Curtis gave the best performance of the night.
Compared to the girls' performances on Wednesday night, I was a bit underwhelmed by the guys' on Thursday's "American Idol."
The first 10 of the Top 20 men performed in the sudden-death show, and only a couple were kinda obvious -- most notably Curtis.
"You know damn well you're going through," Nicki Minaj told him, the first of the 10 to find out his fate at show's end. Minutes before, he sang Luther Vandross' "Don't You Remember."
Although Keith Urban thought a few parts were "overdone," there was no doubting his voice is "beautiful," with Randy Jackson adding he is "one of the best singers," and Mariah Carey ending the judging with "it moved me to tears."
I also wasn't surprised that Devin made it into the night's Top 5 with a stellar version of Beyonce's "Listen" from "Dreamgirls." He made a "connection" with Keith, and Nicki remarked that Devin's breaking into Spanish during the song made him more "marketable."
"I thought it was amazing," Randy added.
Otherwise, the judges weren't agreeing much throughout the evening, which may have led to some of the surprises of the night. Other than Curtis and Devin, I guessed that Chris was going to make it through, not Paul.
But Paul was the week's first split decision after singing "Tonight I Wanna Cry" -- by Keith Urban. Sorry, but what are people thinking by singing a song one of the judges recorded? That's either ballsy or stupid.
Whatever, Paul sounded good, but Keith called him out on over-performing, as did Nicki. Randy even said it was "risky" performing Keith's song, although adding he had "great potential." I totally forget what Mariah said. Love her, but she's coming off mostly as the kiss-the-boo-boo-make-it-better judge.
Anyway, Paul was allowed to stay whereas Chris went home. Now that I've said all that, I remember thinking "the vocal runs are wearing me out a smidgen" when Chris sang "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay."
"I want to marry your vibrato," Nicki told her, but none of the other judges seemed to like his vocal performance. So he was cut in the end.
I wasn't surprised when Jimmy was cut -- another guy who sang a Keith Urban song. Wasn't bad, but it wasn't fabulous either. When Nicki and Randy both said they were bored, I figured that was a closed deal.
They were most definitely NOT bored when Charlie took the stage with "Rocket Man," as one of my favorite little underdog performers soaked up the limelight after he finished.
Keith described Charlie was as if "Freddie Mercury had a love child out of Woodstock," which was funny. "... Tackling that song was like, 'What the hell are you doing?'"
"It's rock-star, it's fresh,”" said Nicki, who gave what I believe was the night's only standing-O -- and said something about wanting to cradle him. Mmmmm-K ...
Randy said he was "wild, uncontrollable" -- but not necessarily in a bad way. (I think he just threw his hands up because he knew he lost control of the outcome by that point.)
Still, was he better vocally than Kevin? Not that Kevin was fan-freakin'-tastic, but I think he sounded a bit better with his "Everything I Do (I Do It For You)" -- although not a good song choice for him, so maybe that's what did him in. However, Keith said "your range is crazy," with Nicki adding "every single musical choice you made was perfection."
But then lo and behold the mayo, just after the judges told someone (was it Chris?) they were looking more at vocals and less at the performances tonight, they still went with Charlie, who was
way more theatrical. But whatever, Charlie stayed, and he's still one of my sentimental favorites.
I was not, for whatever reason, a fan of Elijah. Nothing personal, he's cute and all; but his "Talking to the Moon" was one of my least favorite songs of the evening (even though I love me some Bruno Mars).
However, because he seems to embody the young male pop-star look, that won the judges over -- especially Nicki, who said she wants to have his babies. (Someone needs to make a pop-up book of Nicki Minaj's crazy quotes. I'd totally buy that. But only if it's a pop-up book.)
Even Randy said Elijah's vocals weren't great, so why? Whatever, he stayed, while Johnny (who sounded better with Jason Mraz's "I Won't Give Up") went home.
And as much as I wish I had the testicular fortitude that JDA possessed to come out on stage and be whatever the heck he wanted to be, no matter what anyone else and their mama thought, I wasn't surprised he was sent home, even after a somewhat decent cover of Adele's "Rumour Has It."
"If we have the award for best performance, it would definitely be you," Randy said. But he noted a lack of "originality" in the choreography, whatever that meant.
So that leaves 10 more girls and 10 more guys for next week -- including Zoanette Johnson of Tulsa.
Who was your favorite tonight? Did you agree with the judges?
Peace, love and vibrato-marrying, Charlie-cradling idolatry ... XOXO
