To me the competition has stratified into groups of three, where the three in each group are very close in performance skills and raw vocal ability.
LaToya
Jasmine
Diana
Fantasia
George
Jennifer
Jon Peter
Matt
Amy
John (I like him and his unique voice, but he’s not an American Idol)
Camile
Leah
Looks like the Dopers are not unified on much this week!
Except regarding Leah. 
Won’t somebody say something nice about Leah?
Not me, I thought she was horrible. Somebody else, I mean
I’d like to see Amy or Leah go. They both suck.
Other than that I pretty much like everyone. If I had to choose the best, I’d say:
Fantasia
LaToya
Penboy
I like the redheaded guy, but he’s just too boring to be in this contest for long.
I’m going to go against the flow, and say that I really dislike Fantasia’s singing. Of course, I don’t like Macy Grey either. It’s not that she makes mistakes or anything like that, I just personally don’t enjoy the sound of her voice.
My favorite this week was George. Last week he did well, but seemed to be very nervous. The nerves didn’t show this week, so you could really see he was having fun. Diana also impressed me with her confidence on stage. For a 16 year old, she’s very poised.
At the other end of my list are Leah and Camile. However, I think Camile’s problem is not lack of talent, but lack of confidence. Leah is the other way around, so I’m hoping she gets the “gong” this week.
I agree that John Stevens needs liven things up, or he won’t last long. I enjoy his singing, but he’s pretty boring to watch. Simon was right though when he said it’s good John’s in the contest because he’s totally different.
Just some general thoughts on what, to me, was a surprisingly good show:
I was very amused by the little bio they did of Teen Martin. Everyone else had this frenetic look-at-me look-at-me editing, and his was so calm. I don’t know if the kid’s on tranquilizers or if he’s just the most low-key person on the planet.
I’d buy an album by him and (possibly) Fantasia. Everyone else, no matter how talented, sings in a style that doesn’t interest me outside of this competition.
Though the only suck was from the direction of Leah. Yipes.
Julie
I took a bathroom break during John Stevens’ performance; major snoozefest for me. He’s completely wrong for the competition although he has a decent voice. His grandparents were adorable, bobbing their heads in unison on the videotape.
I thought Camile Velasco was going to vomit from fear. Her nerves adversely affect her singing, which in my opinion was never that strong in the first place.
Apart from George Huff’s performance, which had me grinning nonstop, I highly enjoyed how much Leah LaBelle BLEW last night. That was just terrible. George can make me an omelette anytime.
Fantasia’s voice annoys me no end, but that’s more a personal thing.
LaToya and her stepdaughter looked almost the same age in her video.
I am desperately, hopelessly infatuated with Matt Rogers. Seeing him in the bubble bath last night nearly finished me off.
I was all set to like Matt Rodgers but I have to agree 100% with Simon’s characterization of his “Tom Jones performance”. Of course I didn’t know it was an Otis Redding song, since it was covered by a white band (googling turns up The Black Crowes). But he had no style or spirit to it despite the kneeling thing–Josh Graycin as DtC said, but I think Matt does have more skill than Josh.
I really would like to see George Huff do a ballad (say, something by Luther) to show off his rich voice without all the “dancing” around. OTOH, I was happy to see Jennifer come from behind the mike and move around a bit. She looked great, at least compared to in the cotton candy dress.
I also hope that LaToya ends up beating Fantasia. They both have strong voices and are great performers, I’m just not sure if Fantasia can tone it down and do more than the Macy Gray thing.
All in all, it was refreshing to actually enjoy 11 out of 12 of the performances, not having to cringe and wonder how these people got this far.
My rankings:
LaToya: awesome.
Fantasia: a very close second, lose the pained look on your face.
Jennifer: she oversang a bit but has the voice.
George: loved it–best performance so far. He’s gaining confidence and it’s allowing his personality to come through.
Jon Peter: not a great performance but I really, really, really like his voice–it has a nice resonance to it. With some good vocal coaching, he could be really good.
Jasmine: technically good but I find her boring.
Diana: great voice but it seemed a little too Aretha to me–she needs to develop her own thang, as Randy might say.
Amy: like Jasmine, technically good but boring as hell. Her song selections suck.
John: excellent voice but boring, boring, boring.
Leah: yeah, she was pretty bad. Not every song calls for “sultry” especially when you’re singing a song that’s telling a guy to get the hell out of your life. I have her at 10 because I think she actually has a decent voice but crappy performance skills.
Matt: yuck.
Camille: weak voice, weak performance.
Camille, Matt, and Leah should have their bags packed.
Camille: weak voice, weak performance.
Jon Peter:
Um … how about she looks better with her hair straightened?
I have to agree with an earlier post; I do hope Simon’s brutal honesty (although correct) does not win her enough sympathy votes to keep her around, ala Nikki McKibbon and Carmen who lasted way too long during their seasons.
Last night I was wishing that instead of voting for people to stay we could directly vote for who should go, if that were possible I would have spent two hours calling for Leah to leave. As it is, I have yet to phone in a vote this season and I doubt I will. I am just not as interested this season as I have been in the past and I just end up getting disappointed anyway.
I liked George, Fantasia, LaToya, Jasmine and Diana. None of the others really shined for me.
I do find Fantasia a bit too much like Macy Gray for my tastes but I think she does have more vocal ability and depth of sound that Macy. I can stand about one song with those voices but I could never sit and listen to an entire album by either. But I don’t deny that I think she does have talent (Fantasia that is).
Jon Peter, everyone keeps saying he’s entertaining but I really think he needs to stop dancing.
I guess I’m the only one who really didn’t care that much for George last night. He’s a great guy, and I really like his personality and talent in general, but he just seemed to be holding something back. For me, there just wasn’t much soul in it.
