I guess I will definitely take the minority position here but to me Danny took the top spot in last night's performances. He looked great in the suit, he curtailed the corny moves and he never misses a note. I thought switching into the blues later in the song was a good change of pace and provided interest. Even though he hasn't been in my fav category for many weeks running I reluctantly gave him his due at the end of his performance. To me his vocals were head and shoulders above the three who went before him.

I really expected Kris to better and when I listened to him again, his vocals were as usual right on, but maybe it's that "connection" thing. He seemed to approach the song with the same attitude he had for the jazz version of "She Works Hard for the Money" so it didn't make the performance all that believable.

Allison sounded great and was getting the words to come out without sounding like she was having to work them around something in her throat. Maybe Simon didn't like the song choice, didn't Cat McPhee do that one? I know someone did it before.

Adam, for the first time was a, meh.. for me. Maybe it's just getting overused. He has the best voice hands down but maybe the pressure to "do something different" each week is getting to be too much. I still think his most stunning performance was simply sitting on the stool singing "Tracks of My Tears". He just doesn't need the white shoes or the staircase.

Matt? Trivial but I can't get past that hat. I knew this genre would give him an excuse to wear it again. But seriously, how many of today's Pop Stars are wearing a fedora? Lose it already. Then again, I think we'll be losing him all together.

Ye Gods !? Can there ever be a more brutal place than being in the Bottom Two with Adam? Good grief ... what a "death notice". I'll say it happily, though: it was a dandy and purposeful run, Matt!

I was rather incensed to see Adam in the Bottom two... last night wasn't his greatest performance, and no one else was bad... but... that's my Adam

I wish I could vote for him to prevent that from happening again.

Could you imagine if there'd been Rock Week without Adam, though... will definitely be more entertaining with him

Adam was in the bottom two?? Wow. Was there a gasp from the audience when that was announced??

When I saw Adam go into the bottom three, I couldn't be patient and fast-forwarded through the whole show to make sure he wasn't getting the boot. After Chris Daughtry got the boot at exactly the same spot a few years ago, I wasn't taking anything for granted. I was very relieved, since I promised that if he doesn't make the top three, I'm not watching anymore. Rock Week without Adam?

I guess I need to break out my dialing fingers next week.

Y

I had trouble logging into the forums so I missed posting last night! I was surprised to see Jamie fox mentoring the gang, but he did a great job.

Taylor Hicks' performance was all right -- never seen him with a guitar before (cuts back on the dance moves). I've seen Natalie Cole in better shape, but she was all right too (looking skinny though). So Jamie Fox has the number 1 record on the charts huh? Not a bad song, but I wouldn't go out and buy it.

Wow, I was shocked to see Adam in the bottom two, what the? I can't rationalize how that could happen. Maybe his fans got too comfortable? I bet they'll be dialing in full force next week.

Anyway, no surprise Danny was safe off the bat, I thought he put in a great performance (and just when I thought he was starting to sound the same every week). Looks like Simon's comment to Allison was all the fuel her fans needed to keep her in the competition. I expected Kris to be somewhere in the middle of the pack, and picked Matt as the bootee of the week. He's a great talent, just didn't always pick the right songs.

I'm looking forward to Rock Week (but why choose Slash of all people? Can that guy sing?)

Quote:

---

Adam was in the bottom two?? Wow. Was there a gasp from the audience when that was announced??

---

The audience gasped but there were no shocked looks from the judges (Kara said that her jaw dropped but we didn't see it)...

I just find it hard to believe Danny and Allison could get more votes than Adam.. come on, no way. That looked as if it was a set up to me.. If it smells like a rat and looks like a rat, it usually is a rat..

Ryan put Danny on the spot tonight when he asked him what he did differently this week. Danny seemed quite uncomfortable with his answer and I found it strange that he said that he had been watching performers to see what they do and he was trying to bring that into his performances.. Doesn't he see himself as a performer too? Perhaps he just admitted his weakness to the public without even realising it...

