American Idol- Top 24 Part 1

About 15 years ago, the Internet was full of American Idol blogs and I was one of the people doing them, as I first began back in 2007. These days, I do not think there is any amateur blogger in the country who still covers this show in as much detail as I do. If nothing else, it is a diversion from politics.

So, once again, I will be watching the show and offering performance reviews, weekly contestant rankings, predictions, and voting analysis. However, I have been fairly busy the last few days as I type this late on a Tuesday night. I managed to catch up on all four hours of Idol by watching recordings after the shows had already ended airing "live" on Sunday and Monday evening. At the time, I made my rankings, which are pretty much based on vocal performance alone, as well as my predictions for the bottom two for each group, which are supposedly supposed to be eliminated during a three hour episode next Sunday night.

Tonight, I am going to stick to the Sunday night episode and tomorrow, I will plan to blog about the Monday night show. With the passage of time, my memory of the performances will have faded a bit, and thus, the critiques will be a bit short, but I think I will get some basic points across. Later on in the season, I can try to "live-blog" each performance, pausing after each song, or at least get the write-up done on the same night, but that was not possible this week.

Once again, the kids, host, and judges are at the Disney report in Hawai'i. On Sunday, the guest mentor was Tori Kelly, who  is now a Grammy winner, but was once a young Idol hopeful herself. She never made it past Hollywood Week however, so she is now mentoring contestants who have already gone further on the show than she ever did.

1. Hailey Mia- "she's all i wanna be"

I am not even going to be familiar with many of these newer songs the contestants are doing, especially the one that are stylized in either all lowercase or all caps. I suppose a TruthSocial musical would only feature songs in all caps.

From what I recall, 16 year old Hailey sounded very competent but also came across as fairly young and inexperienced.

2. Jordan Anthony- "Titanium"

This song I know. Jordan is a singer from Australia who as far as we have been told has never lived in the United States. In recent years, the ABC version of American Idol has been open to foreigners, or at least those from the "nice countries"

Not a bad effort on a big song from Jordan, but as I recall, he seemed maybe a little bit behind the beat and maybe attempted too many runs.

3. Jayna Elise- "Confident"

This Demi Lovato song is probably kind of polarizing to some viewers. Jayna delivered it with big vocals and big attitude as well. Appropriately enough, she seemed very confident on stage. That is basically what I remember about 48 hours later.

4. Julia Gagnon- "Rumour Has It"

Adele has a lot of great songs, and I am not sure this is one of them. One thing for sure though, is that Julia is crazy talented, which is why she was one of the three people to get a "Platinum Ticket" this season.

I think she can probably outbelt anybody in the competition this season and while she seems like a nice person, it is also clear that she recognizes that she is very good at what she does. I enjoyed the way she showed off her powerful voice but some may think she was overdoing it a bit. It is very possible she will cement herself eventually as my personal vocal favorite this season.

5. KAYKO- "How To Live Without You"

During the auditions, in what felt like a complete pre-arranged productions, this particular person was a piano player for a friend who was auditioning. Then, Sam was "convinced" to sing for Luke, Lionel, and Katy himself and blew them away and big surprise, was off to Hollywood. I recall thinking during his piano driven performance that he would go very far this season.

Now, he has the stage name of KAYKO (in all caps) which I am surmising comes from his last name(s) of Kelly-Cohen. (Too Irish or too Jewish?") The singer formerly known as Sam sang an original tune about missing his deceased mother and for that reason alone will get a ton of votes. The winning Iam Tongi narrative of last season about a deceased parent is going to be used by more than one contestant this season.

KAYKO is a very good singer but I do not think his vocals were as stellar as the judges thought.

6. Nya- "The Best"

Idol has presented Nya as your not so typical Broadway singer, who has a chance to also be a mainstream pop star. To me, she feels like someone who they are not expecting to actually be around that long this season. Critics might use the political parlance "DEI"to explain her presence in the Top 24. I do not know if I would go that route, but I was a bit underwhelmed.

