Five months, 100,000 contestants, four judges, 35 million weekly viewers… and Tuesday night it all came down to two contestants, five songs, and one hour to make a case for who deserves to be bathed in confetti and tears Wednesday night in the cavernous Nokia Theater.

No, my math isn’t wrong, while there were six performances, there were only five songs and that was one song too many.  I normally try to keep my reviews in somewhat of a chronological order, but I am so incensed with the banality of this year’s “Idol Song” that I cannot wait to get this rant out of my system.  First of all, like a courtroom judge who recuses themselves from a trial because they know the defendant, Kara DioGuardi should have stepped away from the judges table instead of offering any commentary on the song that she co-wrote.  Better yet, she should have never told anyone she helped write the piece of musical dreck in the first place.  Best of all, she should have stepped away for good, acknowledging that Idol works best with the original trio and that she had long overstayed her welcome at the party.  One can only dream.

To be honest, to steal a line from Simon Cowell, I have never been a fan of the Idol Song that ends each season.  It is never a very good song, no matter who writes it, in large part because it wasn’t written for the specific contestants.  The songs are always written well beforetime, and it shows.  This season’s song did not fit either Adam or Kris one bit.  Seeing them struggle to try to make the song even remotely enjoyable was both painful to watch and a real disservice to both them and us, the audience.  Would it be too much to ask Idol producers to stop sabotaging their own show and do something truly innovative: letting the contestants pick the final song themselves, a song that they feel would best show their own style? 

Last season, David Cook pulled a fast one on Idol by instead of playing his “favorite performance from the season” he instead went with Collective Soul’s “The World I Know”.  It was risky, but I felt it was one of the main reasons he ended up winning.  Of course, he still had to sing the Idol Song, but at least it was a shot of independence.  This year, the producers weren’t going to have any of that, making certain the final two stayed on script.  But the decision left me still wondering how much better the finale (and the entire show) could be if they truly allowed the finalists to stand on their own two feet.  Alas, Idol is all about control, and producers are the biggest control freaks in Hollywood.  

But enough of my ranting.  Idol is what it is, and I still love it in spite of its faults (numerous though they have been be this season).  Because in spite of all the machinations and pointless banter between judges and sometimes blatantly outright campaigning for pet contestants, the voters made the right call with a finale that truly offered a real choice for a change.  Two confident artists with great skill and talent, each coming from remarkably different backgrounds and lifestyles, yet finding a common ground to share a stage.  If what Kris said was true, and I have no reason to doubt him, that he and Adam agreed not to compete but just to put on the best show they could, I feel they accomplished their goal.

Each of them started off very strong, picking easily their best performances of the season.  Adam’s Gary Jules arranged cover of Tears For Fears “Mad World” was in many ways even better than the first time.  He fully grasped the moment, the stage and the audience, giving a beautifully restrained performance of one of my favorite songs.  His vocal control was superb, showing great comfort in both his lower and upper registers and he resisted all temptation to break out in vocal histrionics.  He respected the song and made it flow effortlessly.  Though I have to wonder if Simon was just now meeting Adam.  Simon, he’s been “theatrical” since day one of the competition.  Why on earth would you be surprised now?  It’s the finale for goodness sakes, Simon.  Of COURSE Adam is going to dress up and fall in love with a fog machine.  It’s who he is and what he does and one of the main reasons the fans love him so much.

But as good as Adam was, I think Kris was even better.  His fantastic take on Bill Withers’ “Ain’t No Sunshine” was (heretic alert!) even better than the original.  And I love the original.  I even sang it myself in a karaoke  bar this past Saturday in Birmingham, Alabama.  But nowhere in my wildest dreams could I ever come close to Kris’s performance.  His absolutely perfect timing on the first line, drawing out the pause to precisely the right moment, was sheer brilliance.  You cannot teach that sort of timing, it is a gift and one that Kris has in abundance.  What impressed me even more is that it was his own arrangement.  To take a near iconic soul classic and freshen it up to the point where it could be a hit song on the radio tomorrow speaks of an ability rarely seen.  Because of that, I gave the first round to Kris, by a nose.