Ryan was up to his old tricks again too, the old "choose which group you think you belong in" again.. I hate it when he does that, he makes the person who is put on the spot look bad no matter who they choose.. I didn't like the way he pushed Adam over into the bottom group either.. Not nice at all..

Why does Ryan do this kind of stuff to the contestants? I don't see the point in making people squirm (except maybe Simon).. I did like it when Ryan questioned Simon on performance night on what he meant by the term "wet" when referring to Kris. It's about time someone brought the "King" to task on his critiques. So much rides on what Simon says and it does influence the way people vote so I think he should be made to explain what he means by his comments..

The iTunes studio versions are up and they are all really good.. Adam's "Feeling Good" is total wow factor for me.. Matt's is really good too, I love that song.

==SPOILERS== (Warning even in a known Spoiler Thread regarding a leak on I-Tunes.)

If you watch American Idol and follow much of the chatter online, you probably know that contestants Adam Lambert and Danny Gokey seem to be the favorites to win the singing competition.

However, iTunes projects a possibly different outcome, if some download numbers that weren’t supposed to be shown can be used as a predictor of who gets voted off the show.

According to The New York Post “a glitch in the Apple software allowed fans a glimpse at which contestants are selling the most “Idol” download.” And, in what will come as a surprise to many Idol fans, Gokey was not the first or second most popular artist.

While Lambert, as expected, is the most downloaded artist so far with 6 of the top 10 top tracks, Kris Allen actually occupies 3 of the slots, while Gokey has just 1 song on the list. Of course, American Idol fans don’t vote on singing skills alone, and Gokey, as you might know, has a compelling backstory, which could make all of this irrelevant.

However, the Allen case gets a bit more compelling when you also look at recent Twitter trends. Allen’s Twitter buzz has now surpassed that of Gokey in back-to-back weeks, while Lambert maintains a healthy lead over both of them.

Also worth noting – on Intrade, which lets people make real money bets on the outcome of Idol, Gokey is still favored over Allen, by almost a 2 to 1 margin (while Lambert is the far and away favorite).

Could the iTunes leak coupled with some social media savvy actually be creating an opportunity for those wagering (or at least those participating in a prediction contest with friends) to take advantage of what might be a discrepancy in the odds? We’ll find out over the next few weeks as the show winds down.


---Apparently the Gokey download which made the top ten downloads was "Endless Love".

Neither Matt or Allison have had a single performance crack the Top Ten Downloads in any given week. Also, Allison "trend" on Twitter is nearly a flatline, even Matt managed a couple times with some spike in the action.

Maybe this explains the sudden disinterest by Simon. For whatever reason Allison just doesn't appear to be "marketable". Maybe she doesn't fit into any specific market category. She's only 16 but she neither appears or sounds young. (I mean she's the same age as Miley Cyrus, so you can see she doesn't interest that market at all). On the other hand she's too young for the over 40 crowd to get very excited over. She can sing. It just looks like no one really cares.

I don't think it's unbelievable that Adam was in the bottom 2, even though he's fantastic. The thing to remember is that as each contestant drops out, the people who had been voting for them probably choose someone else to vote for. And I would suggest that Adam is good enough that if people were going to consider voting for him, they would have been already. This means that although his number of votes each week stays relatively stable, his percentage share drops. Having said all that, a "scare" for his fans will almost certainly see him safe next week.

And Copago, I'm pretty sure I know why Matt wears the hat. If you see him without it in any of the later footage, he has quite a large mole/wart smack bang in the middle of his forehead. I'm sure the hat is to hide it. The odd thing is, I'd swear that it wasn't there in the early stages of the competition. Hence the increased hat-wearing as the comp has continued.

Just wanted to add a (pretty much off topic) update here. And a very sad one, too. Our "Idol" champ - and significant favorite - from last year's show, David Cook, lost his older brother (Adam) this weekend. Adam had been battling brain cancer for some time and is the inspiration for David's single "Permanent" (which is linked to, somewhere early on in this thread). It was a harshly bittersweet element to last year's show, what with Cook taking the airwaves by storm while simultaneously dealing with the agonizing family situation at hand -- but, I daresay, I suspect that a large chunk of the "Idol" audience wasn't even aware that his bother was in such peril. I'm having trouble finding an article giving details on this, but once I find one, I'll link to it. Very sad stuff, all around.

