American Idol

We totally called it yesterday when we theorized that maybe Simon Cowell would find a way to reunite with Paula Abdul when he departs American Idol next year. Now Cowell has admitted that he does indeed want to work with Abdul again, saying “I’ve gone on record, I adore Paula. Whatever happens, I will be working with her in some capacity, because I miss her.” Now, we don’t know if this means she’ll definitely be hired for The X-Factor, but it sure sounds like it!

Funny, season 9 of Idol hasn’t even started yet (tonight, baby!) and already it feels like it’s unravelling - we sure hope all these departures don’t result in lost momentum and maximum suckage. We already went through that with this most recent season of Project Runway and we can’t handle another reality crap-fest.[Photo: Getty Images]

Rumors have been swirling that the timing of Paula Abdul’s “resignation” from American Idol and the appearance in L.A. of Britain’s X Factor host Cheryl Cole isn’t just a coincidence — and that Cheryl could be lined up to replace Paula on the hit show. But apparently, this is way off the mark, and the truth could be that fellow X Factor judge Dannii Minogue could indeed be the younger(ish) model replacing her.

“There have never been any plans for [Cheryl] to go on US TV … she only wants to focus on her music,” reports Metro, instead playing up Dannii’s “exciting” talks with the show producers.

If true, it would be a neat victory for the Aussie star, sister of Kylie, who’s had to face down unfavorable comparisons with Cheryl since last year. Alternatively, it could all be another massive publicity ruse for the show, and Paula will return regardless. And Simon Cowell will rub his hands in evil glee at yet more money-making PR for his shows. Sigh. [Photos: Splash News Online]

Last night we shed a single tear for Allison Iraheta who, despite 64 million votes being cast on Tuesday, got the lowest amount and was ousted from American Idol. It pains us to admit that our baby’s gone. We know Adam Lambert is going to win this now, he’s the only performer the judges haven’t criticized harshly for any of his performances and that’s the only thing that pains us more than seeing Allison go. We can barely go on anymore. But we must. …

(more…)

It’s Rock Week on American Idol! We’ve got Slash! We’ve got duets! Some sign above the stage rocked so hard it fell down! But if Slash is your mentor, we half expect these kids to sing some G’n'R or hey, what about “Enter Sandman”? Songs that are a little dirty and gritty…ROCK, y’know? Instead we got a watered down “Come Together” from Kris Allen, a version of “Dream On” that was more pitchy than the Yankees bullpen from Danny Gokey, and decent but not exactly rockin’ versions of “Whole Lotta Love” and “Crybaby” from Adam Lambert and Allison Iraheta. Still, it was a pretty action-packed show.

(more…)

This week’s American Idol felt predictable because a) it was Rat Pack theme week which means we got a bunch of standards, but without any of the banter, martini-sloshing, and stage presence that made the Rat Pack so enjoyable and b) there are four solid contestants left and one inconsistent Matt Giraud, who is probably going to go home this week, but we knew that he would never win this thing, so: predictable. On to the good stuff.

(more…)

Everything went according to plan on Idol last night. Anoop Desai and Lil Rounds were out, Matt Giraud stayed in, and the other four had nothing (almost nothing, anyway) to worry about. And now that the Judges’ Save is used up, there’s none of that fun “Sing for your life!” business anymore to humiliate the contestants. Still, the show had a healthy dose of guest appearances and crazy outfits last night (OMG did you guys see Ryan Seacrest’s outfit?? He went tie-clip commando!) that made it all worth it.

(more…)

So obviously Lil Rounds will get eliminated this week, that’s just common sense. The judges have it out for the poor woman. But after we so boldly proclaimed last week that Matt Giraud, despite his Judges’ Save, would get the boot this week, we’re not so sure anymore. Even though the judges were tepid about his metaphorical “Stayin’ Alive” performance, we liked it more than a lot of the other songs. At this stage of the game, we’re think Anoop Desai and his Pepto-pink vest will join Lil on the elimination stools tomorrow.

