This week the Final Four get to sing movie songs. There are tons of songs to actually choose from given this theme – unfortunately I’m guessing that half of their approved list consists of Diane Warren or Randy Newman songs. And actually, it’s probably a good thing that Aaron was eliminated last week, because he’d have sung a Disney song. Maybe “A Whole New World” or perhaps “Hakuna Matata”.
Jamie Foxx was the mentor, and he tried a different approach to critiques by using t-shirts to designate the singers as “contestants” or “artists”. Unfortunately, with one exception, the solo performances would put them in “contestant” territory, so this was a bit of a fail. Full marks for trying though. However the duets were much better. And you know what would be awesome? Having the Final Four put their guitars together and do their own version of “Signs” (as covered by Tesla). I’d love to hear that. But I digress. Here’s what I thought of the performances.
Lee Dewyze, “Kiss From a Rose” (Seal, Batman Forever)
Not a very good rendition. This is a really hard song to sing, to be honest, and Lee isn’t quite up to doing it, although he does try hard. The duet probably helps to keep Lee safe, but I dunno, he’s gonna have to try harder because he’s plateaued and he needs to snap out of it.
Michael Lynche, “Will You Be There” (Michael Jackson, Free Willy)
I like the gospel thing. Mike can pull that kind of thing off. But you know it’s trouble when the judges riffing on the film title is more interesting than the performance. I don’t know really what you can say. Mike was singing and he was very comfortable in how he was singing it.
Crystal and Lee, “Falling Slowly” (Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, Once)
Just brilliant. I don’t know what else to say about this. Crystal and Lee were really on point with this song, and their voices really complimented each other here. And to top it off, they made me feel like I KNEW this song, and I’d never heard it before. Best performance of the night, by a country mile.
Casey James, “Mrs. Robinson” (Simon and Garfunkel, The Graduate)
Casey somehow failed to sing this gem:
I’m disappointed. Also disappointing is that Casey probably would’ve done so much better doing something akin to the Lemonheads cover. And he used the electric mandolin. We know how well that went over the last time someone used that instrument. But overall, this was really just boring, and what was more interesting was the judges trying to get Kara to crack up, which Ellen finally did after the last song.
Crystal Bowersox, “I’m Alright” (Kenny Loggins, Caddyshack)
Easily the best song of the solos. Crystal really seems to know what song to pick and what to do with it, and really, if she doesn’t win it’s gonna be a freaking shame because she has really been consistently very good, except maybe last week.
Casey and Michael, “Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman” (Bryan Adams, Don Juan de Marco)
Not as good as Crystal and Lee, of course, but it flowed very well, and again, the voices were quite complimentary. But you know, I was hoping to get through this week without hearing a Bryan Adams song. I like Adams’ stuff (well, some of it), but let’s face it – his movie songs are pretty darn bad, outside of “Heaven”.
Kevin’s Rankings:
Crystal
Michael
Lee
Casey
Predicted Bottom 2
Big Mike
Predicted Elimination:
Casey
Really tough to call who goes home at this point, but I can’t see Crystal and Lee going and Mike has dodged numerous bullets.
