Idol Styx It to Rock (now with results!)

RESULTS...

Here's the opening... we see glimpses and flashes of the remaining Idol contestants, they each tell us how ready they are to rock, how ready they are to win this whole thing, we see the judges comment here and there on various things, and Seacrest comes out to tell us that around 87,980,000,003 people voted last night, right after asking, "Who will graduate from the school of rock... and who will just get schooled?"

This, of course, is American Idol.

Tonight, No Doubt performs, as does Daughtry, as does Paula the Flake, so there's a good chance we might see some or all of the performances, but definately not the group song, and no chance on the Ford Commercial.

Randy the Dawg, Kara the New Hotness, looking especially New Hotnessed, Paula the Flake and Simon the Cowell all wave to the audience.

While I was working at The Happiest Place in the Mall, somewhere around 7:12pm, I heard a scream and a hoot from somewhere in the distance. It makes sense now. I heard Drew Morris when Slash came on stage to perform for the group song, which I skip past.

It speaks to how big this show has become... do you think Slash comes on to Idol back in Season One or Season Two? Heck no. No credibility. But now... now that its watched by around 67 billion people worldwide, added to the fact that he has an album coming out, yeah, Slash is pretty quick to take up the invite to Idol.

Seacrest heads to the Idols sitting upon the Couch of Safety, killing time, bantering, discussing the first Zeppelin song ever to be sung on Idol, that by The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert, plus giving more excuses and passes to The Widower Danny Gokey after his crazy screaming note at the end of the song last night. The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen... "We didn't like what you did with the song, even though you sounded good, but you sounded pitchy and so on...." but to The Widower Danny Gokey, "It's okay, its alright, we know you can do better, shh, its going to be just fine..."

And now, here comes Paula the Flake...

Here is what I want to hear from Paula the Flake...
"You're the whisper of a summer breeze..." OR
"Lost.... in a dream... don't know which... way to go..." OR
"You're a cold hearted snake (look into his eyes) Oh oh, he's been telling lies..." OR
"I got that Vibeology, that V-I-B-E-ology..." OR
"Hey baby... you got to remember... I'm forever your girl..." OR even
"Eagles calling, calling your name..." but what I really don't want to hear is this.

She's dressed up in an outfit that would have been perfect for her in 1991, when she was brand spankin' new on the scene... but perhaps not now. Its also important to note, that Paula, now what, 45? is not moving nearly as fast as she did back in 1991.

For those of you kiddies who just don't understand, who only know Paula Abdul as a flake and a joke and the Idol judge, let me tell you a story... back in the early 90s, she and Janet Jackson were the two best chick dancers alive. Their videos were unbelievable demonstrations of movement and rhythm, their music was fun, their albums were great, and both--especially Paula--were beautiful. What you know now as the blithering, blubbering, drooling pain killer induced Paula Abdul is nothing compared to how... well, for lack of a better word, how cool she used to be.

I give you the title track to her most excellent first CD, "Forever Your Girl". This is how awesome she used to be. Oh, and disregard that "MTV" in the corner of the video. This is back when they actually played a music video. You know, ever.


This song, the one she's doing, "I'm Just Here For the Music" is annoying. And I'm going to go on a very short limb and say that the song I just saw was prerecorded, because before the song, she was in a cutesy little beige dress, then she came out in the aforementioned too-skimpy-for-her-age costume, and now that the commercials are over, she's back in the beige dress.

But now... here's someone I can watch. Gwen Stefani, with No Doubt, doing their first big hit, "Just a Girl". As she sings, though, two things occur to me. First, she's so goofy, and weird, and yet, she's still hot. I mean, not too many chicks can do what she does, dress like she dresses and appear like she appears many times and still can be considered hot, but she pulls it off. Secondly, dear goodness she sounds terrible... absolutely terrible... she hasn't held any single note for longer than two seconds... its almost like she can't. I can't handle it. I fast forward. This song is definately not B-A-N-A-N-A-S.

Old joke that I've told before, but will tell again because I have a new audience that may or may not have heard it... So, Gwen Stefani is married to Gavin Rossdale, lead of one of the hardest rockin' bands of the 90s, singer of such awesome rock classics like "Machinehead" and "Everything Zen"... obviously, he and his wife sing two different styles of music. Do you think he just sucks it up, and tells Gwen whatever she writes is good, even though he knows that he'd never, ever be associated with some of it otherwise? Like, I imagine this exchange...
Gwen: Hey, babe, come in here
Gavin: Yes, dear? Whats up?
Gwen: So I've written this awesome new song, and I want to read you the lyrics to this last part that I think is soooo awesome
Gavin: Sure babe, whats the title?
Gwen: Oh, its called "Hollaback Girl"
Gavin: (pausing) Holla... back... girl?
Gwen: Yeah, check this out... "Its bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S. This s&^% is bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S". See, I say "bananas", then I spell it! Isnt that awesome!?
Gavin: (pausing, speaking slowly) Yeah, thats... thats great, Gwenie... I, uh... I love it. I mean, Bananas. Thats... thats wonderful. So, uh... so cool and all
Gwen: So I was thinking, I had written a song for your new Bush album and...
Gavin: Uh, gotta go. Game's on.

