Eleven weirdos left. Well, twelve if you count Jewel.
Everybody: "It's so weird how sometimes you're on a game show where people get eliminated, and then people get eliminated. It's so weird how everybody on a game show always has this exact same conversation in the second episode. It's so weird being the most photographed barn in America. I'm not here to make friends. Et cetera."
Giant Sassy Black Guy: "[No idea. Not relevant. What is his name?]"
Jewel: "[Irrelevant, except she says "booty-shakin', which is quite relevant.]"
The Challenge: Write a dance song. If I were involved in this challenge I would write a dance song about not wanting to dance, or possibly a dance song about not wanting to write a dance song. That would blow Jewel's entire mind I bet. Or just sing a song by Interpol and she would have no idea. They're the kind of band that's simultaneously mainstream and like super esoteric if you're Jewel, do you know what I mean?
Awkward Dancing, the new moisturizing razor from Schick. Free your mind with Awkward Dancing.
Jackie: "Over dance music, I prefer writing strange toy music. That is my preferred genre."
Jewel: "Thish week I'm going to talk with a Carol Channing shlur. I still haven't figured out how talking worksh. Razzberries! Now, say hello to decorated singer-songwriter Donna Summer."
Sonyae: "This is relevant because it allows me to talk about myself. Sound effects. Grits. Noises. Mostly, me."
Jewel: "Now, the thing about dance music is that it's pretty stupid, so this challenge is going to be pretty stupid. We all know that a dance track is just hooks set to a beat. And since you are making the hooks, and then pretending to make a song of them later, we thought we'd give you some phat beats right now."
Everybody: Applauds for no reason.
Jewel: "The phat beat was composed [srsly] by [some guy who I think is a sponsor of this show or maybe I made that part up]."
Everybody: Pretends to know who he is slash look grateful.
NICK MIGHT EVEN BE WORSE THAN NEVIN
They all hook themselves up to headphones so nobody can hear them thinking, and that snotty punk rocker one, Nick, tells everybody more wisdom about life even though he's so gross he's got two different colors of colored contacts on so he manages to look both unhinged and also like he works in the bitchiest section of Uniqlo, and then crazy Melissa brings it home.
Melissa: "I thought first of a forest with wolves in it, but then I was like, that's too foresty. What about natural disasters?"
Everybody: Is mortifying singing to themselves with these headphones on. I would rather die than watch this part.
Elvis Guy -- Brian?: "I'm going to sing really low like a young boy wearing his father's shoes. It will be kind of like 'I'm Too Sexy,' only like vastly creepier."
Bitchy Nick: "Everybody else in the universe is such a problem, I feel like."
Country Girl Karen: "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE"
Nick: "Like that. The only club Karen's ever been in is the country club. PS, I am so consumed with generating soundbites and catchphrases and being an annoying cutesy little swot that I don't even really notice when the things I say are idiotic and make no sense. I'm sort of the Christian Siriano here, to be honest."
Giant Sassy Scott. Scotty? Scott? Something: "[The dead look in his eyes.]"
Jewel makes everybody put down their pencils, which involves waving her arms around because they have headphones on and can't hear her slurred, breasty speech.
TIME TO GET HOOKING
Karen: It's not bad, it's actually pretty. You can get fairly melodic in there. I like Kylie -- well, Fever -- and St. Etienne and that's all I know, but it's a sort of Kylie hook.
Jackie: I'm sorry, but it's terrible. Just like in every way. So probably the judges will love it, because I really just don't understand this dumb show at all. Plus Donna Summer says she got goosebumps, which causes Jackie to act even more like herself than usual.
Blessing: The song is called "Dance Romance." I know the impulse secretly is to infantilize him or treat him like he's magic or somehow innocent and so it's good to reverse that -- maybe that's why the first thing he did was try to fuck Sonyae in her name -- but it doesn't mean that he's not a huge dork. Even Donna Summer stares at him like, "What a loser."
Nick: Crosses the line once again on the way to complimenting himself, then sings in his whiny Metro Station voice about putting those hands up. It's annoying and terribly commercial and he's just such a terrible human being that he can say shit like, "I can hear the ooh-aahs/ As I try to moonwalk" and think that is acceptable behavior for a person. He has literally the most punchable face I've ever seen. Just luxuriously and flagrantly cruisin' for that bruisin'.
