Talkin' It Up - It's Barry Gibb on American Idol

We have big news tonight!!!

Yes, it's bigger than the pictures of Lindsay Lohan using recreational drugs AFTER rehab along with the post by her friend.

Yes, it's bigger than the video of David Hasselhoff drunk.

Yes, it's bigger than the report that Bon Jovi hated Blake's "You Give Love A Bad Name".

Yes, it's even bigger than the clip of Bush forgetting when America's bicentennial was, the news that Clemens is coming to the Yanks, and the rumor that Sanjaya might be a contestant on "I Love NY" combined!

Want to know what it is?

The dates for the summer American Idol tour have been announced!!!!!

Going through the list, I see they are coming to various locations in FL, CA, IL, GA, CT, MA, NJ, NY, WA, and NC, so I expect to be reading reports from all of your trips to the shows over the summer.....

Tampa tickets go on sale on 5/19. I'm looking at you Paul, Dina, Crystal, and Missy.




This week is Bee Gees week on American Idol with Barry Gibb. Ugh. We can only hope we get some of this:


I can only hope Barry Gibb talks about chest hair and crazy cool medallions.

Although, here at AI HQ, we might have to check ourselves. After all, we were down on J. Lo and Latin week, and we were pleasantly surprised. Then we were down on country week, and we were pleasantly surprised. And then we were down on Inspirational Week, and we were very pleased........we were never down on Bon Jovi. He's awesome.

Want to know how awesome? After he performed last week, Adele wrote us and said this:

Dear Idol Pool Master,
Bon Jovi is like Leo and John Mayer and horses and Beni Hana all wrapped into one. I love him so much.

Love,
Adele

Anyway, back to Bee Gees.....we're guessing it's not just Bee Gees, but music that the Bee Gees wrote, because the rumor was that Phil was going to sing "Islands in the Stream" this week if he was still around. Although, truth be told, we have no idea what other songs the Bee Gees wrote that they didn't perform.

We do know one thing, though....Idol contestants better not do any songs that the Bee Gees performed but didn't write.

I'm talking about this:


Or anything else from this:


No No NO NOOOOOOOOOOOO

Of course, if we get too much disco on Tuesday, there's always this option for the American Idol studio audience.



OK, let's look at the standings really quickly.

Enjoying his one (and probably only) week in first place is AI Pool Founding Member Will Beekman. Will was 4 for 4 last week, but his 4 are in this order - LaKisha, Melinda, Blake, Jordin.....that just seems like the wrong order at this point, so we're not sure how long Will is going to last in #1.

In 2nd place sits Marybeth Heyd. MB can go 3 for 3 if Blake goes home - her top 3 is Melinda, LaKisha, and Jordin. So, if it's Blake's week to go home on Wednesday, MB will leapfrog Will into 1st.

In 3rd place is Missy Minock. Missy has Melinda & LaKisha 1 and 2 and her #3 is out, so she really needs Blake or Jordin to go home.

Kirstin is lurking very dangerously in 4th place. She was also 4 for 4 this week and her top 4 read thusly - Melinda, LaKisha, Blake, Jordin. So, like Will, Kirstin will be in great shape if Jordin goes home.

Team Zach & Sarah is still hanging around the top 5. They can go 2 for 3 if Jordin or Blake goes home.

One person who doesn't want Blake going home is Paul Peters, currently in 6th. Paul has Blake #1 overall, so the further he goes, the higher Paul will climb.

However, there are lots of people out there who can go 3 for 3, and we should mention them all here:

#1. Will if Jordin goes
#2. MB if Blake goes
#4. Kristin if Jordin goes
#9. Crystal if Jordin goes
#23. Yvonne if Jordin goes
#24. Jon if Jordin goes
#26. Cindy if Jordin goes
#30. Grant if Jordin goes
#33. Dina if Jordin goes
#39. Don if Jordin goes
#44. Darby if Jordin goes
#46. Peter B. if Blake goes

So, there are lots of Jordin haters out there this week. She was one of our favorites two weeks ago, but she really fell apart on Bon Jovi night. However, we're betting she's going to pick a good song this week and regroup.

If we were betters, we'd say LaKisha is going home this week. The word is that she was having trouble picking a song this week, and that seemed to spell near disaster last week.

And if LaKisha goes, it'll mess up a good number of remaining entries. She is, after all, the 2nd most popular pick for this year's winner in the pool.

Enjoy Tuesday night!
The Master

When 6 become 4.......

Too bad one of these bosom buddies had to go home. Maybe they'll go drink the sadness away.



We all knew Bon Jovi week was going to be incredible, and it was.

