Rolling Teenpop 2007 Thread

And I didn't mean Left Behind two posts ago. I meant Guilty Ones, which is the duet I really like the most on the soundtrack. (If all goes well, I'm getting students tickets to see the show on Thursday. Wish me luck!)

Checking 'em out on YouTube, is hard to get interested in any of the current AI contestants you mention (made it up to Amy Krebs on Greg's list, with Amy being a total hairball on a song whose original I love). All the women could be Joss Stone, for all I care, but I can quite easily imagine my having had a similar reaction to Kelly and Carrie if I'd been watching back on their run-through, and of course they've turned out extraordinarily well - prob'ly would have liked Carrie more, as she wasn't doing the big diva va-va-va-voom thing. Not that I'm against the va-va-va-voom, just that, like, someone belting out "Respect" in a talent show is just someone belting out "Respect" in a talent show. Would have been genuinely impressed if Kelly'd whispered it, found a way to bring an encapsulated, closed-off song back to life. Found Lakisha's the one intriguing performance, in that her raging gusts didn't lose the sense of the song; a disco-house-techno producer might be able to put her hurricane winds to interesting use. My favorite was probably Jordin - don't think she altogether found her way into the slow burn of "Turn My Ass Around" or whatever it's called ("Give Me One Reason"), but that's a style that moves me. Leslie Hunt's smoky throat was a snooze for me both onstage and on MySpace; can't really remember the others from last night when I was YouTubing; "All By Myself" is a good song, so I liked that. Melinda's the one with the three-year-old, right? Was interested in how "overcoming lack of confidence" is used as a selling point. Don't remember the actual sound, though, except that it wasn't soft. I'd just echo Greg on the subject of the narrowness of the apparent criteria for success. I'd wonder if Paula Abdul could have done well as a contestant if there'd been an Idol in '88. Voice too small and squeaky!

Look forward to your further reports.

Just spent half an hour searching and wondering why I couldn't find a link for the alleged FAQ, then found it linked in the middle of a thread. I presume there are technical problems with putting the link up on the board right now; fwiw I far preferred the old layout and old features, but apparently a lot of what I liked helped make the board vulnerable and also used up hunks of CPUs so will never come back.

This thread is so intimidating.

Well, the thread's length is the thread's length, but I think it's understood that few people will have read every post, that most people won't know, say, who Matthew Gerrard is (man who's co-produced and co-written much of the more boring Disney teenpop these days), etc., and I don't see the usual nastiness that you get on other threads along the lines of "don't you know how to use Search?" and so on. Also, I think people on this thread are remarkably articulate about why they like and dislike things, but those can lead to complexities because most people (emphatically including me) don't always know the sources of their likes and dislikes, and so the reasons they/I give often raise more questions, provoke further thought. (I find that ilX goes dull when people don't give reasons for their likes and dislikes, or don't realize that their reasons need further reasons.)

Briefly on AI, girls night:

I feel really anti-consensus this season and it's starting to bug me. I liked Gina Glocksen ("Alone"), though it was not as good as Carrie Underwood. Lakisha ("Midnight Train to Georgia") was meh yet again. I REALLY liked Leslie's performance ("Feeling Good") tonight though, I think she's got a great touch to her voice and very nice interpretation/performance skills. I'm still not sure how much of my Leslie love is due to her actual performance and how much is due to finding her attractive and liking her personality and the "something different" factor . I also like Alaina ("Not Ready to Make Nice") a lot, except that she can't seem to give a good performance. But I like her phrasing and I like the tone to her voice. I wish she could stay on pitch. I hate Sabrina ("All the Man I Need"), I think she has no control over her vocal runs. Haley ("The Queen of the Night") just such an odd performance. Jordin Sparks ("Reflection") very disappointing. For the guys, I like AJ ("Feeling Good") a lot and I HATE Chris Richardson ("Geek in the Pink"). Sanjaya ("Steppin Out With My Baby") was one of the weirdest performances I've ever seen. A Tony Bennett classic, with a mid 80's Michael Jackson fashion sense, and a performance style that basically amounts to whispering. Blake ("Virtual Insanity") good, though a bit of a step down from "Somewhere Only We Know". I liked the beatboxing/scatting/whatever it was. Phil ("Missing You") has a really good and pretty AM radio voice, but is somewhat boring. And I have yet to hear any real originality from him. I'm not feeling this season and it really bugs me that they've stacked the females with all similar singers. Dream scenario for me would be maybe a couple belters, a more restrained, jazzy type singer, a country girl, a rock girl, etc. It now seems likely all 5 of the big belters will make the finals which is just gonna be so boring.