Amber: Seems to be mostly different pronunciations -- hell, spellings -- of the word "way." It's like e.e. cummings over here.
no
way
baybay
it's my way til payday
how much do you
weigh
Scotty: Well. The song is called "Paint This Club With Amazing," and the first thing he does is paint the floor with Amazing, and then presumably the walls are painted with Amazing, and so forth. But ironically, he forgot to put on primer first, so the Not-So-Amazing you can see it coming through the Amazing before it's even dried and you gotta be like, "Oh, shit. How Amazing."
Seriously, watching these thin-voiced people sing and give themselves their own echo effects and desperation with Donna Summer shooting hate lasers are them. It is like the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened.
Donald Trump & Sarah Palin: "Man, this is ugly."
Sonyae: Is bullshitty some more. I'm in NYC this week and the Carroll stop of the F has a poster for this dumb show and it's like all of them hanging out and writing on the wall about their reasons for writing ("I write for money," or "I write to express myself" or whatever dumb thing) and the Brooklyn kids have taken it upon themselves to add more writing to this situation and Sonyae's mouth is now saying, "I WRITE FOR ATTENTION." Which means at least one other person is watching this show, because for real.
Donna Summer: "That wasn't bad, fellow female African-American."
Sonyae: "Thanks for your approval, even though I don't need it. From anybody."
Melissa: Has gone with "natural disasters" after all, and turns out a surprisingly roughed-up sort of grammatically suspect club thing. I think if life was the X-Men Melissa would be Rebecca Romijn, because you just never know with her.
Johnny: The song is called "Push On You" and I suppose the main message is that breasts are inviting but penises, not so much. Donna Summer is unimpressed; the song is gross. It's about how your dance moves make him want to push on you. Which the image that brings up is just like this irresistible force, this weak vegan wall of Heterosexual Johnny, coming right at you, hips jutting, skinny jeans, and like no matter what you do, there he is pushing on you. He's very attractive, obviously, not to say kinda stunning sometimes, but good God that does not sound fun.
Here I come! Better watch out because here I come! To push!
Jes: Whiny/pretty. This is also the point where you never want to hear this fucking beat again. I think she'll be Top Three. One of the top three hookers.
Brian: The song is called "My Ridiculous" and it's so far down out of his range it's like even Liz Phair would be like, "Twelvis, don't write songs for yourself you cannot yourself sing." Once again he sounds like a teenager who has been mistaken one too many times for his mother on the landline and has determined to make at least this one change in his life. Although it is hysterically mortifying to watch, it contains a line about his face becoming stupid that's worthwhile -- and true fact -- and of course, everybody else loves it because this show is so mysterious.
UNTIL MY FACE GETS STUPID, HE SAID
Jewel and Donna retire so the rest of them can beat up Nick, hopefully. Third place then goes to Scotty, who painted things with Amazing. Jewel mentions his strength with melody and arrangement, but tells him to find better lyrics than last week. I would say he already has a fine start with this concept of interior design-as-adjective.
Karen pulls second place, with her codependent soaring anthem sounding song about making it easier to love her. Donna asks her to be more creative even, and Jewel prescribes an extra helping of "modern female empowerment," which firstly I thought was weird but then remembered the words of the song.
Karen: "Thank you, I'll remember that."
Jewel: "No, I mean like in life. Like have some respect for yourself."
Karen: "That's what I meant also."
Donna Summer: "Okay, and this is the number-one winner of the whole thing. Although I am jaded, I was impressed with this person's inspired creativity."
Nick: "You are talking about me, I am sure of it!"
Donna: "No, I am talking about Elvissey over there."
RANDOM ACTS OF SENSELESS VIOLENCE
Brian's joyful face looks like somebody getting a blowjob who thinks they're being taped. It is tense and weird when everybody's clapping for him and I must say I did not care for it. He sucks his cheeks and lowers his eyelids and looks like he's going to slide down onto the floor in a Brian pudding. Barf me out. Anyway, number one hook. Maybe somebody else will sing and we won't have to hear his breathing messy skeleton singing.
