We’ll Be the Judge of That! – Grease: You’re the One that I Want!, February 11

You've seen the show and read the RealityNewsOnline recap, so now it's time to see what the Foxes On Idol judges think. This week, our Sandy (Lamparello, not Dumbrowski) is off on a beach, leaving David to judge our Grease star wannabes by himself. Does David once again have a more critical view than the on-site judges? Let’s find out!

Max, “Can You Fell the Love Tonight?”

David: I dunno, I just don’t see Danny Zuko singing this song. But Max did… and he seemed to have a few problems with it. I heard his voice crack at least once and it was flat at several points. I like Max, but I didn’t like that performance.

Laura, “Jesus Christ, Superstar”

David: While Max did worse than his first performance, Laura definitely did better. For one thing, she showed emotion instead of a frozen smile. And she had some good energy too. This was the best we’ve seen of Laura.

Derek, “Footloose”

David: As in the previous episode, Derek looked extremely comfortable on the stage. And he has shown a lot of dancing skill that others haven’t presented yet. I thought it was a bit interesting that he had his own backup dancers, which could seem to bias things in his favor as he overall put on a better show than he could have with just himself there. The only criticism I have is that he once again didn’t do much to show a wide vocal range.

Ashley S., “Take That Look Off Your Face”

David: God, she looked mad during this song, didn’t she? If she looked at me that way and told me to take that look off my face, I would! But the problem is the only two things I really remember about the performance were the look and her big note at the end. Most of the rest of the song was forgettable.

Kevin, “Burning Love”

David: Kevin was good. But that’s really all I have to say. He wasn’t great. He wasn’t bad. He was good. Even so, I was left… unimpressed. It’s not that there was anything particularly wrong with the performance, there just wasn’t anything that jumped out for me.

Juliana, “Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina”

David: Juliana captured the emotion of this song well, which is a definite requirement for an actress playing Sandy. I don’t know what producer David Ian was talking about! Like Kathleen, I also want to see Juliana break out a bit more, but that wasn’t her fault, since she didn’t pick the song.

Chad, “My Eyes Adore You”

David: What happened to Chad’s left eyebrow? It looks like it has a hole in it. OK, not exactly the most important factor in his performance, but it was distracting! Or maybe my mind wandered to that point because the performance was dull. I don’t know that it was Chad’s fault as opposed to the song itself, but I was yawning throughout. Decent vocals, but not enough to overcome the boredom factor.

Kate, “Buenos Aires”

David: Coming right after Chad’s exhibition of dullness, Kate’s upbeat performance was just what the doctor ordered. She projected and moved well (except for a bit of tentativeness on the stairs) and showed, as her song said, some “star quality.”

Austin, “Ease on Down the Road”

David: In Austin’s intro portion, he talked about how he was singing this song higher than he was used to – and I can’t figure out why. It sounded a bit like Austin-on-helium. He was still good and is obviously among the top – and his dancing was second-to-none – but I think he could have done better if he had performed it in something closer to his usual voice.

Kathleen, “Memory”

David: Whoever has been making wardrobe choices for Kathleen should be fired. She wore something horrible in her last performance, and again this time. Ug-ly. By the time I got over it, Kathleen had kicked into the stronger portion of the song, and frankly, I felt like she was half-yelling it. She showed some good vocal talent in the softer portions, but nothing special.

Tears on My Pillow Sing-Off Performance

David: In the sing-for-survival portion, Jason started out sounding nothing like Danny, but rather like one of the guys on Beauty and the Geek. Even Matt sounded better, and considering what I thought of him last time, that’s saying something! For the women, Allie sounded fine, but Ashley was about as bad as she was in the performance that got her to this point. Even though Matt did better than Jason this time, I agree with the judges’ decisions in both cases – Jason has a better track record and Ashley was just terrible. That said, I can’t believe the judges didn’t understand how Allie had such a poor vote total – I said at the time they were being too generous in their praise to her.

Jason, “That’ll Be the Day”

David: Thankfully, Jason came out singing better in this performance than he did for “Tears on My Pillow.” Even so, there were parts of the song where he just sounded flat. I kind of agree with David Ian’s summary that he needs to get better, fast.

Allie, “I Don’t Know How to Love Him”

David: Allie’s voice was good enough, but her stage presence was extremely lacking. When she moved around, she looked awkward, like she was just walking from point A to point B in a mall rather than on a stage. She simply did not draw my attention.

Final Thoughts

David: Like most of the on-site judges, I think Derek was the best Danny of the night – though I even had my criticism there. The women were tougher, and I can’t really pick just one good one. I can, however, pick the worst: Allie. And I think I have to go with Jason as the worst of the guys. I know it’s not very imaginative to pick the bottom two as the bottom two, but that’s how I see it.

If you haven’t already, be sure to check out these other recent articles on Foxes On Idol:

David Bloomberg is the Editor of Foxes On Idol, and can be reached at RNO@pobox.com.

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