By Buzz Byrne
AMERICAN IDOL has reached its “loathsome” stage of the season. It started right at the opening of tonight’s episode with a profoundly amateurish parody of the MIAMI VICE credit sequence replete with the Jan Hammer instrumental and continued on through the auditions that were wholly predictable and genuinely boring. This show is so ugly at this stage that they make a single mom of twenty years of age a vile caricature. There is a lot of shame to go around with all this nonsense and personally I’m tired of seeing girls who are too young to vote with kids in kindergarten who are hoping this show is their ticket out of their miserable lives. First, let’s find the baby-daddies and make their lives miserable as well and then we’ll call in Dr. Drew to convince America’s youth that a singing contest means NOTHING in life.
Yeah, good luck with that. Anyway, about the show…
Starting off the Miami auditions was Shannon McGough who works in her parent’s meat market and can belch really loud. Poor thing, she didn’t know what hit her. She couldn’t sing. She didn’t just get three no’s from the judges, she got three never’s.
This being Miami, they got a former boy band member named Robbie and he got through to Hollywood. I don’t know which band he was a member of, they never said, and frankly it wouldn’t have meant anything to me anyways.
The next guy came in wearing a poncho and had two Pan flutes. They didn’t show his audition and I’m left with all these questions like, “What did the second Pan flute add to his performance that he couldn’t get out of the first one?” and, “Isn’t a poncho in Miami going to make you a bit gamey?”
Next came Ghaleb who was from “When-ez-whale-ah” and he sang “Yipsee” music. This was Paula’s breakdown of the show and even that seemed a little tired. She felt Simon wasn’t letting her finish her sentences as she gave Ghaleb feedback so she got out of her seat and wandered around the judge’s table muttering and mumbling. Simon said he would enjoy Ghaleb if he were drunk. The same could be said for me and this show. Ghaleb got through.
Next two best friends, Corliss and Britney, came in together and admitted crushes on Randy and Simon respectively. They were fun and bubbly but even still they were highlighted not because of their immense singing talent but for their cartoonish appearance and the patronizing from the judges could have been toned down.
Suzanne is the single mom and during her sob story and singing I realize I have lost feeling in everything from my neck down. She got through. As did Ramiele who wants to be the first Asian to win AMERICAN IDOL. Yeah, well, I’d like to be the first Asian to win too and I’m keeping my dream alive, despite not being exactly Asian. Ramiele barely got through.
Day two starts with Syesha who had a good voice, a positive approach to life and a father fresh from rehab. And I’m a little deader inside. Syesha, Natashia and Ilsy all got through to Hollywood.
Next up Ben was awful, Carroy had fried hair, Grant was told to sing in a dress and Fabienne sang with a finger in her ear. None of them had that special something to make it to the next round.
Then this awful child from, surprise surprise, the state of New Hampshire was next. Julie Dubela was on some awful travesty of a show called AMERICAN JUNIORS in 2003. I guess this was some child exploitation ripoff of AI for the preteen set. Julie is grown up now (16) and ready to impress. Unfortunately she came off like a bad impression of Sandra Bernhard without the biting wit and hip references. I bet you could show tapes of AMERICAN JUNIORS to the six and seven year olds making Nikes overseas and they would feel better about their plight in life.
Brandon ended the show wasting everybody’s time with a half-comedy/half-singing audition that even included a wig and hat choreography. The judges got up and left as did my will to live. How soon to the Super Bowl?