From the Archives: Season 6 British Invasion Week

Here's where I started to realize that there was a gold mine of material available by focusing my poison pen on the mentors. We also learned many things about the competitors. For example, we learned that Jordin and Melinda were the best singers, that Phil was the best shouter, that Blake was the favorite of the pre-teen girl set, that Haley had great legs and not much else, that Stephanie didn't know that she sounded just like Beyonce, that Chris Richardson did know that he sounded like Justin Timberlake, that Gina was selected as the designated rocker, that LaKesha was destined to duplicate what happened to Chris Daughtry in Season 5, that Chris Sligh was trying to duplicate what happened to Taylor Hicks in Season 5, and that Sanjaya not only made little girls cry but posed a threat to all of Western civilization. And to think there were 10 weeks of this still to come. I also learned that this season was going to be hard to predict who would be voted off.

From March 20, 2007:

Here we are in Week 2 and everybody will be singing songs from the 60's British Invasion. One interesting note: while The Beatles were mentioned in the opening monologue not one of the contestants dared to sing a Beatles song. Actually most of the songs chosen were ones that were among the least popular from that era, though a few did dare to take on some more familiar material. Our guest mentors this week are Peter Noone from Herman's Hermits and Lulu from, I guess Lulu. It's obvious from their comments that Noone and Lulu have been watching the show. It was also obvious from the contestants' comments that most of them had no clue who these two were before meeting them.

Haley, "Tell Him" by Billie Davis
She showed a much better stage presence this week compared to last, when she looked like a freight train was about to hit her. She showed off some nice moves and some nice legs, thanks to some really short shorts. The backless blouse didn't hurt either. Some of her words were slurred, but at least she remembered them all this time. Upbeat and happy suits her much better than frightened, especially when she's showing lots of skin.

Chris R., "Don't Let the Sun Get You Cryin'" by Gerry & The Pacemakers
The (other) judges loved it but I thought it was a little flat. Still, it is a difficult song to sing well and he didn't do a bad job with it. It was the first time he demonstrated a distinctive sound instead of channeling Justin Timberlake again, so he should get bonus points for that. He also kept in tune and more or less on pitch. A decent performance.

Stephanie, "You Don't Have To Say You Love Me" by Dusty Springfield
During the intro Lulu tells Stephanie that she sounds just like Beyonce'. Stephanie is surprised to hear this but the rest of America is not. This wasn't a very good song choice for her. Try to imagine Beyonce' singing it and you'd have a good idea how it came out. The song was too big for her voice and you could hear her strain to hit some of the big notes.

Blake, "Time of the Season" by The Zombies
You can tell he's getting the preteen girl vote by all the high pitched screams every time his name is mentioned. Unlike last week when he bastardized "You Keep Me Hangin' On" Blake played it pretty straight this week, though he did add some modernizing touches to it. His vocals were strained at times but much less pitchy than usual. Overall not a bad performance for him.

LaKesha, "Diamonds Are Forever" by Shirley Bassey
How successful is Idol? So successful that they were able to outfit LaKesha with a million dollars worth of diamonds just for this performance. It was a good song choice for her, and it was her usual performance, a little shaky at first but packing a wallop at the end once she gets into the song. Still, not her best. She may be suffering from Chris Daughtry syndrome. Like Daughtry last year, she did so well in her first performance (when she outdid Jennifer Hudson singing "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going") that she'll always be held to that standard, and when she falls short of that it'll be seen as poor even though it was still better than many others.

Phil, "Tobacco Road" by The Nashville Teens
It was a spirited performance but he shouted pretty much the entire song, and he had pitch problems on the parts that he did actually sing. He's demonstrated good vocals before but not tonight. It just didn't work for me, Dog. Plus, I didn't think The Nashville Teens were even from England.

Jordin, "I, Who Have Nothing" by Shirley Bassey



Best vocal of the night so far. It was a surprising song choice given that she's only 17, way too young to get into a song about a lost love, but she pulled it off very well. She seems to be getting better and better every week.

Sanjaya, "You Really Got Me" by The Kinks
It was either this song or Peter Noone's own "Something Good." Noone was encouraging him to sing the Kinks song, probably because he didn't want Sanjaya to butcher his own song. Even though he went with The Kinks Sanjaya didn't disappoint, it was still a vocal disaster. Ray Davies is probably calling his agent now, trying to get on Idol to encourage Sanjaya to sing someone else's song. Sanjaya also acknowledged that he's not the best singer in the competition, to which 90% of America uttered a collective "duh!" He does get some style points, though, for showing some enthusiasm in his performance. He even made a young girl in the audience cry tears of joy, though we found out later that she was crying for all the contestants.

Gina, "Paint It Black" by The Rolling Stones
What an interesting song choice this was. She got the look and the mannerisms down, but we never got to hear the big rocker chick voice that she's displayed before because the song didn't really allow for it. It was actually rather weak. Her vocals didn't even come close to Mick Jagger's nor did she try to do something different to avoid the comparison.

Chris S., "She's Not There" by The Zombies
Excellent song choice, maybe the best pairing of song and singer all night. This time he didn't mess with the arrangement and it worked out much better. It was a full-on Taylor Hicks-esque performance, complete with the dance moves, the roaming through the crowd, and the goofy nickname (the "Fro Patrol"). Considering that those types of performances got Hicks a record contract and a boat load of cash it's probably not much of a bad thing to try and do something similar.

Melinda, "As Long As He Needs Me" from "Oliver"
As usual, the best is saved for the coveted final slot. She had some odd facial expressions and her neck seems to have disappeared below her shoulders, but once again her vocals were spot on. She is clearly in another league vocally. Phrasing, pitch, tone, once again it was all there. Even though most of the others upped their games this week compared to last Melinda is still the front runner, and may have opened up her lead just a little bit on her main competition.

Your 3 Stars of the Night: Melinda & Jordin again are the top two. I'd say it's a tie for third between Chris S. and Blake.

The Fearless Prediction: My guess for the Bottom 3 are Phil, Gina, and Sanjaya, though it wouldn't surprise me if Stephanie ended up there instead. If there is a God then Sanjaya will be shown the door, but there's still too many people voting for him just to torment the rest of America and relatively speaking he did better this week than last. So, my guess is that Phil will be headed back out to sea with the Navy tomorrow night.