Other main problem with AI (not just confined ot this season): almost no singers attempt to give their own interprations of the songs. Even the really good singers this year, like Melinda ("My Funny Valentine") just do pretty much copies of the originals. Jon Peter Lewis from season 3 tried to change up interpretations of songs somewhat, which I always appreciated. But I'd love to see someone do a ballad as a rave up or vice versa. This was a really weak slate of girls' and guys' performances. I'm considering giving up entirely, but I'll give em another shot.

Dream World Top 12: Leslie, Melinda, Jordin, Gina, Stephanie, LaKisha; Blake, AJ, Phil, Chris S, Brandon, Nick (if not fixed to 6 guys/6 girls I'd swap in Alaina for Nick).
Predicted Top 12: For the guys, Sundance, Sanjaya, Blake, and Chris S. seem like locks. Phil and Chris R are near locks as well at this point.
For the girls, Melinda and LaKisha are the only two I'm certain about. Stephanie and Jordin seem like good bets. I'm gonna guess Gina and Antonella for the last two slots. I hope that Leslie sneaks in.

Girlies top to bottom:
1. Melinda Dolittle - "My Funny Valentine"
2. Leslie Hunt - "Feeling Good"
3. Gina Glocksen - "Alone"
----Good/Bad Line (more accurately interesting/boring line)----
4. LaKisha Jones - "Midnight Train to Georgia"
5. Alaina Alexander - "Not Ready to Make Nice"
6. Jordin Sparks - "Reflection"
7. Haley Scarnato - "The Queen of the Night"
8. Stephanie Edwards - "Dangerously In Love" (the more I think about this the more I think the great fireworks at the end don't overcome the bad actual vocals)
9. Sabrina Sloan - "All The Man I Need"
10. Antonella Barba - "Because You Loved Me"

Heh, clearly I need to redefine "briefly". Brainwasher, if you jump in I think you'll find the thread a lot less intimidating than it seems on the surface.

Sligh needs to take this whole thing home. Just because he's the only personality (outside Sparks and Blake) that I have any interest in whatsoever. And though he's done some unconventional song choices, he's never done a performance that's made me cringe (a company that includes Gina, Lakisha, and once again - Sparks + Blake). Does it seem like a lot of Aretha songs this year?

AI: Gina is extremely likeable, but I don't think she has the ammunition to go all the way. Simon was right about her not hitting the note in week 1, and she had similar problems last night.

I really enjoy Sligh's voice, and he's my favorite at this point. Doolittle has potential, but I have a feeling that we're going to have week after week of her pleasant but limited style of lounge singing.

The Pruitt album is excellent. I'm gonna stick up for Who Likes Who; it's not one of the top 4 songs on the album, but it's very enjoyable, and lyrically I find it amusing. I also enjoy that the spoken word intro paints the singer as as much of a gossip as anyone she's singing about!

AI: Curse of Nina Simone last night. I'm disappointed there are no Country singers this season-- first time since season one? Sing Dixie Chicks, lose votes of surge lovers. There was a promising country singer in the auditions (forget her name) who was highlighted but somehow cut in Hollywood. I'm also not seeing the Great White Hope who usually (excepting season 3, and if you wanna be technical season 2) knocks off the heavily favored African American singer in the last few weeks of the competition. Still too fuzzy on names, and won't bother to learn them until there's a final 12, but is Powder GI Joe really much of a threat? Or Chris Sligh (I do know one name) with the over rehearsed, Bob Jones University punchlines? I like Beatbox but he was totally outdone at his own game by Justin Timber-fake this week. He should sing the New Radicals.

I keep meaning to link to the following article by Alan T in Freaky Trigger, which is pertinent to this thread:
http://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/wedge/comics/2007/02/its-hot-and-tepid-celebrity-comic-strips/

(click on the images for larger, i.e. legible, versions of the comic strips featuring McFly, Lil Chris, etc.)

Oh, and Greg - I did read your last post directed at me. I think we largely agree about JP. (And I wouldn't worry about the music theory stuff. It's by no means a badge of quality in and of itself, it's more an extra hook for me to get into a song.)

AI: For the first time since Jessica Sierra was eliminated in Season 4, I have no favorites to root for now (well I have mini-favorites like Blake and Gina), so it'll be kind of refreshing to be able to hear the show from a more objective standpoint. It does seem pretty much inevitable that a white girl will win. If Sligh or Blake prove to be more likeable and enduring than I've given em credit for, they might have a chance. But this is a diva season. And oh yeah, Pickler gave a good performance.

