Five Minutes More

We have finally reached the Top 5. In years past this was when the contestants were asked to sing two songs instead of one, but because Fox is only giving them one hour this week so they can burn off the remaining episodes of Fringe each contestant this season only has to sing one song. You would think that the producers of America’s most popular show would have put up more of a fight with the network to make the show longer. However, I would venture to guess that these same producers still have nightmares about last season’s Top 5 show when Paula, under pressure from Trained Seal to make her comments quickly, had her vision of the future and critiqued Jason Castro’s second song before he sang it. So now without the pressure of time the producers can sit back and relax knowing that it is less likely that Drunk Chick is going to panic and break kayfabe again and spoil whatever mystique this show still has left.

Trained Seal starts the show by talking about evolving pressure while the contestants stand at attention behind him. Even though they have plenty of time this week there is still no unseen announcer introducing the judges, so I guess that means there is one more person collecting unemployment checks besides Lil Rounds and Anoop Desai. We find out that Ricky Minor and the band are not among the unemployment because they start playing some swing song while the judges are introduced. Sadly the contestants just get the canned Idol song for their intro.

Tonight’s theme is songs by the Rat Pack, which means that it will be de-facto Frank Sinatra night, though it would not surprise me if Broadway Boy sings a Dean Martin song just to be different. Since, as Kris reminds us in the opening video, all of the Rat Pack members are dead (though rumor has it that Angie Dickinson is still around) the producers had to be creative when choosing a tor-mentor, and since neither Harry Connick Jr. nor Billy Crystal were apparently available the producers put their extra strong creative caps on and chose Jamie Foxx. That is the only reason I can think of to explain this choice. Well that and Foxx has a movie to promote that, ironically, was not produced by Fox. I guess Rupert Murdock deserves that for forcing American Idol to stay within one hour.

It is so sweet when irony works on more than one level.

Kris Allen – “The Way You Look Tonight” by Frank Sinatra & others: For the first time that I can remember Kris has selected a song that I have actually heard of, which means of course that the other judges will likely think that it is a lousy song choice. Before he starts to sing Trained Seal asks Kris what he thinks he needs to do to stay in the competition and Kris gives a standard, pat answer that I didn't bother to pay attention to. Foxx is impressed that Kris is not competing in the “Throat Olympics” and thinks he is the best singer still in the competition. He is out this week without either his guitar or another instrument and his voice sounds rather weak. The screaming chicks in the crowd don’t seem to care though, perhaps because they cannot hear Kris above the din they are creating. Instead of changing the arrangement again Kris sings the song relatively straight, though he adds a short loud section just to keep me awake. Overall it was just OK for me, a bit pitchy in spots. Big Sexy can’t talk above the screeches, but then when they calm down he declares that this was Kris’ best performance to date, complete with solid story telling and nice stylings. Horny Chick thinks Kris has set the technical standard impossibly high tonight and declares Kris as “truly a dark horse in this competition.” Since we are down to just 5 contestants I think that it is probably a little late to declare anyone a dark horse, but that is just me. I am not a trained professional like Kara claims to be. Paula is amazed by Kris’s transition from the boy next door to a handsome sophisticated gentleman. I am amazed by Paula’s glow-in-the-dark lip gloss. Captain Jack only thought it was good and gets booed. He then reaches once again into the analogy bag of tricks and declares that Kris’ performance was “wet” and that Kris is like taking a very well trained spaniel for a walk, safe and nice but not incredible. Trained Seal asks Captain Jack for a clarification and gets none.

You know summer is near when Fox starts promoting So You Can Think You Can Dance during Idol. Another possible sign that Idol’s run is close to an end is that Fox has stopped running Cheyennis Doom’s Ford commercials during the show. I do miss them so. Speaking of promos, Trained Seal adds some excitement to his iTunes pimping by promising that this week you’ll get a signed autographed picture of an Idol contestant with your iTunes download. I guess they still have some Jorge Nunez portraits that they have to get rid of.

