Alrighty folks, tonight we’ll be seeing our top 8 once again, this time performing hits (or songs, anyway) from the 80s. The excitement is palpable.
CJ or Malaya goes home.
Harry: You sang with more subtlety. You did it, and I’m proud of you.
Keith: It was killer. It was all function. Like a… fanny pack. I loved it man.
JLo: It’s no small task to take on Steve Perry. I could tell you were out of your comfort zone in the beginning. You murdered it [in a good way, she means]
Honestly, there’s nothing at all in the world that is lamer than a lighter app on your phone.
Oh, he’s safe as hell. I wasn’t saying otherwise. But that first verse was rough, man.
Caleb probably has sufficient momentum (and sufficient older people rooting for him) that he can screw up worse than he’s doing right now
Ok. So now we know that when Caleb isn’t pushing his pitch is bad.
I dunno. Faithfully doesn’t really have a chorus, per se. Maybe not the best choice.
Caleb is singing Journey’s Faithfully
Oh BOY Caleb is doing Journey.
Keith’s commentary is into Paula Abdul levels of obscurity.
JLo: It started off shaky, but by the end… you have the ability to touch people’s hearts
Harry: There’s a connection that you have virtually every time you get up there. When you hit the high notes you were much more in tune. Zone in and focus and practice that intonation thing.
Keith: You’ve got a survivor tone in your voice [???]. I love that optimism.
CJ is such a mixed bag. Some of it was really good, and some of it was pretty off key.
Ok so this is more similar to the John Mayer version, which I heard in a sushi restaurant (because they ALWAYS play John Mayer in mediocre sushi restaurants)
Yeah, Receda is the pits (I’ve never been to Receda)
CJ is performing Tom Petty’s Free Fallin’
Harry: You have to make it stage-worthy. The coffee-house treatment is going to catch up to you at some point.
Keith: When you start singing, you grab my attention like [snaps fingers] that. Tonight was a bold undertaking; I commend you for that. Push and pull the phrasing a little bit.
JLo: I disagree with the guys. I love your voice and what you do. I miss the melody of that song. Changing it that much lost the soul of the song.
HCJr’s critique was sophistry.
The obvious complaint is the same as that made against Susanna’s version of Without You, which is that it’s really just the same lyrics over a whole other song. This was maybe more similar than that one, but it was quite different. Without lyrics nobody would recognize it.
Although I kinda liked it better without the string section
Untrue. I love this.
If you hate the Ryan Adams version of Wonderwall, you’re going to hate the hell out of this. I love that, and I love this too.
Alex is doing The Police’s Every Breath You Take
Every Breath You Take is by the far the most played song on radio, when accounting for how old it is. Probably one of the most successful, longest living, songs ever.
11
On a scale of 1 to 10, how phoned in are these duets?
Keith: I loved that you did that solo acoustic guitar. Loosen up and lay into that song a little bit.
JLo: Great job tonight. I love the way you sing. I felt you really trying to feel it and sing the words.
Harry: You’re getting better every week. You were looking into the camera almost the whole time: look at the young girls. Second, go on YouTube and look up Ricky Nelson; watch what he does. Nice job.
That was in Sam’s wheelhouse. I felt it was pretty strong.
For Sam this is actually pretty good
Sam is trying to do this Alex style but. Um. He is not Alex.
Sam Woolf is singing Cyndi Lauper’s Time After Time
Harry: You have a great voice and it sounded great on that song, but sing the shuffle: feel that groove
Keith: I’m still waiting for the rest of the release. It all still feels slightly outside of ready
JLo: Tap into your sexiness, or it’s not a great song for you no matter how good you sound
Ah the awkward commercial break between the performance and judges’ remarks.
Possibly the first Jessica song I actually liked. I thought it was pretty good.
This leisurely stroll around the stage isn’t really doing anything for this
Jessica Meuse is doing Blondie’s Call Me
It’s like piggyback rape
That girl looks disturbingly unwilling to be on HCJr’s shoulders.
Duet time again. Jena and Caleb.
Oh come on, we still have CJ to get rid of. He’s been pretty consistently terrible.
If (when?) Malaya is out this week, people are going to see the Sam save in a different light.
Keith: There’s no doubting your vocal ability. Try and lay back into it a little bit more; don’t worry about what’s coming next
JLo: We all love you so much. I have nothing to add [yet I will still keep talking at some length]
Harry: There’s not a lot of people who could hit that Chaka note, but it sounded like the entire performance was geared up for that. You sacrificed some of the earlier song to set that up.
Siobhan could get away with that. Not Malaya, sorry. It did get a little better at the end, but it was really weak.
I have no feelings about this. It was certainly loud.
This song is way too big for her. This is a bloody disaster.
Malaya is performing Through the Fire by Chaka Khan
Oh also Alex’s shirt is really ugly
There’ve been 3 songs in 35 minutes and I’m kind of dying here.
Oh come on, that was cute
This actually isn’t terrible, even though Sam still has all the charisma of a bar of Ivory soap
Oh good, a duet
You can honestly hear that in any karaoke bar in the south. The guitar playing was frankly awful. Bleh.
JLo: You always sing kinda perfect. It felt good today.
Harry: Last week was really really great; I thought this was fine. You did a nice job.
Keith: First part felt a little stiff. Feel free to do something unexpected.
Corny.
This is exactly the kind of thing I do not enjoy
Dexter is singing “Keep Your Hands to Yourself” by Georgia Satellites
There really weren’t very many popular country tunes in the 80s. In the mid 90s country tunes began having crossover popularity, occupying several of the stops in the top 100. I guess Kenny Rogers had a few.
Keith: I love the originality
JLo: It languished in the middle, but you put your stamp on it and I did like it
Harry: I wasn’t a fan of the arrangement. It felt really choreographed.
Seemed really really hard to hear and then very frantic. It wasn’t great.
I did not dig it
Wow. Wow. This was a bad song choice.
I’m having flashbacks of Ryan Starr doing “You Really Got Me”
…almost inaudibly, which is weird for Jena
Jena is singing Joan Jett’s I Love Rock ‘N Roll
David Cook looks different. That hair is… not good.
We took dirty pictures on polaroids as god intended
This intro stuff really is interminable
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Hmmmm I don’t know that three of them were significantly worse than the other five. CJ was pretty bad. Malaya struggled. Beyond that I dunno. Sam was a’ight but not great, so maybe he can round out my bottom three.