Jewel: "Nick, you're making a shitbag face like usual. Care to make this whole situation weird and toxic for no reason?"
Nick: "I can do that for sure. I am the best at that. I am the best at everything, but especially being a buzzkill princess."
Jewel: "If you think you already know everything, you are going to be a permanent state of disillusion and whininess."
Melissa: Nods her head because one of her incarnations was like that.
Nick: "Okay. But I do know everything. And I am chock full of those things."
Jewel, insightful as usual: "Nick, it's not because you feel you're the best and this is unfair, it's because you're a jealous little bitch. You're not sad because you didn't win, you're sad because somebody else did. Which is not the same thing at all."
Nick: "I'm going to keep arguing, even though you are not offering opinions but facts."
Jewel: "Yeah, well, when you don't know anything then everything's up for debate."
Nick: "Maybe I'm acting childish because I'm a total child."
Jewel: "Or maybe you're just acting like a hater because you are a textbook hater and that's why nobody likes you. That and your bewilderingly off-putting choice in eyewear."
Johnny, which this is also exactly how I feel about Nick: "There's a lot there. It's just that there's more of how horrible he is, so much more, that it doesn't really balance out. Makes me sad."
Jewel: "Okay, now that baby has his wittle bottle and it's nearly naptime, let's talk about grownup things like this game show we're all on. Pay attention, no matter what antics Nick and Sonyae get up to trying to pull focus."
SUCH AS SOBBING, OR CRAZY STARING, RESPECTIVELY
Nick spends the entire team-choosing portion of the episode crying and whining and pulling cunty little faces. The big surprise of this challenge is that the songs will be up for judgment by the notoriously harsh, collective LA clubgoer. Right, because when you think discernment right away you think of LA clubbers.
Brian picks Jes first, for her amazingly authentic energy, which is code for "Like most guys, I consider women tiny mirrors to adore myself in, and Jes is really vague, so I guess I feel positively toward her." Nick is literally crying right now, sobbing in his stupid hoodie.
Karen chooses Blessing, because she wants help writing a big gay Donna Summer anthem and probably he will be best at that since he likes moany ooh-ahh songs without a lot of words in it and she's afraid she'll forget what music sounds like or something.
Scotty chooses Nick with the caveat that he is a huge asshole, but incredibly talented. I love Scotty for that; so does Nick. He sniffles and snivels on over there gratefully and it's a nice little moment. Like, you would want to be the kind of person that would do that to be kind, but it's a competition, but luckily it's also true that he's talented and young and neat, so it works out. The best/least real kind of charity is the kind that demands nothing of you, and works to your favor.
Brian will not stop sucking on his cheeks for anything and it makes him look so fucking stupid and insecure. Anyway, he calls Jackie . I like how all of them have already figured out the pecking order of who's most talented, and they all kind of accept that and they're like, just leveraging the more talented people to keep themselves in the game. That's a thrill right there.
Karen's second pick is Amber, with her never-ending supply of crocheted asshole hats; this makes Melissa feel weird.
Nick leans over with another snivelly bitch-face and tells Scotty not to pick Sonyae because he hates her and thinks she's a bitch, so Scotty totally burns him by explaining out loud to everybody that Nick hates Sonyae, so then the two drama queens can have a big fucking drama fight about what fucking losers they are, and it's brill.
Jewel: "I am loving every single second of this. I feel like Andy Cohen right now."
Sonyae: Prefers You Say It To Her Face.
Scotty: "Well, he hates Johnny too."
Nick: "To be fair, I absolutely despise every single one of you."
This Room Full Of Egos: Actually manages to have their feelings hurt by this. I'm so fucking sure. You know what Nick hating you actually feels like? Getting an award for Best Person.
Nick, verbatim: Is Not Here To Make Friends.
Sonyae points out that this entire show is about group projects, so you're not just being an asshole when you say that -- PS, you are an asshole if you say that, 100% of always -- but shooting yourself in your dumb bitch foot. And I mean, it's a weird structure for a reality show, but it occurs to me that collaboration is always a thing for songwriters. If you're a singer that writes your own songs (like Jackie secretly is, like Johnny incorrectly thinks he is) you wouldn't be on this show. So in fact Nick is just going on TV to ask that nobody ever, ever work with him no matter how talented he is and that, my friends, paints the entire room with Amazing.
