The top 12 Guys & Girls have now performed “live” (it was pre-recorded) on Idol. I take back what I said about the boys being better than the girls! The girls seemed weaker in their packages when the Top 24 were picked, but based on the performances of the past two nights the girls are AWESOME. The boys? Not so awesome.
It is hard for me to pick which ones were the worst of the guys because there were so many of them that were not that great! However, I decided to try out the Facebook voting to see how it worked and I gave 2 votes to Tim and 2 votes to Stefano before I got sick of typing in “captcha” code. It is a heck of a lot easier to get massive amounts of votes by calling than it is online, so I think I am going to stick to calling. That is, if there is anyone who catches my attention enough to justify me spending time calling. I was also really bummed that James Durbin did a good job. I did not want him to do well because I feel like he is a Lambert2.0, but unfortunately for me I think that his performance is going to guarantee he stick around for a while. I was also shocked that Dial Idol had Scotty McCreery as #1 when I checked their site! He was ok, but I wouldn’t say he was the best of the night. I’m a bit bummed that a couple of my “not so favorites” did well, because it means that a couple of my 6 favorites will not be making it through to the 12!
The girls were really, really good. The ones that I think will be the bottom/going home are Ta-Tynisa, Rachel and Julie. There actually have to be even MORE than that in the bottom because they are going from 24 to 12 but I am having trouble picking 3 more girls that I don’t like. It looks like Dial Idol has Ta-Tynisa as #1 which is odd to me again. Although I think that site has a lot more trouble being accurate in the beginning rounds and I am not sure how they are factoring in Facebook votes. I think the younger voting crowd might opt to vote on Facebook instead of (or in addition to) the phone lines and I don’t know how Dial Idol is taking that into consideration.
For those of you who don’t know, DialIdol is a website which “measures the busy signal” and tries to correctly predict which contestants are getting the most votes because of it. I think in the more recent years Idol has opened more phone lines because busy signals when I call seem to be less and less (unless I just end up calling for less popular contestants) so I am really not sure how accurate it is, but I always cross reference the site and then go nuts when it predicts one of my faves will be in the bottom. For this preliminary round I am trying to ignore it – especially since the #1s seem to be so off the mark compared to my opinions.
Under the cut is a bit of a breakdown for each contestant I wrote as they were performing. I only watched each of the performances once so it is “first impressions” I am hoping to have a DVR really soon so I can reference performances again… that is if I decide to also make this a weekly post. Still not sure! But I do now have that fun little graphic, so we’ll see 🙂
1. Clint Jun – he seemed like he was all over the place – yet the judges loved it? Am I listening to a different performance than they are?
2. Jovany – I don’t really like him, but he did good. Nothing really amazing, but good. Safe song choice though.
3. Jordan – I think the background drowned him out and I wasn’t blown away by it.
4. Tim – My twitter pal! But.. not that great, unfortunately. I think the song selection was the issue.
5. Brett – He seems very awkward on the stage. However I thought his performance was good. Probably the best one to this point.
6. James – It pains me to say this, but he was great. I could do without the screaming/screeching though. Never a fan of that.
7. Robbie – Definitely the wrong song choice. He started off alright, but then he seemed to lose it. Depressing, because he was really good in past rounds!
8. Scotty- I really don’t like country. But, I guess he was alright.
9. Stephano- In the beginning he seemed to be overpowered by the band. But then he seemed to find his groove… except for a note or two… 😉 But I liked it!
10. Paul – He has a really interesting voice. I liked his performance, though my parents weren’t too impressed with him.
11. Jacob – I kind of go either way with him, but I thought his performance was very good.
12. Casey -awesome, awesome, awesome!
1. Ta-Tynisa – She seemed pitchy at points, but otherwise I think she did pretty good.
2. Naima – I liked that she put her personality in to it. A lot of people questioned her decision to do this song because of Fantasia, but I think she did the song justice.
3. Kendra – I really liked her performance.
4. Rachel – I really don’t like the arrangement changes she made to the song. It made it hard to recognize and it came across as really cabaret.
5. Karen – Another good performance. And here I thought that the girls were weak! I liked that she went from English to Spanish.
6. Lauren T – These girls are surprising me! Another good performance.
7. Ashton – She seemed a bit shouty at parts and she wasn’t one of the best, but I didn’t think she was horrible either.
8. Julie – She had spots that were good and some that were not so good. I wasn’t impressed.
9. Haley – I think that she is one of my favorite girls. Not sure if the song choice was right for her, but I still think that she did well!
10. Thia – I like Thia. I wasn’t sure about her starting without any music, but once the music came in it as evident that she is a beautiful singer.
11. Lauren A. – She had a real good command of the stage, great stage presence and I am glad she delivered since she is “the chosen one”
12. Pia – Very nice job! She nailed it.
Katie 
