It's Paining Men

So, the show has officially started and AI decided to let the men kick things off this year. Which, if we were watching Season 5, would have been a great thing.. y'know, back when Daughtry and Taylor and EllyEl and even Ace Young chose good songs and ripped it silly like. But instead, we're a year off the mark this time, and have to wade through a pile of suck so high that I'm not sure how I made it to work this morning.

What in God's name were most of the dudes DOING last night?! Now, in a relative sense, we can discuss who was better than someone else on stage, and who has great potential, and so on and so forth. But the fact of the matter is, there are too many great singers in the country to realistically sit here and say that any of that was truly remarkable singing. Even the ones who can theoretically be truly remarkable ranged solely from good to highly upsetting last night. Which leaves me in a state of shock and disbelief as we expect AI to age gracefully like fine wine. Instead, I'll be buying an extra bottle of it next week to pull through the muck that the men have left us to examine.

Fine, so with standards considerably lowered this year for the menses, I'm going to do my best to chop up the good, the bad, and the Sundance Head from last night.

1. Rudy -- There's nothing sadder than seeing a potentially great singer pick the worst song in history to show off his chops. Wait. No, there is something sadder than that. It's watching Rudy hip swing in my face in the most wretched of ways. Was that dancing? Was it supposed to be used as a ploy to make us forget that he sang the most karaoke of karoke songs? I didn't appreciate having to look at it if so. While the performance as a whole was mainly whiny and annoying, he did show about 3/4's in that he does have soul somewhere in that corny chasm of his. Were it not for some of his fellow sucksters, he likely would be the first to pack his bags... not for lack of talent, but for lack of thinking ability. It saddens me even moreso to watch Rudy sink his own ship because he possesses a tenor register so high that most men would sever his limbs off to get a piece of it. In short, you're only born with a chest voice that high for a man. I hope he gets another shot at a better song, but I may be hoping for too much on this one.

2. Here comes Usher's, Christina's, and JT's backup singer Brandon!!!.... .... .. . . . (sorry, my excitement was enjoying a slow and sorrowful death right there). Only to prove under so much hype why he belongs in back. Brandon has the chops, as we've heard before, but he most certainly crippled his own "now you're born to be in front" status by 1) choosing a Michael Jackson song (note: no one who'd like to actually win a singing competition chooses MJ's music as a way to prove their vocal prowess), and 2) sucking on a Michael Jackson song. The runs were the only thing reminding us that he was actually breathing throughout most of it. And once again, the disappointment of seeing a great singer singlehandedly shoot himself in the foot knows no words. And to top it all off, he was off-pitch for a great deal of it. Amazing. Melinda had better have a talk with her Siamese twin and kick him into first gear PRONTO.

3. Then comes Sundance.. the one I've been hoping would wake up for so long now. Instead of sticking to what got him here in the first place (i.e. da blues), he sings what can now be called the WORST SONG CHOICE EVER MADE IN AMERICAN IDOL HISTORY. Seeing as how there was not one redeeming thing about this performance -- not a one -- I'm not going to discuss it anymore. He's gone ... but maybe Sanjaya can braid his chest hair on the trip back to Nonamesville after Sundance is finished braiding his.

4. Paul Kim chose George Michael's best song of all time (although we all know there are FAR TOO MANY great GM songs to really just crown one), and then crapped all over it. Maybe his toes were itching from being barefoot, or maybe he thought trying to invoke the spirit of Joss Stone on stage would help him get more soul. Either way, it didn't work. And then, and THEN, he had the audacity to NOT EVEN HIT the climactic peak of that song of songs, in which anyone singing it had better hit the falsetto accent towards the end. Swing and a miss by Mr. Kim. You'd think he'd at least have mastered that part with all the karaoke he must have practiced leading up to this big gig. Apparently not. And so I say, you're lucky your fellow brethren suck too... but that fact does not excuse you from not belonging here either. See ya!

