Kenny Rogers! Yay! Wow, he looks fantastic. Actually, not so much like Kenny, but I know that’s Kenny, because it’s his voice. Lots of plastic surgery? Anyway, who cares, it’s Kenny, and I don’t care if he gets Dolly’s boobs put on his body, as long as he can still sing.

Kenny is saying what he means and not sugarcoating. Yay! I love it! He actually said Taylor seemed weak at first. That’s awesome, I like when they tell the truth.
IDOLS 01… So Taylor is singing “Take Me Home, Country Road” by John Denver. That was one of Taylor’s most boring performances ever. I don’t think he’s ever sang a bad note, though. He’s never flat, never sharp, so we know he’s talented, but that was a horrible song choice. It was exactly as Simon said, safe and boring. Rewatch: Oh, I do love his high notes. Still boring. And oh my dear Captain Tightpants, please please loosen up.
IDOLS 02… Mandisa is singing “Any Man of Mine” by Shania Twain. First of all, it’s a Shania song, so that’s strike one. And once she sings her first phrase, I know it’s the wrong song choice for her. The whole song was awful. Way too deep in the low range for her for most of the song. PAULA: “Mandisa, you can sing the phone book, you can sing the Encyclopedia, you can sing anything.” SARAHK: “Yeah, but she can’t sing that song.” Re: wardrobe. I’m disappointed. It’s not as modest as she usually is. And she really just shouldn’t wear jeans. Rewatch: Note to Mandisa: You don’t need to sing teasin’ squeezin’ pleasin’ kinda songs. It was just uncomfortable for me.
IDOLS 03… Elliott’s singing “If Tomorrow never Comes” by Garth Brooks. I’m not a big Garth fan, but he has great songs (make sense?). Elliott’s wearing brown, so of course, he gets my vote, as that’s my recently confessed favorite color. Anyway, it’s good, a little subdued and safe, but kinda the right balance of smooth v. warbling. I personally liked it a lot and enjoyed it more than Garth. Plus Elliott took liberties with the melody, and I like that. Did Paula just say that “If Tomorrow Never Comes” is a hard song to sing? No, it’s really not, but I don’t care. Simon agrees. Rewatch: I enjoyed it just as much the second time around. He’s probably my #2 tonight.
IDOLS 04… Ryan is asking Paris how many hairstyles she can possibly have. I dunno, Ryan, how many over-priced t-shirts can you possibly have? She’s singing “How Do I Live” by Trisha Yearwood if you’re country, Leann Rimes if you’re pop (sorry, but Leann’s version was the lesser of the two, because she was way too much about herself on that song). Here’s hoping that she’s singing Trisha… aaaaand she’s not. The first “ever survive” was… um… wait, Frank, can you pause the DVR? I’m not done baggin’ on Paris. Anyway, the first ever survive was screechy and just offkey enough that I couldn’t tell if it was sharp or flat, but it made my face hurt listening to it. The second one was fine. She looks great, I love every part of the outfit, including the hair. Oh look at me being Paula. “Paris, you’re beautiful tonight, so you should be proud.” Really, the song was awful. And Simon must be doing that reverse psychology thing. ? BTW, didn’t Jessica sing this song last year and it was awful? Rewatch: Just really did nothing for me. And I really didn’t like the cuts, it could have been cut much better. Just doesn’t flow. Eh, not impressed.
IDOLS 05… Ace is next, and Kenny’s like, “Ace sings with his heart” (hearts don’t make pretty music), so we know this is gonna s-u-c-K. He’s singing Keith Urban’s “Tonight I Wanna Cry”. This is terrible and boring and … sorry, I was sleeping. What’s going on? Oh yeah, Paula’s talking. Anyway, I was praying for him to leave off the falsetto, because his falsetto makes me wanna cry, but he had to do a whole phrase of it and not just one note, and that means there’s all kinds of cringing goin’ on up here in the house of J. Ryan: “Ladies, he’s officially single.” Translation: “Like Clay Aiken and me, Ace has failed to find the right woman.” Wink wink, nudge nudge, I heart Kathy Griffin. Rewatch: The purple tulips I bought today are very pretty. It wasn’t as awful the second time around. The chorus sounds like the chorus from “Wind Beneath My Wings”, now that I hear it again. I was too busy hating it the first time. It’s still fairly off-key, and there’s that dreadful falsetto. Yech.
[HELL AIN’T FROZE OVER YET, Y’ALL]… Kellie Pickler is next, dressed in her jeans and brassiere. Nice girl, that Kellie Pickler. Ok, so Ryan asks her, “Are you really as big an idiot as you pretend, or are you faking, you big phony Earsore?” “No, really, I never heard of calamaray, and salmon has an L in it.” Yeah, well Kellie, “pseudo” has a silent “p” – don’t hurt yourself trying to figure out how to pronounce it – also “fake” has a silent “e” but it’s not pronounced “fakey” unless I say “fakey fake Kellie Pickler”, and “pretense” also has that big fat silent “e”. But you know what, now that Ryan axed you if you’re fake, and you said, “Naw, I wouldn’t even know how to spell fake, what with that silent ‘e’ and all”, I believe ya. You must be the real thang!
