American Idol Top 10: Where's Gavin Rossdale?

This week's theme on AI is a rather random one: Gwen Stefani songs. Or No Doubt songs. Oh, or just songs that Gwen Stefani likes. Is this the best idea the producers could come up with? I'm anticipating that the theme for the Top 5 will be "Songs written by guys named Bob, Bill, Joe or Clem." Can't wait!

Kicking things off tonight is LaKisha Jones with her version of Donna Summer's "Last Dance." LaKisha is wearing her ass-kickin' boots and making everyone miss disco. All the judges like seeing her vivacious side and give her good marks across the board.


Next, Chris Sligh gives The Police's "Every Little Thing She Does is Magic" a shot. In rehearsals, Gwen mentioned that Chris has a habit of getting ahead of the music, which has been his problem throughout the competition. He doesn't rise above it for his performance and ends up all over the place. I normally like Chris, but he's not doing this song justice and he just looks bored. The judges all tell Chris to give them a call when he finds the beat.

Since I haven't really been a fan of Gina Glocksen's, I'm not expecting to like her rendition of The Pretenders' "I'll Stand By You," but she really knocks it out of the park. This is the best I've heard her and this performance is going to be hard to beat tonight...even for Madame Doolittle. Again, all the judges agree that this was Gina's best. Why is everyone getting along so well tonight? I guess Randy and Simon finally caved and started taking whatever Paula's on.

So, hmmm....how to follow up Gina's lovely performance...

I know! How about setting music back a few years, courtesy of Sunjaya Malakar and Haley Scarnato? Ryan tells us they're up next and...oh Good Lord, Sunjaya has some sort of girly-mohawk thing going on. Has AI suddenly become a sitcom? After a quick shot of Sunjaya's bad hair day, Seacrest gives the camera his best zoinks-stare, a la Jim from The Office.

Now I'm getting a better look at Sunjaya's head and...well, what should we call this look? The retarded rooster? It's obvious that the evil little marionette realizes that gimmicks are his only hope for staying in this game. Sunjaya announces that he's going to sing No Doubt's "Bathwater," which prompts a smirk/eye roll/shrug combo from Ms. Stefani. Well, at least she doesn't have to worry about him singing it badly, because he's not really singing at all. He's lumbering through this song with all the passion of someone reading an eye chart. Oh, hey look! It's Fonzie! On waterskis! Yes kids, I think AI jumped the shark right this instant. It's just so pathetic that Sunjaya knows that he could come out, flash all his 4,000 teeth, hum a few bars of something and literally take a dump onstage (he's been doing that, figuratively, so why not), and he'd probably still be here next week. The judges are all laughing, Simon has just given up, the audience is in disbelief, and even Ryan, who is usually very supportive of all the contestants, is ready to kick this kid in the ass. Now would be the time for the producers to finally examine the flaws of the voting system and - here's a crazy idea - stop letting talentless jackasses get through to the final group. If it's really a singing competition, they need to stop worrying about making "good TV" and give us some good vocalists.

Churning through Sunjaya's wake, Haley is warbling Cyndi Lauper's "True Colors" like she's hoping to just walk away with the Miss Congeniality crown. Ho-hum. Everyone tells her, again, how pretty she is. Oh, I'm so glad. I don't think she knew.


Phil Stacey takes on the second Police song of the night with "Every Breath You Take." Every time I hear anyone but Sting do this, it just sounds like bland, AC fare...which is the direction this cover is heading. It's definitely not bad, just a bit humdrum. Phil definitely has a nice voice though, and I'm so glad he's cooling it with the yelling tonight. The judges all say it's good. I can't take all this harmony from the judges. I'm waiting for them to all join hands and sing "Kumbaya."

Guess what? Melinda Doolittle was great! Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry, folks, I'm just so bored all of a sudden. All that shark jumping took a lot out of me. Let's see, what else can I say about Melinda? I'll say this - her technique is kind of overpowering this song tonight. She's doing "Heaven Knows," another Donna Summer song, so I think she should be having a little more fun than she is. Don't get me wrong...it's good, but I think LaKisha captured the Disco Diva attitude much better. But, whatever. Melinda could sing the phone book and still bring down the house. Big surprise - everyone's in agreement.

Blake Lewis is lulling me to sleep with his version of The Cure's "Love Song." Well, this sucks because I've really liked Blake lately and I was looking forward to him doing something funky tonight like "Hella Good." His voice is pleasant enough, but this is doing nothing for me. All the judges seem to like it. Simon agrees, though, that Blake is in danger of falling into a rut.

Oh, thank God Jordin Sparks has come along and snapped me out of my coma. She's singing No Doubt's "Hey Baby," which I hate, but she sounds really good. I prefer her take on the song much more than the original. She's another of the judges' darlings, and with good reason. I'm a bit put off by her Homeless Girl Scout outfit, though. What the...?

Closing out the show tonight is Chrustin Richardslake with No Doubt's "Don't Speak." Gwen doesn't like Chrustin's "vocal olympics" any more than I do. This kid needs more singing lessons and a new wardrobe. He's at least making strides with the clothing choices. He's gone from used-car salesman to bowling instructor to - tonight's look - out of work junior high teacher. But, I don't hear his voice getting any better. Just once I'd like to hear him sing a one syllable word. Just once. Of course, Randy loves all those runs. He likes the "flava." Paula would like to taste Chrustin's flava too. All she can manage to blurt out is "you're so goooooooooood." She's such a shameless hussy. Anyway, I really hope Chrustin can pull it together and I can go back to calling him Chris. There's something very sweet about him that always makes me feel bad about dissing him. He looks particularly melancholy tonight. Maybe he's sad about the whole shark thing too.

Will this be the end of the road for Sunjaya? I'm afraid the answer is still "no." However, I'm still holding out hope that he will be the one to go this week. Making fun of him isn't even that enjoyable anymore. I'm just sickened by him. I think the bottom three will be Sunjaya, Chris Sligh and Haley. I have a bad feeling that his performance tonight might be enough to get Chris bounced. While Sunjaya has nine lives, one bad performance is sometimes all it takes to end the ride for everyone else.