Bogus Gold

Carly Smithson lead us off with "Crazy on You," by Heart. Heart is one of those bands I've never really liked for reasons I can't really figure out. But if you're going to do a Heart song I can get into, this is the one. And Carly sang the lights out on this one. Listening on replay it was actually even better the second time. She didn't miss a note (despite what Randy Jackson thought he heard). The power was where it was supposed to be and again, unlike a lot of the other performers, she doesn't struggle when she has to soften it up from the power notes (also despite what Randy Jackson thought he heard). Simon named her the one among the girls to beat as soon as she chooses the right song. So maybe he's never really liked Heart that much either, as she sang this one about as well as one can imagine.

Syesha Mercado came next with "Me and Mrs. Jones," by Billy Paul and eight thousand different cover artists. Syesha, Syesha, Syesha... You're one of the most beautiful, charismatic, and vocally talented in the whole competition. What the heck was this choice about? Seriously. You sang it alright, I guess. The glory note at the end seemed a bit gratuitously showy. I mean... if you wanted to belt those kind of notes out, this really wasn't the song for it. So we're back to song choice again, and I'm back to "Why?" See what you did there? Still, she didn't screw it up for what it was or anything. Simon harped on changing the gender from "Mrs." to "Mr." Jones, but I've heard that done like a kazillion times by covers before, so I don't know why he harped on that.

Brooke White next came out in a blood spattered night dress, holding a butcher knife and... no, wait... that was just my last nightmare of her. Seriously, she scares me. She actually sang, "You're So Vain," by Carly Simon. If I can get past the cutesy aspect played WAY too much afterward about how Simon was the "vain" one she was singing to, she actually did this one rather well. She accompanied herself on the guitar and I thought it added something nice to it. She has always had a rather "Carly Simon" sounding tone to her voice, so Syesha should take a few notes from her on appropriate song choices. That said, the judges loved this one, and I didn't love it. It was good though, and among the best of the night.

Ramiele Malubay then began the most disturbing trend of the night. No, not disco. We've made our peace with that theme on Idol already. It was that she sang "Don't Leave Me This Way," by Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes and seriously underperformed her performance last week. Watching the performance back again there wasn't a lot wrong with it. A little unexpected control with her pitch a couple of times, but still showing most of the talent she displayed before. It's just that she set the bar so high for herself last week this was kind of a dull, let down of a follow up. The judges sort of complimented her talent and it came out that she couldn't make up her mind on a song for this week, switching back and forth. And this was the one that came out on top?

Kristy Lee Cook followed with "You're No Good," by Betty Everett originally but really better known by Linda Ronstadt. I panned Kristy pretty well last week, but at least it was noted that she was ill for her performance then. So this was our first look at a healthy Kristy. And I will be the first to admit - this was a lot, lot better. It wasn't stunning, but she seemed a lot more confident and compelling on stage this week. She warbled her notes a couple of times, but nothing too awful. Still, only kinda a middling performance compared to others tonight. For some reason (perhaps Carrie Underwood's record sales?) they keep trying to shove this girl back into a country music box, and in their comments this week all but ordered her to do country next week.

Amanda Overmyer took the stage next with "Carry on Wayward Son," by Kansas. And if you think that sounded kind of cool in concept, as I did, you were going to be terribly disappointed, as I was. Wow. This was mostly a great big turd of a performance laid in the middle of the stage. Just not in tune, not in synch, her normal confident stage presence was replaced by a kind of wandering around the stage, and she sported a hairdo that could only recall the Bride of Frankenstein. I hope her lower register isn't always that troubled, because she really can't scream out every single note on every song and hope to win. Really down week for her. And the judges seemed almost annoyed by this fact.

Alaina Whitaker, the show's youngest youngster, next sang "Hopelessly Devoted to You," by Olivia Newton-John. I thought Alaina did pretty well last week. This week she caught the dreaded "let down" disease, and didn't do quite as well. She demonstrated some real trouble staying in tune more than once. And she was, like many others this week, really pretty boring. It's kind of a singer's song, so I didn't expect her to jump around dancing or anything. But there was just very little worth listening to here either. Even the good moments were only notable for not going off key. The judges said similar-ish things.

Alexandrea Lushington sang "If You Leave Me Now," by Chicago, which was a weird song choice to me from the beginning. But she's kind of an off-beat girl so I was willing to let her win me over with the choice. She didn't. This song just doesn't work as a solo vocal, and the background singers didn't provide the Chicago-esque vocal harmony. Plus, somewhat surprisingly, she really struggled with pitch this week as well on a vocal that wasn't really that challenging. And unlike last week's lively performance, this was delivered as a stand-in-one-spot ballad. Off-key, dreary, and poor choice. Bad combo. The judges called out the "let down from last week" theme again on her here.

Kady Malloy next went with "Magic Man," by Heart. Kady discovered something I think some of the other girls better learn pretty fast. Don't do the same artist as Carly Smithson on the same week as her. Because she'll probably out-sing you, and you'll look bas in comparison. And that was, indeed, the biggest problem here. That plus, you know, I don't much like Heart. It wasn't awful. It wasn't very interesting, or as good as the original, or very different than the original, or as good a cover as what Carly did to start the night. The judges continued to be frustrated that she's not really showing them whatever they thought they'd see when they put her into the finals.

Asia'h Epperson, after a strong performance last week, got the coveted final spot going with "All by Myself," by Eric Carmen. This was one of Clay Aiken's breakout songs in Season 2, if you've been following along. It's not easy to take a song this simple and deliver the combination of softness and power along with an emotion that doesn't come across as saccharine. How did Asia'h handle the task? Not abysmally, but still a bit of a let down. She was pretty shaky in the early parts of the song, but recovered well toward the end. It was not a flop, but not even close to a breakout performance. We learned in the judges comments that she was sick this week. So she was a week late on that theme, but didn't miss this week's "let down" theme either, so she's all caught up for next week. The judges all declared this a Celine song, which was kind of unfair since she's one of many to cover it. And then used the Holy Diva Trinity club to bash her with. "You're no Celine! *bash* How dare you attempt Celine! *smack*" It really wasn't as bad as all that. Just a let down from last week.

Okay so on to the highlights, lowlights, and picks for going home.

The highlights were, unusually for Idol, very front loaded this week. I thought Carly Smithson was the very best, and I'll give the nod to Brooke "psycho-killer" White to join her in the top tier.

Then we had a whole lot of average.

For the bottom of the night? I'd have to go with Amanda Overmyer, and Alexandrea Lushington. I like them both as performers and wouldn't really like either of them to go. But especially on seeing the replays these were the night's weakest.

Who goes home? Tough call. Amanda is popular and unique enough to maybe survive that performance. But I don't think Alexandrea is. So joining her, look for one of the "boring but competent" performers like Alaina, Kristy or Kady. Could be a stunner this week though where we lose someone expected to go much further.