OK, I’m officially bored of Season 7 of American Idol. But more on that later. This week the group had to sing two songs, both by mentor Neil Diamond. Instead of making the show half an hour longer or something, they chose to cram 10 songs into an hour, which gave the show a very rushed and hurried pace. Ryan Seacrest constantly hinted to “rush rush rush”, the judges didn’t have time to make anything but brief sound-byte commentary, and I don’t think it helped the contestants performances any.

Of course, I’m not a huge Neil Diamond fan, so I’m not sure anything would’ve helped the performances as far as I was concerned. There’s a few of Neil’s early hits that I like quite a bit - iconic pop songs - but I’m not overly familiar with his career or songbook.

In the weekly “make fun of Paula Abdul” bit, she outdid herself tonight. Again, I’ll get to that later.

Jason Castro was up first. The two songs he picked were “Forever in Blue Jeans” and “September Morn.” The first was one of the few Neil songs I kinda like, and Jason performed it poorly. No vim and vigor to it. The second song was a better performance, but bored me.

David Cook picked “I’m Alive” and “All I Really Need is You”. The first performance was mediocre and boring. The second was much better, and while not my personal thing, was a very good performance from The Cookster.

Brooke White chose “I’m a Believer” and “I Am, I Said.” - Now, I absolutely loved the Monkees as a kid, and I loved “I’m a Believer.” Brooke did the song no justice - she doesn’t have the power to keep it a ‘rock’ song, and she didn’t really do anything interesting with the arrangement. I thought it might’ve been better if she’d slowed the pace of the song down a lot, perhaps. My husband said she shouldn’t have played the guitar because it seemed to throw her off. Simon thought it was “a disaster.” For her second song, however, Brooke bounced back, sitting behind the piano once again and crooning out a pleasant and pleasing performance.

David Archuleta picked “Sweet Caroline” and “America.” If the latter choice surprises you, it shouldn’t. In fact, both songs made me think “Yeah, I knew he’d pick those….” His performance of the first song was the usual David (as of late anyway) - fine but bland and dull. I thought it was a little pitchy, but maybe that’s because I find his nasal quality a bit wearing by now. David’s version of “America” was better, with more vigorous inspiration, but still … kinda flat for me.

Syesha Mercado picked “Hello Again” and “Thank the Lord for the Nighttime.” I can sum up both her performances as being the best of the evening. She was polished and still displaying her stage-presence persona, which made her seem much more interesting compared to the other four. At least on this night.

I’ve been wrong on the “who’s going home” the last couple weeks, so I don’t even want to make a prediction this week. It’s anyone’s game, really. But I do think Jason, Brooke, and Syesha will be in the bottom 3.

So, on to a few other commentary points about American Idol tonight:

On Paula Abdul: When Ryan told the judges they could briefly sum up their thoughts on all 5 contestants, after they had all performed their first song choices, Paula started to comment on Jason’s second performance….after several seconds, Ryan and Simon reminded Paula that they were supposed to comment only on the first performance and no one had actually sung their 2nd song yet. Paula backpedaled and said “I thought you performed twice!” - in other words, the judges viewed the pre-show rehearsals, and then Paula spaced out during the actual show…I believe Paula’s brain resides in a place called PaulaLand, filled with moonbeams and fluffy clouds.

On my being bored with Season 7: The mentor-weeks aren’t my favorite part of American idol. And honestly - none of the 5 that are left make me feel anything. I think a few of them are very accomplished and certainly have a lot of talent, but they don’t strike any emotional chord with me at this point. In other words, I don’t have anyone I’m “rooting” for anymore. Carly’s gone, Michael’s gone…and the horse-girl is gone. At least she was fun to make fun of. At the moment, the show is simply boring the pants off of me … not because I hate anyone, or hate the show … I just don’t find any of the contestants exciting. I don’t know if I’ll be writing many more of these entries this season - except perhaps for the last winner-result episode. I will be curious if David A. will actually win, or if it’ll be David C. - who will have the bigger, more fanatic fan-base? Battle of the David’s, indeed.

If cats could speak.

Baby washing after eating some yummies.

While we were at the store hunting for plain ol’ beefsteak tomato plants - which aren’t always easy to find since there seem to be 50 different varieties of tomatoes/new hybrids now - we also picked up something else.