At which point Adam does what he has been doing all season long.  Whenever someone did very well, Adam dug down deep and got better.  With everything on the line, Adam stepped it up with his best performance of the entire season.  Sam Cooke was one of the best R&B singers of all time.  “A Change Is Gonna Come” may have been one of the best songs he ever sang.  Idol creator Simon Fuller challenged Adam, and he delivered in stunning fashion.  Showing the best control of his voice I have heard yet, an astonishing range, and a blues infused growl, he brought the house down and said to one and all, “I am the next American Idol”.  This is the type of performance I tune into Idol each week hoping to see and hear. 

And the problem with raising the bar is that everyone else that follows has to raise it back.  No matter how good Kris was going to be, I just somehow knew there was no way he could top Adam.  And I was right.  Fuller made another excellent song choice with Marvin Gaye’s classic “What’s Going On”, and I really enjoyed Kris’s version.  I think he made all the right choices – acoustic guitar, nice percussion, an easy-going lineup along the front of the stage – but what held him back just that tiny little bit that separates champions was not quite understanding the room.  His performance was just a bit too intimate for the Nokia Theater, and I think that is what is going to hurt him in the voting.  I have nothing at all bad to say about the performance itself, as it truly enjoyed the smooth, soulful and surprisingly current feel he gave to it, but it needed to speak to the cheap seats as well as the front row.

And before anyone says that even Marvin Gaye couldn’t have taken that song the back row, take a moment to watch (and listen) to Marvin do just that from a stadium concert in 1973 that should be must listening to every fan of music.  Yes, it can be done without sacrificing either the song or the artist.  Like an Olympic competition, where a couple of milliseconds can separate gold from silver, Kris came up just a whisker short of Adam.

Then came the third round. Ugh.  Do I really have to recap this, or can I just pretend that the ten minutes or so of that part of the show was zapped into an alternate universe by a passing wormhole, or some other Star Trekian type of disaster?  No?  Well… damn.  Okay, I’ll try to keep it short then. 

Adam was too frenetic and surprisingly a bit pitchy (yes, Randy was right) and the song just did not fit him at all.  Kris had to struggle with the too high key the band set for him and a terrible arrangement.  He tried gamely, and may have done just a bit better than Adam, but I doubt anyone was swayed in either direction by their individual performances.

So, now it all comes down to the final decision.  How will America vote?  I can honestly say that I will be happy no matter what the final decision will be.  I expect to hear much more from both Adam and Kris in the coming years.  They are both exceptional talents and have proven themselves on one of the very biggest stages in the country.  But based not  just on the finale but on the entire season, I will say that Adam Lambert truly deserves the Idol confetti shower.  He has been the most consistently amazing contestant on Idol in years, if not of all time.  I doubt we will ever see the like of him again, at least not for a very long time.  Even more telling, can you imagine how less interesting a season this would have been without Adam?   The entire show was one bottle of black nail polish away from becoming irrelevant, and I sincerely hope the current crop of producers understand just how Adam saved not just this season but the franchise itself.

Final Prediction: Adam Lambert is the next American Idol.

I would like to end this last Idol review of the season with a couple of notes and thank yous.   First of all, thanks to all of you have read my little reviews each week here on the Pulse website and the various other blogs it ends up being forwarded to.  I’ve enjoyed reading all the comments and emails I’ve gotten back from you folks.  Secondly, I want to thank my sweetheart who watches Idol with me every week and allows me to steal, er… borrow so many of her lines.  She’s the snarkier of the two of us, so I’ll leave it to you to figure out which were her lines and which were mine.  I’d also like to thank my mother, a devoted Idol fan like myself, to giving me a slightly more mature (ahem!) viewpoint on the show.  She’s the reason I became a writer in the first place, but try not to hold that against her.

