American Idol - Barry Manilow

Cafe Society
21

Solely based on last night, George was the worst, but he’s been good in the past, so keep him. John also did very well. Diana will probably go, because she is nothing really special (she’s had a few VERY good performances but mostly average ones).

Is it just me or this year’s AI underwhelming? I really just don’t care about any of these people too much. The only person I’m really rooting for is John, but he’s not good enough. It’s not like last year, where I rooted for Reuben and realized Clay was awesome, and then, out of no where, Kim Locke showed her stuff. This year… eh. Don’t really care so much.

22

I thought Jasmine did the best job last night. If I hadn’t known her before and hadn’t held those prejudices, I would have thought she was great. I also liked John. George was horrible. Diana was pretty good. Fantasia was blech.

23

I’ve never been entirely okay with AI’s policy of truncating songs. I know they have their reasons, but sometimes it’s to the detriment of the song, and by extension, the singer. In “Weekend in New England”, the singer’s voice is supposed to increase in force throughout, building to the passionate climax (god, I used a suggestive term when discussing a Barry Manilow song…I’m gonna have to take a Clorox bath now). Jennifer didn’t get to sing that part, so the “belting” of the last verse did seem to come out of nowhere. But if she’d been able to sing the entire song, it all would have worked.

Yes to both. Technically, it was flawed, mostly during the time when he got up from the chair; stylistically, he’s found some of that charisma Simon said he lacked. Still, I’m always left saying, “That was good in and of itself…but not in context.”

I think Mr. Rilch said it best last week, after “As Time Goes By”: “American Juniors? He’d walk away with that. But this? He shoulda waited until he was 21.”

Sigh…I hope you’re wrong. But there’s no one left for him to hide behind, now that HobbitBoy and Camille are gone.

I personally will hate to see him go, because…I’ll admit it; he has what there is of my heart that’s not claimed by Mr. Rilch! But for his sake, it’s probably the best thing.

It occurred to me a couple weeks ago, when I thought he might get axed, that he is very much over a barrel. At whatever point he leaves, it won’t be as the first–place contestant, but the longer he stays, the greater the backlash. I can’t project what his fellow students are thinking and saying, but it might not all be complimentary. Face it: it’s easier for kids to mock than to praise, and there’s been a lot of mocking of him in the media. Will the other kids be happy for him that he did as well as he did do? Or will he be subjected to reprisings of his “Crocodile Rock” performance throughout his senior year?

It probably won’t be a barrel of laughs to assimilate back into high school, especially so late in the year. And, for every girl who will bat her eyelashes at him, and every guy who will try to catch some of his reflected glory, there may be two haters who will say, “Oh him; he’s gotten all uppity” before they’ve even greeted him.

Me either. After his last two performances, I no longer think he has this thing sewn up, as I once did.

24

It’s not just you. . . the show pretty much sucks, especially since George sucked greatly last night.
I, for one, don’t want to see a “Battle of the Divas” as Simon predicted. If I did, I could always watch a VH-1 special. And of the 3 Divas, I think only LaToya deserves to be on that stage.

But, could somebody please tell me why Paula had her arm in a sling?

25

[imitating Simon] The problem with you, LaToya, is that I hear you, and you sound good, but I look at you and you may as well be invisible. You literally have NO personality. I’m sorry, but that’s nothing that can be worked on. Either you do or you don’t. Now John, here, has gotten this far by the teeny-bopper votes. Yes, I like the lad, but he’s out of his league. Neither one of you have enough personality to fill this Vanilla Coke can. Now, Fantasia. May I ask, what is with the yeahyeahyeah thing? You have a wonderful voice, but when you start that…thing… I tune out. It’s that simple. I find I don’t care when you do that. George, George, George. Last week you were terrific. This week? Not so much. Let me ask you, is that “Golly Gee” smile real? I know Randy will call his ‘dawgs’ on me, but when we are critiquing… wait… when Randy and I are critiquing you and Paula is slobbering, you just stand there with this black Opie “yessuh” smile. It’s quite annoying. QUIT SMILING. Jennifer. I truly enjoy your singing. I’m glad you lost the weight. But you do look mildy possessed when you sing. I believe you may go far, but you need to tone the eyeball rolling, gaping fishmouth habit you have. And now Jasmine and the other one. You are interchangable. Now that Herbal Essences has made one of you blonde and the other one removed that horrible flower, there are some physical differences, but you two are interchangable.[/imitating Simon]

I know John needs to go, but if this ends up to be an all wanna-be-diva competition, I will have to quit watching. George, no matter how much I love his voice, is not enough to draw the teeny-bopper votes.

