American Idol Final 11

The theme for tonight’s show is the music of The Grand Ole Opry as coached by Country Music star, Randy Travis. Anyone who has watched the show over the years will know that Simon Cowell has a particular dislike of Country Music so it was interesting to see how objective he could be or if he would let his musical preferences cloud his judgment. I don’t really care for Country Music either, so I wasn’t optimistic about finding much joy in tonight’s performances.

Michael Sarver started off the night singing Garth Brooks’ “Ain’t Going Down (Til The Sun Comes Up),” which I thought should have been a no-brainer big hit for him. The problem is, I think he had to struggle so hard to focus on the lyrics that he was having a hard time walking and singing at the same time. I remembered back to when Josh Gracin sang this same song a few seasons back and knocked it out of the park. I don’t think Michael’s version had the energy that particular song needs and I’m actually thinking it might have put him in jeopardy.


I don’t think that Country is going to be the style of music Allison Iraheta will perform when she inevitably ends up with a recording contract, but with that said; I think she’d be very successful as a country singer judging by tonight’s performance of “Blame it On Your Heart” by Patti Loveless. I think she secured her position for one more week in the finals, but I know I’ll enjoy her more when she’s back to singing her standard Rock songs.


It was nice to hear Kris Allen sing the very nice country ballad “To Make You Feel My Love” without the country twang that Garth Brooks sang it with. Kris Allen was able to sing it as a nice, easy pop ballad. I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of him as well.


In her interview, Lil Rounds said that she wasn’t going to sing Martina McBride’s “Independence Day” in Lil’s regular R&B style but that she was going to “honor the Country genre.” I think this was a mistake. I couldn’t help but think that, instead of making the song her own like Kris just did, she sang something that sounded a little more like karaoke and it didn’t show off her natural skills. A little slow and plodding in the beginning, and hard to get into. I don’t think it’s a good idea to try and show that R&B isn’t the only thing you can do if you don’t do the other stuff very well. I’m assuming that she’s built up enough of a fan base from previous weeks that she’ll be here again next week, but that probably wouldn’t be the case if this was the first performance we were seeing from her.


Adam Lambert’s interpretation of Johnny Cash’s “Ring of Fire” definitely lives up to the whole glamour rock feel that he’s been giving off lately as he reached deep into the song to pull out drama that didn’t exist there in the first place. Personally, I really didn’t like it and I can’t imagine that the majority of America is going to like it either. The judges sure seem to love just about everything that he does, but I’d really like to get an idea of how many people in America actually like him, or if it’s all just manufactured hype. I’m hoping that he doesn’t last as long in the competition as they’re setting him up to.


I’m not familiar with “Wild Angels” by Martina McBride so I don’t have any way to compare it to the original. What I can say about it is that I appreciate how Scott MacIntyre performed it in such a way that I can easily see it showing up on an album he would release, which I’m sure I would go out and buy. I love his piano playing and singing and I hope he’ll go far.


For me, Brooke White sang my favorite version of “Jolene” that I’ve ever heard so I found myself comparing Alexis Grace to Brooke more than Dolly Parton. Of all the songs she’s done this season, this was probably the least interesting for me. In my opinion, it’s a more tender song that didn’t really warrant some of the extra drama she tried to add to it. In this case, I’m hoping that her past success will outshine this dud and keep her in for a few weeks more.


I’m going to check my Man Card at the door now and say that Danny Gokey’s version of Carrie Underwood’s “Jesus Take The Wheel” gave me shivers. I’ve heard the title of the song before, but I’ve never actually listened to the song. I really liked the feeling that he sang the song with and the power that he sang the chorus with. He sure has a special talent for singing earnest ballads; it’ll just be interesting to see if he can ever really pull of a faster pop song.


I’m more familiar with Elvis Presley’s version of “Always on My Mind” than I am Willie Nelson’s or Johnny Cash’s, so that was the version I was thinking of as I was listening to Anoop Desai’s performance. I liked the restraint that he showed in the way he sang it without trying to color it up with a lot of decorating the notes. As I’ve said before, I really like it when the contestants sing the songs in ways that don’t compare to the original, and I think that tonight he really stood out. I just hope that the stinky performance from last week doesn’t spill over into this week and get him booted off.


“Walking After Midnight” Patsy Cline. In a lot of ways Megan Joy Corkrey reminds me of the lead singer from the Squirrel Nut Zippers, Katharine Whalen, and tonight she really cemented that association in my mind when she sang Patsy Cline’s “Walking After Midnight.” I’d like to see what Megan would do with a pure Jazz or Swing song and I hope that we’ll be seeing enough of her to find out.


Matt Giraud’s rendition of Carrie Underwood’s “So Small” was my favorite performance of the night. I love his singer/songwriter piano player style that he has which reminds me of Elton John, Marc Cohn or Joshua Kadison. I also can’t help but compare him with Scott MacIntyre, which I thought Matt’s performance was the better of the two. He had more power and feeling in his vocals than Scott. He’s pretty consistently good and I hope he’ll be around for a long time.


In my opinion, the bottom three should be Michael Sarver, Lil Rounds and Adam Lambert. My votes tonight are for Scott MacIntyre, Allison Iraheta and Matt Giraud. My choice for elimination tomorrow is Michael Sarver, which is weird because you’d think he would have shone with tonight’s Country theme.