But most of all, I want to thank all of the 100,000 people who braved strange weather, long lines, capricious judges and took the chance to try out for the show.  If it wasn’t for them, we’d have no reason to rush home on Tuesday and Wednesday nights.  And after tomorrow night, it will all be over… until Thursday, when the new season of “So You Think You Can Dance?” stars. 

To quote Mary, “WOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOO!”

See you next season.

But in the interest of journalistic fair play, I’ll go ahead of critique all three just to show at least a sense of impartiality. Though I will say that if Adam doesn’t make it to next week, I’m renting a movie and turning off the DVR.

Danny Gokey, fresh off last week’s “Scream Heard Around The World”, was the first up in the two song festivity, the first round of songs being selected by the judges. Paula Abdul saddled the bespectacled one with Terrence Trent D’Arby’s rather monotonic “Dance Little Sister”, which was an odd choice. I would have much rather heard him sing something more suitable to the husky voice he wields like a spiked club, but the musical choices of Paula have long been a major puzzlement to veteran Idol watchers. Danny’s performance did little show his range, seemed more shouted than sung, and left me wondering if I would even be able to remember how the song went by the end of the show, much less the next day.

(The answer is, I had to check with Rickey Yaneza’s excellent Idol fan site, rickey.org, to listen to a replay, and even minutes later the song had completely disappeared from my short-term memory).

Kris Allen was up next, with Randy Jackson and Kara DioGuardi selecting a more modern song, One Republic’s “Apologize”. The delicate piano-driven song was a good choice, although Kris inexplicably decided to play it straight and didn’t put any of his normal personal stamps on the tune. Sure, he sang it well even if his falsetto notes were a bit weak, but it was a disappointment because I have come to expect so much more from him than just great singing. However, when it came time for the judges to weight in, it was obvious the “No Kris Memo” from the producers had once again been passed around. And it was just as obvious that Simon Cowell had finally had enough of Kara’s weekly babble and proceeded to put her firmly in her place. I’m really wondering if Kara will be back next season or if she will go the way of Brian Dunkleman.

If you don’t know who that is, let’s just say he is the Peter Scolari to Ryan Seacrest’s Tom Hanks. Think “Bosom Buddies”. Okay, there’s a reason Google exists, people.

Then came Adam. Simon picked a superb song, U2’s “One” even going so far as to tilt the competition even more in Adam’s favor by mentioning how he had to ask Bono permission to use the song. Gee… I wonder who Simon wants to win Idol this season? Hmmmmmm. OF course, Adam turned around and delivered an amazing performance. What more is there really left to even say about him? I’ve pretty much run out of superlatives without resorting to a thesaurus, but what I can say is that the song was over far too soon. I wanted to hear Adam sing the entire song, time limits be damned.

Round One to Adam in a knockout.

With the pressure mounting, the Three Amigos (nice line, Ryan) returned for round two, where they each got to sign a song of their own choosing. Danny picked a very good song in Joe Cocker’s “You Are So Beautiful” and set up the stage with a four-piece string section and an acoustic guitarist. And then proceeded to show a complete disconnect from the classic tune. He started off far too low and slow, and even when he bought out his power pipes, I never felt that he was inside the song as opposed to just merely singing the lyrics. Cocker always brought an intense personal feel to his material, and that was completely missing from Danny’s performance. So, of course, the judges loved it and lavished praise on the somewhat smirking singer.

Need I remind you of the “No Kris In The Finals” memo?

Then a funny thing happened on the way to the finale. Kris Allen threw all caution to the wind and made a brilliantly gutsy song choice of hip-hop superstar Kanye West’s “Heartless”. And then made an even better decision in giving the house band a break to grab a smoke or a drink backstage. It was just Kris, his guitar, and his voice to give what was easily his best performance since his Top 7 reimaging of Donna Summer’s “She Works Hard For The Money”. It was original, it was quirky, and it was sung extraordinarily well. It was exactly what Kris needed to do to keep his dark horse in the race. In fact, given how lackluster Danny was, I certainly hope that he gets his just reward and a chance to face off against the human scream machine (in a good way, not a Gokey way) next week in the finals.

