I have blind gossip items and I’m going to share them. That’s one of the perks of being a bottom-feeding entertainment journalist in Los Angeles. You’re always meeting some half-drunk and fully disgruntled person at a party who works behind the scenes and is willing to cough it up after half a dozen beers. Here’s what I learned this week from someone who works for American Idol…
Item # 1: One of
the stronger male contestants is not exactly who he
portrays himself to be. His endearing presence is more for
the cameras than anything else.
Item # 2:
One of the female contestants is guilty of the exact same
sort of image-pumping fakery.
Item # 3:
Another male contestant is not especially well liked by most
of the people involved with the show.
Guess with your friends! It’s fun and easy and will take your mind off the war and your eroding privacy rights. And, no, I’m not mentioning names. That’s why they call it a blind item.
On to the crappy singing. And this week—songs of Right Now!—was insane with it…
Kids, remember how they told you in that secular humanist public school you went to that it was very, very important to have simply oodles of self-esteem and that you could do anything you set your mind to and that anyone who got in your way was just an obstacle, jealous of your shining talents? Well, they might have overstated their case just the eensiest bit. Because, see, truth is that you’re not so special or unique or wonderful, really. At all. You’re just not. No one is. Oh, you can sing pretty well? That’s nice. So can 10 jillion other people. Oh, and you say you want to sing a Kelly Clarkson song tonight? Sure! Why not? That’s not a loaded gesture or anything. Because you’re uniquely, magically you and your version is going to be your own. Everyone will see that when you’re done. You’ll transform a fresh-on-everyone’s-mind hit from the very first and most beloved American Idol winner to date and erase its memory from the public’s consciousness. From now on people will say, “Oh, yeah, ‘Because Of You,’ that Lisa Tucker song? I love that song! It makes Kelly’s five-times platinum album version sound like a demo. Plus, Kelly’s all old and stuff now, nearly 30, practically dead. Long live Lisa!”
The judges rip into little Miss Tucker and she makes a pouty face. How dare they!
Pick Pickler is up next, cute-ifiying a big hit from country radio called “Suds in a Bucket.” I know this doofus song because I genuinely dig country music. But the judges clearly do not, so they rake her over the coals. Simon even mentions “lassoing.” British people are adorable when they’re being dumb. But the problem isn’t the stupid song. The problem is, was, and will continue to be Pickler. I already attacked her makeup once, and though it remains thick and barfy, I’m not going to harp on it again. Today I choose instead to harp on her overall performance aesthetic. See, country music is essentially soul music for toothless white people. It’s based in pain. And therefore the coolest country singers are capable of conveying that barren landscape of the soul with a few carefully selected vocal signifiers. My favorite one is the sort of yelpy, yodely, cracked-voice thing. It’s a staple of country sadness, and Pickler is either incapable of it or chooses not to go there. She’ll never be Dolly or Patsy or even Leann Rimes. And she doesn’t want to be. She wants to be Faith and Shania and Martina McBride, all of them fancy ladies and complete bores. Pickler wants to be one too. Of course, she’ll have to learn to stay on key. Or not. Faith never does.
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