So who's left is stupid Sonyae, Melissa in her purple rabbit caveman jacket, and Johnny who is like just so above all this. Scotty chooses Melissa finally and Nick shits his own pants for no real reason.
Brian sucks on his cheeks and, given the option of choosing somebody else or sticking to his team, looks at Sonyae -- whom he'd like to choose, quote, for the "visual aspect of things" -- and complains about how she doesn't play an instrument as though that's the worst thing about her. He sticks with his team, which Nick correctly assumes means he's going to somehow end up on a team with Sonyae, which causes him to whine and spit but underneath that, to rejoice, because he is ungodly amounts of terrible.
Sonyae: "Having heard dance music before, and owning breasts, makes me powerful."
Scotty: "Fine. Nick, could you ditch the awful face for like one second and act like a human being?"
Nick: "Part of me wishes I could, but no."
Sonyae: "I'm such an asshole that playing the victim role is actually a rare treat for me. Please, keep doing tiny pointless bitchy things that I can parlay into abuse in my own mind."
Also, Brian gets to keep the track but the other two teams have to start with new tracks. Once again, Nick bitches and rolls his eyes and is disgusting. But this is all that matters, really, because the lyrics are like by definition going to be stupid. Another dumb, weird thing about this business.
E.G. "CONCRETE JUNGLE WHERE DREAMS ARE MADE OF."
The new track for Team Scotty-Sonyae-Nick-Melissa -- sounds pretty all right -- and Nick says that he's hitting pause on being an asshole long enough to write this song. For him, that's an apology, for them, it is just more noise from horrible Nick.
Nick: Uses a defamatory word for women in reference to Sonyae without even putting any english on it at all. Just straight-up calls her a bitch and keeps truckin'. He is the worst, in absolutely all the ways that there are.
Team Brian-Jackie-Jes are writing a song about sex addicts, I guess. The words are really gross and Brian's pretty gross and put those things together and you got serious grossness. Once again, though, Tohn brings it home.
Jackie: "Brian, I don't know if you comprehend how fucking ridiculous you are, or this song is, but I think we should really push that aspect of it. Sometimes when I feel so awkward about myself that I want to jump in the river, I'll take that energy and turn it into irony. I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm a little bit of a hipster."
Also, Jes is or was Jackie's roommate in real life I think, or at least music partner, and I cannot figure out why they're pretending they don't know each other on this show, but it is awesome.
Team Karen-Blessing-Amber-Johnny tackle the soaring of anthems, and Karen says this retarded mumbo-jumbo right here:
"And also women empowerment, like, what exactly you're going to say, to make it easy to love [you]."
I love, love that Karen thinks this is what feminism has been leading toward this whole time: Finding just the right wording when you're begging for a man's approval. You've come a long way, Jerkoff!
More Wisdom From Karen's Empowerment Manifesto, Verbatim
"I am going to cook for you!"
"I know you like to eat that, so I am going to make it!"
"I am going to rub your feet!"
"I don't know if you've heard, I may have mentioned it previously, but I am a Southern Girl."
"I JUST SHOT ANDY WARHOL."
Amber is horrified because club songs are about sex, not cooking meals for your husband in the missionary position, and but then over on this side you've got Blessing going, "I think it should be less risqué, leave the foot-rubs out of it" and you've got Johnny stuck in some kind of Sensitive Heterosexual Guy conundrum where he can't even offer an opinion and it's so fucking stupid. They all sound like idiots. I am not going to debate a "soaring anthem" about shitty housewife fantasies. Just taking part in that conversation demeans the entire United States of America by how stupid it is. Move on.
Anyway, the words of their song are dumb, but the harmonies are nice. Blessing refuses to take part in the lyrics, I guess because dancing is evil? Or sex is? No, it's because he's too good for dance music, I'm sure of it. Which is the stupidest thing of all. It's so unfair to Johnny and Amber to have them stuck in this maze of dumbness. No sir, not when you claim to like jazz, the stupidest most indulgent annoying pretentious awful caterwauling noise ever invented so musicians could finally feel okay about jerking each other off...
