You know, people harsh on Simon Cowell’s terrible monochromatic wardrobe. And they should. That haircut alone is enough break mirrors. But bad fashion is Randy Jackson’s game if we’re going to really break it down. His giant sundial watch notwithstanding, Randy consistently looks like the side of an airbrushed Chevy van in 1979.
On Tuesday’s show he’s wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt that has about five different design elements going on at the same time. It’s a pink right shoulder and an orange moon over the left pectoral and some Chinese alphabet characters spelled out in blackened jewels combined with a necklace and a wristband.
And the face-size watch. Which can stay. Because it’s fascinating.
So it’s '80s night. This should be gay.
Up first is Luke Menard, who kicks off the week’s Personality Reels by talking about his most embarrassing moment as a child, in which he was dressed up like a girl by his sister. Last week he boldly claimed that being a part of the a cappella singing group he’s in required vocal perfection. So here he is to show off some of that skill, sharp-noting his way through one of Wham!’s more idiotic songs, “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go.” (It is, in fact, the third most idiotic Wham! song. The most idiotic Wham! song is “Club Tropicana.” Runner-up is “Wham Rap!”) His singing is weird, pinched, and thin, but at least the backup singers are doing the Pepsii and Shirlie dance. The rest of the guys are standing on the railing over him. Only David Hernandez is dancing. That’s because someone said “Go-Go” and he thought it was time to head for work. Luke finishes the song by grinning and exhaling the word “Jitterbug!” while pointing at the camera. Sometimes things that stink of phony and suck a lot still give me a truckloads of pleasure. This is one of those things.
David Archuleta is thirsty and he has to pee. Isn’t that a sign of diabetes? Where’s Randy? Someone ask him. He’s been doing those diabetes commercials lately that run here between ads for Coca-Cola. He’ll know. Don’t lose a foot, David Archuleta! D.A. tells Seacrest that he didn’t want the world to know of his thirst and his need to hit the pissoir. But he does want you to know about this one time, when he was being flown down to Honduras for a gig (yes, really) and he lost his voice in the middle of the song. And his mom got up onstage and finished the song for him and wow, so embarrassing. D.A. sings that Phil Collins song about homeless people, whatever it’s called. It’s a song that Patrick Bateman would chainsaw massacre someone to. Then he’d cook their brains up in a copper pan and eat them. Then he’d go to Barneys.
Randy says that “it’s like watching one of your concerts.”
Now, what exactly does that mean? Has Randy been to one of David Archuleta’s concerts already? Was he in Honduras too? Did he play the bass? Paula actually praises the boy for his bum notes, calling him perfect. THE WHOLE WORLD WANTS TO CUDDLE THIS KID. Simon bitches at him for singing downer lyrics regarding whatever this song is about. D.A. says the song draws attention to the plight of people who have nothing. Thank you, Homeless!
The camera cuts to the first celebrity of the season, serial Idol taping attendee Denise Richards. You might remember her from making out with Neve Campbell in Wild Things or that James Bond movie where she was a nuclear scientist named Christmas Jones. Or you might remember her from her upcoming reality series, where she plans to exploit her own children and make her ex-husband even more furious and drug binge–prone than he already is.
Danny Noriega makes me really happy. He is the product of decades of gays slowly inching their way to a place where no one has to give a damn about who’s watching. I don’t give a shit about his singing; I care about the everything else. He takes on Soft Cell’s “Tainted Love,” which is the right thing to do. Randy calls him vocally “shy,” and that’s right too, because the boy really has no idea what he’s doing when he sings. Paula calls him a “bright light” and he nods his head enthusiastically, like, “Yes, that’s true! I am!” Simon rips into him. D.R.’s response is to hold his hand up to his head, mocking Simon’s signature “thinking hard” pose to shout, “Whatever!” Then Seacrest tells him he had never noticed the purple streaks D.R. put in his hair, to which the boy says, “Mmm-HMMM.”
Seacrest looks puzzled and introduces David Hernandez. I half expect D.R. to say, “Oh, her?”
D.H. says his most embarrassing moment had something to do with a photo shoot and a booger. All I can hear is my husband-partner-whatever saying, “A customer put a 20 in my ass crack and I left a skid mark on it! HA! My stripper name was Bolt.”
We are a classy home. Full of classy people.
He sings “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now.” It’s technically an ’80s song but not by much. Recorded first in 1989 by a female group called Pandora’s Box, then made famous in the ’90s by Céline Dion. It’s in the same camp as “Total Eclipse of The Heart” and all those other nine-minute bombast ballads where people sing about “the flesh and the fantasy.”
Michael Johns’s most embarrassing moment involves wearing a kangaroo costume and getting the shit beaten out of him at a rugby match. He sings “Don’t You Forget About Me” and seems to be enjoying mixing up all the lyrics to suit his own tastes. He gets the “hey hey hey heyyyy… oooooohhhooooohhhh” part right, at least. Anyway, I’m trying to forget it as soon as it hits my ears. And I’ve watched this show for enough years that I think I’m pretty good at that now. Randy tells him he sounds like Michael Hutchence. That’s nice, Randy. But this is a Simple Minds song. Paula likes it when he hops around.
David Cook’s most embarrassing moment is the plaid hat he’s wearing in his Most Embarrassing Moment clip. He takes “Hello” and turns it into a power ballad. Randy calls it emo, but that’s just because of D.C.’s awful hair. Paula joins him onstage and, blindfolded, sculpts a bust of Lionel Richie out of clay.
Jason Castro is here to sing Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah."
Dear Jason Castro and Leonard Cohen and Jeff Buckley and k.d. lang and John Cale and Rufus Wainwright and Imogen Heap and Keren Ann and Willie Nelson and Bono and Bob Dylan and Bon Jovi and Spoon and Regina Spektor and Bettie Serveert and Gov’t Mule and K’s Choice and Damien Rice and Betty Buckley and Gavin DeGraw and the Dresden Dolls and Sheryl Crow and Pedro the Lion and anyone else in the world who’s covered “Hallelujah”:
Y’all are the reasons I never need to hear it again.
Sincerely,
Dave White
Chikezie’s most embarrassing moment happened when he accidentally walked into a women’s restroom, which kind of officially means that nothing embarrassing has ever happened to Chikezie. He sings “All The (Wo)Man That I Need.” It’s fine, if a touch too Luther’s Ghost. And what have they done to his makeup? He looks like they’ve put him through the matte-ing machine. Oprah, it turns out, in spite of big-giving the world one of the most awful reality shows ever, was right, at least, about African-Americans getting the wrong end of the stick on TV where lighting and makeup are concerned. I heard her talk about it once on her show, and then she told the audience that the lighting in her studio is designed for black skin. Poor Chikezie doesn’t stand a chance here now that the new Archu-Light’s been installed.
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