And then something even stranger happened. Adam made a musical misstep. Just when it was obvious to everyone in the universe that Adam was the preordained winner, he showed that he is no the perfect musical machine everyone has gotten used to. His cover of Aerosmith’s “Cryin’” was merely decent. In fact, at times, it was actually fairly bad… though a lot of that goes to whichever backup singer was being strangled with a microphone cable. Note to Idol producers: can you stage a summer series, “The Search For American’s Best Back-Up Singers” to replace the trio you have now. Please? Naturally, the judges were fawning all over Adam after he finished, but that was likely just a dress rehearsal for next week, so I’ll let them slide this time.

So who will the final two be? Obviously, Adam will be there, but who should be joining him? Based on performance alone, it should be Kris. And if you want a really interesting finale, Kris would be the best choice as well. He, week after week, has maintained his own style and integrity in the face of obvious judging bias, and never seemed to let it get to him. I would be very intrigued to see how he would counter the bombast and big voice of Adam head-to-head, far more than listening to Danny. Yet, will the Idol voters agree with me? My gut is saying, “not a chance” as Danny has been the odds-on favorite for finish second for months now, but I have hope that the voters will for once vote with the ears and reward the most deserving one.

Let’s put it this way: whose album would you be more interested in buying, Kris’s or Danny’s? I know which one will end up in my CD player next fall, and it’s not the guy with the glasses.

Final Grades:

Danny – C+ for “Dance Little Sister”, B for “You Are So Beautiful”
Kris – B- for “Apologize”, A+ for “Heartless”
Adam – A for “One”, B- for “Cryin’”

(Yes, in the cumulative scoring, I have Kris beating Adam for the night. Surprised me, too.)

Let’s just get this out of the way right up front. Adam Lambert may be the single most talented vocalist in American Idol history.

I could end my weekly review right now and feel confident that I have said all the needs to be said (written all that needs to read?), but something tells me that a 23 word review is not exactly what is expected. So allow me to be a bit more verbose with my admiration of being able to watch the birth of what could become a true rock god. No, I am not getting carried away in the emotion of the moment, nor am I suddenly channeling Kara DioGuardi, I honestly feel that Adam is just that good.

He has the stage presence, the Elvis-like sneer, the swagger and the vocal chops to rival many of the rock greats. Combine that with real humility and you have all the elements that could easily make Adam the biggest star to ever come out of Idol. And I am still not convinced he is even going to win the competition.

Bear with me on this, and understand that I am not alone in my thinking. None other than Simon Cowell, in an interview with TV Guide, said the same thing. He feels that Danny Gokey will end up winning because he is “safer” and appeals to a wider audience than Adam, who has been riding that edge of Idol acceptability all season long. And once the initial high of watching Adam swagger with way through Led Zeppelin’s immortal “Whole Lotta Love”, I came a bit back down to earth by the simple expedient of listening to an audio-only replay of his performance. Yes, it was good, very good indeed, but it wasn’t at the level of true rock stardom. The potential is there, without any doubt, but it will all come down to what he does after Idol to see if he can achieve his potential.

Did I grade it an A? Nope. I graded it an A+, making Adam the only contestant this season I have given four A+’s to (for “Tracks Of My Tears”, “Play That Funky Music”, and “Feeling Good” before tonight) if my notes are to deciphered. And in hindsight, I probably should have given him an A+ for “Mad World”, but if I recall I was in a bit of a grouchy mood that night. Even so, I worry that he might turn around and make an album of songs in the vein of his biggest “whut?” moment of the season, his bizarre Indian take of Johnny Cash’s “Ring Of Fire”. Time will tell.