...Is what I would say, if I wanted a big fucking hassle from a bunch of douchebags, so I won't. Brian's song still contains the words about his face getting stupid, and Jes and Jackie complain at length about how he's singing so loud they can't think.
Jackie: "Some dude singing is not a club hit."
Brian: "Wrong."
Jes: "Seriously, who wants to hear this song at all?"
Brian: "Wrong. Elvis called, you're wrong."
Jackie: "Dude, here's the thing. You've already written a song called 'My Ridiculous," which makes no sense, and contains the lyric ''til my face gets stupid,' which also makes no sense. Do you really want to add your douchey self into the mix here?"
Brian: "I am amazing. I paint myself with Amazing. I am my own Ridiculous. I write for the widows and the orphans and Nevin. I can't believe what I'm hearing right now. I am getting railroaded."
Jes: Sings it to him to show how the sound could actually sound good.
Brian: Nearly cries with visible rage.
Sonyae: "It's true. Nick is an amazing collaborator. Despite being the most awfulest."
Melissa: Mostly some crazy talk that once again turns into an awesome song.
Scotty: Mostly just dancing; perhaps lending an air of sophisticated uranianism.
Johnny: Absolutely 100% heterosexual dancing.
Amber: "The thing is that lyrically, Karen's a dolt, and that makes me nervous."
Nick/Sonyae: Pretty amazing.
Melissa: "They love their chorus and they love ignoring me. They love those two things. I do not love either of those things."
Jes/Jackie: "Brian is all about production, now that we've kicked him out of being the creepy singing role. Jackie will now be assuming that role."
EVEN L.A. GAYS KNOW NICK'S A BAD CALL
Sonyae: "You know how people dress up to go to the dance club? I am the best at that."
Scotty: "It was a gay bar just like every gay bar like I go to, because surprise I'm gay. Can you believe it?"
The Universe Entire: "Yes."
Jewel: "Gays of LA, would you like to hear a song called 'Paint This Club With Amazing'?"
Gays Of LA: "That is totally dumb just like us! Thanks for not condescending! Pointless California Gay is like Regular Pointless Gay with a double shot of Pointless Gay on top!"
Team Sonyae Scotty Nick watch the boring unhappy gays dance to the song. They are some smirky motherfuckers. Scotty seems to be having the most amazingly-painted night of his life; Kara DioGuardi seems to have painted her personal club with Restylane tonight. Watching the people overbite about the song and/or touch themselves in a desperate attempt to appear like they're enjoying any of this -- it is almost as tough as watching the people sing to themselves with the headphones.
The Gays of LA don't seem to have heard of dancing before tonight, and it's awkward. Maybe they're all tourists or extras. Actually, you know what, they probably taped this at like six in the afternoon, so I bet it's like virgins from Comic Con or something. They have the look of being an inauthentic crowd-shaped crowd, you know what I mean?
Song two is Team Karen Blessing Amber and Johnny. It's slow but it sounds good, okay. Johnny looks at ease in this context is all I'm saying. I think the problems with this song are in production, and if the judges like it they'll like it because of some mysterious implicit quality that they're judging on.
Nick: Bitching out and rolling his eyes, of course.
Nick: "That was the kind of song that you'd rather leave and piss when it plays. I am still the goddamn worst."
Team Jackie-Jes-Brian: The "My Ridiculous" track is pretty lame, but the vocals and arrangement are pretty awesome. Brian, of course, is worried about how his amazing contribution is left out and therefore the face of the song is stupid. Oh Brian, you're my ridiculous. I just wish you weren't so unattractive, with the Elvis eyeballing and all that cheek sucking.
Scotty: "I have heard a lot of dance music. That, plus a propensity for ill-mannered comediennes, makes up a lot of My Whole Thing."
I love that each of their talking-heads is like a 60% chance they'll utter that sentiment about this week's genre of music. Everybody in this episode is either defined by their secret love of dance music, their total gayness which is really what Scott is selling right now which kind of pisses me off frankly, or how they are defined by whatever Southern bullshit cornpone momma cooking thing.
