American Idol 7: Why Garrett Lost

Garrett came into Tuesday night’s show with barely an appearance on our TV screens. Indeed, about the only thing we knew about him was that he had long hair and looked kind of like Leif Garrett. Not exactly a whole lot to go on. Because of that, Garrett was a favorite to go home after his first performance – and he did. But can we completely blame his lack of screen time for the lack of votes to keep him? Or was there more to it than that? Why did Garrett lose?

We’ve already addressed the women, looking at Why Amy Lost and Why Joanne Lost. We begin the men by examining Garrett’s situation in the same way – by looking back at What ‘American Idol 7’ Contestants Need to Know in order to answer the questions we have posed.

Before we begin to worry about whether Garrett got enough TV time prior to the first semi-final round, we need to ask ourselves if he made good use of his TV time in that semi-final round. Did he follow the first rule by singing and performing well? The short answer is, “No.” But only using the short answer would make for very short columns. So let’s see what various people thought of his performance.

Randy and Simon both called it boring. Simon added that it was whiny. To further explain just how it was boring, Randy said Garrett didn’t do anything new or interesting with the performance. While Paula would never say a performance was boring, she used many words to explain basically the same thing, as she advised Garrett that it was okay to mix things up and take some chance. In other words, it was boring.

Recapper Betsy said the performance came “across as really bland.” Among the We’ll Be the Judge of That! panel, Sandy and I were similarly bored. Tyler said Garrett needed to go big or go home – and he didn’t go big. Kathy and I also commented on how nasally it was (which I think was the same thing Simon was referring to as him sounding whiny).

In other columns here on Foxes On Idol, Sting7 ranked Garrett dead last, saying, “it was really important for Garrett to establish his identity, and in a winning way. He fell way short of that.” And Joseph Banks, in his NGH Report, placed him second-to-last.

In other words, Garrett didn’t exactly thrill us. Part of the reason was his failure to observe the second rule and note how important song choice was. The on-site judges and several of our commentators noted as much. I mean, when even Paula Abdul tells you to change things up, you’re in big trouble.

Moving to the third rule, we would normally talk about how contestants need to be consistent from one week to another. This was, of course, the first week of performing for votes. More importantly, it was the first time we’d seen anything from Garrett. That made it even more important to follow the portion of this rule that says, “you need to treat every performance on Idol as if it could be your last – because, well, it could be! Be excellent every time.” If that was the best Garrett could come up with to show us why he deserved to stick around, well, let’s just say it wasn’t anywhere near excellent.

Garrett might have done okay on the fourth rule, which says to be unique. His long hair and Leif Garrett looks were the only thing that stood out at all about him. If he had performed well, his looks – and his locks – could have helped people identify and remember him (aiding with the fifth rule). But he needed more than one performance after zero prior screen time to get himself into the viewers’ minds.

Similarly, Garrett didn’t have the opportunity to follow the sixth rule and show us that he could be a complete package. He did try a bit of humor, and he was polite to the judges (thus following the seventh rule), but again, he needed to give viewers the opportunity to get to know him better. To do that, he had to provide a reason to keep him around for at least a week. The same is true for the eighth rule, creating a fan base. He obviously couldn’t do it prior to the semi-finals, and then he failed to do it when he had his chance.

I should note that it’s not impossible for a contestant in this situation to make it past the first week. No, I’m not going to point back to Kelly Clarkson – I only need to point to Alaina Whitaker from this season. She came in with the same TV time problem as Garrett – and had even less of a unique appearance – yet she had a great performance and earned herself a spot moving forward. Garrett didn’t. Instead, he was boring – the absolute last thing he should have been in his situation. That is why Garrett lost.

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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