A Kindler Gentler Bitch-Slap

When oh when will this end? Can't we just get to Hollywood, please?

Here is what I noticed last night. Some of these people who "can't sing" according to Simon and Randy sing just fine. Just not American Idol-fine. Earnest long haired girl (who Jacob on TWoP said has hair that "whispers softly, 'My family is in a cult'.") has a perfectly pretty church singing voice. The first girl who was oh-so-confident beneath her nervousness (she sang "Reflection" which I persist in hoping is going to be the Supremes "Reflections" instead of the irritating Xtina song...) was karaoke-fine. The jumped on her like she was barbecuing kitties.

Although I enjoyed the way that Simon and Randy cut through the contestants like a hot knife through butter, I missed Paula. I was amused by her love for the Jack Osborne-ish looking funny boy. I really liked the repartee between the judges last night as a whole. It seemed much less fake-conflict-y than usual. And there were less sad-crazy people and more happy-crazy-old-big-bird-funny people. Although you could see how ticked off Simon was to have his time wasted.

Altogether - this was the first auditions episode that didn't make me feel a little dead inside. Thank you polite citizens of Birmingham for restoring my faith in humanity!