American Idol(review) Triumph of the Hicks

As we left for work this morning, I kissed my wife and said “Bye Dear, whooo!”

She first ignored me then shook her head at my bright purple blazer as I raised my fist and chanted “Soul Patrol, Soul Patrol.”

“Dear, What are you doing?”

“America and American pop music are forever changed because Taylor Hicks beat the Simon-declared odds and became America’s Fifth Idol. I felt it was important that we observe the moment appropriately.”

My wife, who still hasn’t forgiven the show for letting Chris Daughtry get voted off by Elvis, began to back out into the street. At that precise moment, sixteen blue-robed zombies joined me in the driveway to sing that certain- ground-breaking chart topper “Do I Make You Proud?”

At least this was better than the alternative, which would have consisted of Toni Braxton popping out of the sunroof of my Honda Civic in white lingerie, to duet with me on “In the Ghetto”. I know the concept wasn’t Taylor Hicks’s fault, but could somebody have paid attention to the words a little before unleashing Toni Braxton as fembot prancing around Idol V?

If I combine that visual with the lyrics, I get this - white southern male does the vertical limbo with hot black woman dressed as hoochie mama , she gets pregnant, he abandons her, she raises child in the ghetto, child has to attend a school that got left behind too, and grows up to run Enron unless someone can teach the angry young man to be soulful and play the harmonica like his dad.

This is Civil Rights in 2006-white boys and girls can now have sexual fantasies about Toni Braxton and Taye Diggs in public and black boys and girls get to have sexual fantasies about Taylor Hicks and Kellie Pickler. Think about another southern male, Strom Thurmond, who in 1960 would never have done this duet on tv. Of course, by the time he died Strom not only had his segregationist cause honored by Trent Lott, America found out a bit more about Strom’s private perspectives on race. I suppose too that “In the Ghetto” was better than having Ryan make bawdy innuendo about Elliott Yamin’s mother and her Idol statue, which I’m convinced never did happen.

btw Toni Braxton is a very attractive woman with a great voice, but it didn’t help that they lit her and made her sound like someone Eddie Murphy might pick up hitchhiking at three in the morning.

Okay, obviously I wasn’t one of the millions of Americans who voted in greater numbers for Taylor than for George W. Did Ryan really say that American Idol was the biggest election in the world without even a hint of irony? Unlike real elections, I know that American idol voters still often seriously believe that their own votes actually affect the outcome. Some of them buy special cell phones just so they can get in mass text messages and not have to worry about busy signals and Dial Idol making like the NSA. Maybe the key to revitalizing our democracy might be to let everyone vote as many times as he/she wants by cell phone and eliminate all campaign contributions except from Ford and Coca Cola?

One idiosyncrasy of Idol’s last week is that after a season when the Tuesday show is the interesting one, the reverse is true once it grinds to the finals. All through the season, the producers pad Wednesdays with Ford commercials, group sings, less than probing interviews by Ryan, and sadistic variations on the week’s inevitable game of un-musical chairs. The coronation show, though, is two hours of tasteless TV genius in which “Can you top this?” alternates with “What were they thinking?”

This was especially true this year. It didn’t help that both singers reprised numbers that they’d had some success with earlier in the season followed by two Idol “exclusive” songs that must have been rejects from the “Up With People” libretto. Yes, Katharine should still have done a better job staying in key and maybe enunciating better, but shouldn’t the contestants at least get to sing music? Taylor did do a better job with the coal he found in the Idol “Here’s your single….Sucker!” stocking, but that was a just a brutal way to end the competition phase.

At 9:00 pm Tuesday, I could have gotten better odds of Ryan reconciling with Terri Hatcher than Katharine McPhee winning idol especially after Daniel Powter came on stage at the end of the Tuesday show to announce that he would sing his McHit. The actual singing in the finals may have been less a factor than people think. Taylor also won because he had the better narrative. First, they cast him as the underdog while simultaneously giving him more time on screen than the promos of a new NBC Thursday night sitcom. Second, late in the game I noticed the narrative of Taylor as musical journeyman who had spent the last ten years singing in dive bars and at events like the Mullet Festival seemed to be all over the internet.

