American Idol top 8 guys

It's Tuesday night -- that means it's time for another session of Idol liveblogging! Tonight's the last chance to make the top 12 and move on to the "big stage", as Ryan puts it. It's 80's night tonight, so it should be a good one!

First up is Luke Perr.. er, Luke Menard. Everyone expected him to be gone last week, so it's no surprise that he starts off very shaky. Man I hope he goes home this week! Paula is in rare form this week, babbling on and on and on... it's only an hour show this week, Paula! Uh oh! Simon just gave him the golden blessing -- he said there's no way he makes it through to the top 12 and can't possibly win. That makes him a shoe-in for VoteForTheWorst (as if he wasn't bad enough already).

David Archuleta is up next... and apparently has to pee. Is that his secret weapon? He's singing AND playing Another Day In Paradise. If you watched the show, you don't need me to tell you that he is absolutely amazing. Wow. He makes some great changes with the melody that make it seem like he's been performing this song for 15 years. Randy just thinks it was "nice" but I'm not really sure what was wrong with it. Simon does make a good point that he needs to pick an up-tempo song sooner rather than later. But there's no doubt he's still the one to beat.

Ugh... it's time to sit through another performance of this year's Sanjaya, Danny Noriega. Boy, he is flaming hard tonight! Work it, girl! He does Tainted Love in kind of a cross between the original and Marilyn Manson's version. The vocals actually aren't bad, but the performance as a whole is just so ridiculously over the top. There goes Paula again... what is she on? He has GOT to go.

David Hernandez is fourth to take the stage tonight. He gives a solid performance, but it's not his best and he doesn't really do anything original wth it. Hm. I still like him... still probably in the top three guys, but he may not have the one of the best performances tonight.

Apparently there are some technical difficulties, so Michael Johns is going on next. Will that change the voting phone numbers for DialIdol.com? He's singing Don't You Forget About Me, one of my favorites. It's too bad he can't carry a tune in a bucket. Just because you're from "down under" doesn't mean you have to sing down under every note! Man this guy has got to go too... whch sucks because only two can go home this week. By far his worst performance of the competition.

After the break is David Cook, another wanna-be rocker who should go home sooner than later, playing guitar again tonight. He's doing a rock version of Lionel Richie's "Hello". (I wonder if this was someone else's cover of this song, like when Chris Daughtry did Live's version of I Walk The Line?) He was just ok last week, but I think he's even worse this week. The judges seem to like it, but they seem to like everything tonight. Even Simon's gone to the dark side! But apparently it really was an original arrangement, at least as far as the judges know.

Jason Castro lives up to his reputation of awkward interviews, before launching into a great rendition of Hallelujah. I didn't know this was an 80's song... I only know it from the Shrek soundtrack. I like the way he intentionally gets a little ahead of the beat at times, giving it a sense of urgency. It wasn't clear to me if Randy really liked it or not, but Simon loved it. I liked it, but I didn't think it was as good as Simon thought.

Last up tonight is Chikezie, doing yet another ballad. What's with the song choices tonight? Haven't the guys learned yet that BALLADS ARE BORING AND FORGETTABLE! It's a very safe performance, although he changes it up a bit at the end. It's actually pretty good, and luckily for Chikezie, there were three or maybe four people who were far worse tonight.

Overall... wow, I'm not sure what Randy was listening to when he says the song choices for the guys were far better this week. I honestly thought most of the guys were worse this week, whether it was bad song choices or just poor performances. The weakest performance of the night clearly goes to Michael Johns, followed by either Luke Menard or maybe David Cook. Unfortunately Danny Noriega actually wasn't one of the worst tonight, and, coupled with support from VoteForTheWorst, will ensure him a spot in the top 6.