Whew! After much anticipation and trying to get my house clean and kids down before sitting down to enjoy Idol I have to admit I am feeling exhausted two hours later. Idol met my expectations in two respects--they showed that there looks to be strong female talent this year and they showed a decent number of whack jobs. Believe me, in a few weeks I'm sure I'll be complaining about the weirdness and ready to move on to the legitimate part of the competition, but it was nice to have a laugh tonight and feel a little more normal for a moment. I think they did a good job too if not including too many clips of people saying, "wicked awesome!" or other Boston slang.
As far as standouts go, I thought Maddie Curtis was nice and did a fairly good job of her song. I have mixed feelings about the video intros beforehand because I feel like it endears the audience to a few people who have "extraordinary" stories, so I don't feel like it is fair to all the contestants. At the same time, I love getting to know new people and finding out their background and family. Maddie reminded me of kids I would have been friends with in high school from Nottingham--very hippy-dippy, birkenstocks and corduroys, wild hair and no makeup. I am interested to see how the country mouse does in the big city.
I absolutely loved Ashley Rodrigues. I loved her style, her confidence and humility and her talent. I really hope she does well in the next phases. I also liked Katie Stevens and really connected to her story about her grandma with Alzheimer's. My grandma also had that and I can remember feeling that she recognized me when I sang to her. Even though she sang one of my least favorite AI audition songs (At Last) she sang it well and I think she had enough talent to make it through Hollywood. I also like repressed church girl Leah and feel like she has a talent that will grow with encouragement.
For the boys, I was brought under the spell of dreamy Justin Williams even before he sang. I don't think he has the most impressive voice I have ever heard, and I think he did too much with thte song but I do like to watch him. Pretty as he is, I did have some reservations towards him since he reminds me of those guys in Utah who know exactly how good looking they are and who would never speak to someone like me because I am not blond and skinny and 19. Here's to hoping that he doesn't fit that stereotype. After writing that, I think it is funny that I am married with two kids and still look at guys like that and imagine the ways they would ignore or embarrass me if I were single. I am such a weirdo.
I also like Amadeo Dipicco because I like his big fat Mediterranean family and would love to see more of them. I also liked the tone of his voice. And, if anyone reading this blog has been to Providence, his accent is spot on.
My heart went out to Justin Blaylock, the unassertive "Simon, shut up!" guy because I feel like he will never really succeed in this competition and I can see him having a breakdown during group number rehearsal in Hollywood week. He started his song out strong, but it kind of unraveled as he got further into it.
For completely entertaining weirdos I really like Pat Ford from Derry and I really hope I run into him one of these days. He was so delusional and had this very odd accent that is not really typical of people from NH. For some reason I can picture myself at a Target and hear that voice coming from the handbag aisle asking the two tubby girls he's with if he can pull off yellow patent leather.
My other favorite non-winner for the night was Derek Hilton. I loved in his intro when he said his interest in music came during the "lowest peak" of his life. I'd like to know what a low peak looks like. I also couldn't tell when I first saw him if he was a boy or a girl. And, when he dramatically blew the flower off his palm and it landed about 6 inches past his foot I started to laugh knowing his audition was going to be bad.
All in all I think the season is off to a good start and am looking forward to Atlanta's audtions tomorrow.
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2 comments:
I felt the EXACT same way about "Mormon Justin."
One of my two 12-year-old roommates (aka 19-20 years old) said, "I would totally date him." All the while I was thinking, "Wow, he looks like the typical rich, Utah mormon who knows he's pretty, only associates with girls who go to hair school, and is probably a total tool."
When my roommate said that, my suspicions were instantly confirmed.
I, too, feel hesitant about him.
Sure, he's got a nice voice, but can there not be any Mormon guy on the show that can be like a real human being? Seems the only Mormon guys that ever make it onto AI are the wholesome, child-like David types or the type that are like Justin. Ugh.
In terms of the judges, I felt like Simon was MUCH nicer overall than he has been in years past.
Maybe Paula brings out the worst in him ...
It will be interesting to see Justin's appeal. Once he started singing, I thought, "Oh my sister Eliza would totally like this guy." Eliza, like every other high school girl, is totally into the Michael Buble thing - and Justin could ride the Buble bandwagon pretty far in the competition (especially because he's good-looking). It will be interesting to see how he does.
I was SO excited for the show last night. When the opening credits came on, I felt so giddy! Yay for Idol!
(There were a lot of great girl voices last night - who was that blonde with the funky black glasses? She really stood out to me.)
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