Allison Iraheta – “Someone to Watch Over Me” by Frank Sinatra & others: Allison gets the Coca-Cola treatment this week and she is actually dressed normally. It must be standards week. Allison talks about how scary it is that she is the only girl left in the competition. Allison has just turned 17, which prompts another 17 year old in the crowd, hopefully a dude, to ask for a date. Foxx talks about how innocent Allison sounds and since Allison is too young to have a boyfriend (since when is 17 too young to have a boyfriend? Unless you are the father of one…) Foxx recommends that she think about her family while singing the song instead. Allison plays it straight for once instead of trying to rock it up and she is still in fine voice, with lots of the grit that I have missed from Allison as of late. Damn, that was good. I think it was her best performance in quite some time, perhaps ever. That gentleman Kris just got blown out of the water by a 17 year old, but let us see what the judges say after heaping so much praise on him. Big Sexy was not sure about the song choice, so yes, he loved it. Kara is not nervous about Allison being in the bottom 3 this week with her deep beyond her years rendition. Paula was waiting forever for Allison to do a ballad and is proud of her tenderness. Simon asks Allison if she thinks she can win the competition at this stage. The crowd answers in the affirmative for her, of course, because they think that everybody can win the competition. After a slight hesitation Allison says that she thinks it can. However, Captain Jack cannot sense the confidence in Allison and despite it being a strong performance he thinks Allison is in trouble tonight. Horny Chick interrupts to declare that Captain Jack is crazy, and then Big Sexy interrupts to again tell Allison that she was the bomb and can take that home with her. Allison no longer looks very comfortable as Ryan gives out the phone numbers and I do not blame her.

Matt Giraud – “My Funny Valentine” by Frank Sinatra & others: If there is anybody who should be worried about being eliminated tonight it is not Allison, it is Piano Man. He too gets the Coca-Cola treatment, where Trained Seal asks Matt to describe how much he was looking forward to this week even though he got a B in jazz class. Foxx had no suggestions, really, but then he calls Matt back into the room after the cameras leave so he can claim to give him some advice. Matt is wearing hats all the time now, even while singing to Foxx, perhaps to hide that big zit on his forehead. I bet you 2o years from now when he loses most of his hair Matt will wear hats to bed. Perhaps the same ones he is wearing now. His voice sounds even weaker than Kris’ and he struggles a bit to get to that falsetto that Horny Chick loves so much. The crowd cheers for this but not as loudly as they did for Kris. Matt gets more in tune when he briefly goes into shouting mode, and then he ends the song with a weak glory note. I don’t know man; I think this dude is in trouble. Randy thought it was a little bit pitchy and that Matt tried too hard with some of his runs. Kara appreciates the runs but was not emotionally connected to the song. Drunk Chick loves what Matt did to the song and the advice that he took from Foxx and the audience cheers Paula’s unique insight. She felt the emotional connection that Horny Chick missed. Captain Jack has to disagree with Big Sexy and say that he thought it was the only authentic rendition that he heard so far tonight. He name drops Nat King Cole when praising Matt’s phrasing. I guess we know who Captain Jack wants to keep in the competition (Piano Man) and who he wants to send home (Allison) in order to justify his decision to save Matt two weeks ago.

Danny Gokey – “Come Rain or Come Shine” by Frank Sinatra & others: Danny promises not to change it up tonight except to add a bluesy aspect to the song. That sounds like a change up to me. For some reason Foxx is staring a hole into Danny as he sings for him, which seems to shake Danny up a bit. Foxx claims that this is what Michael Mann did to him during the filming of Miami Vice and that only when he got up in Danny’s grill was he true, fresh, and pure. Danny walks out from backstage and the chicks in the audience greet him with a collective swoon. He is in decent voice tonight, deeper in pitch than either Kris or Matt but not as deep as Allison was. He works in some runs during the ballad section that are only semi-successful, but his pitch gets better when gets to the more dramatic portion of the song. Then comes the shouting and the Taylor Hicks imitation that was a bit over-indulgent. He is clearly trying to inject some emotion into the song but it sounds somewhat fake to me. Still, it was a decent performance. Big Sexy was again worried about the song choice, so of course he loves it. He even thinks that Danny can have “an album of songs like that and win!” Win what, a Grammy? A platinum album? A role in a Broadway musical? Big Sexy continues on and dismisses Captain Jack and Horny Chick’s comments about connections because it is a singing competition (6) and Danny can sing! After mailing it in last week Big Sexy is all fired up tonight for some reason. Horny Chick loves Danny’s “Rat Pack swagger” that apparently she has been missing from Danny all season, even though I doubt neither she nor Danny knew they were missing it before now. She also thought Danny’s shouting was the most creative Danny has been all season. Drunk Chick promises to keep it short but then babbles on about how stellar Danny’s performance was and how she thinks he can see the finish line from here. Well that doesn't necessarily mean that the finish line is the finale. This time Captain Jack agrees with Horny Chick and praises Danny’s confidence. Simon then thanks both the band and Jamie Foxx for bringing out Danny’s best. Danny forms the heart sign again as Ryan gives out both of his phone numbers.