As for the show itself Tuesday night, well… I was a bit disappointed. I was hoping it was going to be like last week, where you could barely decide who other than Adam should be home. Instead, it ended up more of, “Can we just pour confetti on Adam’s head right now and be done with it?” The omen of a falling apart stage was not missed, along with the reveal of a new Idol! Duets! idea combined with what may have been the least interested mentor in years in the guise of guitarist Slash should have been ample warning that things were not right in Idolville.

It was a neat concept to put the final four on a club stage with a real rock band and have them rehearse loud and proud, but I think it backfired for everyone except Adam. Rock night didn’t mean it had to be scream and growl night, which went a long way to explain why the Other Three (as I am now calling them) made such poor song choices. In a way, it was a brilliant test of their ability to adapt to the music world, and in their cases, it showed them all as not quite ready for the big show. It also didn’t help that Adam started off the night, as Simon noted in his usual blunt manner, but making certain that no one who came after would sound good in comparison not matter how well they did.

Allison Iraheta, who I’ve come to really like for a number of reasons, made a nice attempt at Janis Joplin’s “Cry Baby”. I appreciated that she didn’t pick the tired old standby of “Piece Of My Heart”, which has been done several times over in past seasons, but wish she had avoided Janis altogether. She has the lower register and power that Janis had, but as my mother pointed out after the show, she didn’t have Janis’ distinctive whiskey-soaked growl. I was introduced to Joplin by my mother (yes, I was raised by an unapologetic rocker who loves Idol as much as I do), so I knew I had to get her take on Allison’s performance. In the end, I think what may save Allison is that she finally stood up to Simon, and did so in a way that wasn’t annoying. Her confidence was grown week by week, though from the judges’ comments, I wondered if there is some top-secret memo to the judges to make sure the final is Adam vs Danny.

After that, the show started to veer even more off the tracks. The Kris/Danny diet of Styx’s “Renegade” wasn’t very good, with the exception of their harmonies. I don’t think it helped either one of them, least of all Kris Allen. Of course, Kris’s solo performance of the Beatle’s “Come Together” made his chances even worse. The song has been covered in a number of different ways over the years, from Aerosmith’s down and dirty version to a recent version by Joe Cocker from the “Across The Universe” soundtrack (which I recommend highly).

About the only thing that Kris did with the song that really got my attention was how he changed up the middle some, but overall it just wasn’t very good. He got way too caught up in the “rock out with a loud guitar” mentality of the week and made a bad song choice. I would have loved to see him do a blues guitar driven version of “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” or a funky version of “I Am The Walrus”, just to cite two examples.

But as much as Kris may have been caught up in the “rock out with a loud guitar” mentality, it was nothing compared to what overcame Danny Gokey. Rock stars do not wear vests unless it is all they are wearing, and even then they never button them up. Nor do they take on songs that are so far beyond their ability as it would be for me to try out of “So You Think You Can Dance?” I make people with two left feet seem graceful, to explain the analogy.

Put simply, Danny’s tortuous rendition of Aerosmith’s classic “Dream On” was just bad. I can’t remember ever giving a D grade to a final four contestant before, but that’s the best I could muster up for Danny. And if I never have to hear his final dying animal screech again, I’ll live a long a and happy life. Which made my conspiracy memo theory seem ever more believable when the judges fawned all over him, telling how much they admired his effort. Effort? Hello? Are we involved with the same show, where anyone who had sung that way Danny did wouldn’t even have made it through the first audition? But the memo states clearly, I am certain, that it must be Adam vs. Danny for the finale, so no one is allowed to say what should have said, “Danny, that was an atrocious performance, a terrible song choice, and you should pack your bags tonight.”

Nope, instead we’ll most likely be seeing Kris heading home Wednesday night. Danny will get through based on his fan base with some help from the judges, Adam is a no-brainer, and his final duet performance with Allison most likely will keep her around for another week, where she just might surprise everyone by toppling the Osmond-like spectacled one and giving us a real rocker vs. rocker finale. I think that would be a lot more entertaining, especially since they both seem to get along with each other so well.