“Had my brother not talked me into going to Las Vegas to audition after I got flooded out of New Orleans, I was going to take a day job.”kept replaying.

Compare that to “My tv producer dad cries a lot”, “Mom was in "Showboat"with Donald O’connor”and even taught Marianne Willamson how to sing cabaret(perhaps someone wants to turn "A Course in Miracles" into a Broadway Musical), and I’ve spent the last year auditioning for pilots and plays where I pretend to be a whale with good cleavage. Given that America loves to come to the rescue, faced with this choice, who were millions of Americans going to rescue with their cellphones?

As a second matter, I suspect Katharine McPhee shouldn’t have taken “Advanced Smoldering Look” during her short time at the Boston Conservatory in lieu of Talk Show 101. If you want to be a celebrity, you have to learn to do the five minutes on the couch next to Leno or Letterman. They ask you vapid questions, you give them enough to make you seem loveable, inoffensive, and sincere before they cut to commercial. Whenever she had to be mediated by Ryan, Katharine was mostly giggles, thank yous, and maybe a bit too much honest reaction. She came off as a late model Valley Girl with a voice, which is like, you know, totally, like who she happened to be.

As I was watching the two hour coronation show, it occurred to me that whoever put the thing together must have the blueprint of Idol’s TV genome sequence. This year’s kitsch-fest homaged all the show’s myriad influences. Obviously, the show is a direct descendant of Ted Mack and Star Search, but it tapdances on the naïvely-sentimental essence of its direct TV ancestors by dosing it with an edge of mean spiritedness. The Gong Show aspect of the show mostly comes into season during the audition episodes, but Simon is Idol’s magic ingredient, the jalapeno on the bologna-cheese sandwich, because he gives Idol to keep it from slipping into Amateur Hour blandness.

I’ve long maintained that when the music is bad, the judges deftly step up the sideshow and the center of that is inescapably Simon who is the direct tv descendant of Charles Nelson-Reilly and Paul Lynde, two individuals who extended the game show genre with sarcasm-covered honesty as subtext for the idiocy of the goings on around them.

Similarly Paula Abdul carries on the chaotic non-sequitur tradition of Charo crossed with her very weird take on the Delphic Oracle. I tend to think of Randy Jackson as an uncool version of the Fonz, but it would likely take me too much space to explain that one other than to mention the longstanding tv technique of creating “catchphrases”, Dawg.

On Wednesday night, Idol’s provocative balance between sentimental and mean took the form of Kevin Covais and Michael Sandecki aka Clay Faiken. Early this year, the show created a niche for Covais as its stud manqué. Whether he was singing "Part Time Lover", or being called “Chicken Little” by Paris, Idol only avoided looking like the high school bully because the show constantly reminded us that Kevin was in on the joke and having fun too. By the time he was soloing to "What’s New Pussycat", I was starting to wonder, “If I were mom and dad, would I want my son turned into Pee Wee Herman just for the sake of fifteen minutes?”

As one of the hundreds of Idol bloggers out there, I’m well aware of Idol’s latent tv ancestors. Reality TV’s roots are in events like Miss America and the Academy Awards . By the late sixties, much earlier if you happen to be gay, roughly half the tv audience for both events watched less because they were interested in the competition than because they loved to snark. Miss America and Oscars viewing parties became a regular social event where people would get together to see who could supply the best subtitles about the absurdity of the outfits and other goings on. This, of course, is why Miss America died with Bert Parks. Ryan's tv great-uncle. The producers never quite got the Camp-factor which in a tv version of Heisenberg only works if the makers of the show pretend to be oblivious to it.

For millions of people, the Idol technology triathlon is to Tivo the show, vote with cell phone, then post on the internet in a post Y2k Oscars’ viewing party. It’s even evolved to a point where many of the participants don’t even bother to watch the show. In any case, Idol is rooted in the great winking gay cultural tradition that runs through television that starts at least as early as Liberace, moves through Robert Reid and Felix Ungar, came out through Ellen, and culminated in Will and Grace. Of all the semi-stars who have emerged from the Idol machine, the one who couldn’t have gotten America’s attention without Idol is Clay Aiken. Aiken also happens to be the most sexually ambiguous of all Idol finalists.

