Idol's Top 6: The Wal-Mart of Broadway

Meanwhile, I am absolutely wracked with jealousy about Mike's opportunity to schmooze with Marvita - Marvita of "maybe we gonn' be nekkid... maybe we gonn' be nekkid in coats!" fame.

But let me be the first to volunteer that I absolutely disagree about Brooke. That is, I agree with the judges. And I mean, maybe there's not much to do at this point, but I hate that it's like she has just given up on trying to sing well. Of course she's never going to have the range or the refined technique of some other contestants on the show, but she could at least try to breathe properly and support her voice and work on sounding more professional/mature with the capabilities she has.

Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself here! Welcome, it is Andrew Lloyd Webber night... and since fully one third of the remaining contestants aren't really good singers, the fact that this is going to suck should come as no surprise. Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber is in the audience looking a little like Prince Gerhardt at this time.

In standard fashion, I will be grading the contestants on the following scale: "Phantom of the Opera" (very good), "Evita" (passable), "Jesus Christ Superstar" (okay bordering on lame), "Cats" (utterly horrific), and "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" (you have got to be fucking kidding me).

Syesha is up first. I feel like I can start referring to them by first name only, now that we're down to six. She sings "One Rock & Roll Too Many," which I have never heard before, but just learned via Google is from Starlight Express. Which I have also never heard of. Fair enough. Syesha, by the way, is GREAT on this number. She really belongs to an earlier season of this show. She's wearing this smokin' outfit and sassily dancing around the stage flirting with Rickey Minor and the orchestra. You know, I don't like Syesha, but I have to give her credit for actually doing this theme justice instead of wussing out and avoiding the theme like everyone else has done week in and week out. I give her a solid Phantom of the Opera.

Jason whines and whimpers and hyperventilates (literally, he is gasping for air every every third word like he's on his deathbed) through "Memory." Randy says that he thought it was a musical and vocal trainwreck, but he liked the fact that Jason has dreadlocks. I'm just taking the notes here, folks. I agree with Randy, minus the second part, so I'm giving Jason an out-and-out Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

Brooke is next, and you can tell in the rehearsal footage that ALW hates her, which makes me feel kind of bad. He comments that none of the contestants seems to know the context of the songs they're singing, and this kind of blows my mind. I mean, you can't always track down the private diaries of a pop artist to find out what they really meant to communicate in a particular song, but the whole thing about songs from musicals is that there is, you know... an entire musical to help you figure out what the song means. It's not exactly classified information. Wikipedia that shit, please. Anyway, enough about Brooke, you know I'm giving her a Cats. Sorry, Brooke.

D'Arch has one thousand sisters, we find out right before his performance. He is singing "Think of Me," and it's nice to know he can't only sing Phil Collins style pop ballads; he can in fact also sing musical theatre numbers reimagined as Phil Collins style pop ballads. Cool. I wasn't blown out of my socks or anything, but I thought David did a serviceable and smart job with this song. He earns an Evita from me. Meanwhile, David's dad in the audience has recently traded in his signature douchey hat for an even douchier hat. Because this is the part of the competition where everyone needs to step up their game.

Carly is up next, which means David Cook is last. Man, I love this blustering, ham-handed show. Carly sings "Superstar," and I'm really conflicted on this performance... on the plus side, it's good. It's fun. It doesn't wimp out. Rickey Minor is busting a freakin' MOVE during it. On the other hand, she's chosen a key which puts the chorus of the song just barely out of her range, so I spend the majority of the time bracing myself for the inevitable destruction of her glottis. Also, Carly just cannot help looking like someone's mom doing karaoke. Granted, it's someone's mom who's really, really good at karaoke. You know, like Mike's mom, who they call "Mona" because she is so good at karaoke - true story. Anyway, due to my totally split feelings on Carly's performance, I can only give her rendition of "Superstar," fittingly, a Jesus Christ Superstar. David Cook then smarms us into the next commercial break...

David Cook is singing "Music of the Night," which Andrew Lloyd Webber points out is one of the most sexy songs he's ever written. This makes me laugh because ALW totally reminds me of someone's awkward dad in all of these rehearsal clips. David Cook is like, "Umm, thanks Dad?" His performance is quite good, and he hits all of the money notes perfectly and satisfyingly even if the rest of it comes off a little under-rehearsed. Randy calls it an "amazing vocal," which is just not true. The vocal was good, indeed it was surprisingly good, and far better than most other vocal performances tonight, parts of it were even great, but nothing about this performance was even in the zip code of "amazing." It's especially frustrating here because a truly amazing vocal on this song was clearly within David's natural ability (as opposed to Jason or Brooke), and he didn't quite make it happen - he also made the boring choice of keeping his delivery in the gray area between fabulous Broadway vocal and hip alt-rock styling, accomplishing neither of those aesthetics particularly well. Nonetheless, this is one of the only two performances from tonight I enjoyed, so David Cook earns the full Phantom of the Opera.

My overall verdict on tonight was that it was less good than Mariah week, more good than Idol Gives Back week, and overall about as enjoyable as one of Andrew Lloyd Webber's shows. Ooh, burn, Idol!