American Idyll -- The Top Ten Female Singers ages 16-29 in America

American Idol: Photos - Feb 28 2005

Let's start this off with me saying that I was underwhelmed, in a big way. A lot of boring songs from a lot of boring people. I, like most other observers, think the guys, from 1-10, are a better team than the ladies, from 1-10. So, this post probably isn't gonna end well for a lot of contestants. And making a prediciton on who is gonna leave is pretty tough. At the outset of this writing, I am only really confident in one lady packing bags and going back where she came from. By the end of the post, I hope to sort it all out and have my predictions for the elimination. In the words of Mills Lane, "Let's get it on!"

Editor's Note: Contestants are evaluated in order of appearance. That's all that's going on there.

Katharine McPhee went first. My wife, prior to this week, thought she was the best white chick. Since I can't really tell them apart, save the really bad ones, I couldn't say, substantively, that I could tell the difference between her and Ayla, except that Ayla plays basketball. I don't think I could pick them out of a lineup. McPhee came out and sang Stevie Wonder's "All in Love is Fair", a relatively bad ass love jam from 1973's Innervisions. Innervisions, by my accounting, is the second or third best Stevie Wonder album, to Talking Book (definitive #1) and possibly Songs in the Key of Life. Yet somehow, Katharine McPhee managed to find the one boring song on the album. I'd pay money to see ANYONE on Idol take on "Higher Ground" or "He's Misstra Know It All". Hell, I'd buy an album of someone doing "Jesus Children of America. And of course, "Don't You Worry 'Bout a Thing" is a pantheon Stevie song. So, how she managed to comb the entire discography of Stevie Wonder and find one of the boring songs, I don't know.

--Side Note Here
One of my ongoing annoyances with modern life is the neutering of political voices. I touched on this briefly while writing about Flavor of Love. We are three episodes deep into Idol, and we have had three Stevie Wonder songs. Stevie, in his prime, wrote about politics and society a lot. Most of his best songs from his best period (1971's Where I'm Comging From to 1976's Songs in the Key of Life) are about politics. And since there are some interesting parrallels between that period in American history and today, you'd think people would maybe revisit and appreciate that a blind guy saw things better than most sighted people. Being political was a big part of being Stevie Wonder. But I guess the pop machine doesn't want that. God forbid someone sings Big Brother or He's Misstra Know It All in 2006. The culture might rip itself in half. Where are the Clash when we need them most.
--End Note

Any rate, back to Ms. McPhee. I thought she sang the song well, but completely neutered the sexual charge of it. This is a song that appeared on Baddest Love Jams #2: Fire and Desire along with Rick James, The Temptations, Gladys Knight and two jams by Smokey Robinson. I didn't feel like making out to her singing it, so it must be a failure, ultimately.

Second up was Kinnik Sky. She sang some bouncy country number, which I applaud, since I pretty much said she should sing a country song last week. (You gotta scroll all the way down to my Kinnik comment, but it's there. I said:

I think she should pick some fun songs and have a good time with it. Sing some sappy neo-country ballad. Sing some George Michael. Sing songs that weak people sang the week before.

I didn't say she should pick this particular song, but it's kind of what I had in mind when I said she should go crazy. And she looked like she had fun singing it. The Judges hated it, but I'm starting to think that there is a narrow band of pleasing the judges, and that they will give you contradictory advice. Last week, she sang Oleta Adams beautifully (better than Justin Guarini who murdered this song a billion times in season one) and everyone wants her to break out and do something different. Be less cabaret was Simon's suggestion, if I recall correctly. So, she does that, and they bitch, and doubtless everyone else at home will too. I think, next week, she should sing something from the Brit Homo school of song, like Depeche Mode or Morrissey. Just keep em off balance. Again, she's not gonna win, despite being better than a lot of white chicks. I think she's safe this week. She stood out and not in a bad way.

What the hell was Lisa Tucker wearing? She sang "Who’s Lovin’ You," an old Miracles song. And she dressed like a refugee from Radio Disney, with an elongated tank top in the exact shade of yellow of Big Bird, with a fire engine red bra peeking out and jeans. The outfit was completely incongruous with the song, and confused the hell out of me. She was dressed to sing Britney Spears. And last week, she was so elegant. Last week's outfit would have worked with this song. She got the dreaded, "you're sixteen, don't be fifty," comment. I am unclear on what they want to get with this comment. Bubblegum pop? I guess. Lisa Tucker is safe for a long time, probably till they merge the guys and the girls, whenever that's gonna be. In terms of performance critique, I thought it was boring, but she sang it well. I think that's going to be her undoing in the long run. Singing: 9, Looks: 8, It: 7, Song Choice: 2. At no point thus far, do I have her ahead of Mandisa in anything other than ass size.

