Hmmm. Interesting show tonight. As I told my husband, I felt like there was one person who was clearly the best, several fighting it out for second, a large pack in the middle and a few subpar performances. More on that at the end. For now, here’s the play by play.

Rudy Cardenas started the night off with “Free Ride”. Rudy is very cute and personable. I thought it was a good performance, good energy, good vocals, but something just seemed disconnected. I couldn’t really put my finger on it. Randy hand no problem stating his issue with the performance. He felt it was corny. Paula, predictably, loved it. Simon finds Rudy utterly unremarkable.

Brandon Rogers turned in a solid performance of “Rock With You”. He was a bit stiff to me— maybe it was nerves. Other than that, I thought he was a strong contender. Randy felt like it was “pitchy”. Paula said he needs to step up as a lead singer. Simon thought the performance was safe and predictable and then he gave the first of several complidisses for the night (Ryan’s phrase, not mine), saying that Brandon was “much better than that”.

My husband and I were both really excited to hear Sundance Head. We both really liked him in the initial auditions, and he’s from Texas, so we were pretty sure we’d be voting for him for quite some time. Tonight he sang “Nights In White Satin”. It was, um, interesting. Okay, here’s the truth. It just wasn’t very good. He was very humble in his pre-interview, saying that he made it to the top 24 on the strength of his first audition. He’s right. It’s been pretty much downhill ever since. I hope that he makes it past tonight and that he can dust himself off and be the singer that he obviously CAN be. Randy, Paula and Simon all had varying degrees of dislike for his performance but all agreed he needs to go back to the bluesy guy they saw in the initial auditions.

Barefoot Paul Kim attempted “Careless Whisper”. This is another guy that I really wanted to like. He seems very sweet. His initial audition was not my favorite kind of singing, but it was alright for that type of music. But tonight— ugh. It was not good. There were some really rough notes, and his energy was very low. Randy still holds out future hope for Paul, though. Simon’s advice was that he put his shoes on next week. In a show of solidarity, Ryan then appeared without his shoes.

Upfront I want to say that I find something about Chris Richardson unappealing (not on a personal level, but as a performer). He seems like a really nice guy, but I think his voice, performance style, the whole package, really, is just not my cup of tea. Tonight he sang Gavin DeGraw’s “I Don’t Want to Be”, which makes me think of One Tree Hill, but that’s another story altogether. I know a lot of people probably loved his performance. My husband really liked it, but I just didn’t care for it. I thought he sounded young and immature, and I didn’t care for all the chicken wing flapping that he did with his arms. Randy and Paula, on the other hand, really liked the performance. Simon said he “sounded small”— whatever that means.

Nick Pedro has such a mellow, pleasant voice. This was really showcased tonight when he sang “Now and Forever”. However, I did have to agree with Simon that he had lost some of his sparkle tonight. He could have had a bit more energy, and he needs to stand up straight. Randy and Paula just didn’t like it at all.

I had never heard Keane’s “Somewhere Only We Know” before tonight. I thought it was a really nice song. And I thought Blake Lewis did a great job of singing and ballad with energy. Even though he was sitting for the song, he wasn’t at all boring. There was no beat boxing tonight, but he promises we’ll hear more of that in the weeks ahead. Randy dug the performance. Paula thought it was a surprising song choice but with a contemporary vibe. Simon thought he was the first person tonight who sounded like a singer singing in 2007. He named this the best performance of the night.

In his initial audition, Sanjaya Malakar had great fortune with a Stevie Wonder song. He tried to repeat that tonight with “Knocks Me Off My Feet”. Unfortunately, this time it didn’t go as well. He has such a nice smile and is so soft spoken. He just seems a bit overwhelmed. He picked a difficult song, and he just never really dug into it and let go. The judges were not kind. Randy said it was really bad, Paula opted to just call it a hesitant performance, and Simon referred to it as dreary and dull.

Before he took his blog down, Chris Sligh had a list of his top 100 favorite songs. Number 9 was MuteMath’s “Typical”. And that’s what he chose to sing tonight. It’s definitely a song that fit Chris. He’s certainly not a “typical” American Idol contestant. All in all, it was a good, solid performance. Randy said, “I’m a Chris fan”, Paula said everyone had a great time. Simon was having a hard time coming up with exactly what to say when things got kind of weird. Chris insulted Simon and then I couldn’t tell whether Simon was mad at Chris or Ryan. Either way, it was momentarily very uncomfortable.

Shayne Ward’s “Back to One” is a bit gimmicky for my tastes, but Jared Cotter did a good job with it tonight. He has a cute smile and makes you want to like what he’s singing. Randy felt like it wasn’t his best performance, and Simon felt it was unadventurous.

A.J. Tabaldo is definitely the most persistent of this year’s contestants, since this was his fifth time to audition. He turned in a decent performance of “1000 Kisses”. Personally, I found the performance a bit cheesey. But Randy and Paula liked it. Simon felt it was a bit like a theme park performance (hey, at least he dodged the karaoke bullet). But then said, “Maybe you’re better than I thought”. Boy, he sure knows how to pour on the sweetness, doesn’t he?

The final performance of the night was Phil Stacy. His wife was in the audience, and he was clearly nervous. He chose a song that was clearly meant for his wife— “I Could Not Ask For More”. It started off “monstrously”, as Simon said, but after the first couple of lines, he relaxed and gave a really lovely performance. It was definitely an “awww” song. Randy said it was the best vocal performance of the night. I’m not sure if I agree with that, but it was really good.

So, here’s how I would rank tonight’s performances.

1. Blake Lewis

2. Phil Stacy
2. Chris Sligh
2. Brandon Rogers

(in no particular order)
5. Rudy Cardenas
6. Nick Pedro
7. AJ Tabaldo
8. Jared Cotter

(bringing up the rear)
9. Sanjaya Malakar (he almost made it into the middle group for me)
10. Sundance Head
11. Chris Richardson
12. Paul Kim

I don’t necessarily think that Chris Richardson will actually be in the bottom two, as I’ve already admitted my bias there. And I’m not sure that either A.J. Tabaldo or Jared Cotter won’t join Paul Kim in the bottom two, since tonight was the first time we’ve really seen a great deal of either one of them. If I were guessing, I’d guess A.J. would be in the bottom two out of those two.

So, what did you think of tonight’s performances? Love them? Hate them? Let me know.