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March 25, 2008

Is Seeing "American Idol" Live That Much Better than On TV?

By: The Dude on the Right
So it is "Songs the Year You Were Born" night.  Oh, goody, it is "Songs When I Was in College" night, or thereabout.  I'm sure flashbacks will be in order, but I'll only type about them if I think they will be okay for my Mom to read.  Here we go...

Ramiele Malubay - Born in 1987
- Sings - "Alone" by Heart
- A song I totally love, but man she doesn't have the pipes to pull off the chorus for this song and the bombastic sound the Wilson sisters had.  Totally wrong song choice, and I'm sorry she is sick.  Ramiele, quick shaking hands with people and then touching your eyes or picking your nose.  That's how you get sick.

Jason Castro - Born in 1987
- Sings - "Fragile" by Sting
- Does a good job by playing the guitar, it keeps him behind the mike and not having to perform.  The singing is good, the song is sort of boring, but it should be enough to keep him going, especially because I think the dudettes dig him.

Syesha Mercado - Born in 1987
- Sings - "If I Was Your Woman" by Stephanie Mills, I think.
- A really nice R&B performance.  Vocal range was good, performance was good, and this was a great performance that should keep her to the next week.
- What the hell is with all of these 21 year olds?  I remember, sort of, my 21st birthday, and I wasn't singing in 1988.  Thankfully the picture people supposedly took of me on my 21st birthday has disappeared, I hope.

Chikezie - Born in 1985
- Sings - "If Only For One Night" by Luther Vandross
- Chikezie is showing he might be the next R&B singer to blow up across the Universe.  From week to week he shows differences he can tackle, and he actually needs to lose this competition to make his own career, a la Daughtry.

Brooke White - Born in 1983
- Sings - "Every Breath You Take" by The Police
- How boring can you get.  Sure, it's nice on piano, and she screwed up the start, but unless she does something special to get her butt off the piano stool, or straddles it like Tori Amos, as much as I think she is purty, sings purty, and has talent, this week wasn't her best.  So much potential that went away.

Michael Johns - Born in 1978
- Sings - "We Will Rock You " by Queen
- Only a few words need to be written - You are no Freddie Mercury.  I guess a few more words are needed - the band didn't help.  I don't know what the judges heard, but he just doesn't seem to have the persona to be Freddie, at least on TV I guess.  For whatever reason I thought he wasn't that good.  Maybe I should just wonder what is wrong with me, or I need to be there, live.
- I was 10 or 11 when this song came out, the first album I ever bought was "Night at the Opera," and I found "News of the World" fantastic as the years went on, especially with the album art.  I always loved reading "No Synthesisers!"

Carly Smithson - Born in 1983
- Sings - "Total Eclipse of the Heart" by Bonnie Tyler
- A simple choice for her, but for me it just brings back flashbacks of high school.  Ugh!  Okay, singing wise Carly was good, but she just seems to be singing, not performing, and for Jim Steinman songs, as much as it is about the song, it's more about the performance of the song.  She just sang it, whereas Meat Loaf knows how to perform.  She needed to really find Jim Steinman history and how Meat Loaf made those songs performance art.  That is what Jim Steinman did.

David Archuleta - Born in 1990
- Sings - "You're the Voice" by Farnham Johnny?
- Is he just trying to get other people money by singing obscure songs?  That said, I really like the song, like the performance, and I was graduating college when this dude was being born.  He tried to branch out, but I'm guessing in 1990 there are better songs, that people might actually know, that he could have really blown out of the competition.  We'll see if his good looks still keep him in the competition.

 Kristy Lee Cook - Born in 1984
- Sings - "God Bless the U.S.A." by Lee Greenwood
- Gosh girl, I like you, but how the hell did you get this far in the competition.  You sing nice enough, at least this week, sort of, but you aren't a performer in any sense of the word.  Thank your lucky stars you got to the final 10 to go on tour because a lot of other singers are better than you.  And from the judge's comments, what the hell am I not hearing nor seeing on my screen tonight.

David Cook - Born in 1982
- Sings - "Billy Jean" by Michael Jackson
- Nice change of a Michael Jackson song.  If anyone ever says "How do I make a song my own?" this is the performance they should show.  He works the stage, he sings like a rocker, and if he doesn't win he will probably have a fantastic career anyway.  He actually got in touch with a song with the year he was born, and if I had a dollar I might actually download that song version from iTunes. (Dude note: As I laid in bed last night I couldn't sleep because I just had to figure David's version probably wasn't his own arrangement. Sure enough, I did some quick research this morning and guess I missed at the beginning where they said it was Chris Cornell's version. Thought he did a good job, anyway. DOTR)

Let's wrap this up...

From a lot of the comments I'm guessing that the performances came off a hell of a lot better live than on my TV because, well, when I thought some of them didn't do well, Simon-Paula-Randy thought they were great.   I know live is better than TV, but is there that much of a difference.  If the "American Idol" folks want to prove it to me, fly me out for next week's show, otherwise, I don't think anyone did that well this week except David Cook.

That's it for this one!  I'm The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

Posted by Rightdude at 9:26 PM | Comments (0)