Oh how I love it when they read what I write about them.
EEEEEEEEE!!! OK! WHEN I WAS THINKING THIS WEEK WHAT SONGS EVERYONE WOULD SING FOR COUNTRY NIGHT, I KNEW SHE WAS GOING TO SING “FANCY” BY REBA! Poor Frank, I just turned and screamed that at him at high volume. Kenny: “This is the perfect song for her.” SarahK: “Yeah, I know, it’s about a prostitute, and we’ve seen that prom dress!” For the record, I think Chris is going to sing “Papa Loved Mama” or “Rodeo” or something by Toby Keith.
I’m going to hate myself in the morning (“but I’m gonna love you tonight”) and blame it on Paula’s vodka, but she was actually on-key most of the time. I have to be honest and say she sang well. But I can dis the hand gestures and laugh at the fact that half of voting AI watchers think she’s a tramp (allegedly) and what a perfect song that makes it for her. For once, I’ll say this: Great song choice, Kellie!! Rewatch: Don’t walk and sing your low notes at the same time. I do really wanna know why she must pronounce “uptown” “upchown”. And she’s pretty weak when she needs to be strong. And she’s still a major phony. You might fool a lot of people, but I was married to your type once upon a time (no, not a girl, a phony), and I knows ’em when I sees ’em.
Sweet, Frank left all his sauce from the Cranberry Barbecue Chicken I made tonight, so I totally get to finish it off.
IDOLS 07… Chris is singing “Making Memories of Us” by Keith Urban. That was awesome. We finally see the softer side, no jumping around, no flipping the mic stand, that was fantastic. Simon says that it was nice to see the softer side (we were all brainwashed by that Sears commercial way back, no?) but that for the last 2 weeks all the contestants had horrible song choices. You can’t blame them for last week – the last 6 years haven’t been the greatest for music (except Dave Matthews and Toby Keith and a few others), and this week – um, what, do you expect Chris to know all the country songs and pick the very best? Let’s see how Kellie does Nirvana week. Rewatch: It was beautiful this time too. Well done.
Frank just said, “So why do we have this guy from the chicken restaurants coaching these singers?” and if he wasn’t joking, it would be the end of him.
IDOLS 08… So. Katharine hates me (why do they always front me?). She’s singing Faith Hill’s “Bringing Out the Elvis”, and we know how I feel about that (scroll to Melissa McGhee). That’s OK if she hates me, the only ones I really want to love me are Mandisa, Chris, and Taylor, if I’m telling the Kellie-Pickler’s-honest truth. Goodness, girl, are you letting Kellie pick your songs? You know she wants to sabotage you, right? No, wait, she’s just a sweet, All-American country bumpkin who wouldn’t sell her own mother up the river to get what she wants. Oh how I hate this song. She’s wearing brown and purple, so you know I’m gonna love the wardrobe. Ok, so it was one of the best of the night, because tonight has been awful. Screechy on the high notes. Rewatch: Much better the 2nd time around, because I was over it being a song that I hate so much, but she needs to make sure she stays on the mic all the time. Anyway, it was really good on the repeat.
IDOLS 09… Bucky is singing “Best I Ever Had”… um, by Vertical Horizon. I guess Gary Allan released it in 2005, but I immediately said, “That’s a rock song. I know that song.” Sure ’nuff. It’s on that album where the girl is cartwheeling into the water or something like that. “You’re a God” is on the same album. But he didn’t sing it rock, so I’ll give it to him. It was good, pretty, boring, safe, too understated. He must think he’s not on the bubble any more since he wasn’t in the bottom 3 last week, so he’s not going for it. But really, no one is, so whatever. Rewatch: Still pretty, still boring, pitchier than it was before, and very forgettable.
Vocally, tonight (voting for the * ones once, ** ones twice where Frank and I both vote):
Chris**
Elliott**
Katharine**
Kellie (I’m going to hell for putting her in the top half, I’m sure of it, but don’t worry – I’ll never vote for her!)
Bucky*
Taylor* (so boring) – come ON Taylor, you know you’re better than this!
Mandisa**
Paris
Ace
Prediction: This is pulled straight out of my pinkytoe, because this was such an awful week that it’s really hard to predict. Bottom 3 will be Ace, Mandisa, Bucky. No wait, Ace, Paris, Bucky. But if there’s a big shocker this week, it’ll be that Bucky is safe, and Taylor is in the bottom 3. Ace goes home.