Phil started things out with an excellent version of "Blaze of Glory". Remember, that song was from "Young Guns 2", which is the one where Billy the Kid is shot (or is he?) in the back by Patrick Floyd Garrett and starred Emilio Estevez, Kiefer Sutherland, Lou Diamond Phillips, Christian Slater, and a young Viggo Mortensen. But the juiciest role was left for Jon Bon Jovi as the uncredited role of "Pit Inmate Shot Back into Pit".

Unfortunately, for whatever reason, Phil went home first on Wednesday, and for our pool, that means he went home last week. It's a shame because he clearly had one of, if not the, best performances on Tuesday, but it wasn't enough for the total vote tally from the two weeks.

Congratulations to Matty Lane. He was the only person who called Phil out at #6.

Side note - where are all the jokers who think that votefortheworst works now? Votefortheworst picked Phil after Sanjaya went out. Boy, their support for these people really pays off!

In honor of Phil, who certainly won us over during the course of the season, here's the video for "Blaze of Glory":


Awesome, right?

But as awesome as this recent performance? Phil definitely beats out Chris Sligh!


Or this one? Phil definitely beats out Scarlett Johansson, although she really wasn't given a lot to work with:



Back to the show on Tuesday - LaKisha was great and got a smooch. Melinda was her usual rock solid self. Blake hid his mediocre voice behind some fun beatboxing and a repetitive refrain that the whole crowd could sing along to.

The low points of the evening were definitely Chris' "Dead or Alive", which, while not horrible, was also not one of the stronger performances, and Jordin's "Living on a Prayer".

Here are our thoughts about Jordin - she's great and she has a great voice, but we have no idea what happened to her on Tuesday. Maybe our critique of her "You'll Never Walk Alone" got to her.....Whatever the reason, her performance was what we feared a Bon Jovi night could become - terrible karaoke.

But, it turned out that Chris' didn't have enough support over the two weeks to carry on......Could it have had something to do with his lighting on Tuesday night.....Here are our notes for the AI producers when Chris sings on the tour- don't ever ever EVER light him from above in harsh white light while he's staring into the camera with his head down......Why?

Here's Chris from last night.




















And here's Vincent D'Onofrio as Pvt. Pyle in Stanley Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket".



I don't know what the produers' major malfunction is, but I'm pretty certain after getting the boot on Wednesday, Chris went right to the bathroom and blew his face open with a rifle.

Congrats to Adele, Serico, Crystal, Jon, Mike, and Yvonne. They all correctly called Chris Richardson out at #5.



Clearing out some links we've been sent (and while we're on the subject of Chris Richardson) - special thanks goes to Paul Peters for alerting us to this story about the show two weeks ago. Turns out Justin Timberlake was supposed to be with Antonio Banderas two weeks ago to promote "Shrek the Third", but he balked and that's why we got Jeffrey Katzenberg instead:

The folks at Paramount (which will distribute Shrek) also made a big ad buy on the show, of course, but the real lure was that Katzenberg was supposed to deliver Justin Timberlake, who plays a young prince in the new movie. Having the newly redeemed Timberlake appear as mentor to the aspiring Idols makes a lot of sense, no matter how unwilling one might be to listen to boy-band covers.

But Timberlake balked. Katzenberg's camp says the problem was that Timberlake's touring schedule changed, making the appearance impossible. A well-placed Timberlake source says the young man opted to spend the week in Scotland with his parents.

Anyway, let's get to the scoring!!!!!!!!!!

The scoring system has taken two weeks off, and a lot of things have changed. Up is down. Black is white. Dogs love cats. It's crazy.

With Phil going home last week and Chris going home this week, do you want to guess who has now moved into first place overall? You'll never believe it.....

WILL BEEKMAN!! Will is the only contestant who is 4 for 4 and he is now #1 overall!!!! Will's combination of 4 for 5 for last week and 4 for 4 this week vaulted him to 231 points, and since he still has the top 4 all still alive, he can max out at the unsurmountable amount of 295 points.

(Side note - It's actually going to be tough for him to win out as he has LaKisha winning the whole thing. - end side note)

No one can take his Week 9 accomplishment away from him. He is tops this week, and tops in our book.


Then, there are a bunch of other people at 2 through 5. Do you want to know who they are?

Ok, fine. I'll tell you.

At #2 and almost certainly out of reach of Will is Marybeth Heyd. She has 230 points, which is one GIANT point behind Will and can only max out at 294. Loser.

At #3 is Missy, and she better just consider packing up her bags right now and calling it a season. She has the laughable amount of 228 points and can only max out at 282. I mean, it's not even close.

At #4 sits Kristin. Remember when I said Will was the only person who went 4 for 4? Yeah, I lied, Kristin is also 4 for 4, but she's not in first place, so who really cares.

Kristin did write in to us tonight with these comments:

Whoopdy Doo!!! My name is Kristin and I'm 4 for 4 with Melinda Doolittle winning the whole thing. Make sure you write about how awesome I am....

