American Idol judge Kara DioGuardi was responsible for penning the universally loathed season 8 finale song “No Boundaries.” We’ve spent countless hours thinking about how bad this song was, and we clearly weren’t alone — even Kris Allen opted to cut it from his set list during the Idol Summer Tour. Seems like Kara isn’t willing to let us forget the craptastic ballad though, she has re-recorded it on her own and released it on YouTube so America will have yet another version to deal with.

To be fair, her version sounds better than either Kris Allen or Adam Lambert’s renditions. However, let’s face it, it’s still a pretty sucky song. What say you, does her rendition give the song the respect it deserves, or is it superfluous and pointless to release this three months after the fact? [Photo: Getty Images]

America voted … and the loser of American Idol is “No Boundaries.” This season, as with all other seasons on Idol, the winner has sung a theme song written specifically for the show. Think “A Moment Like This,” the song Kelly Clarkson sang at the end of the first season, which became a best-seller. This year, the song “No Boundaries,” co-written by superfluous judge Kara DioGuardi, was that special song and it’s safe to say no one took to it. Not even DioGuardi: during the finale she actually told winner Kris Allen that the song wasn’t written for someone with his register, which is probably one of the reasons the song has been canned from the Idol tour this summer.

Apparently, the song was getting such a poor response during the live concerts that producers told Allen to find something else to sing to replace it. We hope Kara doesn’t feel too bad about it — if anything, she should take a lesson from her own overly-optimistic lyrics. Let nothing stand between you and your dreams, Kara. [Source: NY Post]

Angry Adam Lambert fans, here’s your conspiracy theory. AT&T representatives in Arkansas apparently gave lessons in “power texting” (sending multiple texts at once) to Kris Allen supporters at viewing parties, despite the show’s claim that votes created by “technical enhancements” would be thrown out. Since AT&T users are the only ones that can send votes by text, some frustrated Idol viewers are frothing at the contradiction.

While the hypocrisy is obvious, it’s hard to believe that a few rotten apples in Arkansas could have swayed the vote (which apparently wasn’t close enough for Ryan Seacrest to acknowledge on air). After all, DialIdol had Allen ahead by phone votes as well. But the company may have to make a sacrificial offering of a few local reps if the calls for blood continue.

[Photo: Getty Images]

Whoever said Clay Aiken wanted to tour with Adam Lambert was wrong, wrong, wrong. The season 2 runner-up revealed to his fan club today that he is not a fan of the raven-haired shriek machine.

I only turn the show on once a season, and only to see what the set looks like each year. This year, I happened to turn it during the minute that Adam Lambert was singing “Ring of Fire” and, at that moment, thought my ears would bleed. Contrived, awful, and slightly frightening! I wasn’t really a fan and found myself surprised whenever folks told me that they liked him. Granted, I never saw another performance (and many folks who I trust said that he was great) but I can’t imagine I would have enjoyed it. Just not my cup of tea at all. To each his own.

He then went on to explain the victory of underdog Kris Allen over Lambert as “a battle between David and Goliath—my money is on David!”

Those votes for Kris were also votes to return the show to its roots of finding “real” contestants with undiscovered talent and giving them the chance to grow and shine. They were votes that said “we’re tired of seeing contestants who already seem to know it all.”

Is Clay right, or is he just sore that Glambert won’t make that album of duets?

[Photo: Getty Images]

If only every American Idol episode was as good as THIS one! Is everyone as stunned as us that Adam Lambert didn’t win? (The judges sure seemed to be!) We’ve been anti-Adam all along but we always expected him to win so it was okay to feel that way. Now we’re just speechless. Except not really … Part two of the season eight finale was so jam-packed and full of entertainment, nary a moment could be called filler. Ryan Seacrest warned us on Tuesday to set our DVR’s to go overtime (Idol even showed up in our DVR as running till 10:07pm which we thought was hilarious - sorry Fox 5 news, hope there were no new swine flu developments today!) and we figured it would be loads of crappy appearances and 20 renditions of the already-hated finale song “No Boundaries.” But it was so much more. We have 10 favorite moments for you, but right now we need a moment to regroup from all this excitement. Way to keep us entertained, Idol. HOLY SHIT. Kris Allen!