Non-AI: Anybody heard the Everlife album? I haven't liked any of their Radio Disney singles so probably won't bother to check it out unless I hear good things about it.
I noticed that Mika was added to Tommy2's upcoming releases chart. I never thought of him as teenpop but I guess it makes sense. From that chart, March looks like it's gonna be a pretty slow month . Things pick up in April with (scheduled) new releases by Hilary Duff and Avril and Corbin.

And by "It does seem pretty much inevitable a white girl will win" I do of course mean "It does seem pretty much inevitable a black girl will win". Whoops, that kind of changes things.

Just posted this on the country thread:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/hollybeth2

There is nothing audibly country about Holly Beth Vincent's new solo album, but she recorded five tracks of it with musicians in Nashville, and she's not metal, and she hasn't been a teen in years (though, okay, Holly and the Italians were sort of from the Go-Gos/Tony Basil era which might connect them to the current Avril Lavigne single but who cares since everybody always ignores what I write on the teenpop thread anyway), so I guess this is the best place to talk about it. What's standing in my way from liking it more, strangely, is Holly's voice, which seems to have become much smaller and more quiet and held-back over the last quarter-century. The singing doesn't especially bug me, but it never really seems to grab me either, and I wish it was more in the forefront. What keeps me listening anyway is the abundant variety of lively dance-pop backing: dancehall days wang-chunging ("Behind 4 Walls"), straight-up Paula Abdul ("Sparkle," where Holly's voice sort of does an squeaky little A'Me Lorain thing inasmuch as I remember what A'Me Lorain sang like), Hombres letting it all hang out ("Arlington"), Nirvana smelling like teen spirit ("I Hate You"), smooth jazz getting lite-funky ("King of Fat"), Roxette doing whatever Roxette did (other places). It's not bad. Maybe the goal is to appeal to Gwen Stefani or Goldfrapp fans or something? But I keep wishing it was hitting me more.

On the other hand, some of you small-voice fans might like it more than I do.

Hey, "Stewy" is still gr8!

Kelly Clarkson on her new album: My cd is finished!! We’re now starting to schedule all the promo stuff and photo shoots and I’m so pumped! I can’t wait for y’all to hear the album! The album is called “My December” and a few words to describe it : intimate, raw, personal, rock (although some are very sweet and soft), and I can’t wait to perform every song on it! i really hope y’all dig it!

Radosh.net posted a video of a single by Krystal Meyers, whom he refers to as the Christian Avril Lavigne. I thought I'd heard something by her before, but I guess not...video for "Anti-Conformity" here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BhAwFpNjNI

And what the heck: The Xtian Kelly Clarkson: http://youtube.com/watch?v=nh1Gh10-QjA and the Xtian Hilary Duff: http://www.myspace.com/tiffanygiardina.

I like the Krystal a lot, even if she can't get around to telling us what she's not conforming to; Jessie Daniels has the Clarkson look and the SUBG guitar but a voice that's washed-out Ashley Tisdale (which makes her pale pale pale); might be OK - if anonymous - if she had good material, which this isn't. Tiffany has promise for a little 'un (though at 13 she's a year older than when the young, alienated, outcast Taylor Swift wrote the far superior "A Place In This World"), and I'm glad she's not sounding like Jessie's little girl whine.

I was ignoring Holly and the Italians back then too, since I can't tell you what they sounded like - though I remember their being classified as "new wave." Always got them confused with Katrina and the Waves, a similar And The band.

Tanya Headon would approve of Holly Beth's record company.

Of course, "wrote 'A Place In This World'" probably means "wrote the original version before various Nashville song doctors reworked it."

Frank, you should have mixed up Holly and the Italians with Pearl Harbor and the Explosions, instead! (Katrina and the Waves were later, I think.)

Jimmy Draper on the new, reinvented (but not running for President) Hillary:

i got the 5-song sampler of duff's upcoming 'Digni ty'today. actually
just 3 new songs since i have the single, "with love" (#1 on TRL this
wk), and the genius "P:lay with Fire". this is gonna be her best CD by
FAR if the rest is Kylie-esque like this. these tracks are the new
ones, all listed as unmastered on the promo:

"stranger" is is def not the same song as the "stranger (instrumental)"
that leaked last wk. if they're the same, it went thru a major
revision. this one is very mid-eastern-tinged (in vein of mandy's "in
my pocket')and is gonna sound killer in club remixes. anyway, so now
i'm even more excited to hear what vocals she adds to the mystery
instrumental i have--it's a fab dance track.