Melissa McGhee cleans up pretty good, but she had the unpardonable muffin top poking out from her top. It is not unforgiveable to be shaped less than perfectly, but her outfit really kind of directed the viewer to her muffin top. And no one wants to see that. Not really. She sang a recent Bonnie Raitt song, that fit her voice nicely. I don't think she has an Idol winning quality voice and her ability to switch on an audience has yet to be seen. Simon called this one, and Paula initiated the biggest change in Idol since season two saw the departure of the Dunkelman. She stopped sitting next to Cowell. I have been saying that Paula serves no purpose, since she only has nice things to say. Cowell should cancel that out, since he is brutally honest, and it pains him to give unmitigated praise. That should leave Randy "DawgDudeMan" Jackson as the judge worth listening to, the middle position between the two extremes. I think maybe Randy is the problem. If he could drop the shtick long enough to give something useful to them, the show would be a lot better and the contestants would get better. I think this is one of the areas where America's Next Top Model is a better show. The panel of five judges are all ciritical of the girls and usually give them something they can act on. The ones who win, act on their advice. The ones who go home, don't. Their panel has other issues, like some major groupthink problems in eliminations (I bet this is the ONLY American Idol blog post to link to 12manage.com!) and Tyra's alpha dominance of the proceedings, but I think they give more actionable help to contestants, and it improves the storyline. We want to see the raw talent sculpted by the process into some intermediary stage on the way to being a finished product. I can't think of someone who became a better singer from Idol. I just have to look to season 1 of ANTM to name TWO girls who became better models through the process (Adrienne and the girl who went to med school). Any rate, I digress. Melissa has an itneresting voice. Idol isn't looking for that. So, she can't win.

Heather Cox sang Mariah Carey's "Hero". Bo-ring. Her voice was O-kay, but not great. Her look is okay, but she's the #2 blond chick to Pickler after this week. Both in looks and performance. The judges didn't like it, because it wasn't as good as Mariah. I don't think Mariah is so special. I just think this is a REALLY BORING SONG that no one would listen to with a lesser light than Mariah Carey singing it. People, let's put a two week moratorium on singing ballads. They are boring, they don't get the fans into it, and they aren't going to get the votes at home. She's got a good chance of being my other pick for going home tonight. Maybe it picked up later in the tune. My dad called during this number, so I didn't see the whole thing. But I thinkI heard enough.

Speaking of awful, Brenna Gethers continues her assault on the classics after I picked her to go home last week. This week, she assaults Donna Summer's Last Dance. I missed the whole thing, including the judgement. I did hear the clip they played at the end of the show, and she was all over the place pitchwise. I was convinced last week that her personality carried her this far, and have seen nothing to convince me that she can sing a lick. She is my STONE COLD LOCK to go home Thursday. If you can lay money on this, this is where to put the money. The kid doesn't stay in the picture. Resheath the claws and enjoy all six hours of the flight home.

Bette Midler made an apperance as a young black girl named Paris Bennett this week. I can't objectively judge this because the song is in my pantheon of songs that should be erased from the collective memory of society. There are not a lot of songs in the pantheon and they are hard for me to remember, but off the top of my head, there are two. The Wind Beneath My Wings (which I think should have been used in a commercial for Secret) and that damn song from Titanic by Celine Dion. There are some similarities here, and the most important one is that they are hit songs from sappy movies that a ton of people saw. For my money, I will watch Titanic twice before I see Beaches again, but I'd rather watch a test pattern than either, with the music being a key component. Anyrate, that's way more ink than I want to give to Beaches and the Wind Beneath My Wings. I think Paris sang it as well as la Bette Noire, but I don't think that's the standard to hold her to. Shirley Bassey did a great version of this nonsense and Paris wasn't that good. Shirley is also 800 years old, which was the crux of Simon's critique, the near ubiqitous "You're sixteen, don't sing like you're 800," line of commentary. I have to agree with Simon here. But I think any song except that one from Titanic would be younger than this piece of junk. All that said, Paris is safe and not going anywhere this week. A lot of stinkers are left, and she is actually atlented, so she's safe to sing whatever for at least another week, maybe two.

Just when I thought I was going to be sick from the song choices, Ayla "Squinty" Brown dips into the Celine Dion song catalog, with "I Want You To Need Me". Boring Boring Boring. The judges ate it up, but I think they were bludgeoned into saying something nice about someone by this point in the show. I mean, we went seven contestants deep with the most interesting things being Breena's last dance and Paula switching seats with Randy. This was not the stellar performance they made it out to be. It was serviceable. On a very boring song. And we learned that she now wears makeup. Amazing. I don't think this mess can last long, even though Simon is convinced she is a hard worker and will turn it around by the time it's done. If she sings another boring song, I hope we can choose to get rid of her, before we collectively fall asleep.

Cute Kellie Pickler worked the second Bonnie Raitt song of the night (this has to be some kind of non-Bonnie Raitt concert record), the more famous "Let's Give Them Something to Talk About". Her version was solid. But I already knew she can sing country. I think we have to send her home if she stays in the country millieu for another week. Like bring it to Country Rock at least. I'm not saying she's gotta sing Mary J, but let's sing something with a less pronounced twang. This girl is good looking enough to hang around for a while. Though when she bounces all around, it kind of ruins the image. The judges all loved it, which suggests that either the Pickler has IT or they were over quota on being real to contestants who failed to live to potential. Either way, Pickler is safe this week.

My favorite, Mandisa, had some problems with her song, "Cry" that icky Country song that almost everyone and their mother has recorded. I wasn't crazy about it, particularly the verse, but Mandisa is safe for another week. And eventually, she's going to string together a few stellar performances. They need a Mandisa around, Paula as much as said so. So, I think America will keep her around for another week or two without a solid performance.

My Top Three Picks for Eliminated Chicks:

1. Brenna Gethers (I think this is guaranteed)
2. Heather Cox (likely, though not a lock)
3. Katharine McPhee (I think going first is bad for voting)

Tomorrow, the boys & the men.