Singer: Aaron Kelly
Song: "The Long and Winding Road"
Monkeys As Critics' Take: To fill space, the "Idol" finalists are describing each other. It turns out that the Force is with Aaron, prompting everybody to do their Yoda impressions. Becoming increasingly boring, Aaron is. Makes every song super-earnest and country ballad-y, he does. Practically asleep tonight, he appears to be. Slouching around the stage with zero charisma, Aaron does. Sigh. That was much less fun than I hoped it would be. I hope Aaron feels the same about this performance. Even the director seems to be trying to escape the drowsiness, flying out into the audience, where a dozen people are half-heartedly waving their arms. It's not dreadful, but it sure isn't good. That's about as energy-free as I've ever seen an "Idol" contender and kicking the show off, that's the kind of performance that lands people in the Bottom Three.
Randy, Ellen, Kara and Simon Say: There were things Randy liked about the performance, but they had absolutely nothing to do with this particular performance. He agrees with my assessment of sleepiness. Ellen says, "It felt like a long and winding song." Yay! Everybody agrees with me. Kara thinks that Aaron needs to mix it up next week. He promises he will, though Aaron seems to have forgotten how to use his microphone and both Kara and Simon have to say "Sweetie, use the microphone." Some idiot in the audience is aggressively booing every negative comment. I hope that person gets dragged outside and flogged. Kara does a cute little "tempo" dance.