Has American Idol Saved the Best for Last?
I’m going to put aside my disdain for the city jumping and the easter egg dress and just say that tonight’s next to last audition installment was finally entertaining from start to finish. I couldn’t help but feel like the producers were rushing a bunch of good contestants on stage tonight so that we could get to know some of the top 24. Maybe that’s putting a lot on this group but I really felt like tonight was a showcase of contenders.
I’ll rank my top five, although that might be hard!
5. Joy Dove was delightful in all the ways. Her energy may be a little too much for America but her audition was smile inducing. She is from Natchitoches, Louisiana and I want to hear Ryan say that a couple of times. Speaking of Ryan, was he even on tonight?
4. Miranda “Poh” Scott has a raspy soulful voice that I thought sounded a little like Amy Winehouse but Keith thought sounded like Rhianna. Her sister Shi was one of my favorites last year until she crumbled under the pressure and fell apart when it counted. I think Poh learned a few things from her sister and has the self-confidence that her sister was lacking. She’ll do well if she makes it through drama week. Plus she got her nickname from the Teletubbies!
3. Already I’m stressing about not fitting them all in. I think I’m going to give the third spot to Amelia Eisenhauer, who played her fiddle for a few bars and is a big Led Zeppelin fan. Her voice was well beyond her 15 years and fiddle players are just cool. But also, Jenna Renae had such a presence about her. My notes just say “coolest girl ever” and “real-girl vibe” so the fact that she sang so well and played the piano only add to her star power. Ok, third spot is a tie between these girls and Emily Brooke who returned to audition after making it to Hollywood last year and getting the “come back next year” cut at the end. She’s good and she already has a hashtag fandom team so I think she’s in #EmsGems!
2. This is tough because if I thought a girl could win this year, I would have picked two of the three names above for spots 1 and 2 but I really think it’s going to be a guy that wins. That said, will it be a young guy or an older guy with a guitar? My number two goes to Adam Lasher because he is a super hot 28-year-old singer who showed us his rocker, long-hair, headband wearing side last year. This year he strolled in wearing a suit and had his shoes shined and a haircut and it worked on me. Oh, did he sing? He did, it was good and if he doesn’t turn into a d-bag in Hollywood I think he’ll do well.
1. I’m giving my top spot tonight to an underdog maybe. I really loved Mackenzie Bourg and his mashup of songs from the judges. He is 23 so he doesn’t make me feel like a creeper for voting for him. His performance was quirky and cool and he looks like he could win. He doesn’t have the baby-face of some of the younger WGWGs but he wasn’t real edgy either. They didn’t pile on the praise but I think sometimes they do that to trick us. I’ll be mad if this guy doesn’t go far.
Ok, I think that was actually everyone that got a ticket Tuesday but who is counting.
My only negative comment tonight (besides, where the heck was Ryan?) is that I don’t know why they had us meet Mario Bonds and fall in love with his personality and then cut him like that. Kid had a voice better than half the people they put through on the first night of auditions. I don’t understand this nonsense of showing us audition segments that are going to make us angry. Maybe it’s some kind of viewer-science voodoo that I don’t understand. Make the viewers angry and they’ll come back for more? I don’t know. Anyway, a good night all around but I’m looking forward to wrapping auditions so we can get serious about singing (and making fun of style choices and seeing Kelly Clarkson and please can we have more Simon Cowell clips)! Ok, one more to go. See you tomorrow.