Finally, at long last!

Eliminated today:

From Rock Star: Supernova - overwrought, over-intense, over-angst-filled emo-kid Ryan Star.

From Singapore Idol 2 - non-singer, all round nice-guy Joakim Gomez.


Joakim is 18 and Ryan is in his late 20's. Of course, that means that the teenager gave the gracious, classy exit speech, while the chronological grown-up was sullen, sour and about as mature as an 8-year-old. Bah to these wannabes and their inflated sense of self-importance. Of course, if Ryan was less full of himself, he probably would not have ever been cast in Rock Star at all.

Kudos to Joakim for handling his elimination in just the right way. I think he must be rather relieved to finally have the pressure taken off him. I could hardly bear to listen to his singing, but he does strike me as a very nice fellow. I do think he will very soon be on our TV screens, perhaps doing a spot on a Channel 5 sit-com, or flogging some cool consumer product targetted at tweeners. To his credit, I do think he sounded somewhat better last night than he ever had. It is always nice to leave on a high note, after a good performance.

As for Ryan Star, EVS, as his pal Toby Rand would say. I admire his musicianship, but he was a very inconsistent singer. Besides, there is only so much of that emo-intense thing that anyone can take or listen to for any extended amount of time. (Someone needs to tell Rahimah Rahim about it before she turns out like this, all equipped with dark eye make-up and a laughable inability to smile.) With the bottom 3 performance he gave, he definitely did not leave on a high note. Baba O'Riley is a great, great song and one I always find myself humming when it comes on at the start of CSI:NY. Ryan made it well night unlistenable, choosing volume as his way of modulating. Ugh. EVS.

I have goosebumps

I have been waiting for this album for seemingly forever. At long last, Clay Aiken's sophomore album will be released next month. "Without You" is the first single off this album. The full song can be heard online at his My Space page: http://www.myspace.com/clayaiken

Excuse me for a moment of gushing: OMG, that voice!! Wow and double wow! It sends chills down my spine and just hits me like a sledgehammer square in the solar plexus.

This is just MILES better than the production values on MOAM. His voice is better recorded, down to the echo of his wailed top notes, and really sits forward in the layers of sound.

If this sounds so good on my tinny computer speakers, how great is it going to sound on a properly engineered CD? RCA better bring that album to Singapore very soon after its US release - I am NOT making do with purchasing the digital download. MP3's won't cut it with this voice.

Seriously, Singapore ....

WTF is going on with the Singapore Idol voting this year?

Even the trailers and ads have started admonishing viewers that "this is a singing competition". The judges are in on the act, Gurmit is doing his bit, and even the ousted Rahimah Rahim has thrown in her 2 cents' worth that it should be "about the vocals".

Listening live to tonight's elimination - Mathilda, Jonathan and Hady in the bottom 3. Good heavens! Gurmit is reminding us again that SI is looking for a singer. Yeah, well, the judges and producers should have kept that in mind a few months back when they put these same people through to the voting rounds!

Awww, Mathilda is out. I guess she really did not connect that well with audiences and her scary-eyes act is less successful than Storm Large's on Rockstar: Supernova.

Ken is scolding the teeners and tweeners for basically being idiotic. Haha, love it. Unfortunately, this would probably spur them to vote twice as often for the tone-deaf brigade next week.

Awww, Ken is being really nice to Mathilda, certainly nicer than he has ever been to her during judging. He is acknowledging that she has a voice and can sing. He is also not-so-subtly putting down some of the other contestants. I don't often agree with Ken, but this time? You go, Ken!

Geez, SI voters. Singapore is always first-in-world at so many things, so much so that a book has been written about it. Will Singapore have the dubious distinction of voting in the first tone-deaf Idol?

Idle Musing: Singapore Idol

The best thing about Singapore Idol is probably the guest performer spot on the results show. For five blessed minutes, we actually get good singing on a Singapore Idol episode!! I think having this spot is also the biggest mistake the producers made.

Coming hot on the heel of a SI performance recap, the guest performers show up this year's SI hopefuls so badly that it is just embarassing. Is there one person in this year's crop who could have sung as well as Olinda Cho did a couple of weeks ago? I thought Olinda was great in the first SI season and she has shown growth as an artist, pulling off a beatifully restrained yet impassioned version of "You don't have to say you love me". Mathilda is this year's Oli, but she's all brass and sass and very little tenderness. In her hands, this song would have sounded like an Aretha Franklin remake (not necessarily a bad thing, of course, but Mathilda is beginning to be just a tad one dimensional). I don't even want to think about what Jasmine, and to a lesser extent, Rahimah, would have done to this. Cringing would probably be involved.

If Oli was a difficult act to follow, what about Kit Chan? Man, she just about took those Idol contestants by the scruff and slapped them around all the way back to their singing teachers. She just kicked complete and total ass tonight and showed these wannabes how it is supposed to be done. If this lady had slightly more appealing orthodontics, she would be a bigger superstar than Steph Sun.

Some thoughts on the performance show (I refuse to call the performance shows the "Spectaculars" - whose bright idea was that?):

... National Day stories, oh yay (not)! Give the kids more time to sing and cut out these boring pre-song stories!

... Wow, all these emo kids dedicating their songs to their dads et al. Okay, I will have a heart; it was actually quite touching.

... "The Living Years" !! A favourite song from my university days! Why is Mathilda singing it like some up-tempo R&B dance track? It's a sad, sad song with very poignant lyrics - not a clap-along! Girl can sing, but this was wrong.

... The "Friends" theme song. Hehe, if you aren't strumming a guitar while singing this, you're pretty much going to come off like a dork singing this song. Oh, poor Joakim, like you don't have enough working against you.

... What's with Ken ? He's getting to be rather bitchy - like a nicer, less funny Simon Cowell.