26

My wife said she heard it was a manicure that went HORRIBLY WRONG.

Where is RickJay? Two weeks without Rick’s Ratings is more than I can bear!

27

Hee hee! MissTake, I heard Simon’s voice through the whole thing.

p.s. John must go.

28

I agree that I find this season a bit lackluster. I even forgot to vote last night.

Diana -Started very weak and shaky, got better and more powerful but not really good enough. She starting to show that “Camille Deer in the Headlights” look. And what was with the leisure suit she was wearing? Gods, that was ugly.

George - Disappointing. I hope his one bad night doesn’t get him a “Tamyra”*but I would put his peformance in the bottom three, I don’t think he deserves to be booted though. His voice sounded very scratchy, which makes me wonder if he isn’t sick.

Jennifer - She’s got a powerful voice all right.

Jasmine - Hey, no flower! I thought she was a lot better than her past few performances.

LaToya - Good.

John S.- I thought it was actually one of his better performances, it started out good at least. But yeah, still out of his league. I thought Simon was going to say he looked like Conan O’Brien.

Fantasia - Eh … I just don’t like her voice or personality.
John will probably go tonight, but it could also be Diana.

*A “Tamyra” is when a good singer has one slightly off night and doesn’t get enough votes to stay because people forget all the other wonderful performances and are stupid enough to vote for a Nikki or Justin instead.

29

Ding Ding Ding! Thank you Shayna!
I probably had some comments to make about the other performers, but my total anger at George wiped most of them out! I will never forgive George for that completely boneheaded “interpretation”. Is English not his native language or what? Maybe next week he can smirk his way through “Send in the Clowns”. Idiot! :mad:
Everyone else was, uh, not good. Latoya was still the best, although she went overboard with the melisma, and I actually liked John last night, just because he sang the freakin song correctly. Unfortunately, it is now time for him to go home.

30

I don’t know why, but this was a pretty underwhelming week for me overall. No one stood out as explosively good, like LaToya and Fantasia last week, and no one was cringe-inducingly awful. Maybe it was the Manilow. Anyway, on to the cattiness:

DIANA: Didn’t see her. I misprogrammed the VCR and missed the first ten minutes of the show.

GEORGE: Well, he was just awful last night, in every way it’s possible to be awful. Missing pitches, atrocious diction, and never seemed to catch the style of the song. I’d still vote for him on balance, though, because his performances throughout the competition have been mostly much stronger than last night’s.

JENNIFER: Ready for a shocker? Jennifer belts. I still think she has no artistry, no real sense of what she’s singing, no honest emotion. I am so bored watching her give the same performance every week.

JASMINE: I have nothing to say about her - the singing was bland and unspectacular, like every other time she’s been onstage - except that her personality makes me twitch. The precious little hand-over-the-heart move whenever she’s praised by the judges? The dainty little blown kiss to the audience? Vomit.

LATOYA: Honestly, I can’t figure out why she’s not getting even more respect from the world at large. I completely disagree that she doesn’t have personality. She’s not bugging her eyes out all the time, or bouncing around like a child’s windup toy, or showing the world her molars, or wearing a flower, but she carries herself with grace and dignity and sings every single word of every single song with attention to its meaning. Many of the other singers in this competition (notably Jasmine, Diana, and Jennifer) treat the soft, reserved sections of a song like obstacles to get out of the way so they can get with the belting. LaToya sings the hell out of those introductory passages, and has as much power and excitement to her high belting as anyone. I love her.

JOHN: I really don’t think he’ll be going home this week. This was probably one of his two best performances so far (“The Fundamental Things Apply,” last week, was the other). He obviously has an enthusiastic fanbase and they’re only going to desert him if he gives a real stinker of a performance. I liked him this week, but then I usually like him.

FANTASIA: Thought it was kind of dull. She’s been growing on me, but her performance this week did nothing for me - although it was probably the second best of the night (I think I just don’t like Barry Manilow’s music). She doesn’t deserve to, but I have a feeling she might have her cautionary trip to the bottom 3, previously taken by Jennifer and LaToya, this week.

I RANK 'EM(This week only)

  1. LaToya
  2. Fantasia
  3. John S.
  4. Jennifer
  5. Jasmine
  6. George

INC: Diana

I RANK 'EM (cumulative)

  1. LaToya
  2. George
  3. Fantasia
  4. Diana
  5. Jennifer
  6. John S.
  7. Jasmine

What I wish would happen: John S, Jasmine, Jennifer in the bottom 3, Jasmine going home.

