Clyde's Place

How long has it been since the last time that I  wrote about American Idol?  Long enough that I don’t want to dig through my archives to find out.  It’s hard to believe that for the better part of two seasons (Seasons 5 & 6) I wrote thousands of paragraphs and a gazillion words that were enough to piss more than  a few  fans off not to mention the relatives of certain contestants.  (Hint:  One perpetual ring wearing virgin and one Elly Mae Clampett type)

But I did tune in occasionally last year, just long enough to know that the whole mess had become (as I predicted) a weekly crapfest of bland generic  karaoke singers, all of whom had the personalities of a boxful of No. 2 pencils.  But you had to know that was coming when the manufactured winner of Season Six, Jorbacca Sparks, took home the trophy against the likes of Boring Blake the Beatnik Beat Boxer.  Talk about a total snooze fest. 

Thinking about it though, one only needs to go back to Season Five, when the minimally talented Taylor Hicks sashayed his Soul Patrol into a win over about four other contestants who had more talent in their pinkies than Hicks had in his entire prematurely grey haired scalp.  I mean, where did the million selling Daughtry finish that year? 

Hicks is now relegated to singing as a bit player, Teen Angel in Grease.   He was only marginally better than the awful Kellie Pickler (her performance on Idol in the past week only reinforced how painfully awful she really is to listen to), who has mysteriously managed to goad some record executive into letting her into a recording studio to crap out a couple of albums.  It’s amazing how far silicone implants will get you. 

And last year made me eternally grateful I had given up writing about this mish-mess.  Who were those two finalists again?  Oh yeah, David Cook and David Archuleta.  I think Cook managed to win because the finals is the only time that anybody besides grandmothers and tweentards decide to actually vote, and the thought of having another talentless tweeny bopper Idol like Jorbacca Thumper spurred more than a few people to start pressing those phone buttons in a fit of panic.  Thus we end up with Cook over Archuleta in the biggest who gives a rat’s ass finale of them all.

Anyway, I digress.  There is something unique about Idol this year that has awaken me from my self imposed Idol slumber.  After two full seasons of total Idol manufactured misery, they somehow seemed to have managed to actually find a couple of contestants with exceptional talent this year.  Yeah, I know.  It’s one hell of a fluke, isn’t it?

No tweentards and grandmama’s, I’m not Talking about the marginal karaoke singing, dead wife pimping Eddie Haskell type Danny “Shmuckface” Gokey, who in the early episodes dragged his wife’s corpse out front and center to build up his huge tweentard fan base, and could  possibly and probably parlay that into another robotic manufactured Idol contestant winning.

 

Frankly, every time I see Shmuckface perform I want to smack that plastered on, shit eating smirk off his face and shove his designer eyeballing glasses up his ass.  But people continue to call in and vote for this half assed half wit because after all, his wife is dead.  I should give him credit though for realizing that a dead wife trumps just about everything else  and makes Jorbacca’s “I’m only Seventeen” catch phrase, Hick’s “Soul Patrol” and Pickler’s “Haven’t seen my momma since I was two” story lines seem like small potatoes by comparison.  Look, I’ve seen a lot of people dealing with death and tragedy in my time, and heading out to an Idol audition shortly after the fact would not be on any of their lists of priorities, even if they had talent.

No, the two contestants I’m talking about are  Adam Lambert and Allison Irahita.   Talent wise, both contestants easily surpass anybody who has been on this show since Season Four, and when all is said and done, win or lose, one or both contestants could end up being the biggest stars to ever come out of this show, although only time will be the true judge of that.

Watching Adam Lambert perform is just plain scary.  You could probably count his stumbles this season as being no more than a note here or a note there since his first appearance.  He has been about as perfect as one can be, and  if there was any justice in Idol land, he would win this thing walking away.  And it’s just not his singing that makes him great, it’s the performance.  When he is on the stage, he demands the spotlight.  If Idol was ever to produce the perfect contestant, Lambert may be the one and I have never looked forward to watching any contestant as much as I do this guy. 

Poor Adam is also handicapped greatly by not having a dead relative to carry up on stage, but you can’t have everything perfect. 

But I also have to marvel at the other contestant whose talent may be a lot more raw, but who at sixteen years old makes the sounds emanating from “I’m only seventeen” Jorbacca sound like squawks from a Donald Duck cartoon by comparison. 

I’m talking of course about 16 year old Allison Irahita.  I don’t know where this young gal came from, but she has so much raw untapped talent that the career possibilities are endless.  When Jorbacca was on the show two years ago, it was obvious to me that she may have  only been seventeen, but vocally she was already as good as she was going to get.  She was trained to sing the notes and memorize the lyrics, but she sings with all the emotion of a boiled turnip.

With Allison, the notes and lyrics are not only there, she sings them as if she means every damn word of it and you had better listen up and pay attention, bub.  Is she flawed?  Yes, sometimes the lack of experience does show up, but which each appearance she only seems to get better and better.  I mean, how could some one this talented even get a sniff of having been in the bottom three?  Oh yeah, I almost forgot.  This is American Idol we’re talking about in which things like talent, personality, and ability are far down below such voting priorities as dead wives and missing mummies, err…I mean mommies.  But there is no limit as to how dynamic this kid can be. 

 

Of course, in a perfect world there would be no doubt that Adam and Allison would finish first and second, which would probably lead to the most dramatic and best final we have ever witnessed since Ruben Studdard threatened to sit on Clay Aiken to take the crown.  But fickle Idol tweentards and other fans have proven one thing:  boring and robotic is the order of the day which means we’ll probably end up with Dead Wife Shmuckface in the finals by default.   I mean after all, didn’t they make Miley Cyrus a box office sensation?

As for any other contestants, none of them exhibit the ability to do much ability wise, charisma wise, or talent wise,  beyond heading down to Mel’s Karaoke Bar on Friday and Saturday nights back in whatever towns they sprang up from.  They pretty much fall into the category of same old same old and we’ve seen them all before so let’s get them off the show as quickly as possible. 

The only ones other than Adam and Allison who were remotely entertaining have already departed (note I said entertaining, which is not the same as being talented) the building, those being Scott, Megan, and Tatiana, who were special in a different kind of Sanjayish kind of way.

So I’m glad I DVR the show because I think from here on out, I’ll speed right past Li’l Rounds fat ass and three kids, Matt’s Magic Mole, and Anoop’s and Kris’s annoyingly boyish charms as they try to suck up to tweentards every where.  Sorry guys. Dead Wife Danny has that market cornered.

However, when I think about the past three winners of Idol, it might turn out that not winning Idol will be the best thing to happen to either Adam or Allison.  I guess we’ll find out in about six weeks.