I still love American Idol. It is so much better than those other singing competitions such as (from best to worst) The Voice, The Sing-Off, and The X-Factor (I’ve never even watched America’s Got Talent). That’s why I can’t believe I haven't already written in my journal about the CDs I made from last season’s show! I made a copy for my sister and her daughters and she loved it so much, she just about wore it out!
First, I always try to make these playlists more entertaining not only by the music I pick, but the order as well. I made this playlist so that, if nothing else, there is variety, and I go back and forth between the male and female voices, and then don’t repeat the same singer for the next three songs. Thus, if I put a song of Scotty McCreery’s on these CD’s, that means the three songs before it and the three songs after it are not songs from Scotty. This gives a lot of variety, and I really like that in my music.
The entire collection starts out with the song “What Are Words” by Chris Medina, a singer who didn’t even make it into the top 24 and whose wife had been in a serious accident. The song, which he released later on his own, is about how you stand by someone in the good times and the bad times. Although my brother and his wife loved Paul McDonald, the Rod Stewart sound-alike with the contagious grin, and even I found him somewhat likeable and refreshing early on, he didn’t live up to his potential in my opinion, was ultimately a different artist than I at first thought, and I was ultimately offended that they cut Chris Medina to make room for him. He may have a great attitude and a very infectious smile, but I didn’t end up downloading any of Paul's songs. They just weren’t that good.
I did like Thia Megia’s smooth vocals on old standards, and the second song is her version of the old Nat King Cole hit “Smile”. Of course, I loved the winner, Scotty McCreary, and the third song is an early one by him, “The River,” originally sung by Garth Brooks.
As much as my brother and his wife might have loved Paul McDonald, they hated Haley Reinhart just as much, having more to do with her attitude than with any actual singing ability she might have had. They even went so far as to laugh at her when she fell during one performance. My brother taped that fall over and over again onto a CD for their future enjoyment. They found her to be snotty and spoiled, and I can see that in her, certainly, but if that’s going to be a determining factor in whether or not someone gets a record deal, most of the store shelves would be empty and iTunes would have to fold. She has very distinctive vocals, and this season would not have been half as entertaining without her! And I first really took notice of her when she nailed “Blue” by LeAnn Rimes, complete with that ear-catching little yodel. It’s the fourth song on my collection.
Then I included James Durbin’s version of “Maybe I’m Amazed,” perhaps not my favorite song in the world, but he did it justice. He’s into heavy metal music, and though that may not be a genre I’m usually drawn to, I still know talent when I see it, and this guy has a great heavy metal falsetto. When he uses it on normal songs, it can be quite good. Besides, he reminds us so much of our nephew in his mannerisms and odd behaviors. My nephew has a good, emotional heart, and I could see this also reflected in James’ eyes as well. He was never less than impassioned and real when he sang, and the lyrics always seemed to touch his soul. I like that in a performer.
Lauren Alaina was the runner up, and another country performer, but I wasn’t so sure of that when she first started out, singing the Aerosmith song “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” with judge Steven Tyler. (By the same token, that song does lend itself well to country, as young country crooner Aaron Kelly had sung it well in the previous season.) The first song of Lauren’s I included here was “I’m the Only One” by Melissa Etheridge. I guess the song’s okay, and Lauren sings it very well.
By this point in the collection, it settles into these same performers, as one song after another show how great they all are. Scotty sings “For Once in My Life,” and even if it gets a bit dreary in the middle, especially with that lifeless instrumental break, he ends it on a great note, especially for the live version (though all these downloaded songs are thankfully the longer studio recordings). Then I included Thia Megia’s version of “Colors of the Wind” her last song before being voted out (unfortunately). I don’t know why people didn’t like her. Perhaps they couldn’t connect with her because her song choices were from another era, but to me, it doesn’t matter when they came from: A classic is a classic is a classic (even though, for some unexplained reason, sister-in-law absolutely hates that song!)! Then I include “I’ll Be There for You” by James (the Bon Jovi song, not the Rembrandt’s theme from Friends) and “I’m Your Baby Tonight” by Haley, and then I included one more singer I hadn’t yet, and he was yet another favorite, though it took him a bit of time to find his place. Casey Abrams, the bearded guy with the jazzy style, had quite a few missteps at the beginning of the competition, including doing a version of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” that was simply awful and surviving a vote off with the judge’s save. He should thank his lucky stars. From then on, he started doing the kind of music he should have been doing all along, as evidenced by this number of his I included, “Your Song,” originally by Elton John. That’s followed by a fun and rambunctious version of “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” by Lauren, James’ rockin’ “Livin’ for the City,” and “You’ve Really Got a Hold on Me” by Haley.