Artists who can't tell the difference between themselves and their art run the high risk of being a-holes (Nick), because you get into a headspace where being an Artist is your excuse for being alive, which implies that you need one, and then you're down the rabbit hole of constantly needing validation for something you used to do for joy, and then you're lost.
But more importantly there's this: The purpose of craft is to get you over those humps, and if you think that art is purely about self-expression, you run the risk on the opposite side of being unable to function (Nick) if you don't feel okay or great that day. Drawing the line between oneself and one's art is, in the overall project of being a human being, essential, but it can be hard or make people defensive because they're so much romance surrounding the idea that it sounds a lot harsher than it actually is.
Anyway, Scotty's gay. He already said this six times -- or like an infinite number of times, really -- but once again that has something to do with his songwriting abilities. I think it's odd that you would admit to something like that on a show like this, because liking house music is admitting that you don't really like music that much.
Scotty: "I can vogue my ass off."
IN 2011 THE MOTHERFUCKER SAYS THIS
Scotty: "Nick was hitting on gay guys with poor decision-making skills, Melissa was trying to have sex with gay guys which did not go well, Sonyae picked the biggest fag caricature in there and went for it, Blessing is blind and kind of judgmental or maybe it's a sour-grapes situation, Jackie and Jes will generally start making out after a couple of drinks anyway, and then there's Johnny who didn't seem that uncomfortable but kept telling anybody who would listen how comfortable he was in this gay club so we would see that he's so okay with gay people that it's kind of weird, because that's how straight he is, and then eventually he just wouldn't stop holding Jes's hand, and I think somehow he ended up going home with a guy."
AS EXPECTED
Kara: Dressed like your mom.
Jewel: Says "booty-shaking" again; still weird.
Team Nick Sonyae Scotty Melissa is summoned to the carpet for discussion of their song, which actually won the night. Johnny borrows Nick's bitchy face; Scotty makes it clear that Melissa be left out of the group in terms of any kind of credit at all. It's gross. Kara loves the way that Nick layered other hooks and tricks on top of the original hook to make it awesome, which is pretty insightful although it's mostly due to Nick explaining it really well. Melissa, maybe she feels bad about getting iced out of this maybe not, but it's kind of true and she really should have spoken up. I think if you're coasting it's okay to get called out on it, because why are you coasting.
Donna: "Nick and Sonyae, do you still hate each other?"
Nick & Sonyae: "Nah, we're done with that weirdly imaginary storyline."
Jewel: "You have painted this show with Amazing. Sleep well."
Team Ridiculous and Team Make It Easy -- the songs I actually liked -- are brought forward to justify themselves. Karen explains that the point of Making It Easy is that things are thus Easier. Jewel nods.
Kara: "The anthemic quality. Anthems. Et cetera. But that can be boring too, like in this song."
Johnny & Karen: Nod; are boring.
Jewel: "Team Ridiculous, what was your song about?"
Jes: "Crippling sex addiction."
Jewel: "Imagine how creepy it would have been if Brian sang it."
Jackie: "My bone's got a little machine."
Jewel: "Yeah, or worse than that."
Donna Summer: "I liked his voice actually."
Jewel: "Actually, she's right."
Brian: "I was so worried about that, so I'm with you guys. They teamed up on me."
Jackie: "Except that you didn't complain or speak up or fight back at all, just sucked your stupid cheeks and whined."
Brian: "That is as dynamic as I get. I am rock and roll royalty. Through reincarnation, I mean."
Jewel: "Whatever, you ladies are safe. Cut it out."
Jackie: Starts crying with relief! Get some sleep, girl! There is zero need for that business in your second round of eliminations! This shit hasn't even begun! Turning Dirty 30 means taking care of yourself!
Weird Trevor: "[Vague praise]."
Brian: Will take it. Desperately needs it. Is kind of a sad fucking tale, to be honest.
BOTTOM FOUR
Weird Trevor: "Karen, your song was written as if by toddlers. I would not know where to begin workshopping that shitshow."
Kara: "Seriously, who the fuck is responsible for these lyrics?"
