American Idol Recap: Saving The Best For Last?

American Idol, Episode 11: "Girls: Sudden Death, Pt. 1"

So, Idol is doing something they have never done before.  They are having the contestants, 10 at a time, battle it out, Hunger Games style on stage in Vegas.  The last five standing out of each round will go through to America's vote.  Nicki is Effie Trinket.  May the odds be ever in your favor, contestants!!  Just joking.  In this sudden death round, groups of 10 ladies and 10 guys will perform.  At the end of the performances, the judges will cut five of them.  The five survivors will go through to the live voting rounds.  If there is a tie, Jimmy Iovine will crawl out of his cookie making tree and cast the deciding vote.

First up is Jenny Beth Willis.  I am almost positive that I have never seen Jenny Beth before.  That already does not bode very well for her.  Jenny Beth decides to perform Trisha Yearwood's "Heaven, Heartache, and the Power of Love."  What a (God awful!) way to start the show.  Jenny Beth is clothed in a hot pink tutu, covered in black lace and black cowboy boots.  She looks like she was just allowed to dress herself for the first time.  Gadzooks.  That vocal.  I'm pretty sure she wasn't on pitch the entire time.  When she tried to go low, she lost all breath support.  She tried to save the abysmal performance with a glory note at the end, too bad it was both sharp and flat.  I loved how they kept showing Mariah smiling widely.  Mimi's awkward smile is going to be to Idol what Britney's stank faces were to The X-Factor.    The judges should have just gave her the boot right then.

Side note:  Mariah is shaping up to be this season's Paula Abdul.  Her critiques start out ok, but then they start going nowhere.  She rambles awkwardly and you half expect her to start telling stories about Morocco and Monroe and how they spit up on her new chinchilla and how she is sick of supporting Nick.  Get it together, Mimi!!

Next up is Camp Mariah veteran, Tenna Torres.  Oh Tenna.  First off, can we talk about that look?  You are only 28 years old, but everything from that wig/weave to that terrible makeup makes you look like  you are 50 years old.  A rough 50.  A Mickey Rourke 50.  Seriously, for a minute there, I thought that X-Factor season one contestant, Stacy Francis, had knocked you out backstage and went on in your  place.  That being said, I liked your performance.  I loved the song choice.  "Soulmate" by Natasha Bedingfield is a killer song and I liked how you turned it into an R&B slow jam.  Tenna needs to be careful because sometime she puts on this affected tone  that sort of makes her sound like she sucked in helium.  The judges loved it, as they should.  Nicki told an odd anecdote about how her fans didn't like Tenna, but I agreed that Tenna is serving 80's R&B singer realness.  She also called her out on the hair.  We are so in sync!

Adriana Latonio covered Aretha Franklin's "Ain't No Way."  It is a big song and at times it got away from 17-year-old Adriana.  I liked the emotion in her voice.  I was a fan of how she inched closer to the judges, little by little.  Mariah was singing background.  I loved Adriana's rich and velvety tone.  The glory note at the end was not as good as she thought it was, but her performance did earn her a standing "O" from Randy and Keith.  Nicki was right, when she said that Adriana conquered the stage.  There were no nerves and that really helped her performance.

Brandy Hotard looks a lot like Emily's mom on Pretty Little Liars, no?  That was the first thing I thought when they were showing her intro package.  She sang "Anymore" by Travis Tritt.  It is a sad song.  Brandy is singing lyrics like "My mind keeps recreating a life with you alone" and she is grinning from ear to ear the whole time?  WTF?!  I seriously couldn't even focus on the song.  There was such a disconnect from the lyrics to the emotions that Brandy was projecting.  I literally watched it back three times and I couldn't tell you how the vocal was.  I could only focus on her pageant-y face.  Keith and Nicky and I must share a brain because their comments were all about her faces.  It was hilarious.  She tried to give a lame explanation about how she was strong and she was trying to project that and blah, blah, blah.  Whatever.

