An Idol Mind

A Whole Lotta Recap!: Ousters, Predictions and The Top 3

Well hello there! Sorry about the long absence, everybody. It's been eight days since my last post, and as most of you know, a lot of tremendous Idol-related news has happened in that span. I apologize for the delay - but I do hope you'll be happy to know that it will never happen again. After not posting to An Idol Mind in over a week, I became light-headed, feverish and sweaty; had trouble sleeping and eating; and found it impossible to give my opinion to anyone without reducing them to tears - all classic symptoms of Snark Build-upitis. So trust me, I'm back for good. That way everybody wins! ...Especially that cat I kept poking with my mechanical pencil.

First of all, to recap: America's favorite G-rated nanny, the Carole King-emulating Babbling Brooke White got the boot last Wednesday - and I can't tell you how much seeing her go made me want to cry. Frankly, I don't know why I didn't; she barely held it together herself, and what better way to send off an emotional mess than to become one yourself for a few minutes? (A moment of silence for Brooke, please. I will choose to remember her for what she was, before she went from lovable-crazy to batsh!t-crazy - a bright-eyed, endearing sylph who found her niche playing the piano on good easy-listening classics. [I never buy CDs, but I will buy hers.]) When Carly Smithson prematurely got the axe in that travesty of a voting ho-down two weeks ago, I was more furious than I was sad. But Brooke's departure was the final tug on my already-tauter-than-taut heartstrings. And I am now, I regret to inform, officially no longer able to emotionally invest in this season. Idol has never devastated me in such a quick, short time frame. After watching Kristy, then Carly, then Brooke sing their swan songs in back-to-back-to-back weeks, my emotional CPU has crashed.

And I think the only possible Control-Alt-Delete would be to see the newly unsinkable Syesha "Triple Threat" Mercado disrupt the seemingly inevitable Finale of Two Davids.

Could Miss Mercado do it? Does she have enough game? I'm not sure, but here's definitely hoping. Heck, apparently her still simply being there - you know, as a black woman competing on a televised singing show against two white guys - is on historical par with the tireless and life-risking efforts that defined the '60s Civil Rights movement, as well as with the trailblazing campaigning done by the black and female Democratic candidates of this year's race for the White House. (According to Syesha, that is.) Since she's only one buckwild Tina Turner head swish away from replacing Rosa Parks and Hillary Clinton in our nation's textbooks, who knows - maybe she can pull off an amazing upset and kick one of the Davids out of the finale! I mean, seriously, who doesn't want to see the grand tale of Syesha's karaoke journey printed right after a chapter on the tribulations of Birmingham? Oh that's right. Everybody. Okay, Syesha? We like you now, so stop pulling Brookes and sabotaging yourself with absurd rambling. You stick to singing, we'll stick to analysis - because when it comes to the latter, you're really, really bad.

The second piece of news that's so-worth-reporting-that-my-brain-is-going-to-explode-if-I-don't-mention-it-soon is the official lifting of this blog's name-utterance ban on the inimitable Dreadlocked One. That's right, ladies and gentlemen - Jason Castro, the man whose friends recently released a video of him lazily strumming a guitar while swaying and mumbling on a sofa due to his being "so sauced," was last night kicked off American Idol. Yup. The Barack Obama of Season 7 - all style, no substance (zing!) - met his doom, and I loved every second of it. I actually didn't go to work just so I could watch the momentous occasion unfold live. I'd been waiting for that glorious event for six weeks, and I utterly refused to have to watch it later on a crappy, ad-riddled YouTube clip. And I'll have you know that I make a whopping eight dollars an hour, so by not stacking cups and recycling food for two hours on Wednesday, I quite literally paid the universe 16 dollars to see Jason Castro eliminated. Sure, I won't get to eat my weekly EBA's BBQ Burger or Orient Chicken and Broccoli Platter, but I would sacrifice a hundred BBQ Burgers and Chicken and Broccoli Platters just to again feel the robust swelling of heart I felt whilst standing in my dormitory lounge, witnessing that doofus grin that spread across his lips when he realized the end had come, and that no amount of special brownies or girly votes could save him. Best of all was that after the news he'd be leaving, which shocked no one, Jason pricelessly admitted that he wished he could have stopped screwing up so badly but that he just couldn't seem to, and that he knew he would have screwed up even more next week with three songs to do. Indeed, dear readers, I stand my ground. Completely worth the 16 Washingtons.

Anywho, one would think that after weeks of despising this incoherent hipster, upon seeing his ouster I would feel finally relieved - that my arms would uncross, my shoulders unslump, and my intense dislike for him evaporate in a cloud of vindication and euphoria. Actually, I am vindicated, and I do feel relieved and euphoric - but my enmity for Jason Castro, which I believe I once compared to the fervent white-hot heat of a thousand burning suns, extends farther than even I had imagined. I was still cackling joyously as he stared at the house band when it totally awesomely began to play Bob Marley's "I Shot the Sheriff" without his even knowing what was going on anymore. ...But this was probably just all the Snark Build-upitis. I admit it. Because really, aside from his having no voice whatsoever on a singing competition, it's quite hard to dislike Jason Castro. In truth, I must tip my hat to him, since he left as a good sport. While Syesha was busy donning the expression of someone who'd just had a cold can of soda rolled down her back, Jason, as usual, was smiling and mellow, and quite congratulatory. He'd probably already made peace with the fact his number was up, and it's always nice to see a contestant depart gracefully. ...And now that he's gone I will begrudgingly confess that, when he wasn't looking like a confused, effeminate elf, Jason could be pretty cute; and when he wasn't critfailing (that is, failing, and rather critically), he reeked of charm. However vacuous it was.

