Un, eins, I, um, one.

Ahhh, le sigh. Due to the new play I’ve just started (no please, hold your applause, I do it for The Art, for The Love Of Performing, I am merely a humble player in the tapestry of community theatre, a puppet of the muse Dionysius . . . ) and the first readthrough we had last night, Idol this week was viewed via remote control; ie when I wanted to listen to the boys interview the singers post judgement, Fosse would poke me in the back and urge me to fast forward through to the next song because he had to get up early. Pffft. So I didn’t hear any of what might have been pearls of wisdom from my boys and I only vaguely registered that the contestants were receiving some kind of ‘choreography’ lessons, which appeared to hinder the Idols much more than they helped.

To begin. Klancie looks like a sausage in a black wraparound dress. (Bad dressing will be a recurring theme tonight, it's as if the stylist guy from last week took the night off, ringing in only to ensure that Jessica wore what might be described as the perfect Fuck Off Kyle Dress – but we’ll get to that later) Klancie flounces around the stage, gyrating to Shania Twain’s ‘If You’re Not In It For Love (This Title Is Too Long)’ in a manner that makes me uncomfortable, and from the look on her face, her too. Its just same old same old with Klancie. There are many pitchy breathy bits and she just doesn’t know what to do with her hands. It is karaoke, plain and simple. Klancie reminds me of that scene in Bridget Jones where Bridget sings at her Christmas party completely off her scone. She’s still having a ball, but I’m just over her. She has the weakest female voice in the competition and I really don’t want to listen to her anymore, sorry. Mark calls her an undercooked snag – hah! See, she does look like a sausage – and daggy. Marcia blah blah fine blah girlfriend blah. Kyle thinks she’s sexy and vocally great. Is he wearing beer goggles? And . . . beer hearing aids??

Irish is singing Ronan Garth Keating Brook’s ‘If Tomorrow Never Comes’. He starts off sitting at the front of the stage . . . and that’s all I wrote until he was finished because I? Was. Fucking. Transfixed. That was just an amazing performance, so incredibly well sung, with the trademark falsetto that he has basically taken and hidden somewhere in the house so none of the other guys can play with it. He was just soooooooo good and – lets face it – sexy. Yep, I said it. The Irishman with the big scary teeth (my kryptonite, bad teeth) is sexy. Seriously. I turned to Fosse and new housemate Boner (name authorisation pending subject approval) when he had finished and told them that I had never actually felt my ovaries before. All the judges love him. Well, duh.

Sigh. The moment I’ve been waiting for arrives. Lavina performs, and I hate it. Granted, I don’t hate it like I hated every fucking thing her sister did, but her version of Thelma Houston’s disco classic ‘Don’t Leave Me This Way’? Kind of makes me want to Leave Her That Way. She starts off really weakly in the lower register, which Boner attributes to the tights she’s wearing – I confess, until he mentions them I hadn’t noticed them but by all that is holy on this earth, they are HIDEOUS. They look like they’re cutting off the circulation to her . . . EVERYTHING. Blame the leggings!! They’re sucking all Lavina’s vitality away! Even the big powerful shouty bit of this song that Lavina should rock righteously? Is not big, powerful, shouty or righteous. Instead the whole thing is dry, dull and derivative. I’m really disappointed because I still want to like her. Mark wants to give her a touchdown – because, hey, he’d have given her sister one if she’d come on stage and belched the national anthem – but he doesn’t think she’s there yet. Marcia babbles about light and shade and calls it bad. Why, yes, Marcia, it was bad! Well done! Oh. You mean ‘bad’. As in ‘phat’. No. Kyle thinks she still needs to connect with the audience and I agree, there was no warmth to that, there were shades of Emily The Coldly Anointed One about it. Shudder.