"Danger" is kinda too '80s for my tastes, it woulda fit on the latter
1/2 of Gwen's L.A.M.B.; my least fave of the sampler(very repetitive)--
good but a tad forgettable. the chorus is "danger danger danger in your
eyes/in disguise" which is essentially the same message as :"stranger".

"burn" has a minimal beat that i could sing "My humps" over. it'sgot
the same kinda bump to it, but more '80s-y. (im prob the only one who
will ever make the connection tho..since it doesnt really SOUND like my
humps) it's a more low-key dance-pop song. again, mid-eastern kinda
vibe.

can't wait til the whole thing!

Oddly, I gave the five-song sampler a couple spins myself a couple weeks ago, and couldn't hear the Kylie connection (also made by somebody I work with), and the songs in general kinda made me shrug. Maybe I should have listened closer? Though then again, it's not like I'm a huge Kylie fan either.

You're right. I was confusing Holly and the Italians with Pearl Harbor and the Explosions, not with Katrina and the Waves - which means that yesterday I was confusing Pearl Harbor and the Explosions with Katrina and the Waves. (I also can't remember what Pearl Harbor and the Explosions sound like, 'cept once again I assume it's "new wave.")

The Hilary-Kylie connection would be to stuff like "I'm Spinnin' Around," which was Kylie's neodisco comeback record (co-written by Kara DioGuardi, though I don't think Kara had anything to do with producing it; but not only did that track revive Kylie's career, it was DioGuardi's first big hit; also co-written by Paula Abdul, originally intended for an Abdul comeback LP that never materialized), rather than to Kylie's earlier Stock-Aiken-Waterman music. Anyway, "Play With Fire" does go for both disco and Kylie-like lightness; don't know if it's a DioGuardi composition/production, though people have been saying that pretty much everything on the new Duff is. And it is (or was, if the album doesn't follow through) a different direction for Hilary, though interestingly enough Kara had a hand in Hilary's early music, most notably "Come Clean" and "Fly." But those were much more in the style that producer and co-writer John Shanks had created on Michelle Branch's "Everywhere." Also, while I like "Play With Fire," I don't love it the way I love "Come Clean" or (for that matter) Britney's "And Then We Kiss," which was her neodisco move.

Anyway, "Play With Fire" does go for both disco and Kylie-like lightness; don't know if it's a DioGuardi composition/production, though people have been saying that pretty much everything on the new Duff is.

I don't know about production, but it is a DioGuardi (co-)composition. She's credited on 9 of the album's 14 tracks so far; the final 5 haven't shown up on BMI or ASCAP yet.

Checked out [Removed Illegal Link] to see what her actual "Christian" stuff is like; sound is basically rock going from softness to loudness to quasi-Ramonesness, depending on the song, none of the three as good as "Anti-Conformity"; Krystal's not got the near-feedback that Avril can put into her voice; the lyrics to "Beauty of Grace" vague out as much as the lyrics to "Anti-Conformity" do - though if you're gonna say "The mistakes that you made: forgiven!/The memory's erased" then I guess you won't dwell too much on the mistakes; but detailing mistakes sure made Montgomery Gentry's "Some People Change" and Carrie Underwood's "Jesus Take The Wheel" far more touching than this song is. Choosing not to turn one's back on the past is far more interesting than undergoing a memory wipe.

"Collide" has more emotion: "Collide, crash into me/Collide, I want to be broken by you." "Bring your storm to me." The romantic sublime Christianized. But if you want divine collisions that really sound shattering, you're better off listening to Flyleaf.

(I put "Christian" in quotes not because I doubt Krystal's Christianity but because I don't like how evangelicals have tried to appropriate the term "Christian" for their sole use. Not that this is my issue.)

Oh, poo, I guess they're still not letting ilX link to MySpace. Go here for Krystal Meyers' MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/krystalmeyers.

(I wonder if the similarity between Krystal Meyers and Bristol Myers helps get Krystal name recognition.)

Experimenting with links, to see if I can get this to work:

http://www.myspace.com/krystalmeyers

http://www.myspace.com/krystalmeyers[/link]

OK, so is it that for some reason MySpace and YouTube links (unlike some others I've done) are "illegal" when you try to give them some link title other than the URL, but not when you make the URL itself the title?