5. Pool of Abdul

“Looking at Paula’s face during that song, you were melting her into a pool of Abdul,” Ryan Seacrest told Adam Lambert after Adam’s gentle version of “If I Can’t Have You,” thus coining our new favorite phrase/band name. Hello Cleveland! We are Pool of Abdul! For a second we thought we’d finally fully enjoy an Adam performance but damn him and his high notes, we went right back to hating when he started to howl at the disco-ball-moon.

(more…)

When we heard that the theme for this week’s American Idol was songs from cinema, we were psyched and thought we’d hear “Diamonds Are Forever” from Adam Lambert (of all the contestants, he’s the one with an inner Eartha Kitt), or we thought maybe Anoop Desai would sing “Gangster’s Paradise”, there are plenty of kickass choices that would have suited these contestants really well. Alas, we got two Bryan Adam’s songs that haunted us through high school and that will continue to haunt us for the next 24 hours, and one “Born to Be Wild” (shudder) among others. Quentin Tarantino was the mentor (and awesomely, Idol couldn’t even plug his upcoming film Inglourious Bastards because the title is too racy for the 8 o’clock hour), and as tiresome as his manic craziness can be, we had actually hoped for more Tarantino. We did enjoy a few moments from the show though.

(more…)

There were only about eight minutes of actual content in last night’s results show of American Idol, and of that content, none of it was remarkable. Unless you count the celebrity sightings of Mario Lopez and the mayor of Kalamazoo, Michigan. We knew that Scott MacIntyre would probably be sent to the bottom three, but the other two that joined him were anybody’s guess and when all was said and done, Anoop Desai and Lil Rounds joined him. It was Scott though who finally was sent home. His time had definitely come but it was actually bittersweet. Also bittersweet,  the fact that there were only four moments we could scrape together because this episode offered nothing.

4. The Search is Over for Scott

After Scott was revealed to be the lowest vote-getter, he walked the metaphorical plank while the Dread Pirates Abdul, Cowell, Jackson and DioGuardi debated his future. The judges’ votes were split two to two on whether to save him (but you know that had they saved him this week, he would get the boot next week). Ultimately we think it was his last high note (”Living for a drrreeeaAAM!”) where his voice cracked that spelled the end  for him. As always though, he was a class act and in a special PSA at the end of the show, Paula Abdul said as much when she went on about how amazing he was, when really you know the voices in her head were like “Just don’t say the word ‘blind’ out loud and you’ll be fine!”

(more…)

The American Idol theme last night was “Songs from the Year You Were Born” and we can think of about ten thousand songs we would have preferred to hear instead of the dreck that was sung last night. We were surprised by how much we liked hearing Allison Iraheta’s version of Bonnie Raitt’s “I Can’t Make You Love Me” and we give credit to Adam Lambert for making the best song choice of the night with “Mad World” but we still don’t like that guy and ain’t nothing gonna change that. Here are a few things we did like:

5. Simon’s Standing O - Undeserved, We Think.

The best thing about the last fifteen minutes of Idol lately is that the judges have to rush through their critiques and give quicker-than-normal notes on a performance, like Kara DioGuardi saying to second-to-last performer Matt Giraud “Incredible on every level! Unbelievable!” and not trying to get poetic and verbose as she often does. So we were kind of shocked at Simon Cowell who chose critiqued Adam Lambert by simply saying “Words aren’t necessary, I’m just going to give you a standing ovation.” Simon, if he had the time, may have wanted to ask what, exactly, Adam did in that song that was so innovative or different from the version sung by Gary Jules for the Donnie Darko soundtrack. The song was written originally by Tears for Fears whose version was kind of uptempo-new wave, but then it was covered by Jules who uh, Adam basically ripped off. We still love the song and think it was a great oasis in a desert of blah song choices, but if you’re going to call something karaoke, this was it.

(more…)