Whatever Kristin. People who write about how awesome they are just because they are 4 for 4 should be belittled, not celebrated.

Then at #5 is Team Zach & Sarah. Team Zach & Sarah just continuously hangs around the top 5-7 of the pool. Unfortunately, they only have two of their top 4 still alive, so this could be the highest they're going to get for the rest of the season. Currently, Team Zach & Sarah have 216 points, and they can only max out at 270.

Want to know who the top 10 are now in max points? Here you go:

1. Will - currently 1st - 295 points
2. Marybeth - currently 2nd - 294 points
3. Kristin - currently 4th - 286 points
4. Missy - currently 3rd - 282 points
5. Crystal - currentl 9th - 275 points
6. Zach & Sarah - currently 5th - 270 points
T7. Paul P. - currently 6th - 268 points - Paul has made a big run up from the bottom of the pack!
T7. Kendra - currently 16th - 268 points
9. Julie - currently 12th - 264 points
10. Jennie - currently 14th - 263 points

Two final thoughts:

1. Let's all give a big American Idol Pool hand to Lisa Wagner! Lisa stayed on top of the standings for 9 weeks, which is an amazing run. In fact, I think we should name some sort of award for Lisa and hand it out each season to the person who stays on top of the pool the longest.

Unfortunately, Lisa fell back into 11th place this week. She only has 2 of her top 4 still alive and can max out at 253. There's a chance for her to finish in the top 10 still.....

1a. We should also acknowledge the nice run Matty Lane had at the top of the pool as well. Matty was giving Lisa a run for her money every week for the last month. Unfortunately, like Lisa, Matty just ran out of gas and can max out at 231 points. Still, he made some very nice calls this season (like Phil out at #6, and Sabrina out of the top 12 altogether).


2. Everyone needs to look at the bottom 3 in the pool this week. For those of you who don't know, Paul F., Jaime, and Suzanne are all family. Jaime's parents are Paul F. and Suzanne - and currently they're in a race to the death to see who will finish dead last! I guess picking American Idol picks is a hereditary trait.....


That's it! Bee Gees next week!
The Master


PS-Who knew that jokes about Simon's girlfriend would give him uncontrollable fits of laughter? Is he really 11 years old?

Standings for Week 9 - Here!!!!!

Rock comes to Idol

AI HQ LOVES Bon Jovi, and we can't be more excited that he is running this week's Master Class.

Will Beekman wrote in to tell us that his favorite Bon Jovi memory:

I saw Bon Jovi play as an Asbury Juke with Southside Johnny at Tradewinds in Sea Bright somewhere around 1998. Southside's set rocked and Bon Jovi simply said "All my life I wanted to be a Juke, and now I have the chance". Then he just jammed with the band and never upstaged Southside. It was one of the best live shows I've ever seen.

And Brian Soucek says this:

I saw Bon Jovi hanging out at a hotel in Chicago and recognized him instantly. He's awesome. I love him.

And Adele Beekman says this:
Bon Jovi is incredible. I wish he would run for president. Of my heart.


Of course, to those of you not lucky enough to grow up in the heart of New Jersey in the 80s and 90s, Bon Jovi will always be the hair band that brought back smiling to music videos. Before Bon Jovi hit the market, the rock hair bands of the early 80s sneered into the camera. Bon Jovi changed all that, and the bands that followed have Jon Bon Jovi to thank.

But to those of you who grew up in Jersey, this is what you think of Bon Jovi he rocks. His voice rocks. Richie Sambora rocks. Bon Jovi's lyrics, though.....well, they need a little work.

Here's the song Bon Jovi will be playing on Wednesday. He's going country!!!!



And here is our favorite Bon Jovi song.....now let me describe this live performance....it starts with a piano playing over Bon Jovi breathlessly introducing the meaning of the song, and then he counts off 4 before the whole thing takes off....and the meaning of the song? It's about a a bunch of kids who were friends, grew up together, and now although they've grown apart, they're still family because of their shared childhood. I MEAN COME ON! Bon Jovi has one person to thank for his career.



So, wikipedia tells us that this will be "rock" week with Bon Jovi, so we're guessing it won't be explicitly "Bon Jovi" week. And that's a good thing, right?

However, you have to wonder exactly what is going to qualify as rock this week....Chris might be able to pull something off, and Jordin should be strong, but I'm pretty skeptical of everyone else - LaKisha has been making horrible decisions the last few weeks, Blake can't do anything "rock" - he's much more "alternative" edging on adult contemporary, I highly doubt Melinda will rock (although I'm sure she'll sound like a million bucks), and the closest thing Phil has done to rock, "Tobacco Road", just wasn't believable. Here's that clip again to refresh your memory.

Then again, we were pleasantly surprised on country week, so maybe this will rock after all!

Enjoy!
The Master