American Idol, Top 5, April 29/30
 

Tuesday: One Hour Show 7pm CDT
Wednesday: One Hour Results show 8pm CDT

Why are they sticking to one hour results shows? For the last couple of weeks I’ve just been tuning in for the last five or ten minutes.

Anyway, tonight the mentor is Neil Diamond whose songs include Sweet Caroline (about Caroline Kennedy), Coming to America, and Red Red Wine (made popular by UB40).

Vote for who you think will go home...

Syesha is doomed. Last week showed that even if she puts out a good performance, she doesn't have a fan base. Plus, of all the remaining contestants, she's the least suited to this genre.

I'm not so sure that Syesha will be going home tonight - Neil Diamond style of music is her genre, I think that she's going to shine tonight. I'm thinking Brooke White or Jason Castro, but I will wait until after I see them perform to make my vote.

Agreed. Her only chance is for Castro to give a forgettable performance at the show's open but to get praise from Simon anyway, with Brooke later throwing up on stage and Archuleta forgetting the words. Castro fans will let their guards down, with the rabid teenage girls rushing to save Giggles and the soccer moms joining VFTW to protect Nanny Brooke. Then maybe, <i>maybe</i>, Syesha could survive, but even then, I don't think there's a chance. We're long past the singing portion of this competition, so it really doesn't matter what they do vocally from this point forward.

das

I will miss the hotness that is Syesha.

I hope she goes out w/ a bang.

And by bang I mean a massive amount of cleavage.

Brooke will sing "You Don't Bring Me Flowers". And she'll have just the right amount of tears in her eyes.

It would be a real kick if she and Jason did the song together. It's perfect for both of them.

I love Neil Diamond so i was trying to figure out what were his worse songs that people would end up picking just to spite me. "you dont bring me flowers" was at the top of the list.

Are they still just doing 1 song a piece? If so, that's going to be a lot of filler even for the performance night. Extra long fluff pieces and obnoxious product placement. Of course, they could do something crazy like give the singers time to sing a whole song ... nah, that's crazy talk!

If Archie sings "Heartlight", I will kill a child tomorrow. Just a word of warning.

I'll take a crack at what they might sing:

Hopefully, they'll steer clear of "I Am I Said", "Heartlight", "Song Sung Blue", and "Sweet Caroline"

Archuleta:
"America" - He's the only one that could get away with doing that song
"Be" - An inspirational ballad
"I'm a Believer" - His pre-teen and soccer mom fans would love hearing him sing this
"Two Bit Man Child" or "Shilo" - Not really, but it would be funny if he did

Cook:
"Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon" - An obvious choice. Probably too obvious
"Solitary Man" - Seems like an easy song for him to do his thing to.
"Brother Love's Travelling Salvation Show"
"Cracklin' Rosie" - The "Song you wouldn't expect him to sing" choice

Syesha - not that it's going to make any difference what she sings:
"Thank the Lord for the Night Time"
After that, I got nothing -confused-


Brooke - Needs to take a risk with one of her songs (an uptempo number):
"Hello Again" - She's been criticized for not connecting with her songs. As someone who's been away from home for months and missed her sister's wedding she shouldn't have that problem if she did this song.
"Crunchy Granola Suite" -pray-
Why do I have this terrible feeling she's going to do "Heartlight"?

Castro

I would be shocked if Castro doesn't do "Song Sung Blue" with a ukulele. Unless Cook's name gets drawn out of the top hat and he does his emo version.

what week do we start hearing 2 songs each?

cook will totally do a "girl you'll be a woman soon" version thats like the UrgeOverkill cover.

why does this episode have to be on the same night i get GTA4???

Song list from TMZ:

Good god, what is Paula on?!?!

No kidding. She's even more incoherent than usual.......and thats saying something.

Paula's hair. Paula's dress. Simon's shirt. :lol:

I'm shocked that Jason has memory problems and motivation issues. Frequent cases of the munchies too? God, is he still singing "Forever in Blue Jeans"? Congrats on making that song even <i>more</i> boring.