5. Yeah, so it's true -- Chris Richardson does sound like Alvin when he sings, and he does try to rally off of having good rhythm on stage to win points that he won't get with singing, but the jury still stands. Man is a FINE WHITE BOY and I'll still have dinner with him. No dessert though.. he doesn't sing well enough for all that. Still got my money on this one though. With a slower paced song that will allow him to breathe (and that won't force him to hit more notes than he's ready for), he'll still fly high. You heard it here first. And whenever he does go, we'll still very much enjoy watching him leave. ;)

6. Nick Pedro sang a song, I think. I was too asleep to remember. Was there even a chorus? Was there a verse? Perhaps a bridge then? I dunno.. you tell me. His smokey vibe can win on the right song, but he's not ready for the big time. And I'm sad to say he's going to find that out sooner than later. Sorry Nicky Nick! But for some unexplained reason, he's definitely won points with Simon who most certainly showed strong signs of man crush last night when he went off about how "charming" and "nice" Nick is. Really, focusing on anything other than the singing because that stunk to high heaven. He must send Simon strawberries in the night... and Simon LOVES it cuz it's more than Ry Ry is gettin'. Way to work the Cowell-Seacrest ManWar to your advantage Nickleback! Can't knock the hustle.

7. Blake did exactly what a smart man should do by leaving the beatboxing mess aside. He needs to sing. And for the love of God, don't listen to the Rand who stupidly suggested you bring that back into your sets. Put the box *down*.. and stay right where you are. You sang well, and it had the most relaxed delivery of the night. If it ain't broke, don't fix it! (I wish I could say the same for your face, but I'll accentuate the positive for now).

8. Before Sanjaya even opened his mouth I said "Why is this kid even on here?". And just as I began to think I was being too hard on the kid, he opened his mouth and proved me so right that I ironically did end up feeling bad. That kind of bad you feel when you're surprised by how right you were? Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. Poor kid. And to sing Stevie of all things? I would knock him more in this blog if I didn't feel so bad for him. He's a goner - but at least this way he can suture himself back onto his sister's hip.

9. Chris Sligh couldn't keep away from the one-two punch jab combo at the end of his judgment by Simon, but at least he made up for awful exterior with great vocal interior. *This* time around. Trust me, the kid won't hit it like that on a consistent basis. He's just a guy who's gonna tackle this competition like he tackles the knots in his bob each week -- "I WILL pick the right song this week! I willl!!!!!! And that way no one will ever realize that I'm kinda a one-dimensional voice looking for two-dimensional faaaaaaammmmmmeeee!!!!". Come on.. we all know he turns into Dracula at night. There's no other way.

10. Jared Cotter is hot.. who knew? If we can just get him to an eyebrow waxer, we'll be able to say that with more conviction. That said, he's got the warmest tone in the pack. Too bad he picked the simplest song ever written. Congratulations! If you can count to five you can sing Brian McKnight's "Back at One"!!! So why are we surprised that Jared can too? He had better travel waaaaay outside that comfort zone to do something even remotely moving next time around. If there is a next time (we all know there are surprises when it comes to voting, and although he's far from the worst, he has no fan base and no screen time aside from last night). Could be his last tune y'all, although I'm hoping not.

11. AJ Tabaldo is still the randomest man alive to me, but I see where SPR are coming from when they swear to us that he can really sing. Too bad I didn't get much of that "really" last night. I appreciated the Luther selection, but he was as forgettable as Jared on his delivery, and didn't give us much to work with as far as "mmph". I need waaaaay more than that to get on this kid's train.. and I mean way. Turn it up man! Or it's gonna be Yawnville for you as well.

12. Phil "No, I really AM an alien y'see" Stacey had the performance of the night. Too bad he also had the shittiest thing that I think we're supposed to call singing of the night too. I'm not sure what he was on for the first 20 seconds of his performance, but it had absolutely NO RELATION to musicality, or pitch intonation, or anything having to do with the word good. Nothing. Zero. Zilch. But, somehow, he woke up halfway through, remembered he was on national television in front of millions, and tore it up in a serious way. If he can just stay in that chest voice zone, and never again return to that ailingly awful headvoice zone, we'll all be very okay. And he'll be extremely okay. Like, all the way there as far as the guys are concerned okay. Too early to tell though. Perhaps by May he'll at least have figured out how to cover that extraterrestrial head of his.

The women will undoubtedly be better tonight, only because there's no way they could be much worse. Until then!!!