Yeah, our own little jalapeno plants. We love jalapenos - I use them a lot in cooking - never tried growing them before, but there’s a first time for everything.
And lastly, one of our neighbors appears to have a lot of blackberry bushes growing on the side of their house, and they are starting to poke through/under the fence into our sideyard. Which is cool, because before long we’ll probably have a nice blackberry bush area growing by the garage. Hehe…this place is awesome.

(…if you’re wondering why Baby’s fur is all funky on the side, it’s because he gets all matted and I recently cut all the knots out…)

Tonight American Idol had the daunting task of taking on the songs of composer Andrew Lloyd Webber. This is Broadway music, folks, not pop-songs, and I wasn’t sure the Idols were going to pull this one off.

Paula Abdul seemed unsure as well, as she was rather subdued and for her, not too wordy in her comments. Or maybe she switched to some downers this evening. Yes, I like poking fun at Paula, god love her.

Syesha Mercado - “One Rock and Roll Too Many”: Syesha gets the top points for the night for her showmanship. She moved around on stage like she was a Broadway actor/singer, even doing a little sultry dance step or two with the orchestra leader. She was obviously comfortable and in her element as far as performance is concerned. Her vocals were good, but I found it a bit old-fashioned. Not so much in a “bad” way…but more in a “boring” way. Like just about every song in the film The Fabulous Baker Boys. If Syesha hadn’t had to go first, I think her showmanship would have made her memorable enough to make her safe, but since she did go first, it might be too little too late. So Not Safe.

Jason Castro - “Memory”: Jason is a likable guy, no doubt. He’s also a fair singer/performer, with oodles of quiet soulfullness that many groove on. Tonight however, he seemed nervous and out of his element. It wasn’t a bad performance - towards the middle he started to sound more confident and vocally with it - but he definitely doesn’t have a power-style voice. It was too soft and a little breathy/squeaky, which imo doesn’t fit the song at all. Paula tried to soothe Jason by saying it was kind of like how Joe Cocker had a soft/rock/pop style to “You Are So Beautiful.” When she did, there was a huge guffaw from my left as my husband expressed his amused disbelief at that comment. Sorry, Jason, I have to agree with my hubby - you’re no Joe Cocker. Not safe.

Brooke White - “You Must Love Me”: Brooke messed up the lyrics or something at the very start, stopping the band and starting over. This is the 2nd time she’s done that this season, and I think it’s going to cost her. I think she knew it, too, because after that she seemed so nervous and uptight that it affected her vocally. She didn’t sound bad, but it was a bit shaky and strained. During the judges comment section Brooke looked like she wanted to cry again, but not in joy this time. Poor gal. Not safe.

David Archuleta - “Think of Me”: Mr. Webber advised David A. to keep his eyes open. David managed to do that most of the time, and his vocal, once again, was pleasant and professional. But also again, it was as boring as dried out dog-poop. Is it just me, or is David A. becoming more and more dull as time goes on? He needs to break out and do something besides these dull predictable melody ballads. This performance barely had any power notes or vocal runs, either, so it was especially snooze-inducing. Here is where I think the AI voting system shows it’s broken-ness, since I think he’ll be safe, but shouldn’t be.

Carly Smithson - “Jesus Christ Superstar”: All right, someone is going to sing from my favorite Webber show of all time. And Carly’s the one to do it. I just knew with her particular voice she’d do well with this one, and I wasn’t disappointed. Strong vocal, good stage performance, great smiling/”I’m having a blast” attitude - Carly cooked. I’m not sure if the voters will think this one great performance is enough to erase some of her lesser ones, but I can hope so, so I’ll say she’s safe.

David Cook - “The Music of the Night”: This is the night where David Cook finally made me like him at least a little bit. I don’t care if Simon prefers David C.’s “gritty” aspect, I like the emoting-stage-persona much better. He didn’t project alternative-cocky attitude and I actually felt the song, so to speak. Vocally, one has to admit that David Cook doesn’t have the best “stage” type voice - the lower notes, for instance, didn’t have the kind of projection needed - but it was very good. He’s safe…and David A. looks more and more like he’s gonna lose to David C.

So…bottom three - Jason, Brooke, and Syesha, with Brooke going home. I don’t think the voters are going to forgive her 2nd false start and her strained performance. I like Brooke and would probably buy at least her first record to check it out, but she is not America’s Idol. ‘Til next time.