Irish is The One That I Want

Dear I Talk Too Much reader,

It is with great sorrow and heaviness of my heart that I come to you today, my friends. (Self) burdened as I am with the responsibility of recapping all four Idols, I fear a Difficulty Has Arisen. I find myself Faced With A Quandary, a Confusion of sorts. A Trouble.
How exactly, am I to remain invested in the other Idol’s? How? HOW?! How do I recap their performances adequately and fairly, when I can see and hear only one? It is, as if the skies had parted on a cloudy day and angels had reached down from their lofty, pillowy clouds of heavenly goodness to impart some small happiness upon us lowly, earthbound mortals. And lo, but we did bare our faces to the brilliance of their love. And it was good.
For real though, this whole thing is over, yeah? We’re done. Irish has won. Strike the set, pack up the scaffolding and ship it back to the nearest Westfield shopping centre, put Mark back into the medically induced coma I assume he enters as soon as the person he doesn’t want to win, wins, return to sender Sandilands back to his shockjock radio station gig permanently, let Marcia toddle off to pimp her Diva CD at Mardi Gras and let’s all just go back to watching Law and Order on Sunday nights whilst we wait for The Best CD Ever To Come Out Of Idol And Featuring Fabulous Fathoms Of Fantastic Falsetto to hit our local Sanity record stores, shall we?

No?

FINE.

Not content with foisting one performance on us for me to recap, JUST as we get down to a manageable four contestants, they screw me completely by letting the Idol’s sing two songs each. My carpal tunnel aches just thinking about it.

Little cutie Jess opens the show with *shudder* a Mariah Carey number ‘Butterfly’ – this is what her fans voted for her to do? Really? Okay, so obviously someone enjoys the trillympics and they’re determined to make us enjoy it as well. Unfortunately Jessica sounds really nasal singing this song, as if she’s trying to sing too much like Mariah and not at all like Jessica. She trills and oversings so much that . . . okay, does anyone else have a grandmother who is completely batshit crazy about frilly fripperies? I do. Every time I go to my grandmother’s house, there are new embroideries to see, handstitched cushions to sit next to (never on!) and doilies to admire – it’s like a kewpie doll from the 1920’s exploded in her house, lace as far as the eye can see. She just keeps adding and adding, I worry for her walls, laden as they are with the burden of heavily framed cross stitched portraits of Ladies In Waiting. Don’t get me wrong, Grandma’s very good at it, she sews like a dervish and it makes her incredibly happy which makes her grandchildren very happy – we love the people we love, to love what fills their days – but it is just so much. My grandmother’s house is exactly like Jessica’s singing. Yes, the glorynoting is fabulous and the singing itself – although nasal – is still very good, but it is just so much and I’m tired just listening to it. Mark calls it great Viewers Choice, noting that although it isn’t an easy song to sing everything Jess does makes it look easy. Marcia completely fucking confuses everyone who has ever watched an episode of Idol by stating that she isn’t going to criticise anymore, she’s just going to sit back and enjoy the ride. I pause the tape and ask Fosse if I just had a stroke, because she didn’t just say that, did she? Hilarity ensues. Kyle thought it was awkward until halfway through and begs her to not stop getting better.

Her second song is Alicia Keys’ ‘Karma’ and THIS is more the hell like it! It’s upbeat, a little racy, she’s bopping around the stage in the most AWESOME boots, Jess is confident and rocking this song. Look! There she is! The girl I’ve missed these last trill filled weeks. She has just the best time with this number and sounds fantastic. If she could just walk the line between pop princess and lyrical gymnast a tad more, I would be back on the Jess train. As it is, I still think she deserves to be one of the final two standing. Standing next to Irish as he wins, but you knew that. Mark wants to give her a touchdown but she wasn’t quite there for him. He then busts on her a little for always choosing songs with hard phrasing which leads to tricky breathing. Marcia tells him to shut the hell up because the viewers chose these songs and I mutter at the screen that while the viewers chose the songs, they chose them from a group of songs that the Idol’s themselves nominated, so suck on that Marcia (and you too, Dean, you fucking whinger). She continues, calling it the most comfortable and sassy Jess has been on stage and tells Jess to find that place for every performance. Kyle adds his kudos to her strutting of the stage and calls the performance ‘very cool to watch’.