Cool. Generic Rocker Video Background #1! We haven't seen that in 2 whole weeks! Cook should have stuck with his simple vocal performance in private with Diamond. This arrangement is ass.

Poor Brooke. She looks so distant and terrified that I wonder if drugs are at work. If not, perhaps she should try some. What a disaster.

I wonder what Giggles will do with "Sweet Caro -- oh, God. <i>Two</i> songs tonight? Say it isn't so.

Can <i>I</i> give Syesha a hug? :fc: A big "do not want" to that hair and overly glossy makeup. Just because Carly's off the show doesn't mean anyone else should be using her former stylist. Nice vocals, though. Pretty much the only performance so far that didn't suck, but not overwhelming either.

:lol: Paula's a fuckin' nutjob. "Nightmare" ... "disaster" ... Simon and I are on the same page.

What's with the swaying nowhere-near-rhythmic mosh pit on "September Morn"? :lol: These are your <i>American Idol</i> voters. Thanks to Castro, I can save 3mg of melatonin tonight. Say something nice about it, Simon, so his moron* fans forget to vote.

* If you're a fan of Castro, obviously I didn't mean to insult <i>you</i>. And I'm sorry you're a moron.

Much better from Cook, ditching at least <i>some</i> of the over-the-top "rocker" nonsense. Not great, but good and still on target for victory.

There's my Brooke! Always completely connected to the lyrics of the song. I too long for the shores of Arizona. :sad:

Archie never ceases to remind me of the twitching little freaks in the Spelling Bee. "Do the chickens have large talons?" Typical David: vocally accurate and entirely boring.

Still liking Syesha. At least she has some personality. Not sure about being barefoot for this song too. NO! Not the dreaded "You may be in trouble tonight" from Simon. :wave: Syesha. You will be missed.

Thank the Lord for the credits.

das

Paula badmouthing the second preformance before she even heard it rotfl

Castro is coma-inducing.

Hopefully, Castro will leave, and Brooke and Syesha will be safe.

HOPEFULLY.

Brooke got her pep back!

Wasn't going to watch this until I saw that Neil Diamond was the guest judge.

How the hell could they praise douche-bag Archuleta's version of America?! He sounded terrible! His voice was nowhere near powerful enough to pull that one off.

Nice to see Kendra behind the judges. :drool:

The wife and I are sick of Brooke and when it appears as if she is holding her breath when the judges are giving her feedback. Or as my wife says - it looks like she is trying to take a shit.

David A. is all that is wrong w/ the world.

I'll have some of whatever Paula's having! :beer:

Should go: Jason Castro. I've seen enough of him to say with confidence ... he sucks.

Will go: Syesha. Despite giving the best vocal performance (by far) of the night, and having the pimp spot. Because AI voters really are that stupid.

I'll say this for David Cook - if I didn't know they were Neil Diamond songs, I'd have thought they were original weak-ass alt-rock grunge-lite songs. I guess that's a kind of complement.

Brooke's first song gave me "Here Comes the Sun" flashbacks. But the second was in her Carole King/Tori Amos zone.

Simon's right on with the Archenator. His team (and you know it's not him, but his handlers) is super smart about this competition and doing all the right things.

It's hard for me to see any other outcome but a battle of the Davids at the end. I know Daughtry V1.0 went out 4th, but I don't think the fan bases outside the Davids are as deep this year. And I'm still sticking with my Archuleta "for the win" prediction. Don't forget his trump card - if this season is like last, the final song they are judged on is the winner of that god-awful songwriting competition. It will be slow, schmaltzy, inspiritional, and the lyrics will be filled with chasing your dreams, believing in yourself, with an extra-large side helping of God and/or Jesus. In other words, Team Archuleta's wet dream come true. If David Cook has a shred of dignity and self-respect, he won't be able to sing it without gagging. And that'll be the difference.

Brooke: "Woooooooooooo!!!!!"

What a strange show. The way they were rushing everything, even the judges were confused (Paula more than usual :)). They should have allowed 90 minutes to reduce the chaos.