Continue reading after the jump.

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Ryan Seacrest’s words, not ours! Last night on American Idol it was all about final impressions — Adam Lambert and Kris Allen needed to pick the right songs and hit the right notes to remind us why we like them. They both did a good job, but it was pretty clear that Adam did a little bit better. (God, it pains us to say that.) From his reprise of “Mad World,” which he originally sang during the “Songs From the Year You Were Born” week, to a toned down Sam Cooke song, he took a slight edge over Kris, whose jammy style felt weaker by comparison. If you joined in our live American Idol blog you would have been there for all the fun and the impromptu drinking games (more on that in a sec), but for now, here are our highlights.

Adam’s Performances

Adam played the game smartly last night, he sang “Mad World” again, which was universally lauded the first time around and got the first-ever standing ovation from Simon Cowell. He also toned down the rock/glam aspect (okay, he sang “Mad World” while wearing a leather duster, surrounded by dry ice fog — he toned it down AFTER that) by singing “Change is Gonna Come,” a song chosen for him by show creator Simon Fuller. It was completely out of character but he handled it competently and the only way he knew how, with a few obligatory screeches. Paula loved it so much she threw an improv-mimed lasso around Adam though to rein him in and keep him locked up forever, presumably in the same dungeon where she keeps MC Skat Kat.

Kris’ Performances

We think the judges are slightly abusive, the way they throw out their love for the contestants one minute, then they coldly rescind it the next, then are like “Baby, shh, we didn’t mean it, you’re great again.” That’s how they treated Matt Giraud and Lil Rounds for the entire show, and it’s how they’ve been treating Kris lately. After he sang “Ain’t No Sunshine,” everyone was all “Wow, awesome, you moved me,” but when he fell a little flat on his coffeehouse-ish rendition of “What’s Goin’ On?” it was like “Kris who? How did he get here?” Y’all might as well just wear “Lambert Lover” T-shirts, judges. It’s hard to keep up with your wavering, just admit you don’t give a crap about Kris.

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Our resident American Idol expert Liz Black live-blogged the final face-off between Adam Lambert and Kris Allen. Click the play button below to get the blow-by-blow on how the show went down.

Whether Kris Allen or Adam Lambert wins, they’re both going to be big stars, right? Just like Ruben Studdard and Clay Aiken. Like the Davids Cook and Archuleta. Like Kelly Clarkson and…Justin Guarini? More often than not, the runner-up on the show doesn’t wind up being the second biggest star. For all we know,  Jason Castro’s upcoming album could blow Archuleta’s out of the water. Stranger things have happened—like Constantine Mouralis getting a Tony nomination.

Check out the gallery to see why—even if the winner has to sing to sing the cheesy theme song—Allen and Lambert better hope they ace tonight’s show.

Related Content: Kris Allen Vs. Adam Lambert—Who Will Win?

The world will have its eighth American Idol in less than one week. But who will it be—the glamboyant Adam Lambert or cutiepie Kris Allen? Though Lambert’s been the judges’ favorite since he first stepped on stage, Allen has plenty of points in his favor. Here’s how we see the playing field.

Five Reasons Adam Lambert Can Win American Idol:

• Simon has spoken!
• That voice could bring down the walls of Jericho.
• Despite all the talk about his sexual identity, a high school girl still bothered to ambush him in her bra.

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Charts, schmarts. Kris Allen arrived on Idol with little to no fanfare, and now he’s in the top 2 with chosen one Adam Lambert. Looks like Danny Gokey’s Christian television cult couldn’t make up for his tight pants and sloppy singing. What was Milwaukee’s own thinking as he pressed his finger to his lip, feigned serenity and watched his farewell reel? Probably something along the lines of “Kris Allen? Kris Allen? Are you for real? I, Danny Gokey, lost to Kris Allen?” You know it had to hurt.

Can Lambert tongue-lash the upstart out of the ring, or will Allen’s lucky streak take him all the way to the top? Only one week to go!

[Photo: Getty Images]