Maybe some Teenpop thread-ers would like Swedish singer Maia Hirasawa. Here is the video for her new song "And I Found This Boy":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRIyb8Sqol8

(Though obviously it seems more like contemporary retro UK indie pop. Pipettes just signed to a major in U.S., by the way.)

I think there's a great audience for good indie pop with U.S. kids, but no one in radio or anywhere wants to take a chance.

Quick point about the Britney headshave and "pop." Thing is, if a high-school punk girl did a headshave, it would certainly be a meaningful act for her, and there's no way that a girl's going bald in a high school (even if she's in Berkeley or some place like that) doesn't put her at risk and doesn't make her a target. But nonetheless, its public meaning is already pretty much defined and encapsulated: "Punk Girl shaves head, punk girl acts punk, dog bites man, we know what this means." So in effect whatever might have gone into the individual act (her shaving her head) can't travel far without being "understood" hence not thought about.

Now, I'm not saying that the tabs are necessarily doing great thinking about Britney. (Frankly I've only looked at the 'bloids' covers so I don't know in detail what they're thinking.) They seem to be trying for a mental illness angle - "SNAPPED!" - and then are taking the thing to "What will happen to the children? Can Britney be a good mother?" And of course to the alcoholism and/or drug addiction. But there's some way that Britney's act is not computing, is still open to interpretation, its public meaning not finished. A friend of mine - a woman my age - says, "It's a big loud FUCK YOU" - which seems right to me, though maybe that over focuses it. According to a customer in the tattoo parlor, "She didn't want anybody to touch her. She said she was tired of people touching her and that sort of thing." A "No!," a denial, tired of being sexy. Something. The thing is, as a personal last-straw desperate act, it actually conveys whatever impulses punk girls might have had for shaving their heads in the first place. And my point then is that within punk "shave your head" is curtailed and limited as to what it can do, whereas within pop it's more potent.

This is somewhat in response to Matt A. above ("The problem is the indie people who are fans of indie music for superficial reasons, or for reasons pertaining solely to the personality traits of the performer"). My problem with indie - and this dates back to about 1980, with my first published rant on this subject being in 1985 - isn't that as individuals indie people aren't sufficiently curious and open in their listening (some are, some aren't), but that the postpunk environment that punk/postpunk/indie types like me had created has long since gotten to the point where it can shut down the effectiveness of any of the music it embraces, whether it's blues or movie soundtracks or country or anything else. I mean, shuts it down in the indie environment. Anyway, I don't want to get dogmatic about this, and maybe what I should just be saying is that the postpunk indie-alternative world has shut down the effectiveness of punk moves, whereas in pop similar moves can still have impact. (Pop may shut down moves of its own, just not the same ones, and not with indie's deadening effect on the music.)

This is also in response to Dave Bedbug's most recent blog post (March 03, 2007), my realizing I ought to write this down before Dave writes it for me.

Pop may shut down moves of its own, just not the same ones, and not with indie's deadening effect on the music.

This is so incredibly black and white. No moves that have been shut down in pop have had a deadening effect on the music? Isn't every mediocre or bad pop record actually an example of this?

I think you're right about the shutting down of the effectiveness of punk moves in the postpunk indie-alternative world, but not 100%. Some moves that might be considered "punk" in some sense have continued to be transcendent. I have no idea why you're arguing that the postpunk indie-alternative world by nature shuts down the effectiveness of other aesthetics it embraces.

Isn't every mediocre or bad pop record actually an example of this?

OK, I take that back, but surely there are examples of it and I don't really know why indie is a greater example of THE MUSIC DYING.

Well, notice I was doing the passive-aggressive maneuver of saying "shuts down every music it touches" and then half taking it back ("well, the punk music it touches").

Gotta go work on a piece now.

It seems to me that many times I have heard contemporary country, for example, and thought that the effectiveness of "country" moves in the country world have been shut down.

Given the thirty years of punk hair, I actually think that Britney Spears shaving her head seems like an act that's devoid of meaning regardless of whether it occurs in the pop context as opposed to a punk context. If there's a "fuck you" in there, maybe it is precisely in this. A sort of Self Portrait move.

The Post Show posted a music video parody about fallen teenpop stars here: http://www.superdeluxe.com/sd/contentDetail.do?id=D81F2344BF5AC7BB3007045D274B54B1E560A6E7BD8699A5

I'd say it's just a one-note joke, but the song is too good to ignore. I think it's the Dick in a Box factor - come for the mockery, stay for the catchiness?

not sure if Audio Club's 'Something Serious' really belongs on this thread but it should be a hit. similar to Kelly Clarkson's 'Walk Away' production wise but with the amusing male rapper (sounds like Petey Pablo meets Chilly Gonzales meets Borat - check the way he says "you smell nice")/female singer dynamic working very well tho it feels overtly 'retro' (late 80s, bordering on Paula Abdul/MC Skatcat at times - but not necess. a bad thing).

youtube oh so it's a few months old already of course. good fun tho, esp. love the rapper Brooks Buford.