What I think will happen: John S, Fantasia, and Diana in the bottom 3, Diana going home.

31

It’s being reported elsewhere that his pastor has confirmed that he did, indeed, have a cold. However, that only excuses the additional raspiness. He’s still personally accountable for picking a song too low for his range, filling it with trills and melisma, and singing a longingly melancholy song as Bouncy!Happy!Smiley!George! It would’ve sucked even if he’d’ve been completely well, I’m afraid.

32

For the record, Jasmine pointed out to Simon that she was wearing her flower. It was just tucked under her hair.

33

I wanted to add something about Barry Manilow. I saw him on Extra before the show. He wanted to do A.I. so he could update the arrangements of the songs for each singer, he really didn’t want to judge them because he knew he wouldn’t be able to be critical.

He said this about his music;
(paraphrased)
“You can sing Elton John songs like Elton sang them and come off sounding great but if you sing my music with my 30 year old arrangements it’s just going to sound like elevator music.”

Yeah, I was and still am a fan (not a Fanilow, though) but that statement made me respect him even more because it shows even after a long successful career he hasn’t let it go to his head.
Interesting enough, he was a little critical of George, apparently George’s “extras” were not Barry’s idea. George should have listened to Barry.

34

By the way, did I imagine it or was Jon Benet calling Manilow “Mr. Barry.” And if I didn’t imagine that, WHY was she calling him “Mr. Barry”? It seemed odd to me.

35

It’s a Southern thing… you never call someone significantly older than you by their first name, and Mr. Manilow would be too formal. I’m 37 years old and I still call some of my parents’ friends Mr. or Ms. FirstName.

36

I thought it was a very good show overall.

But with the ladies doing so well, and Simon basically announcing that it’s turning into a diva contest, it seems like a different competition all of the sudden.

Last night Simon asks LaToya if she thinks she can win, and that’s good by him, because he thinks she can. Last week he tells Jennifer that a couple of other female singers have are probably sticking pins in Jennifer doll, and for the past two weeks he can’t say enough good things about Fantasia.

AI must want it that way – LaToya, Jennifer, and Fantasia in the top three. And maybe they deserve to be there.

George and John didn’t help matters either. I still like George, but that was his weakest night in a long time. He hit a peak with “Take Me To The Pilot.” If he survives tonight (and I really hope he does), he needs something big next week.

And I know John is a genuinely nice guy, and everyone thinks so, but he has got to go —> tonight.

Kevja’s overall

  1. LaToya

  2. George

  3. Jennifer (last night was her best performance – she got her face under control)

  4. Fantasia

  5. Jasmine

  6. Diana

  7. John

37

This idea that George will at least take a trip to the bottom might have legs. During my usual Wednesday morning Idol chatter at work, it was nearly unanimous that John, Diana and Jasmine will be protected by defensive voting, but the Huff mightn’t have a big enough fan base to carry him past two consecutive weak weeks.

There was similar speculation about LaToya, everyone agrees she’s clearly the best overall performer, but might lack the rabid fanbase necessary to counter all the teenyboppers.

Heh, kinda odd that I’m expecting tonight’s results show to be more entertaining than last night was.

38

I don’t watch the show since I always thought it celebrated (and then bankrolled) musical mediocrity, but the fact that they had a whole show devoted to Barry Manilow just confirms my theory. Blech. Just my $0.02.

39

Are you sure about that? I thought she pointed to the flower on her denim jacket when she said she still had the flower. I don’t see how she could’ve hid that flower under her hair.

BTW, Mrs. Balduran was right. Paula’s arm was in a sling because she had to have surgery on her thumb to remove the entire nail. Apparently, her manicurist did something that caused an infection and it was pretty deep so they just removed the whole nail. Why it required her arm to be in a sling, I don’t know. I had part of my nail removed from my big toe and they didn’t do anything except put a bandaid on it and tell me to soak it in epsom salt every two hours. :rolleyes:

And finally, I agree with Tiramisu. Barry Manilow seems to have his ego in check. Plus, it was clear he really worked with the contestants. Some of the bad ones sounded better than ever and the good ones who didn’t follow his advice (George and Fantasia) didn’t do as well.

40

I think Barry came off as a very nice and down-to-earth fellow, and he seems to have done a great job working with the singers. I never liked his music, but after seeing him on the show I’m tempted to like him as a person. Elton came off as a nice fellow, but everyone did horribly that night. Barry seems to have helped everyone do a great performance except George. (He also indicated (without being too obvious) that George had not taken his advice.)