Oh, and on final note. This is a private transmission to Kara DioGuardi: When you told Danny that instead of “Dream On”, he should have gone with some of Aerosmith’s “earlier stuff”, exactly what earlier stuff where you thinking of? “Dream On” was from their debut album released in 1973. A quibble could be made that it actually didn’t crack the charts until 1976, a year after “Sweet Emotion” from their third album had become their first pop hit, but I really don’t think you were intending Danny to sing:

You talk about things that nobody cares
Wearing other things that nobody wears
You’re callin’ my name but I gotta make clear
I can’t say baby where I’ll be in a year

Though, when you think about it that may have been exactly what Danny should have sung to Kara.

Final Grades: Adam – A+, Allison – B, Kris – C, Danny – D. Going home: Kris.

From the moment I saw how the top five were dressed, I knew we were up for an interesting evening. I had been busy with other things the past week and hadn’t noted what the theme was, so I was both happy and a bit nervous when it was announced that the Idolists would be riffing through the Great American Songbook, Rat Pack edition. I have long had a soft spot in my musical psyche for these tunes, all of which require great vocal skill, a deft touch with phrasing, and do not lend themselves well at all to over singing. Considering that Idol has become the dominant force that it is largely in part to an endless parade of those that love to compete in, as Jamie Foxx put it so succinctly, the “Throat Olympics”, you can begin to understand my trepidation.

I was relieved quite a bit when it was revealed that the aforementioned Foxx was going to the “surprise” mentor this week. I’ve been a fan of Foxx since his early stand-up days and was, along with millions of others, astounded by his Oscar-winning performance in “Ray”. He has been a major force in music as well as acting, and I was curious to see how he would bring his intensity to the mentoring process. I was also curious to see how the Idolists, who haven’t been stars long enough to be even remotely comfortable with their new found fame, would deal with being in the presence of a true mega-star.

First up on the night was an amazingly relaxed Kris Allen. After giving a rather intense looking Foxx a taste of his version of “The Way You Look Tonight”, Kris seemed amused and amazed when Foxx offered to record a song with him regardless of where he finishes in the contest. Buoyed in part by the offer, Kris came out and gave a truly superb performance. The tempo change in the middles of the song, and then the backing down to the slow finish combined with a near effortless vocal should have had all four judges eating out of his hand. And so it was for the first three who were justifiably lavish in their praise.

Then we get to Simon. I am convinced that some alien being had taken over his mind (or at least his mouth) tonight. The usually acerbically reliable judge was wandering into territory usually staked out exclusively for Paula Abdul. Kris was “wet”? As in “the opposite of dry”? Excuse me while I do my imitation of a confused German Shepherd and cock my head to side, one ear sticking up. It had to be the aliens speaking, and if you don’t believe my theory, did you note the fact that they dressed their Simon-symbiote in a navy blue t-shirt. Everyone on this planet knows that Simon only wear three colors: white, grey or black. If that isn’t proof, I don’t know what to tell you.

Up next was the birthday girl Allison Iraheta, who looked very nice and far less wild child. She seemed nervous as a, well, 17 year old around Foxx but once she starts singing, nothing else is able to break through her confidence. Her take on “Someone to Watch Over Me” was quite simply the best performance of the entire season for her. She wrapped her husky voice around a song that demanded a dark, smoke-filled room in some jazz club in the 1950’s and did it justice. Her reward? Effusive and well-earned praise from the first three judges, and then a now bizarre-world critique from Zarquon Delt’ar Porfitq of the Orion Nebula, formerly known as Simon Cowell. Seriously, Orions, he’s supposed to wear a black shirt. Trust me.

