Cute Kids Montage -- seriously, really cute screaming kid montage who are there to support, Moms, Dads, and older siblings.
Mary Powers
Avril loves Mary from the get go because she's wearing heavy black
eye-liner and has a visible tattoo. You think I'm joking, but it really is that simple. I'll be taking bets that she's the
first one that Avril is nice too. Mary sings a Pat Benatar song, that
shockingly isn't Heartbreaker. She has a strong rock'n'roll voice and
it sounds like it would be perfect in a smokey dive bar. But as
expected, she has Avril Lavigne all smiley, in fact she does little
excited cheerleader claps. She gets four yeses.
Official Avril Rating: "I'm With You"
Surprising no one, a lot of guys are coming out for auditions looking like Adam Lambert. Cue the Adam Lambert look-a-like montage and our last auditioner with Adam-locks.
AJ Mendoza
AJ's hero is Adam Lambert, which is clear not only by his Lambert 'do,
but also because he over sings like Adam. With one huge difference: he
can't sing. It's Adam Lambert over the top, without the pipes. Where
Adam has a throaty falsetto, AJ has well, a throat. AJ's audition was
froggy, growly, and very very bizarre. (And not in a 'it'll grow on me'
Charity Vance kind of way.) It's four straight nos from the judges,
including one that seems to particularly delight Avril Lavigne, who
says with some glee "absolutely not!"
Official Avril Rating: "Unwanted"
We're done with day one of the American Idol auditions, and from what
we've seen there's only been one golden ticket. In more positive news,
Avril Lavigne is done. Maybe Katy Perry won't remind me of traumatic
high school events... but I'm certainly not holding my breath.
Especially after she says that she's brutally honest. Be prepared to be
crushed by Katy Perry Los Angeles auditioners.
Austin - "Cheap Jagger"
Austin is also clearly a train-wreck, he says that "no one's been like
him sexually on American Idol." He's wearing shiny pants and he's
wearing a striped latex shirt. He auditions with a Cheap Trick song
that looks (and sounds) like the world's worst Mick Jagger
impersonation complete with writhing on the floor and scissor kicks.
It's four nos and one very scared Katy Perry. As Austin leaves Katy
asks Kara, "are these people frisked before auditions?"
Andrew Garcia
Andrew is clearly going to make it to Hollywood, because he gets a
heart-tugging lead up. His parents were in gangs when he was a child
and they moved out of Compton to give him a better life. Now Andrew is
Papa himself and is auditioning as much for his parents as his son. Cue
hugs, a former crying gang member, and *SOB.*
Thing is, they didn't need the back story, Andrew has a raspy r&b
voice that hits the high notes as well as it resonates with deep tone.
Simon thinks he's the "only good singer who's come in today." Randy
says he has mad vocals, while Kara takes the usual Randy curse words
"110% yes." He's the only person we've seen in LA so far who has any
chance of making it to the semi-finals.
Katy Perry Rating: so good I'd wear that Sushi Dress Again to hear it
Tasha Leighton
Tasha is a personal assistant during the day and a minister at night.
Which makes sense, because girl sings like she's going to church. She's
cute as a button, has pretty decent pipes, she sounds very much like
Joss Stone without the booming soul power. But it's still good enough
for four yeses.
Jason Green
Jason
is a 21 year old student who talks like a phone sex operator,
surprising no one, he's singing "I Touch Myself" by the DeVinyls. And
I believe him, in a way that I never want to imagine. It's yucky and
over-sexualized and toneless. If I had a few drinks in me, I might
think it was hilarious, but sitting here sober, it's just desperate. Right, you can smell the desperation through this photo even:
Katy Perry says it makes her feel dirty and she doesn't mean it in a
good way. He gets four nos from the judges and rejected by Ryan
Seacrest when he tries to slip him his number.
Katy Perry Rating: UR So Gay (he did try to give Ryan his number and called Randy beautiful.)
So
we've seen three yeses so far, LA may be the city of stars, but so far
we've only seen one: Andrew Garcia. Otherwise even the trainwrecks of
LA have been dull and uncomfortable. Seriously, my favorite part of the
whole night has been the footage of Katy Perry defying Kara, showing
her how a real judge should conduct herself, and saying she'd throw a
coke in her face if Kara didn't stop singing "I Kissed a Girl." No
contest in the battle of the guest judges tonight, big victory for Katy
Perry.
Our
last audition of the night comes from a familiar face and voice, Chris
Golightly who we've seen on a bunch of Idol promos. Let us set the
sob-story scene.
Chris Golightly
[start
scene, with soft focus close ups of Chris looking over the vast
horizon, hanging on to a run-down fence, on what we can only imagine is
the wrong side of the tracks.]
Music
is Chris' only reliable companion. You see, Chris is an orphan, who
bounced between foster homes as a child. He's here today trying out for
American Idol in hopes the first good thing will happen in his life.
(May I suggest he look up Season 1 finalist
Justin Guarini because the two definitely look like brothers from
another mother.) For his audition, Chris will be singing the guaranteed
to tug on your heart-strings "Stand By Me." He sings the song with
passion and lonesome knowing, but also one too many tone changes and
vocal runs.
Kara
loves him and his story and journey. Katy, who hopefully is filling out
an application for Kara's spot says, "this is not a Lifetime movie,
sweetheart." Thank you Katy Perry, thank you. Simon's with Katy that
this is gasp! a singing competition and he thought that Chris' audition
was fine but nothing spectacular. However, clearly, if they gave the
kid the last 7 minutes of the show and the soft-focus sob story
treatment, he's heading to Hollywood with for yeses. Chris, who should
look into writing Lifetime movies if this doesn't all work out, says
"Since I've had nothing in life, this is the first something, that's
worth something" as he clutches his golden ticket.
[And scene.]
According to Ryan's last minute wrap up, there were more than four
people who made it to Hollywood, they just thought we'd enjoy
train-wrecks, manipulative introductions, and an unfortunate ode to
masturbation more. Out of 11,000 auditioners -- 22 Los Angelenos made
it to Hollywood Week.
Tomorrow night the double-headed celebrity guest judging continues with
Joe Jonas and Neil Patrick Harris in Dallas. Hopefully Texas has more
than one lone star.
(Image Courtesy of FOX)
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