Back to the show. The four Idols are standing backstage, awaiting Seacrest to call their name. He points to The Silver Stools... not of failure, but of Safety. There are only three. The Idols come out, and Seacrest says he'll announce them in random order.

My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta is first. Then The Widower Danny Gokey. Then The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert. Finally, The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen. One goes to The Silver Stools of Safety... and The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen gets the nod... this is good. No, this is awesome. He almost collapses, looking speechless with a shocked grin on his face.

While I was at The Happiest Place in the Mall, I also heard a squeal of glee around 7:43, and that makes sense now. It was Erin the Marine Wife screaming as Daughtry comes onstage. Seriously, though... Chris Daughtry, perhaps the coolest Idol ever. He really is an awesome dude. They'll be singing their first single, "No Surprise", off of their sophomore album "Leave This Town", which drops in July. Why is it that music critics and newsmakers say "sophomore" album and not just "2nd" album? The former is six letters and four seconds longer than the latter... hmm.

Song sounds good. I'll ask Erin the Marine Wife how the CD is, because she'll get it the day it comes out, I'm sure. I like Daughtry, the guy and the band, cause it just seems like he recognizes how lucky he is, and he gives kudos to the fans and supporters all the time, remembering they are who makes him so famous... good guy.

Okay, back to the real stuff. Who will join The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen on the Silver Stools of Safety? The second person to head that way is... The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert.

Well, we know this is the end for My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta... how great would it have been to see her to go to the Silver Stools of Safety, leaving The Goke and The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert competing for one spot? Alas, its over for My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta... I take the title back from her, write her name under My Previous Next American Idol Brooke White, and put it aside, awaiting a titleholder in 2010.

As the "journey montage" for My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta plays, I wonder if they've even edited one yet for Dead Wife Gokey or The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert, figuring they have another two weeks to finish it.
_______________________________________________

PERFORMANCES...

I'm shocked. I'm stunned, and ashamed and taken aback in a way that I'm not sure I could have fathomed mere moments ago, before I sat down at the laptop in the recliner here at The Cabana Extended Suites and Resort Spa. I'm just... speechless. You could have told me Lance Bass was gay, you could have told me that MSNBC is pro-Obama, you could have told me that Miley Cyrus really was Hannah Montana... and I would have believed all of those things, those undeniably incomprehendable things that I've only recently discovered as true before I believed the following words...

Paula Abdul is addicted to painkillers.

Sigh. What hath God wrought upon this world?

THIS

IS AMERICAN

IDOL

Its rock week here at American Idol, with our guest mentor, Slash, from Velvet Revolver, but you know him really from... well, is it Guns'N Roses, or Guns N Roses, or Guns N'Roses? Where does the ' lie? These are the things I lay awake at night thinking about.

Seacrest is telling us, and showing us, the part of the stage tower, with the big neon "IDOL" on it that collapsed. This is all George Bush's fault. Its him and his stupid hurricane machine that has cost this country trillions of dollars, when he could have spent that money on our country's failing infrastructure! Seriously! What kind of third world country do we live in when American Idol's neon towers are falling down? What's next? The top level of Deal or No Deal's staircase bends and breaks? President B. Hussein Obama, I plea to you!

We see a montage of Slash, and somewhere, Drew Morris is drooling on himself, convulsing and french kissing his TV screen. Honestly, this has to be one of the coolest mentors ever... Slash, not Drew Morris, though I can imagine Drew Morris would be kind of fun too.

The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert is singing "Whole Lotta Love", and I imagine the number of screeches in a Led Zeppelin cover might be in the hundreds. Slash echoes The Lovely Steph Leann in saying that TAGAL is effortless and has such a range and so on and so forth.

Except for the fact he looks like a gay Hillary Swank from "Boys Don't Cry" (is that an oxymoron? or just redundant?) he sounds a whole lotta like Robert Plant. If I were Robert Plant, I'd call up Jimmy Page and ask him to kick me in the face for sounding like this.

Randy the Dawg loves him. Loves him. He might go gay for him. He tells The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert that he is in fact a rock star. He should be making a rock record. I can see Scott Weiland and Trent Reznor, in a heroin induced rage, beating the crap out of The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert backstage, actually. "Stupid alternative lifestyle guy bringing your alternative lifestyles into our rockin' party atmosphere!" or something like that.

Kara the New Hotness looks like she's stepped out of an Expose video. She tells him he should be making music with Nine Inch Nails. As Trent himself, watching--cause I'm sure he is--is probably saying, "Hailz to the No." Paula the Flake blubbers, and Simon the Cowell loves it too.

Can I be honest here? It sounded good. I hate myself. I hate myself. I hate myself so much. I'm now going to put up a Nancy Pelosi poster and join the Sierra Club.

My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta is taking on "Crybaby" from Janis Joplin. Slash tells her to be more confident, and bring it all out when she sings.