I don’t think the show or Clay’s management have ever known how to deal with it. Sandecki, who was audition round fodder, just happened to be a parody of all that the producers feared most about Clay Aiken winning the show. I don’t presume to know Sandecki’s personal life, but now that he’s had his fifteen minutes, I doubt that his my space page is being mobbed with female fans wanting to date him.

In any case, the producers managed one of these perfectly constructed tv moments. Sandecki got to act out the homage to Idol’s awards show roots, we watched his Clay Faiken audition in all its bladder tightening glory, then Ryan made us wonder if the show had jumped the line to full on mean by asking Sandecki to sing again. As he screeched while scrunching up his face for a few painful bars, suddenly from behind door number three Idol 2A version of Clay Aiken popped out.

Of course, the show can’t directly reference the fact that Aiken disappeared for several months in the wake of tabloid stories about his sex life, but this version of Aiken almost seems like the brocuhre model from one of those “Help me Choose to be Straight” seminars. He’s tan, a bit more muscular, has lost the hand gestures, and has been sprayed with extra testosterone. Even more dramatic, the full on makeover was standing next to the exaggerated version of the old-model nerd Aiken. As a bonus, Aiken sounded better on Elton John (wow interesting choice there) than any of this year’s contestants ever managed. Yes, I’m looking at you, Levon lite.

I don’t know how the Idol version 2 Clay Aiken molded from the pale ball of Clay 1,will ultimately do now that he has K.D. Lang’s hair, but this was breathtakingly good reality TV. It played out on more levels than any Robert Altman movie. In the meantime, network tv continues our bizarre cultural dance between its attraction to American pop culture's inner-homo and its need to act terrified of openly acknowledging it. No show makes the tension of this ambivalence more palpable than Idol.

The only thing that didn’t quite go perfectly was that the seemingly shocked Sandecki kept singing after the punch line. I suspect the producers allowed this so that Meatloaf could feel better about his performance. (I did hear that he’s been sick, so in that sense he did the trooper thing) A few others have noted that Katharine McPhee seemed notably more relaxed on Wednesday and sang better. I suspect it had something to do with the format of the coronation show which is much closer to jump into production number and do your role than sing while everyone stares at just you and talks about your dress being too tight.

I’m pretty sure too that Bucky was tapping on his mike during “Raindrops” because they built experimental technology into it that allows anyone to sing without an accent. “The Raindrops on Idol fall mainly on the plain, I think he’s got it.”

He actually sounded pretty good as did Mandisa. It was also definitely heartwarming to see Chris Daughtry sing a Live duet with his hero and role model Captain Picard.

Stardate May 2006, our band has landed on the stage of an alien planet. The Enterprise is being tracked by a wannabe who appears to be a Borg clone, the chain hanging from his belt being the only clue.

We Walk a careful Line with this situation. I order evasive maneuvers and go really really high to get out of his range. It seems to work, but seconds later he's still there. We go into hyperdrive.

Whoops, something's wrong! There’s Burt Bacharach, Prince, and is that Scott Bakula from "Quantum Leap" piloting my ship? The singularity must have taken us into a time warp. It can’t be later than 1986. I’m pretty sure the one who calls himself Ryan is a poorly disguised Ferenghi.

The pilot for the Kellie Pickler sitcom worked less well. How does one say “More obvious than Hee Haw” in French? If I may be so bold Chef Puck, to get someone like Kellie to eat anything all you have to do is deep fry it. Had you done that, she might have even been willing to try your line of frozen pizzas, say the one topped with kiwi fruit and fiddlehead clams.

Speaking of stupid trends, what is this whole bit with the chefs as tv celebrities ? Except on Star Trek, you can’t taste food even through a high definition plasma screen. I know they use food shows to sell lifestyle accoutrements, but they might as well make bloggers into TV stars.