Adam Lambert – “Feeling Good” (the Muse arrangement) by Sammy Davis Jr. and others: Leave it to Broadway Boy to be the only one to not select a song Sinatra covered. Foxx thinks Adam is going to knock everybody’s head off with his performance, which in the video promises to include a rock edge and some screaming. Foxx is amazed that Adam was not intimidated by having the famous Jamie Foxx standing three feet in front of him. Adam goes against convention once again and comes out with a white suit instead of the traditional black. After a soft start Adam kicks it into high gear with a wink and perhaps a prayer. Adam is in high drama mode now with lots of dramatics and lots of in-tune screaming, and then to top it all off he ends the song with the longest glory note in Idol history. I don’t think this is the way that Sammy recorded it but as usual Adam made that song his own. Big Sexy thinks he is sounding like a broken record by declaring that Adam is in the zone even though it sounded a little too theatrical to him. A little? Actually, I can’t remember Big Sexy ever saying anything about Adam’s theatrics even though it is true. Horny Chick has to pull up her mouth from the floor and then goes into a fake orgasm talking about how confused she is by Adam’s shocking, sleazy, over the top performance. She can’t seem to get over the fact that she lusts after a guy that she has no shot of sleeping with because he just doesn't lean that way. Words cannot describe Drunk Chick’s feelings for Adam until she compares him to Olympian Michael Phelps. Captain Jack loves Big Sexy’s complaints about Adam being theatrical, compared it to complaining that a cow moos. He then tells Adam that he loves how Adam wants to win this competition, once again tossing a back handed insult at Allison. Boy, what did she do to get Captain Jack in her grill? Simon concludes his babbling by praising Adam’s entrance down the stage stairs and tells Trained Seal that he can’t use those stairs for his entrance any more. Trained Seal promises that he won’t walk down the stairs like Adam did, even though rumor has it that he leans the same way Adam does.

And now the continuation of Fringe. Viewer discretion is advised. And despite there being only 5 performances the show still went about a minute or so past 9.

The Final Score: 11 shots at Captain Jack Simon; 10 shots at Big Sexy Randy; 9 shots at Horny Chick Kara; 8 shots at Trained Seal Ryan; 6 shots at Drunk Chick Paula, who was remarkably sober this week; 9 shots at the tor-mentor Jamie Foxx; 2 shots at Ricky Minor and the band; and 6 shots at the audience. 5 references to former Idol contestants and 9 references to other non-Idol performers, including 1 Olympian and 1 network executive. 2 Coca-Cola treatments, 2 iTunes plugs, 2 Olympic references, 2 plugs of other Fox shows, 2 colorful metaphors, 2 people in someone’s grill, 1 dark horse (2 if you count Captain Jack’s declaration back in the auditions that Allison was the dark horse), no K-word utterances, and Big Sexy’s sixth claim that Idol is a singing competition.

Your 3 Stars of the Night: Despite Captain Jack’s insistent criticism I loved Allison’s performance. Adam Lambert was his usual unique self. Danny Gokey gets the third star because he had a little bit more soul than either Kris or Matt, however fake it might have been.

Idol Gives Back: I pretty much covered this in my post last week, except to point out that Matt Giraud is one lucky fellow to still be in this competition.

The Fearless Prediction: It still looks like it’s between Danny and Adam with the others competing for third place, so that makes it easy to predict that Allison, Kris, and Matt will be in the bottom 3. I am a little fearful that Captain Jack’s whining may put Allison in trouble, but judging from past results as well as the relative performances tonight I predict that it will be Matt Giraud who will be going home tomorrow night.