, and they put her through, and Ryan pretends to be her family, and then her mom screams bloody murder on an iPhone.
Meet Cody Sheldon (17, Detroit), who has a lot going for him. He seems smart, I think his voice is pretty good, his family is so very supportive, his dorky girlfriends all have fucked up hair but seem cool (one is already planning on being his Sanjaya Crying Girl), and his -- Grandmother? Bestie? Whatever -- she's like a thousand! She looks like Edie Britt. That's kind of cool, I hope they met at pilates or a book-burning or something. Anyway, he talks about how much he loves horror movies, and they show some footage, and here's the thing: he's so scary looking. He's got bright blue eyes, like the fake contacts that are my kryptonite blue, and shaggy hair that's poorly dyed in the way only a 17-year-old boy can fuck it up, and he's so like "I get lost in the music" and "I really love dark stuff" and it's like, all too real. He's normal until he opens his eyes, and then looks like a monster in a movie, like the Dunwich Cuckoos or that girl that comes out of your TV seven days from right now. He has Pennywise eyes. Kara's like, "Your awesome voice is really at odds with how scary you look in your face," and he gets through, as he should. I don't know if I can handle Cody Sheldon for very long. He's like a scary lady. Maybe they will fix him. Coming up: the "Worst of the West," and this blind guy they keep talking about.
Apparently Simon's big thing in Phoenix has been asking them each what three countries in the world they would be popular in. That's a very interesting question, actually; it's actually more entertaining to watch Kara and Randy's patience with this question degrade throughout the two days, but the answers are similarly interesting. This girl who is like if they remade Rocky Horror Picture Show starring Grace Jones thinks New York and Atlanta are the best countries for her, a blonde girl says the nation of California, cornrow guy says Paris and London, a nerd says the US and Europe -- including England, France, and Russia -- a really weird- and cool-looking guy awesomely says Madagascar, a Korean kid says Korea, the Sweet Transvestite says New Jersey, and then there's Alex.
Alex Wagner-Trugman (19, Studio City CA) is looking forward to rocking the stages in Abkhazia, Zimbabwe, and Canada. He's adorable in a Big Bang-type way, which is to say that if he gets through, there will be much bitching about how nerdy he is, and it will slowly give way to drooling aphasic lols of the Cooktard/Claymate/Botool sort. Mark my words. Also: Abkhazia, right off the top of his head. He tells a story about how he used to train his voice by singing in his closet, but sadly there was mold and he got sick. That's some A-Fed tragedy right there. Also, he is missing a Spanish test to be here. Alex, you are awesome. I really hope he does well. He is about five years from too much tail to deal with and he doesn't even know it! "If I don't do it, then I'll probably get a B, or worse. For nothing. That was a joke." He smiles awesomely and stares into space awkwardly and it's like, you never get anywhere wishing Seth Cohen was real, but what if he was? That would be so neat.
Simon reads off Alex's thing that he just came out of the closet, and Alex swallows his entire protruding Adam's apple at this, and Paula's like, "Don't be a dick!" and Ryan's like, "There is nothing in the world as terrible as being gay!" and Alex just calmly explains to them that Simon was "doing a literal interpretation" of that saying, and so it's fine. I love him sooo much. Remember Adam Pratt? He's like Adam Pratt 2.0, but with a chance in hell. Kara's amazed that Alex is so gentle about it, like, "Who doesn't fucking love Simon Cowell?" Alex will be singing "Baby, Come To Me" by James Ingram, but only if Randy will duet with him on the chorus. Kara asks -- as though you need a reason when you're Alex, who obviously has a plan and an apparatus for getting things done -- if this is because Randy wrote it or something, and Randy's all about the Tao of Alex, like, "I didn't write it, but I like it?" And then is about to say something to Kara but then Alex starts singing and he just drops the whole thing.
His hair is fluffy: that's something you can fix. Great cheekbones. Interesting voice, good range and control. All of this he taught himself in the closet, surrounded by mold and dreams. Randy sings along, and the girls make out with each other, which throws him off. Randy calls it a weird tone but with great pitch, and Paula loved him too. Simon's not buying it, so I guess it's up to Kara? He offers to sing "God Save The Queen," and once again explains that he's kidding because he doesn't know the words. Come on, Kara, give it to him. I love him too much, at least let me see him in Hollywood Week. I'm really surprised by Simon here, because you can see it. Why can't Simon? He calls him "Joe Cocker Spaniel," and without missing a beat Alex goes, "That would be a good joke if it made sense." This kid, you guys. Man. Kara puts him through, and Simon's like, "ugh," but he winks at the other three. Ryan asks why Simon didn't get it, and Alex softly says, "Maybe he drank some bad tea this morning. Apparently I'm not going to be quite the hit with the British audience that I thought." But what of Zimbabwe, Alex Wagner-Trugman? What of Abkhazia?
Okay, let's do this shit. Some kind of overproduced thing like the opening credits of Kid Nation leads into the bad singing montage of "Wanted Dead Or Alive": hot dorky vest guy with Buddy Holly glasses, crazy daycare-worker version of Flavor Flav, a 45-year old man who has no business being here, a ginger dickhead, some girl, that deep-voiced dude, a redheaded child molester, that unstoppable guitar guy, Bikini Bitch, that first guy that almost puked, yet another redheaded freak, that guy with the giant afro, some giant screaming lady, that crazy girl in all the pink, a whole stadium of wannabes, a blonde guy with chromosomal irregularities, the crying rocker guy Randy, vest guy singing his guitar solo, What If Ugly Betty Were A Dude, some timid librarian, vest guy screeching weirdly, and a horrible ponytailed Ren Faire bisexual polyamorous wiccan in a pirate suit. All in one paragraph, friends. Remember when that was 180 minutes out of the week for two months, and you never saw a single person get a golden ticket? This is the best season ever.
But lest we be allowed to go on our way, let's see if they can take every schmucky sentimental thing and wrap it up with a nice bow. He should be blonde, good-looking, possibly a twin, great voice... But what's going to really sell it? They stooped to genetic manipulation to make Archuleta last year, what's more endearing and cynical than a lip-licking child/kitten hybrid? Oh, that's right. This time he's BLIND.
Scott MacIntyre (23, Scottsdale) he looks like Casey Affleck with '70s Cassidy hair, writes and plays beautiful music on the piano, and is a total charmer. Entered college and fourteen, graduated at nineteen, went to London and is wearing his London "Mind The Gap" shirt for Simon. But don't be fooled: the music they're playing over this interview is Coldplay's "Lost" ("Just because I'm hurting/ Doesn't mean I'm hurt"), and I mean, not just any version, the acoustic one, like, Jennifer Aniston is about to bust out onto the screen and be like, "Kids have cancer! Even at Thanksgiving!" I guess since they're not doing IGB this year they had to get this shit out of the way.
He sings "And So It Goes" by Kara's fellow songwriter Billy Joel, and everybody's mother and aunt and grandmother watching immediately starts crying salty rivers of tears that cascade across the floor and out the door and into the street carrying little paper boats on which children with cancer have written their dreams downstream like it's Magic Realism Day, and outside everybody is screaming for him, and Ryan gives him an awkward high five, and dude, 27 golden tickets in Phoenix but you know Scott's going to win this bitch. You know it. Even he can see it coming.
...Anyway, it's been too long, and I love what you're wearing! See you tomorrow in Kansas City.
Check out our worst performances>a? by people who were actually supposed to be good.