But, I think it can be said? Each man was very fortunate to have had the other in his life for the duration of time that they did. It seemed clear that both impacted, and empowered, each other in a very major way.

Here is an article about his brother:

David Cook's Idol Dies

Hmmm. Now here's an interesting little *spoiler*, courtsey of http://www.whatnottosing.com/ (which I typically refer to as the American Idol Database ...)

Quote:

---

Because the judges won't shut up, and because the producers seem not to have the backbone to make them, there's no room for eight performances in this week's one-hour episode. Thus, one round will feature a pair of duets, the first in American Idol history. Unfortunately, neither our database nor our result tables are set up to handle this, and we have no intention of spending hours furiously recoding and testing everything tonight. So, we're going to record the duets as separate performances for each contestant – in other words, you'll see eight performances rather than six. Maybe this summer, if the producers don't irritate us any further, we'll rewrite our site to support multiple-contestant performances properly. ...

---

I'm wondering, in my wildest imagination, how in the heck they've decided who duets with whom ?! If they just drew names out of a hat, or something, that'd seem equitable. But if the producers decide? Yikes, they could definitely do a (more than) fair share of maneuvering this week indeed ..

So sad to hear the news about David Cook's brother Adam passing away. He was only 36 years old. Eleven years is a very long time to be battling any disease, how strong and brave his family must be..

Quote:

---

Hmmm. Now here's an interesting little *spoiler*

---

It must be right if it's on there Gats.. I have seen this being rumored for a few days but wasn't sure whether to believe it or not..

Adam and Danny? Ha ha.. Nah.. Might show the difference between the two of them too much..

Slash has been "Tweeting" lots and says that the Idols have picked really cool songs for this week and that he is going to make it as "Rock and Roll" as possible. Let's hope he's right!

Quote:

---

don't think it's unbelievable that Adam was in the bottom 2, even though he's fantastic. The thing to remember is that as each contestant drops out, the people who had been voting for them probably choose someone else to vote for. And I would suggest that Adam is good enough that if people were going to consider voting for him, they would have been already. This means that although his number of votes each week stays relatively stable, his percentage share drops. Having said all that, a "scare" for his fans will almost certainly see him safe next week.

---

You are probably right with what happened Markboynz but there is a bit of "tweaking" with the bottom 3 according to Nigel Lithgoe, who was the executive producer for Idol for seven seasons. Here is an interview with Nigel and the NY Post which sort of goes where no one dares to tread (except Nigel who blabs it out nicely).

I think Adam will be safe this week too for sure.. the fans have had a big scare.

Here's a whisper..

Paula has been rehearsing her new single "I'm Just Here for the Music". Rumor is that she will be performing it on Idol this week..

With Slash, Daughtry and No Doubt possibly performing (and the rumored duets) this week it may be a tad time constricting .. I suppose they will fit her in somewhere???

Is it any wonder that we don't get to see the Idols sing two songs? I just want to see them sing two whole songs each for once, it's not much to ask is it?

Watch out.. Next week Kara may want equal time..

Seems like a few of those acts could be moved to the "Results" show. That could be over in less than 10 minutes but they'll have an hour to fill.

I've often wondered if they could find a format for duets. Didn't see how it would work unless it just for performance sake. So hopefully this is an interesting format and maybe can be done again.

I like Nigel Lithgow. Then again I'm a fan of "So You Think You Can Dance", the talent is off the charts. Nigel is great as a Judge. He's very straight forward but somehow not quite as snarky as Mr. Cowell can be.

