Post Tagged with: "American Idol Season 11"

"'Member me?"

Perhaps no one auditioner during the most recent season of ‘American Idol’ illuminated star quality quite like Johnny Keyser. From his ridiculously good audition in St. Louis (he sang “A Change Is Gonna Come” in case you forgot), to his fantastic performances during Hollywood Week, Johnny was The Ashley’s early favorite. In fact, she predicted Johnny would be one of the two contestants left standing at the finale.

The Ashley, along with most of America, was shocked when, seemingly without any explanation, Johnny was cut during Vegas Week. He had earned rave reviews from the judges up until that point. Viewers didn’t even get to see him sing his final Vegas Week song before he got the boot. The whole things seemed very odd to The Ashley.

The Ashley was curious to see whatever happened to Johnny, now that it’s been about six months since his time on ‘Idol.’ It turns out Johnny has had some big career achievements lately!

Ryan, point to the contestant that has no shot of winning tonight.

We finally made it to the American Idol Season 11 finale! After watching these kids audition, sing and perform ridiculous group numbers for half a year, it’s only fitting that we watch the finale to see how it all turns out. Actually, if all you want to do is find out how it turns out you can just watch the last minute-and-a-half. But then you’d miss out on a ton of cheese-tastic performances!

It’s come down to Phillip Phillips and Jessica Sanchez, two singers that, while talented, are so boring that they make my eyes glaze over. (The only saving grace is watching Phillip make those weird faces while he sings. He always looks like someone surprised him and grabbed his junk during the performance.)

Anyway, the night starts off with a group number featuring all of the Top 12 (even the Mexican guy who got eliminated first and no one remembers.) They sang “Runaway Baby” by Bruno Mars, a song that Joshua nailed earlier in the competition and now basically owns. They should have just turned off everyone else’s mikes and let Joshua sing and show everyone that he was, in fact, robbed of the ‘Idol’ title.

Before we know it, the performance turns into some sort of creepy dance party. Everyone is running all over the stage, doing the splits and bouncing in sync. I think the ‘Idol’ dance choreographer was taking moves from those special ‘Brady Bunch’ musical episodes. (I know I’m not the only one that loved when the Bradys became The Silver Platters….you did too!)

After that catastrophe, Ryan Seacrest informs us that over 132 million people voted after Tuesday night’s show, setting a new world record. (USA! USA!) Oh, America. We all need to get lives. Seriously.

"Is it OK if I moan in pain until we come back from commercial break?"

If you were one of the over 11 million people that watched American Idol last night, you may be wondering 1) why the hell America eliminated the best singer in the competition, Joshua Ledet (more on that later… The Ashley is mad!) and 2) why Phillip Phillips wasn’t forced to participate in the cheesy-but-fantastic Ford commercial this week.

Phillip was nowhere to be found in this week’s silent-movie-themed Ford product pitch video. (The Ashley has nothing better to do than notice things like that.) Of course, she had to sleuth it out to see why ol’ Philly is allowed to be exempt from the horrible hi-jinks that these videos usually entail.

The answer? He’s practically dying. According to a story posted on TMZ this morning, Phillip is in desperate need of kidney surgery! He’s been suffering from severe kidney problems all season long, even having to have a temporary procedure to hold him off until he can have surgery. (He refuses to quit the competition.)

Skylar and her high school sweetheart, in happier days.

She may have been eliminated from American Idol last week, but Skylar Laine is ready for a career in country music– and a new boyfriend!

Up until last week, the fiery redhead was dating a fellow Brandon, Mississippi native named Joseph. The high school sweethearts seemed to be joined at the hip, doing all of the things Southern couples do together– attending proms, huntin’ and four-wheelin’–for nearly three years.

Unfortunately, things started going downhill once Skylar left for Hollywood at the beginning of the year to compete on ‘American Idol.’ Joseph was unable to pull the cash together to fly to California to see his girlfriend perform. (Just FYI- the show doesn’t fly the contestants’ family or friends out to see them on the show. The family has to foot their own travel bills.)

“He has not come out here yet,” Skylar told Singers and Critics on April 26. “He’s trying to save up some money to come out here.”

Unfortunately, Skylar and her longtime beau split just days after she gave this interview. Joseph, while heartbroken, is still supportive of his now ex-girlfriend, as is his entire family.

The American Idol producers have made some changes to the show to try to spruce it up and keep it exciting. However, somewhere down the line someone must have decided that the ‘Idol’ stage was looking a little stale after 10 seasons and was in need of a makeover. Unfortunately, that makeover came in the form of super-creepy images on the screens behind the singers, ultra-cheesy props and graphics so distracting that you can barely focus on whatever crappy Stevie Wonder song the kids are singing!

During the first few episodes of this season, the graphics and lighting special effects were relatively unobtrusive, but as the season has gone on, the “concepts” of these sets has become downright ridiculous!

As you Roundupers know, The Ashley loves all things creepy, so rather than complain about these ridiculous sets, she will instead celebrate them! Here, she brings you the Top 8 Worst Stage Looks seen on ‘Idol’ this year.

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7. The Glamour Shot Trio

I have no idea what song Hollie, Joshua and Jessica were singing during this number because I was too busy laughing at the lame neon lasers in the background. Seeing those gave me flashbacks of going to the mall to take cheesy Glamour Shot photos with my friends that featured those same lasers in the background.

There are only seven singers left on American Idol! Normally, around this time in the season, FOX cuts the showtime down to an hour or an hour-and-a-half. But because they’re being super-greedy this season, they are still requiring us to watch two hours of mildy interesting filler. (Yes, I know that they don’t actually require that we watch the full two hours but…we have no lives. What else are we going to do?!)

Anyway, the show starts out with a tribute to the most-recent “fallen” ‘Idol,’ DeAndre. Everyone’s shown crying and remembering the good times they had with him. Um….they know he didn’t die or anything, right? He just got kicked off a TV show. No need to bust out the sad memorial music. Good Lord….

After the ridiculous DeAndre montage, we get to follow Tommy Hilfiger as he takes the Idols into the closet to pick out some more horrific clothes for these poor kids to wear. I just keep waiting for the week where everyone has to go to Kohl’s to pick something out of J-Lo‘s new clothing line to wear. (Hello, product placement!)