Chris’ fans think he is the one to break the Robbie ‘Best Friend to Kyle Sandilands’ Williams curse, with his performance of ‘Something Beautiful’ and on paper this is a brill song choice for Mr Murphy as its one of his pop-iest rock songs. Chris starts off at the keyboards which I applaud because that means less Jack Blackisms, right? It is nice to hear him trying something different but this comes across as quite bland until he key changes it up an octave. He also walks away from the keyboards purely, it would appear so he can put on his best School of Rock (the film following the Idol show – coincidence? I think not . . . ) Mark unfairly compares the two Murphy boys, noting that the CourtJester finished third and wondering if that’s causing some less than harmonious family dinners, and of course Chris doesn’t want to play this game and just lets Mark know he’s here to win and his brother will be very happy for him if he does, thanks very much. Marcia, direct quote and the total sum of her comments to Chris : “Well done.” And well fucking done to you too Marcia, you are absolutely worth every shiny penny you get paid for this gig. You are not in any way a complete waste of our time, our energy and nor does your complete inability to coherently put forward any useful critique hinder the Idol process. We thank you for your incredibly valuable time and input. Please feel free to tell us what colour the sky is and your opinion on whether humans should breathe in and out regularly. Like me, Kyle was a little disappointed with the performance as a whole and didn’t think it was as powerful as it normally would have been and likens it to a rehearsal.

His second song is – breathe TallulahBelle breathe – a Crowded House song, ‘Mean To Me’. I sternly warn him not to fucking Jack Black Neil Finn and am very pleased that he comes out with the Gibson strapped to his chest again. He rocks it out and his performance has improved markedly from the previous one – his singing is rougher (in a good rock way) and I enjoy it. Granted, I can’t stop myself singing along but I think that’s more about my Crowdie love and less about this performance. Its not ‘Evie’ but its still pretty fun and rocking. He should always play that guitar. Always. I look away from the tv when he does the head flick thing because I don’t want to scream like a harridan at him right this very moment. Mark apparently doesn’t think I hate him quite fucking enough because he CALLS IT THE BEST VERSION OF THAT SONG HE’S EVER HEARD. I am SURE he means outside of the Crowded House version because if he thinks that ANYONE does Neil better than Neil (and yes, I’m including Irish’s Message To My Girl, which was brilliant, but still not better than Neil) then he is tripping and also COMPLETELY INSANE. Marcia tells Chris what he already knows, ie you look really comfortable with that guitar, strutting your stuff and well done. Kyle calls it Perfectly Chris, that’s what he should do always.

Dean. Oh Dean. ‘Dare You To Move’ by Switchfoot should have been your bag, baby. It should have been a walk in the effing park, instead it was like that first time you try to jog when you don’t know how to do the breathing properly and you think you’re going to have an asthma attack, or choke, or both. Painful and laborious, is what I’m saying. His vocals are really shaky and he just can’t hit those lower notes at all. I want it to be over for him, thanks. Mark doesn’t know how to handle it, telling him he was under the note in his lower register and that for one of the most bankable people to ever appear on this show, he is waaaay off the track. Marcia babbles about the stress of performing and PR and pressure and I think if he can’t handle doing the odd radio interview, showing up to the ARIA’s and performing ONE NIGHT OF THE WEEK, then an actual tour will kill him stone dead. Kyle thinks he’s giving a half effort, whether it be because he thinks he can just coast or maybe he’s truly over the whole thing but that he and Marcia think he’s better than he thinks he is. It is almost as if they’re trying to convince him that he wants this, but Dean looks pained by the whole process. It’s the same look we saw in Lisa’s eyes for the three weeks prior to her leaving.

