American Idol: Bee Gees Night

I suppose if there is any night of American Idol I ought to comment on, it’s Barry Gibb/Bee Gees night, having been the uber fan since before the album Main Course arrived.  That’s the one that included Nights On Broadway and Jive Talkin’, and represented a bit of a departure from their earlier material.  All too many people have little or no awareness of the Bee Gees before that album, or even much beyond what went on Saturday Night Fever.

So.  It was not disco night.  It was not Bee Gees disco only night.  Heck, it was not even Bee Gees night per se, in that the available catalog included things written by but perhaps never recorded by, or a hit by, any of the Gibbs.  Someone could have done Islands In The Stream or Grease, for instance.  Thus is was natural for at least one song per contestant to be not a dance/disco number, and hooray for that.

Cutting to the chase, the hands down winner for the night was Jordin.  Blake had the balls to be next.  Lakisha beat out Melinda for third, amazingly, even though I predict Lakisha will be leaving.  It will make things more interesting if we see a “controversial elimination” of Melinda this week.  If she goes, it clinches a finale of Blake versus Jordin, as it should be.  If she stays, it endangers the integrity of Blake versus Jordin for the finale, but leaves whichever of the two remains against Melinda the more certain winner than they would be against each other.

If Blake were the elimination this week, it would be just fine, as he’d be this year’s Daughtry and perhaps better off.  Oddly enough, at this point Lakisha and Melinda need to win it more than Blake or Jordin.

Melinda did Love You Inside Out.  Slightly odd choice.  She’s been sounding worse to me each week, and she managed to make this song sound slow and boring.  Okay, but they miss her on the Love Boat, wishing she’d been eliminated earlier so she could get back to them. 

What surprised me is later, when I listened to each of the eight songs, without the distraction of TV and kids, just who bad Melinda was.  I’ve always thought she was a great singer who was completely inappropriate as American Idol, but on a straight listen she was just not good dawg.  Even as she seemed more personable than in the past, in the taped sessions with Barry Gibb, who was fantastic.

Blake did You Should Be Dancing, embellished with beatboxing sound effects that partially worked.  He overdid it some, and those who hate it would hate it if there were any included.  Possibly even if there were none included, as they are preconditioned not to hear how good his voice sounds, and don’t appreciate his entertainment value.

Lakisha did a slowed down, adequate version of Stayin’ Alive.  Frankly, it was far better than I would have expected of her.

To Love Somebody is an anthem.  It and Words are up somewhere in my toppermost of all time favoritest songs.  It would have been easy for someone to offend me in covering it.  I loved Jordin doing it.  Barry Gibb obviously did, too.  This episode of AI was all about whether the voters believed Barry Gibb or the judges.  That and reverse psychology, whereby Simon says “you suck” and people raspberry him disapprovingly with votes for whoever he erroneously maligned.

Melinda did How Can You Mend a Broken Heart, an old, classic, already slow and mellow song.  It was possibly the first Bee Gees song I was ever aware of as a Bee Gees song when I was a kid and it was on the radio.  She slowed it down to a dull crawl, courting the vote of the insomniac crowd.  That might have been forgivable, had she remember she’s a talented singer.  I was shocked how bad it sounded on a re-listen.

Did Blake make a smart choice, picking a song few had ever heard of?  This Is Where I Came In is from the 2001 album of the same name; the last before Maurice died.  Here’s the original if you’re curious.  I can see why they thought it could be a hit, which it almost was in the UK.  Blake did it credit; probably improving on the original.  He didn’t overdo the beatboxing.

I’d call it a brilliant choice.  If people voted him off because he did a song they didn’t know, he’d be set to go Daughtry.  If people lacked preconceived notions about the song and voted because they liked it, he’d continue to the next round.  It also primes it potentially to be on a Blake album and perhaps an attempt at the hit the Bee Gees missed out on with it.

On my relisten, I liked Blake’s first the same or less, his second the same or better, Lakisha and Jordin’s better, and Melinda’s worse.

Run to Me is neither as iconic nor as well known as To Love Somebody or Words, but it is another great song I love.  We could barely hear how she was doing during the performance, courtesy of Valerie.  I thought I liked it, but wasn’t sure.  Listening again a couple times, she did the song credit.  I was pleased, and she really showed why she’s been there so long.

Not that it will save her.

Jordin made an intriguing choice, not to do one each of upbeat and slower songs.  She chose to do a pretty good Gibb song that was a Barbra Streisand hit.  Say what you will, Streisand can sing, and is even something of a legend.  It wasn’t quite as good as the first one, but Jordin did well with Woman In Love, even showing the right look in her eye for the camera on at least one pass.

I’m just astonished at Jordin’s talent and her potential.

If you’re interested, I did my second chance reviews of the songs at rickey.org:
Jordin
Lakisha
Blake
Melinda

Rickey also points to an interesting prediction site that works differently and more reliably that Dial Idol.  Though this week they predict the same thing.

Here’s a fun fact: I saw a Bee Gees concert in Providence the evening of August 28, 1980, which I remember because it was also the same day I started my first job ever, and I learned the next day that my boss, Doug Reese, went to the same concert that night.  It was also the night when my brother and I each got a speeding ticket from Rhode Island state cops who were brothers.  We went in two car loads, something like a dozen people in all, and I was following him trying to get out of there and home.

Posted by on 05/09 at 05:07 PM

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