It’s all about the guys tonight on American Idol.  First up tonight is Todrick Hall.  He sings “Since You’ve Been Gone”.  Even though he’s first, he doesn’t come across as nervous.  He’s very familiar with performing.  He just finished up working with Fantasia in The Color Purple.  Ellen says he has stage presence, but the singing “wasn’t the greatest”.  Randy and Kara say he changed up the song too much.  Simon says he murdered the song.  His singing definitely wasn’t very strong, but still a cutie that is going to be fun to watch.

Aaron Kelly, my PA boy is up next.  He sings “Here Comes Goodbye”.   He’s like David Archuletta but without the attitude and crazy father standing behind him.  He’s very likable but he has a way to go before he is this year’s American Idol.  Simon says he had quite a good performance, but that he needs confidence.  Kara tells him that he has no idea how good he is.  Randy tells him he’s a big fan and Ellen tells him he’s going to be around a long time.

Singing “Get Here” is Jermaine Sellers.  My first thought is “not that song again”.  But I liked his version.  Ellen told him that she felt he was trying too hard.  Randy thought the song was too old for him and that he was doing too much vocally with it.  Kara also felt the song was too old for him.  Simon told him he was “over the top” and that it wouldn’t be good enough to keep him on the show.  Ellen objected.  We shall see.

We finally get to hear from Tim Urban who took Chris Golightly’s spot.  As you must know by now, Chris was eliminated because he had a previous contract that he didn’t disclose prior to appearing on Idol.  Tim sings “Too Late To Apologize”.  Simon trashes him by telling him the judges made the correct decision the first time.  Based on his performance, he doesn’t belong in the top 24.  The other judges aren’t much kinder.  Although Ellen does her best Paula imitation by telling him he’s good looking.

A little off topic…the commercial for Glee is on.  Wouldn’t Jane Lynch who plays cheerleader coach Sue Sylvester make an excellent American Idol judge?  Perhaps she can take Simon’s job?

Joe Munoz is one of those competitor’s that I don’t remember hearing at all during the previous auditions.  Ellen says he seems really comfortable on the stage.  Randy tells him that he worked it out.  Kara thinks he picked a song that you wouldn’t expect him to sing.  Simon tells him he has to “get out of the bubble” and that his performance was forgettable. I can’t remember the name of the song, so I guess Simon is right!

My fingers are crossed for the next performer, Tyler Grady.  He sticks to his 70’s theme and sings “American Woman”.  Simon thinks people will remember him but not necessarily for the right reasons.  Kara agrees with Simon.  She thinks he has to break out of the 70’s vibe.  Randy tells him he’s bringing style over substance.  Ellen thinks he’s imitating his 70’s performers, but he’s not being true to himself.  I hope he doesn’t change too much because then I’m not sure I’ll like him.  But he’s also a PA boy, so I’ll stick by him as long as I can.

Lee Dewyze has such a cool voice, I was really looking forward to hearing him sing.  He plays the guitar and sings “Chasing Cars”.  I couldn’t help but feel annoyed by his singing tonight.  Ellen thinks he was screaming–I didn’t…I thought he was whining.  Randy didn’t like it either.  Kara agrees with Randy.  Then, along comes Simon and he says that he thinks it was the best performance of the night so far.  Huh?

I remember John Park from his audition.  I hope he lives up to my expectations.  He chooses “God Bless the Child” and I can tell that Simon is going to be very critical of this one.  Simon says it was a pointless performance that left him flat.  Kara agrees with Simon. She feels that John didn’t have a connection with the song.  Randy eases up on him a little bit, but still thinks it was a bad choice.  Ellen liked the performance but she thinks he didn’t connect with the younger women who will be voting later on tonight.  I love the older songs so I liked this.  I think this is one song that I will go over to I-Tunes to purchase so I can listen to it some more and then decide.

Big Michael Lynche chooses a Maroon Five song “This Love”.  He also sings while accompanying himself on the guitar.  Maybe that’s it.  Maybe the contestants should concentrate on singing and stop playing musical instruments.  Ellen loves him, but does think he had some pitch problems.  Randy says he brought the energy up in the room. Kara is in between. Simon tells him that he didn’t deliver enough in his performance.  He has a great personality, but he needs to work a lot harder to stay in the thick of things.

Singing “What a Wonderful World” is Alex Lambert.  Simon tells Alex he felt this was the most uncomfortable performance of the night.  Simon nails this.  I couldn’t figure out what bothered me about this, until Simon summed it up. If Alex isn’t comfortable singing how can we be comfortable listening?   Kara tells him he has great potential.  Randy loves his tone in his voice.  Ellen tells him that she loves bananas, but sometimes the banana isn’t ripe enough to eat. In other words, he’s really talented but hasn’t quite worked it all out yet.  That’s the kind of thing I expected to hear from Ellen.  Could it be that she’s getting over her first show nerves and the real Ellen if breaking out? I sure hope so.

Two more guys left to perform.  I’ve been waiting all night for these two.  First of the last is Casey James.  He’s really, really hot.  What can I say?  His version of “Heaven” left me a bit breathless.  Ellen says he’s going to get votes like crazy.  Randy says he made a great song choice.  Kara tells him he is eye candy but also ear candy.  Simon tells him that they are both cursed with good looks.  But he also tells him he chose the right song and has done his best performance of the competition.  I loved his performance–my favorite so far, but we have one more to go.

Again, did American Idol leave the best for last?  Andrew Garcia is receiving a lot of publicity where I live.  Can he live up to all the hype?  He chooses “Sugar We’re Going Down” originally done by the Fallout Boys.  Simon was disappointed. He thinks it was too serious, too indulgent and not original enough.  Kara thinks he took a risk, but she doesn’t think it was the right risk.  Randy agrees with both Simon and Kara.  Randy tells him he’s a fan and he needs to go back to his true self.  Ellen feels that his past performances will keep him around awhile, but he needs to work on it.

So who do you think will be going home tomorrow night?  One of my favorite things to do is when they play the little snippets of every performance, I don’t watch.  This will make you hear each performance without your eyes influencing your mind.  I did this tonight and some performances stood out as really bad.  Todrick Hall did not sound good at all.  In fact both my husband and I grimaced when we heard him.  Tim Urban didn’t give a strong performance tonight and neither did Alex Lambert.  My totally unprofessional guess is that two of those will be gone tomorrow, but in the end a big part of American Idol is popularity, so you just never know, do you?

The results show scheduled for tomorrow night will have a special appearance by last year’s Idol Kris Allen and also a performance by Allison Iraheta.  So stay tuned…Bloggergal1