All righty ! Here's this week's "List From Other Lists" roundup. It's pretty much Adam in first, and everybody else in a bit of a knot for second . Allison was #1 on the Idol Databese (her performance last week earned wildly strong numbers, which explains that). Danny was #1 on USA Today (?) but, again, the votes came in after his rather strong showing on Rat Pack night. TV Guide and both Entertainment Weekly lists picked Mr. Lambert. The number in bold is these guys' chart position two weeks ago (I missed a week there ~ I was a sick little Idol-head this time last week ). Underlined numbers are their 'point totals' - the lower they land, the better.

1. Adam Lambert (1) 7 points Even though it seems he looks unstoppable, keep in mind his results night geography last week . One never knows ...
2. Kris Allen (2) 13 points He took some serious hits on his performance last week (I, for one, still didn't think it was that bad --- but who cares what I think?)
3. Allison Iraheta (3) 14 points Only one measly point between her and Kris and only two more than Danny? In all fairness it ought to be called, essentially, a three-way tie.
4. Danny Gokey (5) 16 points Pretty darned good reviews for last week. Still has a fan base. AND Vote For The Worst is championing him this week - and [it shocks me] that place really DOES seem to have occasional power .

So strange, really. I'm sitting here about to type that "I'm not worried about Adam at all tonight" (based on his consistency and that he scared everybody last week, and they'll vote for him like crazy this one). THAT'S the kind of attitude that could get the poor guy booted, though, isn't it? No one's a *sure thing*, not ever. Tonight will be important and watchable, though, I suspect. The combination of song choice/arrangement, this mysterious duets business (and how it plays them, given the details) AND, o' course, Simon's summations will be pivotal matters for the other three. Veddy interesting to consider ...

Goodness

10 minutes into the show and I need a cold shower

Allison doing Joplin seemed somewhat predictable. She's too young to remember the rock era the show was catering to but I wonder how she would've fared with some vintage Pat Benatar, like Heartbreaker. She's got big enough vocals to do it.

Again, I liked Chris but it wasn't over the top good. I agree Danny may have been trying a bit too hard. Definately in the minority here, but Chris and Danny's duet was much more complicated than Adam and Allison's. The harmony is tough to do and they pulled it off without a bad note to be heard.

Adam was as expected since hard rock is so well suited to his voice.

I really wouldn't be surprised to see anyone other than Adam go home.

I liked them all except for Danny - I think it was more that it wasn't his style .. he really really didn't look rockerish.

I'm sick of the "that wasn't the right song for you" complaint from the judges. From now on out I want the judges to pick and just shut up!

I loved the Adam/Allison duet. Thought they worked great together. I hope it's those two in the final.

I'm a bit flummoxed after last night, I think . One thing I'm sure of: Mr. Lambert once again redefined what an effective American Idol performance is, or should be. The dude can sing anything right! That was a tough song to try, too - but it didn't seem to rattle his cage in the slightest taking it on. That's probably why it worked so well for him, maybe? He doesn't seem a bit afraid to take on any song, anytime, anywhere . Pretty amazing show on his behalf, once again. But, there's no *flummox* about that. The bafflement comes in the theme. I think it should have been changed from "Rock Night" to "*Let's Find A Pool With The Hungriest Sharks In It ... And Throw Kris In There Immediately* Night"! Yikes. First to duet him with Danny? And, I agree, they were actually pretty good together (unexpected as it was - Danny is just NOT a rocker, let's face it ... soft or hard varieties of it regardless). But, then it begins . Simon just HAS to say that Gokey was 'better' than Allen? Clearly, Simon had been hitting the hard liquor and confused the adjective 'better' with 'louder', or something? I fully realize that these folks are on that stage to get noticed, to get calls, and so forth. But I'm not sure that the best way to present a duet is by drowning out the person you're singing with at every opportunity. I noted in a wild hurry that Adam and Allison did the politics of a duet just beautifully. They shared it - throwing the power back and forth ... playing catch with the performance quite nicely. Kris was reduced to a lowly back-up singer with Danny. And it irritated me . So that'd be two thrusts into the shark pool for him. Next came having to sing, well, next. Straight into his solo. Granted, his performance wasn't standout (in fact I, for one, thought it one of his least memorable). But he was bound to pale after Adam and Allison's solos, added to that he was right on the heels of being publicly announced as worse than Danny? To me, he looked so darmed happy to be at the end of that Beatles song - and soon to be getting off that stage. Tonight we get to see how [ahem] "sturdy" the audience truly is. Will they do as they were (not even subtly) maneuvered to do and send Kris home? Or will they look at the big picture and rise out of that shark pit? Good thing Danny went last, though. It really helped. His was a painful performance indeed - but it really wasn't his fault (see above "not a rocker"; hell, not really even an expected Bay City Roller rocker ...). But that last note of his, the last live (solo) one heard before the phones opened last night? Yes, that *thing* that was only palatable to (maybe) the ears of a Big Foot/Yeti creature, somewhere, during mating season? My guess is it's the only thing that will save Kris. It wasn't Kris Allen's best night, by a mile, vocally (which is unfortunate enough to begin with). But the rest of it just made it worse for him. Sigh.