Now my sister and her daughters, and my brother and his family, really liked Stefano Langone, and though I liked him too, he wasn’t one of my favorites. Still, I chose to include one of his best, a version of “Closer”. I never would have bought the original Ne-Yo version, but Stefano’s was pretty good. The next few songs on the first disc are “Candle in the Wind” by Lauren, “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” by James, and “Bennie and the Jets” by Haley, the first time I’ve ever heard this song and actually liked it. Then Scotty sings the blazing Elvis classic “That’s All Right,” Lauren sings the equally bouncy “Born to Fly” by Sara Evans, and I finish off the first disc with “Have You Ever Seen the Rain” by Casey, “Call Me” by Haley, and finally I slow things way down with “I Cross My Heart” by Scotty.
Only halfway through the collection, I start off the second CD with a couple of duets: The rambunctious “I Feel the Earth Move” by Haley and Casey and the more mundane “Up on the Roof” by the country crooners Scotty and Lauren. Since these four (and James) sing a majority of the songs on the second disc, I included a few other performers for whom I had downloaded only one song each. Pia Toscano was supposedly a fan favorite, and no one could understand why she got voted out so early. I know why. Her song choices were all blasé! Even the one I chose to download and include here, “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me,” was rather blasé. She’s got a great voice, and when she sang “I’ll Stand By You” on Dancing with the Stars (when she was briefly dating Mark Ballas), it was the best song she’d sung. Perhaps if she’d have sung songs like that on American Idol she might have stayed longer. Then there was Jacob Lusk. Some of these soul singers have the tendency to over-sing, and the reaction of the judges is usually to eat it up, like they did with Jacob Lusk. We didn’t like it, or his outlandish fashion sense! I downloaded, and included here, “Bridge Over Troubled Water” because it was the one time he decided to simply sing a good song and not showboat! He has a good voice, if he would just calm down a bit! Unfortunately, the judges only make him worse when they go on and on about how great he is while he’s howling his lungs out!
Then things settle back into the usual five: Lauren sings “Where You Lead,” Casey sings “Harder to Breathe” (and does a great job of it too, especially that last line!), and Haley does her best song yet with Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep.” That’s followed by the anti-authoritarian “Uprising” by James, the country song “Flat on the Floor” by Lauren, and Casey’s last song on the collection before he was finally voted out once and for all, “Nature Boy” (again, doing a great job with this jazzy version!). Then, before we’re allowed to miss him too much, Haley gets things cookin’ again with “House of the Rising Sun,” followed by James’ rockin’ take on the old 50’s classic “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow”! We love the Martina McBride song “Anyway,” and I was glad that Lauren tackled it so I could include it here, and that’s followed by Scotty once again, with another great uptempo number called “Gone”. Then Haley does a wonderful version of the classic soul song “I Who Have Nothing,” and James follows that up by singing “Without You.” Lauren then sings the modern country hit “If I Die Young,” and Scotty commemorates the heroes and the tragic victims of the 9/11 attack with his edition of Alan Jackson’s “Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)”. I end the collection with these same four: Haley tackles Led Zepplin’s “What Is and What Should Never Be” and shines, James’ does “Don’t Stop Believin’” and gives Journey and the Glee Cast some competition, and the collection ends with “Like My Mother Does” by Lauren Alaina, the runner up, and “I Love You This Big” by Scotty McCreery, the winner, and showing exactly why they made it so far.
And this entire collection continues to show why this show is so much better than all the others. I’ve seen some of The Voice and even downloaded some performances from The Sing-Off, and noted some of the contestants on The X-Factor deserve some recognition, but by and large, these other competitions and reality singing shows simply can’t hold a candle to American Idol, as it’s being proven once again in this new season!
And who would have thought it would be a better show without Simon and Paula!
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