Territorial Bloggings

I’d like to welcome the guys to the competition. Thanks for finally showing up — even if it did take you a week longer than the girls.
A quick editorial comment:� Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson needs to get over herself & stop being so pissy about her time on AI. If it wasn’t for AI, she would still be a cruise-ship singer. Her elimination from AI did more for her career than winning ever would have. Even by her season (#3) contestants knew about the meat grinder that is the AI machine — it’s a talent show & process for making money, and having both controversy and somewhat talented winners both help make money. It’s not a warm & fuzzy process for nursing talented kids to be all they can be. She should have enough class, not to mention gratitude for the opportunity, to at least offer no comment, rather than kvetching like she has in the recent past. (But, then, LaToya was my favorite of the 3 divas, so what do I know…).

Across the board, the performances were better than last week (with the only arguable execptions being Phil & Brandon). Even the guys who did songs I didn’t like and/or “get” seemed to at least sing them well (the exception being Sanjaya, who outright stank).

The judges were feisty in an odd way, not the least of which was Paula’s flustered response to Jared’s channeling of Marvin Gaye. I almost felt bad for her. Almost. I disagreed with Simon a bit more than I usually do, and I thought he was downright being a horse’s ass in his reaction to Brandon’s explanation and (especially) his shout-out to his dad’s birthday.

That all said, let’s take a look at how the groupings broke down based on this week’s 90 minutes of empty pop calories…

Safe & Sound:

• Chris Sligh - “Trouble” — He ain’t heavy, he’s a finalist! He solidified his top twelve ticket with a very nice performance, especially WRT earning fanbase points for having a cute wife while being just so darned sweet to her that he makes life difficult for the rest of us schlubs who can’t sing like him.

• Blake - “Virtual Insanity” — I’m not a huge Jamiroquai aficionado, but I enjoyed the song well enough, and I surely could tell that Blake did a very nice job vocally. The beatboxing/scat portion was good without being too much, so it’s an overall plus.

Sweating Just a Bit:

• Sundance - “Mustang Sally” — Sundance might just be the guy that I’d like to hang out with the most (Sligh is right up there too). He did a great job with the song and, especially, the performance. And his kid is just too cute. I do think, however, that I might have overestimated him in terms of his longevity in the competition. Hopefully, he’ll get another chance to show further improvement next week.

• Nick - “Fever” — Nick schooled young Sanjaya on how to sing a jazzy, smokey song. I really liked his vocals and his overall performance quite a bit this week. For me, he was in the top half of the group.

• Phil - “Missing You” — He put just enough of a twist on the vocals that he didn’t sound like run-of-the-mill karaoke. I wasn’t thrilled with the song choice, as I thought it was a little bit boring, but his overall performance & story are good enough to keep him safe again this week.

• Chris Richardson - “Geek In The Pink” — Ah, what now? Nope, I don’t get the genre at all, and neither do I like it that much. That said, Chris seemed to do a pretty good job & sounded vocally clean enough. And the judges seemed to really like it. I’ll just leave it at that, since I think he’s safe for another week.

• Jared - “Let’s Get It On” — If anyone sounded karaoke tonight, it was Jared. And I mean that in a good way, ’cause Marvin Gaye is so unique that it would almost seem blasphemous to try and reinterpret any of his classics. Jared looked good, emoted well, and sounded solid. He’s safe (I just don’t like him as much as I do Sligh & Blake…)

In Danger:

• Sanjaya - “Steppin’ Out With My Baby” — The main thing he proved is that he ain’t no John “Big Red” Stevens. I’m hoping that the song choice & performance was out of tune enough with his tween fanbase (even the Territorial Daughter didn’t like it ) that, combined with his looking like a little girl trying to play “Michael Jackson Dress-up” (wait, is that redundant? ), he might actually have a real shot at being sent home this week. That would make me happy…

• A.J. - “Feeling Good” — He might have been feeling good, but he sounded as bad as he made me feel while I had to listen to him. That was a horrible combo of song choice & performance at this stage of the competition. He certainly stood out, but not in a good way.

• Brandon - “Time After Time” — It pains me to say it, because I think both he & the song are great. Individually. Just not together. He sang it well enough, and his dedication to Grandma was touching, but I think it might’ve been a bit to reserved overall. That said, I don’t think it was nearly bad enough to justify Simon’s generally assy behavior.

It’s actually much tougher to gauge the victims this week, due to the overall, across-the-board improvement by the guys. I want to see Sanjaya & A.J. go home. I really, really do. I fear, however, that Brandon is seriously at risk, and that Nick could also be a surprise elimination. I hope not, though.

Up next: The Girls - hopefully raising the bar again…

-ghp