Chris is singing one of the few Phil Collins songs I can get down with, ‘Against All Odds’ but tonight, once again, another Idol fails to live up to previous performance greatness. It’s like he’s a four cylinder Commodore and he’s only firing on two (I’m sorry, Boner keeps talking about cars and it’s sinking in). It’s bland as hell, if hell is wall to wall beige, a balmy 34 degrees, and populated with carpet salesman discussing whether Nicole Kidman is more like Naomi Watts or vice versa. His voice really suits this song but he’s just not punching out any of the big notes or making it remotely interesting to listen to. Marcia thinks it was all that, but Mark says he came off a little uncomfortable. Marcia – aware that she hasn’t given her ‘opinion’ in two seconds – butts in to disagree and ask Chris if he was uncomfortable. Marcia, you can’t fucking rebut everyone’s comments when you disagree, this isn’t a debate. Oh, and shut up. Kyle rightly calls it lame. I mentally high five him and then beat him around the head with a baseball bat for his comments to Jess last week.

Woah. Dean is SO flat at the start of the Goo Goo Dolls song ‘Iris’, he needs a key change, STAT. Not that the audience can tell he’s flat because the teenage girls are screaming so incredibly loudly for him. I drift off to wonder if I was that blindly stupid when I was a teenager and remember my crush on the phenomenally untalented Richard Grieco. Ahem. Moving on. The chorus is much better, but still a little flat. And I am aghast at the continual Beatles-esque screaming going on. Someone down the front makes the rock devils horns sign at him and I wait expectantly for Dean to leap into the audience, all Christian saviour in gleaming white lights, flicking holy water and chanting ‘the power of Christ compels you’. Sadly, he does not. Mark is just so desperate for Dean to win that he actually compliments the singing. For real? Jeez. Kyle babbles about Dean’s flaws and how he listens to the judges and the coaches and I just don’t like this guy. He’s cheese! And not good cheese, no, he’s the watered down 50% fat free stuff that has no bite that you have to have instead of the real stuff when you're on a diet because you need to keep up your calcium intake. I may be currently trying to eat well and be a little obsessed with food. Moving on!

I’d like to blame the choreographers for the pose-y ness of tonights show, but we’ve seen this schtick from Mutto before so they get a pass on the blame here. His Hoobastank’s ‘The Reason’ Hoobastinks. He starts off okay but then goes waaaaaaaaaaay off the note and stays there. The bigger notes are better because he pops some power behind them but his softly softly voice is really lacking any strength at all. And for the second week in a row he throws in a superfluous ‘oh my Lord’ into the lyrics. God. Well, actually . . . exactly. Mark tells him he’s flatlining and is in trouble, which gets a ‘hell yeah’ from me. Marcia takes her favourite position – diametrically opposing whatever the hell Mark says – and thinks he’s stepped it up this week and then blames the poor singing on some throat illness that he’s been carrying for a few weeks (so . . . he has stepped it up but sang badly? Make SENSE, woman!) and Mark interrupts to ask if she’s going to continue using that excuse for Mutto every week. Marcia has the barefaced fucking audacity to be pissed off that Mark is interrupting her. Kyle has no time for either of them except to agree with Mark that Mutto needs to perform better to continue winning fans.

As far as I’m concerned they should just crown Irish and Jessica the final two and stop this charade right now. Her rendition of La Aguilera’s ‘Beautiful’ is and I’m sorry but it needs to be said, beautiful. This is an awesome song choice in light of the Kyle Incident last week and I take a brief opp to explain to Fosse and Boner that the Idols in fact chose the song they’re doing tonight, ten days before, so pre-Incident. She looks amazing in a gorgeous white sheath-y dress thing (Sweater Girl could describe it better, I don’t know shit about clothes suffice it to say, she looks great and I fucking LOVE that she’s wearing white again, up yours Kyle). She RIPS the glory note and is just astoundingly good. The crowd screams for about a minute and a half when she’s finished and Marcia has to say her name a couple of times before they calm down enough for her to talk inanely at us. Marks howls at her and gets the crowd on their feet as he delivers the most thoroughly deserved touchdown I’ve seen in almost a season and a half. Kyle harshes my buzz by crapping on about the hard week he’s had defending his stance and his bullshit opinions. I yell at the tv that he’s a grown man who makes his living by being controversial, whereas Jessica is a seventeen year old in a singing competition. Jessica just giggles and bounces back to the boys who are obviously SMITTEN with the little cutie. As am I. In a nonsexual way, you perves.