Second song is (oh, save me) a Nickleback song, GOD I hate those guys. It isn’t even a slightly less annoying Nickleback song, it’s ‘Last One Standing’, gah. To be fair, his vocals are a vast improvement on his first song (which has been true for all the Idol’s tonight, their second songs have been a great deal better than their first). He actually uses the stage a little better, coming to the front and waving to the crowd (although Fosse insists he’s waving to Jesus), however his pained facial expressions seem to have been borrowed from Ricky. He has crazy eyebrows and is frowning a lot, possibly he’s concentrating really really hard but it is quite disconcerting. Mark jumps in with the worried frowns and the ‘I’m concerned my favourite might go’ furrows. He thinks Dean is holding back for some reason and hopes that Team Dean gets behind him – why? Why exactly should they do that Mark? To keep a mediocre performer in the competition who will look good on a CD cover, over three infinitely more talented individuals who might not grace quite as many magazines topless? (And by the way, don’t ever do that Jess. Or you, Chris. Irish . . . it’s up to you man, but I could stand to see that . . .) Marcia believes Dean can still win but that he needs to start pulling performances and tricks out of his hat again, and I say once more, if he needs to resort to ‘tricks’ that aren’t vocal and that don’t add to his actual singing or stagecraft then Shut Up Marcia. Kyle wants to know if he’s got something on his mind and they – honest to god – badger the boy to publically confess that there’s something going on in his life that is affecting his performing and I say if its affecting his performing that much, then JUST MAYBE it isn’t something he wants the FUCKING WORLD TO KNOW, Kyle.

I personally voted for Irish to sing Roy Orbison’s ‘Crying’ and aren’t in the least surprised that others did as well – it’s a perfect song for him to do. He literally brings Fosse to tears with this performance. I feel a ridiculous sense of pride when he hits those glorious high notes because of course, the falsetto is lovely. But even better are the big huge Roy Orbison booming soaring notes that are so blooming large you can actually see his tonsils at one point. He has me on the floor. I will go to the mat for this boy. I have loved Idols before (Chanel, take a bow) but I haven’t been this actively invested in someone who has this much chance of winning. I liked Guy over Shannon, Casey over Anthony, Kate over Emily but I love this guy’s voice. Absolutely love it. I will be crushed beyond words if he doesn’t make it to the Final Two. Mark says he could have listened to the whole version of that song instead of a truncated Idol-lite version and I silently cross my fingers that Irish gets the chance to do that at the Opera House. He also gives him a Touchdown but that was a total fait accompli. Marcia says there isn’t much left to say once a TD is in the house but that his falsetto is marvellous and that he had a good portion of the audience swooning (women over 25 and gay men of Australia give an ‘amen’ – as based on the snap poll of my living room, with Fosse and myself as representatives of both demographics). Kyle says simply that it was ‘absolutely perfect’ and he’s right. It was.

If we’d gotten to vote twice for the Idol’s I’d have chosen Irish’s second song to be ‘Hallelujah’ as I am not quite jaded enough to be sick to death of this song. Truth be told (Shrek notwithstanding) this song makes me cry when ANYONE does it, so this was always going to make me misty. Unlike ‘Crying’ where he falsetto-ed all over the place, Irish holds off until the very end to hit us with it and it compliments the song beautifully. It is evocative, haunting, I could listen to his voice for hours and am desperate for him to get his ass in the studio and start recording so I can indulge my obsession. It is amazingly good. Oh Irish, you damn talented fucking bastard. It’s just him, his guitar and the backup singers. The arrangement is admirable in its restraint and Mark hits the nail on the head when he tells him he has simply stolen the show and gives him the touchdown I always knew this song would get him but that I didn’t think he’d get after already receiving one for ‘Crying’. I am shellshocked that Mark has laid out two in one show for that ‘ugly bastard’ with the bad teeth who only appeals to grannies and Val Doonican fans. Marcia tells him he is setting an amazing precedent and the other Idol’s will have to step it the hell up. He has seen Chris’ ‘Evie’ and raised him a double touchdown, good luck re-raising Murphy. Kyle admits that there is nothing else to say except that tonight he is simply the best. I worry that it may hurt Irish to have done two such similar songs in the one night – ballad-y songs – but honestly. If people are voting for anyone else but him . . . well. They can just go to hell, really. (Shaneequa, I should just go ahead and consider this the death knell of our friendship, yes?)

In a righteous and just world, Damien would be nowhere near the bottom three tonight and if he is then I will throw the Hissy Fit Heard Across The Globe. It should be the others and really – really – it should be Dean going home tonight. But stranger things have happened and it would just be like the universe to finally give me someone I can love who should win this damn thing and then throw them out this close. God, the stress might just give me an ulcer. Hold me?

TallulahBelle out