Johnny: "Maybe I am to blame."
Kara: "[Snore, snooze, sleep. That micromanaging thing she does where it's already over and there's no point in hashing out word-by-word but she does it because that's what's in front of her face and she's like that. On the other hand, her hair looks tons better right now.]"
Blessing: "I kind of helped."
Donna Summer: "It wasn't even a catchy kind of boring. It was regular style."
Blessing: "I can play any kind of music!"
Donna Summer: "Except this kind."
Blessing: "Isn't that a sucky coincidence?"
Jewel: "Not really. You have all this big band experience that you could have brought to bear on the arrangements, even the lyrics. But the real problem is that you consider yourself above dance music, so fuck you. I wrote a song once about selling out that I used to sell out, literally the video was me ironically getting my very unironic breasts soaking wet, while shaving my horizontal integration down to the skin, okay. I know what ironic self-loathing is all about. Cut me a break here."
Kara: "Seriously, you could have been creative instead. Fuck that. Now Karen, what did you do?"
Karen, verbatim: "A really soaring vocal arrangement."
Kara: "I guess so, for a second and then you dropped the whole concept of the hook and made a boring song about it. Also your lyrics didn't explain anything about how the person would actually find it easy."
Jewel, and this part was sort of scary: "Karen, what did I task you with?"
Karen: "Modern Woman Empowerment."
Jewel: "And creative lyrics, yes?"
Karen: "Yes, ma'am."
Jewel, verbatim: "And did you do that?"
Ouch. So fucking ouch. Karen calls her ma'am again and it turns out that Jewel is a pretty intimidating individual. I bet it's because of those years she spent wrestling bears for food.
Johnny: "I totally forgot to overintellectualize this time, my bad. Karen was the hooker but that's it, Blessing just wanted to play piano and is totally boring and probably not even blind, and I was essential because I made sure everybody finished the song. So really it's me and Amber that should be safe, because Amber wrote most of the lyrics. Wait, which were awful. Amber, I should say, kept Karen from writing even worse lyrics. I just want to get out in front of whatever's about to happen. It's possible I'm babbling."
Amber: "I wish I had tried with the lyrics, but I didn't."
Kara: "Wrong answer, little lady."
Karen: "I did okay. The only non-shitty parts were me."
Nick: "Who was the worst? I bet it was all of you."
Johnny: "Kind of yes."
AND YOUR PONYTAIL IS MAGIC
Jewel: "Amber and Johnny, you are safe. Johnny explained why earlier."
Amber: Weeping. Why.
Backstage: Hug City.
Kara: "Blessing, you are full of it. Karen, you write songs for idiots."
Jewel: "Songwriting is hit or miss, and tonight -- Blessing -- you missed. You can't just opt out of a songwriting session. Karen, there's only room for one kooky blonde on this show besides me, and given that Melissa might actually have something wrong with her, you need to find a new Thing."
I always thought Jewel was a smart lady, but this show is such a showcase for the very respectable person she's become. She's gone from being like the wacky neighbor or Phoebe to being a sort of elder statesman. Dignified, well-spoken, stylish. Neat. That's neat, right?
She is a snaggled mess of contradictions, though. Sometimes I think the Intuition thing is the coolest thing that ever happened, and other times I think it's like, well, Katy Perry probably thinks she's using the system too, when in fact that dumbass is really just enthusiastically participating in her own exploitation, full stop, like any other victim whose choices play out their basic historical trauma, whether it's porn or stripping or what-have-you, and we can talk about the permutations of that at a later date but my final word on the subject is: Russell Brand. Case closed.
So yes, it's a given that Katy Perry doesn't understand you're a whore either way, but I always thought Jewel totally did, and probably thought it was funny in exactly the same way that it really is very funny. And while usually the "at least he knows it" defense of poor behavior doesn't count, I always felt like Jewel did it with, hmm, like a panache or an intelligence or something -- maybe just that she did it that crucial year-or-two earlier than everybody else, and made it seem avant and cool -- that actually did redeem it. I guess I'm not done thinking about that.
Anyway, Week: Bates Motel; Johnny goes on a murder spree. Jes and Johnny fall in yet more heterosexual love.