AMERICAN IDOL Recap – “I Am Your Brother”

“I am your brother, your best friend forever…”

What a strange journey it has been…and it’s only night number two of the AMERICAN IDOL auditions. The judges were down in good ‘ol Texas, and the crazies once again came out to play. There were some doozies last night, and I for one may never visit Texas out of fear that I may run into just one of the freak shows from last night. And scary as it is, some of them made it through to the Hollywood round.

There were some really strange and terrible “singers” that got the golden ticket for Hollywood last night. Simon was responsible for sending a few of them through. But here’s my theory…it was all a game. Simon figured he would be the first to chime in and give a “yes” to some pretty bad talent just to see how quickly Paula and Randy would cowtail to him and let the contestant through. It worked every time. Come to think of it, have we ever had a contestant that Simon wanted to send through to the next round only to be denied by Paula and Randy – I doubt it.

There was so much “talent” in Dallas that I don’t know where to start.

Looking forward to seeing you…

Let’s start off by showing some love to some of the better contestants that came through last night. First up was Jessica Brown, a 24 year old mother of two and recovering meth addict. It’s nice to hear one of these sob stories backed up by some actual talent. I really loved Jessica’s rendition of The Pretenders “I’ll Stand by You”, and I don’t know if it was her voice or her story, but I got the chills. I don’t know anyone that’s ever been addicted to crystal meth, well except for my good friend Fergie, but cheers to Jessica for bouncing back and making it to Hollywood (where sadly she will probably make it big and then find another debilitating drug habit..sorry, I just call ’em like I see ’em).

Be still my beating hears…what’s this I see? Talk about “save a horse, ride a cowboy” – did you all see Drew, the farmer boy? Hot damn! The country boy has never been on a plane and has that “aw, shucks” attitude that I completely love. Too bad it’s all a game. This boy knows exactly what he’s doing and how he’s selling himself. Come on, did you see him with the straw in his mouth leaning against the haystack? That had Abercrombie Summer ’06 catalog written all over it. But Drew can play whatever farm games he wants to play as long as he lets me watch. Oh, and he has a somewhat decent voice…like that matters. I’ll be keeping my eye on Jailbait!Drew.

Kady Malloy has a beautiful singing voice and can do a mad impression of Britney Spears – I’m talking spot on! She tried to sing a little “Before He Cheats” until Simon stopped her and asked to hear her – not Brit, not Carrie…just Kady. She gave it her all and it was incredible. Simon thought it was the best he had heard so far. Randy and I disagreed, but it’s all good. See you in Hollywood, Britney Kady.

WTF…are you for real?
I just spent three whole paragraphs saying nice things about people, so now you’ll have to indulge me a bit. The nut jobs need their time in the spotlight too, and I’m happy to grant them that.

I guess I’ll start with the least offensive of them all, a guy named Bruce. At first, I couldn’t help but wonder who this blond cutie was. Would he be my next AMERICAN IDOL crush? Then he opened his mouth and started talking about how he never kissed a girl – ok fine, you’re religious, it’s odd but I can deal. Then he started talking about this key he wears around his heart and that his father (who was there with him) holds the other half of the locket it belongs to. When he finds the woman of his dreams, he will place it in his dad’s half of the locket and give her the key to his heart. Excuse me while I go throw up. Come on now…I don’t buy for one second that this guy has never kissed a girl. In fact, I think he’s banged all the girls in his little podunk town, telling each of them how they were his first. All this time AI (and I) spent on Bruce and he’s not even good enough to go to Hollywood.

Kayla is some head case that almost died in a car crash and now loves life…yada, yada, yada. She’s super annoying and butchers Janis Joplin who must have been turning in her grave (or dying of humiliation on her little secret island with Tupac and Biggie). Simon let’s her through and the other guppies follow suit. Ugh. Brandon Green looks harmless enough, that is until he shows Ryan his collection of fingernails. Dude, this is SO not ok. Someone who has kept their fingernail clippings for seven years has some serious mental issues…I’m not kidding. That’s so wrong. Despite the fact that he’s demented, he can sing and the judges invite him on to Hollywood.

Douglas Davidson was perhaps one of the saddest auditions we’ve seen in the past 7 seasons. This guy clearly had some mental issues. When he started talking about how his father really hated him I knew we were in a whole heap of trouble, and it went down hill from there. After waiting for countless hours to audition, Douglas gets in front of the judges and then asks for some warm up time. He finally starts singing (at least I think that’s what it was) and dogs started howling. The judges were clearly not impressed and he asked for a do-over. Then he starts walking around the room in circles doing his warm-ups. He launches into the song and starts walking around in circles again. It was truly bizarre!! After asking him to stop singing repeatedly, Simon finally had to have the security guards escort the guy out. Sadly, this guy is living somewhere in Texas (again, I wouldn’t visit it If were you). For those of you who missed it, enjoy the crazy in the clip below.

Just as the show did last night, I’m saving the best for last. Renaldo Lapuz is a 44 year old (although I had no idea he was that old…I thought he was in his 20’s) guy who loves all things Simon Cowell. And I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love all things Renaldo. He was great!!! I mean he had Simon laughing, Seacrest and Randy singing backup, and Paula Abdul dancing like she’s never danced on AI before. All around awesomeness!! I’m not going to say anymore about Renaldo’s audition because it’s something you need to see for yourself. So watch the clip below, and if you’re not singing “We’re Brothers Forever” all day I will be floored. It certainly was the soundtrack to my dreams last night.

Did YOU have any favorites from last night? Any talent you think has a real shot of making it? And what do you think of my chances with farm boy Drew?