Gats, I agree with you about Kris last night.. He drew the short straw alright!
The bus is warming up it's engine right about now for Kris. It should be heading for Danny but the "Powers That Be" will not let that happen.

Adam was amazing.. I was hoping he would do that song, I couldn't believe it when I heard the first few bars.. It was a fist raising, "Yeah" shouting, moment in this household. And boy, didn't he nail it. The last part especially.. Now I know what GG meant about the cold shower!

Allison was great too, loved her version of Cry Baby.. For Slash to comment on how good she was must have been awesome for her to take in as well.

Kris and Danny's duet was ok but there was no connection between the two of them. It was as if Danny was trying to out perform Kris instead of him working with him to make it a team effort. Simon just kicked Kris in the guts tonight with that comment about Danny being better than him.. I'm steamed up about that big time.. grrr

Kris didn't do as bad as they said with "Come Together", I liked it anyway.. Another kick in the guts from Simon and Kara too.. grrr (At least Randy give him some dues for playing the guitar.)

Loved Adam and Allisons "Slow Ride", even if the song reminds me of "Guitar Hero" on XBox.. (Teenagers live here.) The hug at the end and the little sis remarks made me get the warm and fuzzies.. Awww, that was so nice. Love Adam and Allison so much.


Danny Gokey.. Danny GO key.. Danny GO HOME key..

Even my poor little dog ran out of the room when he heard that last wail.. Eeeek, that was sooooo bad, probably even worse than Megan's "Caw Caw".

Notes to Danny:

1. Do not try to out wail Adam, ever.

2. See note number one.

Have you guys seen this?

VoteForTheWorst


Now I'm curious - maybe this is why Danny never gets voted low Let the conspiracy theories begin (LOL)...

Y

Interesting article ysmay. However I'm more inclined to think the heart symbol was just a coincidence. I've seen another commericial where people make heart symbols with their hands (only, I wish I could remember what commercial it was!). But, I think, more likely the heart was for his wife's foundation.

Just a few quick thoughts on last night... Kris, he LOOKED uneasy the entire night. And he wasn't bad by any means. The only thing I wished for him was more energy in his performance. I think he's too self conscious to let loose up there on stage. He stands there on stage after performances looking very meek and small. Couldn't he just try to pretend he's got confidence? Must be hard for him.

Of course Adam blew everyone away with that performance. Like Slash said, and what I've noticed time and time again, he sings effortlessly and with so much power. Then he stands on stage so calmly afterwards to listen to the judges, cracks me up!

Allison really rocked it out too, but I wish she would have picked a more melodic song. I agree, Pat Benatar would have been great for her!!

Oh, Danny... I think he picked that song purely for its lyrics. He always seems to choose song that holds a lot of meaning for him, or one that delivers a message. Wow, who could take on Steven Tyler and get away with it? Certainly NOT Danny. I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that he needed a bag of throat lozenges after screeching that last note.

I have a feeling Kris will be on the bubble tonight...

Wrong wrong wrong. That's all I'm saying.

Wrong one went home. Grrr