Tim, I think there's a lot that country and postpunk have in common, and several years ago I called country "a fake moral, fake rowdy, bullshit lie." But one sharp difference is that country rarely prides itself either on its shock value or its novelty. I'd retreat somewhat from my statement about country (at least I'd change "bullshit" to "interesting"), since performers like Eric Church and Montgomery Gentry seem to gain aesthetically from their moral confusion. Country doesn't know what to make of its own rowdy impulses, doesn't know whether rowdiness and rebellion are signs of character or signs of moral weakness. So claims to rowdiness are interestingly uneasy. (Not that such tension doesn't exist in pop and metal and hip-hop and punk - the tension is one of the things that "Search and Destroy" and "Final Solution" are about, after all.)

that Audio Club song deserves to be the club banging single of the year.

Audio Club single reminds me of Los Umbrellos (Scandinavian, big barechested black guy in cowboy hat, two blonde beauties with him), though Audio Club seems to be playing it (even) more for laughs. Think the singing is fairly ordinary sub-Girls Aloud dance pop, but the rapping is fine, swift, funny.

This posting of the video has better sound, I think:

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=1559688692

I don't see that tension in "Search and Destroy" and "Final Solution" so much as I see burnout! Better to burn out than fade away bullshit, but at least "Final Solution" is funny (whereas "Search and Destroy" is bad Jim Morrison!).

OK, I see it in "Final Solution":

livin at night isn't helpin my complexion
The signs all say it's a social infection
A little bit of fun's never been an insurrection

Although the only thing he's admitting to there is the complexion thing. Otherwise, it could just be read as partying endorsement.

Ariana (here) calls herself a punk at heart and sounds like a very low-rent Paris Hilton. She lists the usual punk influences ("dance music, lil kim, madonna, trina, black buddafly, gwen stefani, shifty, electronica, hip hop, beyonce, pop, christina aguilera, britney spears, r&b, blues, ludacris, 50 cent, lil wayne, bubba sparxx, chris brown, sean paul..."). The songs don't really go anywhere, it's all pretty raw, haven't decided if I enjoy listening to it, but I'm curious what you guys might think.

Misspelled her name: it's Arainia.

Warning: AI content

I've been disagreeing with Simon so much this season. I think the show is fading into irrelavance for me (not overall though, ratings are actually up this year) and the reason is SONG CHOICES. It's not enough for the judges to stack the deck with four big divas (plus Jordin too if you wanna count her), now they criticize any song choice that's not a big slow power ballad. "Haley, you sang the song well, but it wasn't a power ballad and so is therefore an inferior performance." They should be encouraging people to step outside their box, not forcing them into it.

I like Haley. She just brings some kind of ridiculous, cabaret, over the top vibe that I kind of dig. I thought she's done OK all 3 weeks, but no great performances. She's going home, and it's not entirely undeserved, though I hope she stays. Gina brings the rocker chick vibe and she's just so likeable and I liked this performance a lot. Antonella was decidedly "not bad" though clearly deserves the boot.

DIVAS: Melinda is clearly the most talented but she basically has given the same performance 3 weeks in a row. Whoever said her lounge R&B act was gonna get old is OTM I think. Curious to see how she'll do in theme weeks. Stephanie is a really great performer, though her vocals aren't always up to par. LaKisha I like OK but she's been really blah for me 3 weeks in a row now. She's got power, but does she have anything else? (Actually, I thought "I Have Nothing" was her best performance yet). Sabrina is so boring and conveys no emotions with her singing. She just overpowers the melody with runs. Go home please. Jordin isn't even really a big-voiced power diva at all. I like her. But how was her performance of "Heartbreaker" NOT karaoke? A karaoke classic done in a basically karaoke style. Whatever.

Actually, I think the guys, while less talented than the girls, are more interesting than the girls, because there's way more variety in the singing styles.

("dance music, lil kim, madonna, trina, black buddafly, gwen stefani, shifty, electronica, hip hop, beyonce, pop, christina aguilera, britney spears, r&b, blues, ludacris, 50 cent, lil wayne, bubba sparxx, chris brown, sean paul...")

best list of influences ever, must check her out