After two stellar performances, it was time for the luckiest man left in the competition to take center stage. Here is the one mentoring bit where I felt Foxx should have well enough alone, though. Something tells me he felt compelled to make some suggestion to Matt Giraud, even though it was obvious he felt completely satisfied with Matt’s original version. Lowering the key of “My Funny Valentine” just to sit up a big ending note didn’t pay off the way either of them had hoped, at least not for me. And even that Matt sang it very well, I kept thinking back to Constantine Maroulis’ fantastic take on the same song back in Season Four. If I had been in Foxx’s shoes, my advice to Matt would have been to change songs instead of changing key. And in keeping with the trend of the evening, PseudoSimon thought it was fantastic. Maybe instead of Jamie Foxx, we needed Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones to handle the aliens, “Men In Black” style.

At this point in the evening, though, I was enjoying myself enough to stop worrying too much about whatever it was that was wearing Simon’s skin, because I was completely absorbed in what can only be described as Danny Gokey’s return to first-runner-up status with his absolutely amazing delivery on “Come Rain Come Shine”. As freaked out as he (and, to be honest, me as well) was by Foxx getting right up “in his grill”, he took that intensity that Foxx was looking to bring out and poured it all completely into what was easily his best performance of the season. I have rather fallen off the Danny Train over the past month, but as of tonight I am back in the club car and ordering a round for everyone. Randy Jackson put it best when he reminded everyone that aside from all the fluff and gruff, Idol is in fact a singing contest. And Danny can flat out sing with the best of them. Even the aliens were forced to agree. Either that, or the dream-destroying black pit that passes for Simon’s soul was reasserting control over the alien control.

Hey, I actually like Simon a lot, but how often does one get to write the line, “the dream-destroying black pit that passes for a soul”? Anyway, I digress…

And I digressed, or rather OBsessed all the way through the final commercial break of the evening wondering and worrying about Adam Lambert. I had just watched the first four give what easily could be described as their best performances of the season (yes, even Matt). Was Adam going to be able to step it up even another notch? Was he going to just be his normal great and therefore seem a bit off compared to how much improved everyone else was? Or was he going to do something completely insane like a Middle-Eastern take on a Johnny Cash classic? Oh wait… never mind
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I knew that I shouldn’t have worried at all judging by Foxx’s reaction to Adam. After hearing just a taste of “Feeling Good”, Foxx was rendered near speechless, only able to mutter an obviously awestruck, “What???”. The rest of us were soon to experience what Foxx was feeling when Adam strutted down the center steps like a bantam rooster who knows he is king of the barnyard and likes it that way. And as great as his entrance was, it was completely overshadowed by what was simply the very best power note sung all season. Forget about the Throat Olympics, Adam could sign aliens right back to their star system solely with the power of his voice. It was a stunningly amazing performance that had me hitting rewind on my DVR remote as soon as the judges finished heaping praise after praise upon him. Failing an alien abduction of his own, it is utterly obvious who is going to be standing under a shower of confetti in just under three weeks. Let’s just hope Adam remembers to wear waterproof eyeliner.

But I am yet quite through with my performance judging. During the course of what has been one of the most inconsistent seasons musically for Idol, Ricky Minor and the band came through tonight in tip top condition. The arrangements were rock-solid, the individual musicians were obviously at the tip of their game (it was cool seeing someone get down and dirty with a trombone on the most-watched TV show in the country), and the entire evening was absolutely anchored by Minor’s best performance of the year.

So, who is going home? Well, it’s fairly obvious that even as good as Matt was, and make no mistake, he was quite good, his best wasn’t in the same category as the rest. In seasons past, this is the week that we go to a bottom two instead of three, which likely means that Kris will be joining Matt on the Silver Stools of Despair. It’s been a great run for Matt, one that went on two weeks longer than, honestly, it really should have, but he’s proved himself to be a talented showman and I suspect he won’t have to go back to piano bars anytime soon after the summer tour ends. Fifth place is still fifth place no matter how you got there, so he should be proud of going out on such a high note.