For some reason, I actually rather liked the Burt Bacharach medley. First, it made me feel like I’d stepped into the first Austin Powers movie and I’ve always liked watching Elizabeth Hurley. (Jay Roach also used live down the hall from me) Second, it came bundled with a free ad for Psychic Friends Network.

If someone could tell me they paid their 50 cents a minute back in 1984 and Dionne Warwick told them she’d be on tv singing with Kevin Covais and Melissa McGhee while promoting one more tour, I’d buy a block of a thousand psychic friends minutes right now to ask about "Peak Oil", global warming, and Karl Rove's possible indictment. In the meantime Elliott as aFurby singing “House is Not a Home” sounded very good, maybe it was the producers way of making up for letting Mary J. Blige yell him off the stage.

If only the Idol producers could have matched that great scene in My Best Friend’s Wedding, this tribute to the guy who kept pop alive during the Woodstock era would have been perfect.

After three hours of Idol this week, my mind is frazzled to the point of being reduced to random bits about other parts of the show. Carrie Underwood (I was never a fan) actually looked and sounded good. Now that she gets to sing in her zone, she struck me as a deserving winner in this sea of the season five final dozen. After a season of telling Lisa Tucker that she kept choosing material that was both too old for her and too big for her voice, what was "Alfie" all about?

I thought the musical highlight of the evening was Paris Bennett and Al Jarreau. She doesn’t have his rubbery inflections, but she matched him surprisingly well with the vocalese. Also, it was one of the few duets that night where the participants actually seemed to be listening to one another. The song from Dirty Dancing with Katharine in a bridesmaid's gown (talk about your not so subtle hints) and Taylor in a tux felt like it was lifted from a bizarro episode of Donnie and Marie .

One last comment on the Idol genome, the show has one other hidden ancestor. In a time of extraordinarily divisive politics and constant talk of bleak prospects for the environment and our children, Idol almost pointedly ignores the truly topical. Except for Josh Gracin, the war in Iraq doesn't exist in the Idol universe, Katrina never happened, and the only reference to global warming is Kermit the Frog in a hybrid Ford Focus.

Idol’s popularity owes much to the fact that it’s the equivalent of cultural comfort food. Does anyone remember that the most popular show on television at the height of the sixties revolution was Laugh In , an electrified version of Vaudeville with little touches like paisley, stickers of flowers, and Goldie Hawn in a bikini. Idol, ostensibly the revival of Amateur Hour, is this generation’s Laugh In

I remember thinking that none of the jokes on Laugh In were actually funny maybe especially “Sock it to Me” and “Here Comes the Judge”, but I laughed and kept watching, maybe because I needed to laugh in those times. Some of the music on Idol is genuinely wonderful, but mostly it’s not. I suspect I watch the show because I want to believe in music, any shared music, in a time where discord or even apocalypse is always just below the surface in America.I know that no second coming of Paul Robeson will ever sing “We Shall Overcome” on the show. I even know that I’ll probably never hear a voice as good as Johnny Hartman’s or Sarah Vaughan’s on AI. Still, I keep watching because in all its tastelessness, manipulation, and silliness, Idol seems to catch some warming echo of tv culture that resonates for me.

In 1987, I was on a bike trip with a group and we were camping in the Mojave desert after being told that the area was filled with roving bands of death worshipping Satanists. For some reason, in the spirit of scary campfire stories it got us just scared enough. By one in the morning a couple riders were crying that they weren’t ready to have their hearts ripped from their bodies for some sick ceremony as if they really believed it, a fellow biker whipped out a guitar and started playing and singing "American Pie" (a song that was a hit when most of the group was in pre-school). Here inthe hottest, most bug infested, waterless spot in California, suddenly everyone started singing along with him and the whole group was feeling safe again just because of the shared comfort of pop music.

Idol is a British show that’s been made deeply American. This year’s finale caught all that’s weird and yet endearing about our own popular culture in its marriage of convenience between the rhetoric of cell phone driven democracy and amateur singers with backstories. Somehow too, it reminds me of that night with Don Mclean after midnight in the Mojave.

What can I say, but “Soul Patrol, Soul Patrol.”

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