Bobby is singing the theme from the movie Arthur. I have to type that again. BOBBY IS SINGING THE THEME FROM ARTHUR. I heard this on Thursday and have literally just stopped laughing. This is a song that I can’t hear without immediately flashing back to the episode of Will & Grace where Jack sings the line ‘when you get caught between the moon and New York City’ whilst holding cardboard cutouts of the moon and New York City. Sean Hayes cracks me up. And Bobby? Is no Sean Hayes. I wish he’d Just Jack this up a bit actually, cabaret it a touch. GIVE IT SOMETHING. His voice drops in and out as though he’s trying to mask the fact that he’s forgotten the lyrics – UNFORGIVEABLE – and some of the notes are truly . . . bad. Fosse writhes in pain on the couch behind me and dubs it the Worst Performance He’s Ever Seen On Idol. I don’t think its that bad, but it IS pretty bad. I mean, Werewolves Of London was weird and out of place on rock night but at least it was well done. This is severely undercooked. Mark bemusedly notes that the phrasing was weak and the arrangement, bland. Even Marcia is taken aback and gets all mother-y, wanting to know what’s wrong and Bobby confesses to getting a little lost. Kyle queries if he lost some of the words as well and when Bobby nods, I jump up and down and point out in my notes where I wrote that then realise that Kyle and I were thinking along the same lines which makes me bash my head repeatedly on the coffee table. They basically all jump to make excuses for him and let him off for the shellacking he truly deserves for choosing such an inappropriate song. Once again, Bobby gets a Get Out Of Jail Free card. I suspect bribery . . .

Ricky’s choice of Chicago’s ‘Hard To Say I’m Sorry’ is further proof he is listening to the judges and moving way away from RnB. He sings extremely well again, even sneakily throwing in some RnB melisima, but as good as it is, on a night when Jessica and Irish have basically thrown down gauntlets to the rest with great performances, he errs on the side of good but not great. Marcia loves puppies, icecream and all the stars in the skies or some such nonsense. Mark calls it ambitious and doesn’t think he pulled it off, calling it out of his league. Kyle started off hating it but Ricky won him over from the middle – he blathers on some more about people losing interest quickly but I quickly lost interest and stopped listening.

Great song choice by Lisa continues with Vanessa Carlton’s ‘A Thousand Miles’. Seriously, what an awesome fucking song for her to choose. We are predisposed to expect a little girl lilt when this is sung and Lisa doesn’t disappoint us. She’s wisely perched upon a stool again – it makes her guitar-less state less obvious – and she’s actually connecting with the audience. There are a couple of flat notes but on the whole, this is my favourite Lisa performance since her audition. Mark reminds us that she’s only sixteen and blah blah criticised blah risen to the top blah well done. Marcia loves it. Whatever. Kyle asks her to compare her performance to last weeks shocker and surprisingly she thinks she did better. Shocking, I know.

It is a total crapshoot as to who is going home in just over an hour. My money is on Mutto to go, with the rest of the bottom three made up of almost any of the others – except Irish and Jessica. And probably I would count Lisa as safe and Ricky should be as well. But any of Lavina, Chris, Klancie, Dean and Bobby may taste their first trip to Bottom Threeville. I’d love to see Dean or Klancie go but I think their fanbase of, respectively, screaming fourteen year olds and . . . hell, I actually don’t know who keeps voting for Klancie but they seem to like her and I think they'll keep her safe for another night.


TallulahBelle out.