Simon is just about always right

While the women rallied last night from their rough performances last week, I’m not sure I can say the same about the guys tonight–we had some good performances and a lot of mediocrity, I think. And my short summary of tonight would be Simon was, as usual, pretty much right on with all his comments tonight, and Paula has some kind of mental disorder. She was reasonably critical (for her) last night with the women, but tonight she referred to everyone–at least after seven performers, and we know what she thought of Ace–as “fantastic.” What was she watching? Every guy is fabulous with her. It seems like a big F-you to her critics last year with the Corey Clark incident–it’s like she’s saying, “I might have acted like I was having an affair with Corey Clark, but that’s not true. I act like I’m having an affair with every contestant, and I’m going to go the extra mile to prove that this year.” It’s really, really disturbing. Does she have anyone to advise her and slap some sense into her? Onto the songs.

Gedeon McKinney (“When A Man Loves A Woman”)–I haven’t been Gedeon’s biggest fan, but I thought he was pretty good tonight. I think he could put a little more emotion in songs like this and his choice last week, “A Change Is Gonna Come,” but he was pretty solid. And I hope he stays just because of his bizarre clipped, overenunciating speaking style and the (apparently) unintentional hilarity of the explanations of his painting. So the record inside the globe signifies how the “sound of music makes the world go round.” I’ve got to see more of his paintings...

Chris Daughtry (Some song by the group Seether that I don’t know the title of)–Chris’ performance was fine, but not great, and part of the problem was that the song really isn’t that good. And if I understood Simon’s criticism that Chris was being too “insular” correctly, I think he’s right–he’s kind of doing the same kind of middle of the road rock songs and needs to broaden his appeal. As for Paula’s comment that Chris will be “selling out stadiums”soon–does she follow the music business? Does she know that there’s only a handful of acts–whose names are the Rolling Stone, Bruce Springsteen and U2–who can sell out stadiums on their own these days? Did she mean ampitheaters? More acts can do that, although I think it’s way premature to say Chris would be doing that anytime soon either. And once again, the most interesting thing personally for me was the video clip. Sure it was starting to recede, but he still had a pretty decent amount of hair left when he started shaving his head. It took me a lot longer to get up the courage to make that leap. But I agree, once you do it, it’s very satisfying.

Kevin Covais (“Vincent”)–First of all, Kevin said he really is gangsta because he likes Kanye West. Is Kanye West really gangsta? Doesn’t he wear Polo shirts all the time? Those guys that won the Oscar the other night? They’re gangsta. Kanye West is a hip-hop artist. Anyway, Kevin picks the song that almost tripped up Clay Aiken one night in year two (of course, Clay was made to sing it, and Kevin actually picked it.) And I thought Kevin started out sounding nervous, and it never got any better. Yeah, he seems nice (although the jokes about him impregnating Katharine McPhee are just creepy), but he’s just not that good a singer. And I think he’s gotten worse each week. Oh, and then Ryan demanded “constructive criticism” from Simon. Ryan, don’t act like Simon doesn’t give constructive criticism–he just gave some to Chris a moment before. At least he’s not giving constructive criticism that contradicts the constructive criticism from the week before, like Randy does. Simon’s not giving Kevin Covais constructive criticism because he would have to say, “Pick a better song and sing better.” Is that really helpful?

Bucky Covington (I have no idea what this song was and I’m too lazy to look it up)–I like the sound of Bucky’s voice, but he just doesn’t excite me and I got kind of bored by the middle of the song. He does provide a sharp contrast to many of the other singers, but he’s, as Simon said, just kind of “adequate.” Paula said she loved his “raw, untapped talent” (feel free to make a joke here), but isn’t an American Idol finalist supposed to mold and “cook” and tap that talent, not just provide that promise?

Will Makar (“How Sweet It Is to be Loved By You”)–This was OK, a little bit than I though it would be, but still kind of boring and pedestrian. The most exciting part of Will’s appearance was his call, in Japanese, for 11-year-old girls to unite (pretty funny), and then Paula proclaiming that she was a fan but realizing that she didn’t want to reveal her age and trying to figure out what to say instead of that and just stuttering for a couple seconds to get her bearings.

Taylor Hicks (“Taking It To The Streets”)–This rocked. It’s what everyone has been expecting from Taylor. Sure, it looked like he was going to have a stroke during the song, but it was fun and the perfect song for him. If he flames out on Idol, he can front a Doobie Brothers cover band. Oh, and Paula: Sit down. I think she was up dancing at the beginning of the song. And we haven’t even gotten to the finals yet.

Elliott Yamin (“Heaven”)–I really like the sound and power of Elliott’s voice, but I didn’t think this song showed it off. I didn’t really like this performance–it wasn’t all that exciting and I didn’t think he sounded that good. Maybe it’s just I had high expectations, but I was disappointed, like Simon was. As for Paula’s comment that Elliott had overcome so many “obstacles” to be here, yes, having 90 percent hearing loss in one ear is a big obstacle. But are there many more we haven’t head about yet? Yeah, his mother was sick a few months ago, and that’s sad, but she’s better now. Is that another of the obstacles? What else have we not learned about Elliott?

Ace Young (A Michael Jackson song I don’t know the name of–yes, I’m weak with the titles tonight)–So again we have a singer going with the falsetto, and again I’m not pleased. This didn’t work for me–it just seemed like it was all over the place. The most interesting thing, once again, was the video clip. It demonstrated that Ace may be good looking, but he’s not exactly blessed with a fascinating personality: Tonight we learned that Ace did odd jobs when he first came out to L.A. Wow, imagine that! You know, I also heard that some very famous current actors and actresses once waited tables in L.A. restaurants. Stunning.

So who’s going home? I would send home Kevin Covais and Will Makar. And I think America will too, although I wouldn’t be surprised if Bucky went home instead of one of them.

I’m Eric Fingerhut, and I’m going to go to bed.