And yes, that is all you're going to get from me in the "Fine, I don't hate Jason all that much" vein. So go on, reign your hopes in.

Also, just to go on one of my trademark ranty tangents, I applaud America for achieving redemption. Sure, we lost Carly in the process, and that still tears me up inside, and every night before bed I ask baby Irish Jesus why it had to be so - but in consecutive weeks the two correct people were finally, and fairly, voted off. Even as a Brooke fan I know this was the only way that Idol could retain that thin shred of dignity onto which it so desperately, desperately clings. ...Plus, Jason was eliminated in fourth place, and on Idol all the truly robbed people go third, e.g., Elliott Yamin and Melinda Doolittle. So cosmic karaoke order remains thoroughly intact.

Which also means don't cry for Syesha, my friend. She'll be in good company. (Wait wait wait, what am I saying? Syesha is Ella Fitzgerald, Coretta Scott King and Toni Morrison all rolled into one! She'll be fine!)

About next week, though, I've heard forum whispers that the theme will allow our newly minted Top 3 to tackle any song that is within the iTunes Top 100. And if that is indeed the case, then I motion that we all promptly fly to Los Angeles and give a big, juicy kiss to Nigel Lythgoe & Co. - it's taken seven years, but Idol is finally realizing how ridiculous it is to place overly restrictive themes on contestants and then give them less than five days to work a miracle and make a dated song "current." (Don't get me wrong, I'm all for themes; they can be interesting and fun, and music's all about fusing the past with the present - but the season is like 15 weeks long, and there are only 10 decades in the 20th century, and most of the contestants weren't even alive for seven of those decades!) Granted, choosing from 100 songs gives a lot less freedom than does choosing from 500 songs, which is the amount they all got a few days ago for the Final Four; but judging from those stale efforts, even when the contestants are given the key to a depthless vault, none of them is particularly daring or creative enough to extend beyond their comfort zone. (Seriously - "Baba O'Riley"? "Proud Mary"? "Stand By Me"? Wow.) So maybe 100 is a good number. But more importantly, if the rumors are true, this week the contestants won't have the safety net of picking ditties from a list that already compiles the pick of the litter for them - so they'll need to be extra-careful if they (for once) choose to think outside the box. Honestly, I get a veritable rollercoaster-esque pang of exhilaration in my tummy when I think of how the three of them will have gone from sifting through tunes by The Who and Bob Dylan to choosing between Jesse McCartney and Hannah Montana's Miley Cyrus.

But all kidding aside, next week is so important it's scary. I can't believe this whole thing is only two weeks away from being totally over. Seven of the 10 people on this blog's header have been eliminated! (Like woah.) With three songs a piece, Cookie, Syesha and Archie must now make a definitive push for the finale. And looking at the iTunes Top 100 for this week, I think I have a few cool ideas for them individually. (Click the song names to listen to them on either last.fm or YouTube.) I can see David Cook doing well by slowing down Gavin DeGraw's poppy "In Love With A Girl" and infusing it with his quintessential rocker growl of a voice. Also, Coldplay's introspective, happily-somber "Violet Hill" would likely suit his knack for simple and heavy chord progression and melodic bridges. For Little David, although the rocky-relationship lyrics are a little beyond his years, Lifehouse's earnest "Whatever It Takes" could work for him if he slowed it down and stripped it bare, carrying it by being vocally even and smooth, and using restrained melisma. (Plus, the song simply begs for an orchestra at its crescendo, and you know how much Idol loves that effect.) In a similar vein, I can see Alicia Keys' "No One" granting wonders for not just Archie's voice, but for his image, too - the song has innocent romantic overtones that could be made even cleaner with precise lyric trimming, it's far from sappy (Archie needs to get out of his "Let's save the world!" rut), and it's got just the right amount of pep for a teenaged Mormon from Utah to pull it off. Only problem is Archie might be fighting Syesha for this song. And Syesha could execute it even better than Little David if she kept her propensity for whininess in check (which, to her credit, she's been doing of late.) Another potential success for the divalicious model-actress-singer could be Sara Bareilles' catchy "Love Song," which would allow her to go nuts in her middle range and to tap into that well-received sassy swagger she's been sporting the past few weeks.

(Oh, and I positively dare someone to sing the Jordin Sparks song that's been making the rounds in the Billboard Top 10 for the past two months!)

Anyway, that's all I've got to say for now, folks. To all the people who poked and prodded me to get around to posting, I thank you kindly. These past few days have been busy and exhausting, but it feels great to finally update the blog. I've been saying this for awhile, but one of these days I will post the emails that my sidebar promises should have been posted weeks ago. (The ones dealing with Jason are hilarious.) I fiddled with the idea of posting a Top 10 Things That Paula's Gaffe Taught Us entry (you thought I wasn't going to say anything about that? PSH!), but decided against it. But maybe I'll post it anyway, since after reading this blog one day my mother asked me why I'm so harsh on Paula Abdul, and I had to explain that I'm harsh because I love. (Twenty years in you'd think she'd know this by now.) But anyway, we'll see what I post in the next few days. I have plenty of random things to say, but this post is long enough. For now, check out this weird Hamster Idol clip I found on YouTube. I personally couldn't finish it - but if you can, you are amazing, and I fear you.