From the Archives: Season 6 Country Week

I better hurry up and get the rest of Season 6 on line. The season premiere of Season 7 is 12 days away (as anyone who has been watching the Blowout Championship Series bowl games can tell you) and I still have 5 more posts to go after this one. Plus there is a big windstorm due here tomorrow and my power line runs right through a dying street tree that I can't seem to convince the city to remove. So if you don't hear from me after tonight please send a generator.

This was the week that finally did in Sanjaya and showed that at least some of voters had come to their senses. Of course that doesn't forgive these same voters for voting Melinda out before the finals. Yes I'm still bitter about that.

From April 17, 2007:

This promises to be an interesting evening. For the first time in a while, there are no country singers in this year’s competition. So everybody will be outside of their comfort zone unless they do what Chris Daughtry (hi sis) did last year when he did a rock version of Johnny Cash’s “Walk the Line” to rave reviews.

This week’s mentor is Martina McBride. Well, at least the contestants will get some actual singing advice this week as opposed to how to shake their booty. Of course this provides much less of an opportunity for me to take pot shots at the mentor. Despite that I will do my best to still keep this entertaining as well as informative.

Again I’m writing this as the show airs, even though I still ended up staying awake until midnight when I tried this last week…

The evening begins on a somber note as to be expected given the events at Virginia Tech. I was wondering how they were going to address what happened.

Phil: “Where the Blacktop Ends” by Keith Urban



We discover that Phil is originally from Kansas. Interesting, I would have guessed Oregon (not sure why, though). He needs to hit a home run tonight as he’s definitely on the bubble. I don’t know if it was a home run, but it was definitely an extra base hit. You can forget what I said about how there are no country singers in the competition, it turns out Phil’s being hiding his 10 gallon hat from all of us. He kept it under control, didn't screech, and showed some passion. Far and away his best performance to date, perhaps just enough to keep him in the game.

Jordin: “Broken Wing” by Martina McBride
Takes some guts to sing a song by the mentor. Then again, who better to give advice on how to sing it? Not a big fan of the big orange dress, but the hair stylist scores some points. She tended to oversell some parts of the vocals, but man she’s got a really good voice. Simon shocks Jordin and the world by saying that he now thinks that she can win American Idol. About time he figured that out.

Sanjaya: “Something to Talk About” by Bonnie Raitt
No creative intro from Ryan this week. Good thing there’s a commercial break between his performance and Jordin's or else he would really sound weak. Not that he needs any help in that department. He picks the song because he’s been giving people something to talk about. So he does read his press clippings after all. Hard to describe this week’s performance. It wasn't horrible, but it pales in comparison not only to the previous two singers but also to his performance last week. It was very karaoke. Ryan cuts off Simon in the middle of his rant about how horrible Sanjaya's performance was, and then the two get into an argument about whether or not Simon would ever like Sanjaya no matter how well he did. Sanjaya just stands there looking goofy as usual. I was going to write about some drunk comment made by Paula but after the Simon/Ryan tête-à-tête I forgot what she said.

LaKesha: “Jesus Take the Wheel” by Carrie Underwood
Another gutsy call, picking a song by a former Idol contestant. Then again, her best performance on the show this far was a Jennifer Hudson song, so maybe there’s hope. Strong vocal as usual, but I agree with the other judges that she could have done better. Given how she pours so much emotion into most of her songs I was expecting more here, especially when she said that the song meant so much to her personally. Instead, it was kind of flat. She looked nice though.

Chris: “Mayberry” by Rascal Flatts
So the dude was raised in North Carolina. I knew that there had to be somebody from the Carolinas in this show. Last year I think half of the top 12 were from there. He promises to do what Phil did and reveal his hidden country. Turns out the hat he was hiding wasn't a 10 gallon one but a beanie cap. We didn't discover any hidden country here. It was a fairly weak, pitchy vocal, almost as bad as Sanjaya's. He should have tried to do a 98 Degrees version of the tune, singing it straight was just weak. Chris tries to argue that “nasally is a form of singing”, nice try Timberlake boy.

Melinda: “Trouble is a Woman” by Julie Reeves
Martina had never heard of this song before, so she’s couldn't give Melinda much advice except not to be as shy. Notice that all of the mentors are focusing on her performing skills and never give her advice about her singing? Probably because she sings better than most of the mentors. Much better than last week. She picked a country song that she could put some soul into and really sold it. Once again best vocal of the night. Just when you think somebody like Jordin might overtake her Melinda surges back out in front again.

Blake: “When the Stars Go Blue” by Tim McGraw
The girls again scream at the sound of his name. The pitchiness that plagued him early on in the competition came back this week. The judges of course ignored this. I thought it was an OK performance but kind of bland. His performance last week was much better. At least he didn't try to make it more “hip”. I've noticed he hasn't done that for a while, and I think his performances have been better for it.

Your 3 Stars for Tonight’s Game: Melinda, Jordin, and Phil. Yes, the bald squid did well this week.

The Fearless Prediction: I managed to avoid being distracted by the gams and correctly picked Haley last week, putting me at 2-3 thus far this year. I was kind of hoping that by not picking Phil he would have been voted off but no such luck. Based on this week’s performance, though, I have new hope for Phil and thus I won’t put him in the Bottom 3 this week. And no, this is not another reverse psychology thing.

I believe that this is the week we will finally see Sanjaya in the Bottom 3. The Evil Ones that want to see him win are running out of other options to distract voters. However, my guess is that he’ll survive for Idol Gives Back Week. Joining Sanjaya on the bottom will be Chris and LaKesha. LaKesha for the same reasons I thought Melinda would be in the Bottom 3 last week, Chris because he was, well, Chris. For that reason I predict Mr. Boy Band will be heading back to the land of Dixie tomorrow night.