17 Mar American Idol, Week 2: The top eleven impress the hell out of me.

Megan Joy

Two down, eleven left. So, how are they going to do this time around? I guess time will tell. What I can tell is everyone needs to get over themselves on the show and stop doing the over indulgent judge entrance. By the way, Happy Saint Patrick’s Day to everyone. Idol celebrates the greatest Irish holiday with a very special theme tonight…the Grand Ole Opry. Looking at the cast of characters, I think this is going to be a very interesting night. However, they have a great mentor this week in Randy Travis, but damn he got old.

Tonight we start with Michael Sarver singing “Ain’t Goin’ Down (‘Till the Sun Comes Up) from Garth Brooks. I thought it was pretty impressive that he didn’t forget any lyrics, but for a country boy, I expected a little better. It was good, but the Harmonica guy way overshadowed him.

Next we have Allison Iraheta singing “Blame It On Your Heart” from Patty Loveless. Here’s my problem with a lot of these theme nights. The Idols don’t show a lot of themselves. I love Allison, and I thought she nailed the song, but she sang it very country, and that’s not her. Don’t get me wrong, I loved it, and I know she will be here next week. But dammit, work it out a little.

Kris Allen is up singing “To Make You Feel My Love” From Garth Brooks. Here is a perfect example of what I was talking about a second ago. Kris is not a country singer, so instead of trying to sing it country, he took the song, and  molded it into his style. Not only that, he also did a phenomenal job with it. Astounding.

Then, Lil Rounds with “Independence Day” from Martina McBride. You know, again, I didn’t see much of a change except she slowed it down, and that was only after Mr. Travis told her to. I don’t know. I like her alot, but again, she didn’t make it hers. Lil is not a country singer, so she should have not done it in a country style. She made a comment saying she wanted to show she is more than R&B. Dude, stick to what you know. Let’s put it this way, you wanted to show you can sing more than R&B, but all you did was show you can’t sing country.

Up next is Adam Lambert singing “Ring of Fire” from Johnny Cash. OK, first, loved the jacket. Second, loves the compilation. Again, he is not a country singer, so he found something different, that was much more in his style, and he rocked it out. The screaming at the end was a little odd, but still an absolutely amazing job.

Adam is followed by Scott MacIntyre singing “Wild Angels” from Martina McBride. It wasn’t bad. Randy Travis said that something was a little off about his performance, and I have to agree. Something was a bit off for me too. It was the other Randy that made me see the light. He’s very mellow and not taking any chances whatsoever. He needs to work it a whole lot more if he wants Americas vote.

Then we have Alexis Grace sing “Jolene” from Dolly Parton. Except for some bad notes, she did a good job. I wasn’t impressed, and she didn’t change it up quite enough, but she did change it up some, and she did OK. With that said, she needs to step it up a whole lot more than that if she wants to make it.

Danny Gokey follows with “Jesus, Take the Wheel” from Carrie Underwood. I’m not all that big of a fan of this song, but I thought Danny did a great job with it. He made it feel a lot less Carrie and a lot more of him. Still not as good as Adam, but still very good.

Next up is Anoop Desai singing “Always on My Mind” from Brenda Lee, but made most famous by the great Willie Nelson. Last week, I absolutely thought Noop-Dawg should have gone home. I still a bit surprised he didn’t. This week, he one hundred percent redeemed himself. That was by far one of, if not, the best performance of the night. It is amazing how someone can go from worst to best just by song choice.

I guess it’s just Megan Joy now? She dropped the Corkrey? Either way, she sings “Walking After Midnight” from Patsy Cline. I just love watching her perform, because she has the cutest little shimmy you ever did see. I also love her voice so much. She is a great singer, and has such a unique voice. Given the fact that she was the flu, she was phenomenal. If I still had my TiVo, that would have been the performance I would watch a second time.

Closing the show is Matt Giraud singing “So Small” from Carrie Underwood. This is one of the few songs tonight I didn’t know. So I can only go by Randy Travis when he says it’s very different from the original. What I can say is that was lovely. I think I said this last week, but every time he performs, he puts all his emotions into it. I thought that was really, really good.

With that, now I have to make a prediction on who will go up. I think the bottom three will be Alexis, Lil, and Scott. This is a really hard season. I feel like I could be way off with that too. I really like the three of them, but tonight, they weren’t where they needed to be. I will have to say, if I had to choose one, it would be Scott. We’ll find out tomorrow night, and until then, keep singing.

The Reverend Statik

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