So I’m crushed, but not surprised that Melinda was off last week. After seeing those hometown vignettes, it’s not hard to believe that Melinda lacked the support that Jordin and Blake have. Did you see the 10,000+ people in Glendale, AZ for Jordin? And the not one, but two different rallies for Blake (one in Bothell and one in Seattle w/ Sir Mix-A-Lot)?
I’m not surprised because this has happened before. Someone listed all the people out at #3 from season one and Melinda is definitely the strongest to go at this point. The list was Nikki McKibbin (Tamyra Gray had already been eliminated at #4), Kimberly Locke, Jasmine Trias (LaToya London had already been eliminated), Vonzell Solomon and Elliott Yamin (Chris Daughtry had already been eliminated). I think that it’s a close one between Tamyra and Melinda not winning their respective seasons, but Kelly Clarkson has been a pretty good original American Idol. You’d be hard pressed to say that the eventual winner (Jordin or Blake) is/will be better than her.
I just really wished it would’ve been a Jordin/Melinda finale. I like Blake, but vocally, I would’ve preferred Melinda there.
Tonight was at the Kodak Theater and Randy decided to break out his Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band jacket. Paula looked horrible. Rumor had it that she broke her nose after tripping over her dog. Simon wore a jacket, but couldn’t resist showing his cleavage. Ryan on the other hand, dressed pretty nicely. Although I can’t help comparing him to the hosts on Dancing With The Stars (Tom Bergeron and Samantha Harris) and they are 100% better and more entertaining than him. Even though Samantha has the lowest, huskiest voice of the three of them.
They had a coin flip to see who would perform first. Blake won and had the right to choose to go first or second. He asked Jordin if she wanted to go first and she didn’t care, so he said he’d go first. Like in football, if I had the choice, I’d have deferred and gone second, which would’ve also meant going last and closing the show. But it didn’t seem tactical to Blake at all, which is pretty cool. I think at this point, they are competitive, but not calculating. And I think that’s cool too.
Blake starts it off with his second go around of Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love A Bad Name.” He changes it up a little. The drummer was featured once again. Still a great performance, but it did lack the shock value of when he first did it (since you knew what was coming). I really enjoy listening to him beat box, but I find myself asking myself if I’d actually buy a CD of him? Maybe I’d download a song here or there (thanks for the iTunes cards TAP!), but may not commit to a whole CD. Randy gave him a 10 out of 10 for the beat box, but the singing was just a’ight. Paula said he outdid himself. Simon said he was not the best singer, but was the best performer.
Jordin chose “Fighter” by Christina Aguilera as her free choice song. I could totally hear her recording this one and her being an R&B artist. She has such a big voice. And, again, I can’t believe she’s only 17. Randy called her voice stellar. Paula thought it would be the best finale ever and the first 2 performances proved it. Simon thought it was great she chose a younger song (I agree), but called it shrieky in the middle. He gave Round One to Blake.
Blake chose Maroon 5’s “She Will Be Loved” as his free choice song. He rocked the green and brown argyle for this song. Didn’t really hit his falsetto notes very well. I think he needs to be upbeat for me to listen to him. Otherwise it comes off as boring and dull. Randy called it a great song and very nice vocal. Paula said it sounded great. Simon thought it was good and safe, but not as good as the first song/performance. He wondered why he picked that song because it didn’t have much impact. Especially for the finale. I kinda agree. He needed to do another dancing/beat boxing song. Shoulda, coulda, woulda…
Jordin’s repeat song was Martina McBride’s “A Broken Wing,” but she probably only chose this one because she couldn’t possibly sing “I (Who Have Nothing)” for the third time and do it two weeks in a row! She really has a great voice. Can’t say that enough. Randy called her the most talented 17 year old he’s ever encountered (I’m surprised he didn’t drop any names of previous 17 year olds he’s worked with). He also called it better than the original. Simon simply stated, now THAT was good. Round Two to Jordin.
The last song for both of the contestants was an original song that was the winning entry of a songwriters contest done by American Idol. Turns out it was done by Jeff Peabody and Scott Krippayne. Krippayne has 7 albums/cassettes on Amazon.com. So much for finding new talent. The song was a “saccharine” power ballad entitled, “This Is My Now.” Good for Jordin, potentially disastrous for Blake.
Blake’s rendition was predictably uninspired. He’s better off mixing things up and Blake-izing songs. No such luck with this one. He was reduced to a few CRich bounces in the middle of it, but it didn’t work. Randy said the song just didn’t suit this voice. Simon called it all a little odd. It wasn’t a bad song, but it just wasn’t one that he’d sing. To Blake’s credit, he did nothing to bad mouth the song. This was an unfair advantage for Jordin. I really would’ve like to have heard Melinda sing this one. Or Sanjaya. Or Antonella, just to see what she’d wear up there. Maybe Jared Cotter would’ve done his face grab to this song. Who knows?
When Jordin’s turn came to close out the show, she knocked it out of the park. She sang it well, and sobbed a bit at the end, which was reminiscent of when Kelly Clarkson injected her exuberance into her winning song, “A Moment Like This.” My wife Kristin hasn’t watched the show yet (she’s putting our son Jared to sleep right now), but I’ve got money on her crying after this performance. (I would’ve lost! But she was distracted because of all the gratuitous shots of Constantine in the audience. She was annoyed because he looked so smug.) Randy called her the best singer tonight. Paula said she looked over at Jordin’s parents and saw how proud they were of her. Simon said that when he said she didn’t deserve to be in the finale last week, he was wrong. And that she wiped the floor with Blake on the last song.
I thought after last week that Jordin was hands down going to blow Blake away. But then when I heard the crowd for him after his first song, I thought that he may have a chance. Then after all was said and done, Jordin will win going away. I know that they don’t disclose the votes, but I don’t think this will be close.
Going back to Melinda, I feel bad for her that she didn’t win the competition, but as we’ve seen in the past, you don’t have to win the competition to have a successful career. Look at how well Chris Daughtry is doing. And how well Clay Aiken did. And Justin Guarini … is helping host the American Idol thing on the TV Guide Channel with Kimberly Caldwell. I’m happy for Melinda because this competition got her out of the background and into the forefront to sing. She will get a record contract and do well. I haven’t seen her exit interview yet, but will watch it on TiVo later. My wife Kristin and I will also miss LaKisha. She was great on her exit interview (American Idol Extra). She is the only contestant to state that she is not a celebrity, as most of the other non-winners seem to forget. That she’s just plain old Kiki. She was real down to earth. I won’t miss her singing, but I will miss her great perspective.
And lastly, my obsession with Dancing With The Stars lives on. I haven’t seen the other seasons (this is season 4), but the finale with Apolo Anton Ohno, Laila Ali and Joey Fatone was spectacular. Apolo and his partner look professional. Joey is on the heavier side, but it’s amazing how light on his feet he is. I know he’s got the N*Sync dancing in his background, but he still had to learn all the steps and did very well. Laila had some obstacles to overcome (she’s admittedly a “big girl”) but she also looked very elegant out there. And she’s engaged to former Chicago Bear/SF 49er/USC Trojan Curtis Conway. I’m pretty much hooked on this show now and I’m guessing there will be a season 5. And I’m guessing celebs and pseudo-celebs are trying to line up the gig right now!
So that’s it for this season. Thanks to Mike Rico once again for filling in when I wasn’t able to do some of the recaps and thanks to all of you for reading these things. I’ve got to admit these were hard to churn out this year. IF they come back next year, I imagine they won’t be as structured. Just bullet points to be less time-consuming. We’ll see.
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