Here's what I dig about My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta... I love the raspy voice thing. She reminds me kind of Sheryl Crow, and I loves me some Sheryl Crow. She's belting out the song, one that I'm not all that familiar with--honestly, my Joplin expertise begins and ends with "...freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose..." and so "Crybaby" is one I don't know well. I've heard it, just don't know it.

Either way, I think My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta is awesome. Of course, she's not The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert, so the judges won't love her nearly as much. Randy the Dawg didn't love the song, wanting more of a melody in the song. Kara the New Hotness loved the Joplin bluesy rock, but said she should have taken on "Piece of My Heart" (oh yeah, she did that before Faith Hill, didn't she?).

Paula the Flake blubbers. Simon the Cowell reminds her that she is still 17. He chides her for not being original, even though he loved The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert for singing EXACTLY like Page and Plant. Who sang the lead on "Whole Lotta Love" anyway? Was it Page? Was it Plant?

And now, we have our first duet of the evening, nay, of the entire show. A new little twist, with The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen and The Widower Danny Gokey doing a song together. And they are doing Styx's "Renegade". This song is FREAKIN' AWESOME...

(putting down the keyboard while I pay attention to this...)

(picking up the keyboard)

This song cracks me up... not The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen and The Goke's version, I will get to that in a minute...

Back in the late 70s, early 80s, you had these soft pop rock bands... REO Speedwagon and Ambrosia and Firefall and Air Supply and the like, and they had one purpose and one purpose only... to sing songs that you related to your relationships. That was it.

Happy with the girl you have? "You Are the Woman" by Firefall, or "Still the One" by Orleans. Longing to tell someone how you felt about her? "Can't Fight This Feeling" by the Speedwagon. Need a completely overblown and silly, yet FREAKIN' AWESOME anthem song? "Makin' Love Out of Nothing At All" by Air Supply would do it. And Styx is in this catagory. Listen just once to "Lady" or "Babe" or "Come Sail Away" and you learn that Styx, in fact, does not rock. They soft rock.

So when I hear "Renegade", it makes me laugh. Its like when Lucas (a film in The Dave100, by the way) the band geek tries to play football and gets crushed... it is almost comical. And a song about a guy who has a bounty on his head and is about to be executed by hanging--"lawman is coming down from the gallows and I don't have very long"--is even better. Don't get me wrong, I love the song, its got several plays on my iPod, but its an unintentionally funny song.


Here's Daughtry doing his version of "Renegade"... Erin the Marine Wife might pass out.

And somehow, two guys who do not rock, who in fact, soft rock, like The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen and The Widower Danny Gokey singing this song somehow fits... Randy the Dawg liked it okay. He loved the harmonies, which were really good. Kara the New Hotness makes my point about these two guys singing this rock song. Paula the Flake blithers. Simon the Cowell has no idea what to say, telling them that The Goke was better than TLSLNAIK'Allen.

So now that The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen is winded from a duet with The Goke singing a crazy Styx power song, let's make him do his solo song! Meanwhile, The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert sings first, and is backstage, taking a rest before his duet at the end of the show. Hmmm...

The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen is doing The Beatles' "Come Together", a song either awesomely, or awfully, remade by Michael Jackson, I'm not sure which. It sounds great, not fanastic, but great.

Randy the Dawg appreciated the song, while Kara the New Hotness said he is the softer side of rock, and wasn't great tonight. Paula the Flake drools. Simon the Cowell didn't like it.

That scream I just heard from all parts of Birmingham was a collective squeal from Emmy Turnbow, Cindy Jo Warner, Stacy "Wife of the 13th Disciple" Mintz and a few other moms around town because The Widower Danny Gokey just appeared onscreen again.

The Goke is doing "Dream On", a classic from Aerosmith. Still sounding like Tommy Shaw from Styx, trying to rock out, The Goke does his thing. And not to let The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert have all the screechy fun, The Widower Danny Gokey does his own end-of-song screech. And the whole song is not all that great.

Randy the Dawg didn't like the song that much, but gives him an A for Effort. Kara the New Hotness tells him that he sounded too over the top. Paula the Flake quivers. Simon the Cowell hated that last note, admitting what everyone things... "With [The Ambiguously Gay] Adam Lambert, it worked. With you, Dead Wife, it didn't."

A crashing of two worlds occurs now, as The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert and My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta come together. Right now. Over me.

"Slow Ride" by Foghat is the song that will be rocked and screeched. When I hear this song, I automatically think of "Dazed and Confused", another The Dave100 movie. The song comes to an end, and now we'll hear the judges rant and rave and fall all over themselves for The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert, and just by being close, they might even give My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta a compliment.

Randy the Dawg loves it. Kara the New Hotness loves it. Paula the Flake blabbers. Simon the Cowell tells them they win the Duet Battle. The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert hugs My Next American Idol Allison Iraheta, and he thinks, "So this is what a woman feels like? Eew. I don't like it. As if."

Tonight... My Next American Idol Allison Ireaheta, The Ambiguously Gay Adam Lambert, The Lovely Steph Leann's Next American Idol Kris Allen and The Widower Danny Gokey...