Maybe I’m hearing things, because no one else noticed this: at the beginning of LaToya’s song, her voice just disappeared on the low notes. I was thinking that she just doesn’t have the pipes to sing both ends of the range, but the judges couldn’t stop raving over her performance. Was it a technical problem with the sound?
I really like Matt, but he still hasn’t found a song yet that really shows off his voice.
KSO: my feelings exactly about Diana. She did a clone of Aretha’s version, which means she has a great voice but no personal style (yet).
And I hate to break it to annieclaus, but the Jon Peter = hobbit connection was made here about 4 weeks ago.
Yes, La Toya and Amy were adversely affected by really bad mixing that obscured their voices.
The audio volume was all over the place last night. I think that’s what lost the beginning of LaToya’s song for us.
And I guess I just wasn’t paying attention about the Hobbit thing four weeks ago. Maybe I wasn’t following the board then. Maybe it’s just that GMTA? :o
George Huff deserves to be in the top three. He had the strongest male performance last night by a long shot.
LaToya was good, but didn’t bring anything we didn’t expect. Since starting spectacular and refusing to grow as an artist worked so well for Ruben, I expect to see her crowned American Idol this year.
Fantasia kicked some ass last night. I expect her to sneak in at #2.
Matt Rogers was uhh… I dunno, he was endearing. I personally didn’t think the song choice did much for him, but I think he did WAY better than the Black Crowes did with it.
Jasmine was eh. Everyone thought she was hot shit but I was honestly bored and thought she came off as affected and I expect her to become excruciatingly boring over the next couple of months.
Camille was cute. Her nervousness makes me nervous, making it really hard to appreciate her performance.
Jon Peter Lewis is still a dear, but within the first minute of his performance, I think all of America wanted him to just sit still. It’s one thing to hop around to an upbeat Elvis song, completely another to just randomly throw fancy footwork into a song that doesn’t call for it… JUST BECAUSE IT WORKED BEFORE. Also, it’s hurting his voice.
Diana DeGarmo is a cutie pie. She’s super young, but a good performer that looks like she’s having fun on stage. I dig that.
Jennifer Hudson is still my girl but I think she’s got alot more in her. If she stays long enough, I expect to see her grow considerably as an artist, much like Kimberly Locke did last season.
And now, for your bottom three:
John Stevens. cry I love this kid, I want to adopt him and bring him to family functions and make him sing Dean Martin songs. However, he really butchered his song last night. I love-LOVE his voice, but he’s really got to kick it up a notch or he’s gonna be gone within the next couple of weeks. I think he’ll get a bottom three seat tonight.
Amy Adams. I like her too, but there was absolutely nothing special about her performance last night. She was blah, pitchy and didn’t seem to be having NEARLY as much fun as she usually does. However, she reminds me of Cyndi Lauper, so I don’t want her off just yet. She’ll be sitting next to John tonight, I think.
Leah LaBell. Apparently Bulgarians have some Samsonesque quality which causes their vocal strength to be linked directly to their hair kinks. Her hair looked magnificent last night, but they seemed to have straightened the vocal talent right out of her. Simon hit the nail on the head, she’ll be packing tomorrow night.
I LOVE George Huff! He had me up dancin’ and grinning like crazy. He’s this year’s Clay Aiken to me – he has that “it” factor, takes constructive criticism and shows improvement every week, has stage presence out the wazoo (though he should stop all that squatting!) and has a wonderful, beautiful voice. Love, Love, Love me some George! He just makes me happy.
I’ve gotta say, though, I totally don’t get what people are apparently hearing from John and Jon. I thought Penboy was completely off key the whole song and was singing so weakly in several places that the background vocals completely overshadowed him – and I did not find it to be due to technical issues with the sound system – he simply got weak in the voice. Not to mention that he sounds like he’s got a damn clothespin on his nose. I think he’s a terrible, terrible singer. Sorry.
And the same goes for John Stevens. His voice is weak. Just plain weak. And so are his performances. And he’s got more vibrato than Carmen Goatgirl Rasmussen from last season. I think he’s absolutely ghastly and I wish he’d get off my TV already.
I reluctantly admit to liking Fantasia last night, though she seriously has to work on that sibilant S thing. I was also surprised to have really enjoyed Diana a lot last night, as well.
Amy does have a very pretty voice, but she has no strength in her upper register. She either needs to work on that, or pick songs in a better key for her to reach all the notes.
LaToya also started out really weak – and flat, too. But she went first, for the first time on that stage, in front of that huge audience and millions of viewers, so I cut her some slack there. She ended brilliantly, though. I really, really like her, too.
I used to like Matt, but last night was too reminiscent of Josh Gracin from last year. <shudder>
I think the bottom 3 should be:
Leah
Camille
John Stevens
I predict the bottom 3 will be:
Leah
Matt
Amy 
My top 3 would be:
George
LaToya
Diana
I’m not so sure about that. It seems like Cowell & Co. were really into Reuben–and he ended up winning. There was constant cooing by Simon which didn’t seem to hurt any.
Mr. Nutty and I thought the audience were like sheep being led to the slaughter (51% of them, anyway). Now that the albums are out and Simon isn’t tooting Reuben’s horn, the public is speaking with their dollars.
I’m not making much sense to myself. I’m really busy at work and trying to read the boards, too. I give up.
Oh, and my favorites are Diana and George. My early favorite, Amy, doesn’t have the power in her voice that she needs. My problem is that she looks like Celine Dion when she sings. I don’t know if I can get past that.
All in all, a good group, though. I didn’t have much hope during the first handful of shows, but last night they all surprised me.
I agree. John Stevens and Fantasia are the best. But John really does seem out of place in this contest because of his style, and I’m not sure he really wants to win. So I hope he loses (even though he is my favorite).
Top 3: