Case Summary S12-2013 Part 2: The First Half Recap – New York to Hollywood

The audition shows began in New York with Phil Phillips, last year's winner, singing his multi-platinum home song that ended up not being used as the going home song this season. The New York auditions featured sniping between the chick judges, a woman who lost 80 pounds, and Gurpreet Singh Sarin, who was nicknamed “The Turbanator” by Nicki because he had 50 turbans.

The Chicago auditions aired on the same night as the Lance Armstrong interview with Oprah and was not nearly as interesting, though for some unknown reason this post got the most hits of any that I posted this year. Keith lashed out at Nicki for rejecting a contestant because of the eye shadow she was wearing, and then after another Mariah-Nicki exchange Keith screamed that he felt like a scratching post. Season 10 contestant and Chicago native Haley Reinhardt showed up to remind everybody that she was on the show. Ryan constantly reminded us that another Chicago native, Jennifer Hudson, also was on the show. Janelle Arthur appeared on this audition show as well as eye candy Johnny Keyser.

The Charlotte auditions were the most memorable of the audition shows this season, perhaps in the entire history of the show. It was at these auditions that Nicki stormed off the set and told people that she wanted to shoot Mariah, which led Mariah to tell Barbara Walters on The View that she was considering quitting the show or hiring body guards to protect her from her fellow judge. Of course there was a big buildup to the blow up but except for Nicki storming off the set none of the rest of the circus was shown. It turned out that it was Randy who got Nicki upset to the point when she stormed off when they argued about their respective years in the business, something TMZ didn’t bother to mention on their show. Perhaps the best part was that the first contestant the next day begged the judges to stop fighting since it made her sad. She got put through as did the chick who the judges argued about, though neither of them made it to the live shows. One of the Charlotte auditioners did manage to do that of course, the contestant who eventually won. After Nicki told Candice Glover that she wanted to eat her I decided to nickname Nicki Jaws. Also in Charlotte Season 10 winner Scotty McCreery showed up and Ryan got to drive around the race track where the auditions were held, in a Ford of course.

Idol held their first auditions in Randy’s hometown of Baton Rouge, Louisiana and not much happened there. Randy ended up going to Café du Monde in New Orleans to invite a street singer there to the auditions. Charlie Askew tried out in Baton Rouge as did a medical doctor who got cut in Hollywood. It was in Baton Rouge that we first learned that Mariah was a beauty school dropout, then saw her cry during Burnell Taylor’s audition.

The Oklahoma City auditions featured lots of references to Carrie Underwood, lots of name dropping of country singers by Keith, and lots of wine drinking by yours truly. Steven Tyler made an appearance in drag. Yes, the dude looked like a lady, albeit an ugly lady. One of the auditioners showed up with a ventriloquist dummy and still managed to get a ticket to Hollywood. Another auditioner claimed that God told her to try out, and then accused Nicki of being a devil worshiper when she was rejected. The star of the OKC show was Zoanette Johnson, who belted out the National Anthem as a tribute to Barack Obama that knocked Keith out of his chair. Who knew at the time that not only would she get a ticket to Hollywood but that she would make it all the way to the live shows?

The final audition show was a doubleheader featuring auditions from San Antonio, Texas and Long Beach, California. The San Antonio auditions were boring except for the brothers who argued with Mariah and Randy after being cut. The Long Beach auditions featured a teenager with blue hair who screamed at the top of her lungs and ran out declaring that “you only live once,” Ryan talking to fake ghosts, Nicki and Mariah both showing up late, Nicki (when she arrived) demanding that Randy put Papa Peachez through to Hollywood, a guy who faked a story about Iraq and impotence, and an on screen appearance by Nigel when the Queen Mary’s fire alarm went off.

Hollywood Week was held in some nondescript theater in the Valley instead of in Hollywood. I patted myself on the back for figuring this out from the one or two outdoor shots the producers showed through the four shows. That wasn’t the only change from previous seasons. There were separate Hollywood Weeks for the dudes and the chicks, there was no grouping in rooms, no chair show, and Nigel chose the groups for both Group Nights to try and play up the drama and to try and jury-rig the contestants to get a chick winner. Nicki ripped into a bunch of contestants but pleaded to save one group even though their performance was a disaster. Keith stopped one contestant cold by telling him he shouldn’t be in the business to chase a dream. Perhaps the highlight was Angela Miller singing her own composition and blowing away the competition in the process. Too bad her evil twin Angie Miller had to come in and screw things up.

The chair show was replaced with shows in Vegas taped before a live studio audience. Each performer did one song and then after everyone was done the judges had heated discussion inside a pit and then announced (while sitting in chairs) who was moving on. Jimmy Iovine made his first appearance of the season and was tasked with breaking any ties among the judges. 10 chicks went first. Amber Holcomb made her first appearance wearing the shortest skirt of all 10 contestants, a trend that would continue for the next 2 months. Adriana Lotorio, a 17 year old Pinay from Alaska, sang well enough to move on to the next round but was unable to capture the dedicated fan base that Jasmine Trias, a 19 year old Pinay from Hawaii, did several years before. Kree Harrison and Angela Miller both sang well enough to move on. One who didn’t was Shubha Vedula, who Nicki said sounded like a cross between Christina Aguilera and “that gangnam style guy.”

10 guys went the next night. Curtis Finch, Jr. cleansed us of our sins. Elijah Liu flirted with Nicki so much that she wanted to have his babies even though he was only 18 years old. Jda, a dude wearing a dress and a five o’clock shadow, performed an Adele song that Randy didn’t think was original enough. I guess in Randy’s mind all the dudes on Idol are in drag. Devin Valez sang the best vocal in not one but two languages. Johnny Keyser was sent home because he was a handsome white guy. Paul Jolley, another handsome white guy, would have been sent home too if Jimmy Iovine had not saved him. The star of the night was Charlie Askew, whose performance of “Rocket Man” was surrealistic theater, like a David Lynch movie or something, but still got him through to the next round.

The final 10 chicks performed the following week. Candice Glover made it past the Vegas barrier that she ran into last year, leaving Randy with trying to make excuses for why he cut her last year. Ryan bantered with Jett Hermano about cool places to hang out in the Philippines. Nicki was obsessed with Jessica Alba lookalike Aubrey Cleland. The two chicks who claimed God told them how to perform their songs were both sent home. Breanna Steer reminded Keith of an old girlfriend who could have taken a hammer to his car windows. Zoanette Johnson performed a Lion King song as only she could, and then shocked the world by being sent through to the live shows.

The last 10 dudes featured the return of The Turbanator from the New York auditions and Burnell Taylor from the Baton Rouge auditions, who went unrecognized during the Hollywood Week shows because he lost 40 pounds after his audition. Vincent Powell inspired Zoanette to call him Papa Smurf. Lazaro Argos got away with singing a Keith Urban song, after which Mariah lauded him for overcoming his obstacles for the first of about a billion times. The other dudes did nothing of note.

Two months after the season premiere we finally got to the first voting round. The judges suddenly turned on Zoanette, bashing her performance of a Tina Turner song. Aubrey did another boring ballad but looked great while doing it. Janelle Arthur bored me with an Elvis song, not an easy thing to do. Nicki talked about Teena Torres’ boobs after Teena complained that Nicki only talked about her hair the week before. Angela Miller was now Angie Miller. Nicki claimed that she and Kree were married. Candice’s performance reminded me of Melinda Doolittle. Charlie Askew almost had a nervous breakdown after all the judges, even Mariah, were critical of his performance of an obscure Genesis song. Ryan doomed Nick Boddington’s chances by getting him to admit that he had lost all of his hair, then bonded with Paul Jolley over their mutual affection for Carrie Underwood. Curtis brought everyone to tears with “I Believe I Can Fly”. Devin did the two language thing again. The results show announcing the Top 10 finalists was nothing special except for Lazaro arguing with the band about the key for the song he was to sing. The Top 10 were Curtis, Burnell, Paul, Lazaro, Devin, Janelle, Candice, Angie, Kree, and Amber.