Shubha Vedula took the stage next.  She sang Lady GaGa's "Born This Way."  She started out at the piano, doing a kind of slowed down version of the song.  I was feeling it.  Midway through she got up and the pace picked up.  The vocal was still good, but the whole performance seemed kind of manic.  I would have enjoyed it more if she had just stayed at the piano the whole time.  Shockingly, Randy and I were in agreement.  The judges as a whole were kind of lukewarm about Shubha.  

Oh, Kamaria Ousley.  The judges were absolutely right.  That white leather jacket, magenta sequined bustier and black strappy heels ensemble was definitely working for you.  Unfortunately, that was the only thing that was.  I'm not sure why you would choose to sing "Mr. Know-It-All" by Kelly Clarkson, but it was the absolute wrong song choice.  It was especially odd after seeing that you had sung backgrounds for Diddy Dirty Money and Ledisi.  Why wouldn't you choose a nice R&B track that would have served you better.  It was off pitch the entire time, screechy.  I'm surprised Kelly Clarkson didn't write you a sharply worded WhoSay blog post after the way you slaughtered one of her songs.

Let's get this out of the way, first.  Kree Harrison has a beautiful voice.  Her rendition of Patty Griffin's "Up to the Mountain" gave me legit chills.  She is relatable and seems super nice.  All that being said, girlfriend needs some help in the wardrobe and stage presence department.  That peach button up maternity shirt she was wearing?  Yikes.  You'd think she was singing in her living room on laundry day, rather than on a Vegas stage.  Then her stage presence.  The whole thing was just so awkward to watch.  Her arms flailing around as she shuffled around the stage, looking like an elderly woman who has misplaced her reading glasses.  I completely agreed with all the glowing praise that the judges showered her with, but if the rest doesn't improve, I'll be forced to listen to Kree sing with my eyes closed.

I felt a little bad for Angela Miller.  Her vocal was no doubt one of the strongest of the night, but all the judges could talk about was her mind blowingly amazing performance of her original song on the final night of solos in Hollywood.  Jessie J is getting a lot of play so far this season on Idol and I'm not mad about it.  I love the song "Nobody's Perfect" and I thought Amanda killed it.  Was it on par with her original song?  Definitely not.  It was still amazing.  I just hope that Amanda didn't peak too soon.  That is the downside to performing such a great original song.  The judges will always remember it and they will always compare whatever you do to it.  I hope that this doesn't lead to Amanda's premature Idol exit.

Isabelle is only using her first name.  OK, Isabelle.  She sang Billie Holliday's "God Bless the Child."  I wasn't a huge fan of this performance.  There was nothing particularly wrong with Isabelle's voice.  She did sound really shaky when she was going for the high notes and veered off pitch.  The arrangement was a little sleepy and I would have liked it if Isabelle would have picked a song by a more contemporary artist.  

Amber Holcomb closed out the performance portion of the show.  She sang "My Funny Valentine."  Full disclosure: Melinda Doolittle's performance of this song during season 5 is one of my all time favorite Idol performances.  That being said, Amber acquitted herself well.  I liked the late '80's/early '90's arrangement of the song.  Her phrasing was great.  She looked gorgeous.  Amber really surprised me.  She was another contestant I don't remember seeing much of during the audition/Hollywood rounds.  If she keeps up these performances, that won't matter.  She did sort of overdo it with the vocal runs at the end, but otherwise a great way to end the show.

It was time for the judges to lower the guillotine.  Angela Miller, Amber Holcomb, Adriana Latonio, Kree Harrison, and Tenna Torres went straight to the live rounds.  Shubha Vedula was for sure robbed, but  hopefully she will be able to come back next year.

Ok, that is it for the first group of ladies.  Tonight it is the boys.  What did you guys think?  Was Shubha robbed?  Anyone you would have sent through that didn't make it?  Hit me up in the comments.