Nya is of course a good singer, but singing a Tina Turner song, especially this one, really opens up a lot of room for comparison and it is hard to hear anybody cover this without hearing what the late Tina Turner brought to it.

7. Blake Proehl- "Anyone"

I was definitely surprised they put him in the Top 24. He seems to be out of his depth. Blake is the son of prominent retired NFL Wide Receiver Ricky Proehl, who spent one season with the Chicago Bears and then went on to greater fame with the Rams team that was once in St. Louis. So, Blake joins Nikko Smith and Joe Magrane in being Idol contestants who had fathers who played professional sports in St. Louis, although baseball was the case for others. What is more though, is that Blake himself is a former NFL player, sort of. Also a WR, he was signed by the Minnesota Vikings, but apparently never got past the practice squad, and decided to leave football due to injury. Still though, as someone who was at least making the NFL minimum for one season, I wonder if he went into Idol as technically the "wealthiest" contestant in the show's history, I am not considering the fact that he obviously grew up in a very rich family. (An older brother, has also had some stints on NFL practice squads as a WR)

Anyways, Blake sang a Justin Bieber song I do not know, and while he looks like a generic mid 20s pop star, and seems like a nice guy, it was not very good vocally. I will say that as far as football players go, Blake can probably outsing Travis Kelce, although the latter would probably easily win the show these days based upon a certain connection.

8. Abi Carter- "Oceans  (Where Feet May Fail")

Abi is another platinum ticket winner, although I am struggling to remember much about her audition. From what I recall, she sounded good on Sunday night. I think I was struck by the fact that she was singing a song from "Hillsong" UNITED, which I did not know was a thing. I am just familiar with Hillsong having been a very large mega-church out of Australia, that later became very controversial, with allegations of abuse, and considered by many to be a cult. Clearly though, this was a worship song.

9. Quintavious- "Something In The Water"

Which brings us to an actual worship singer. For this performance in Hawai'i,  Quintavious went with some Carrie Underwood. Taking on country seemed like a bold choice, and for the first few parts of the song, it seemed like he was going to sing it as a country song. Then, he broke into full gospel mode and was very impressive. That particular genre of music might be all that he will really do well on the show, but it will get him a lot of praise from the judges every time.

10. Kaibrienne "KB" Richins- "Heaven"

This is how her name is presented on the show. I do not really see the point and have to think she will just transition to KB if she sticks around. KB Richins would also be a good compromise, although it sounds a bit like the Governor of Illinois (and his wife) who both use two initials as a first name.

"Heaven" by Bryan Adams has been done many times in Idol history and female singers have historically struggled with the classic. If I am not mistaken, KB sang a particular arrangement of the song which was first done by her fellow Utahn David Archuleta in live performances after his season of Idol was over. I think she has real potential but I do not think she pulled off what she was going for. KB also seemed extremely nervous and out of sorts over this whole experience and that does not bode well because the pressure will only increase.

11. Will Moseley- "Sittin' On The Dock Of The Bay"

Why does his name remind of something from the Star Wars saga? Maybe one of those fanatics can figure out why. While he did not play in Division 1, as Blake Proehl did, Will is another former college football player and while Blake was cut by the Vikings, Will looks like he could actually be a Viking.

I also think Will might be the early frontrunner to take this season. The Georgian is pretty much the epitome of a "white guy with a guitar" and has the everyman quality that older female voters tend to like. He was pretty much the only true country singer in this first group of 12, which would have him easily advance, but he also played it smart by doing an old soul song from the 1960s that people from my parents' era are definitely familiar with.

This was a very impressive, almost effortless vocal and Will made it fit his style very well. I probably will not be really into the country ballads he is likely to perform during his run this season, but I can envision him sounding like a seasoned pro every week and winning a ton of votes.

12. McKenna Faith Breinholt- "The Story"

Another female singer with a long name, and like Guatemala born Julia, also an adopted daughter. McKenna's particular story involves her now deceased birth mother having been a moderately successful singer in the past.

We have seen McKenna perform at the piano but this was the first time with guitar. There is no doubt she has a very appealing quality to her voice, especially when she hits lower notes. It will be interesting to see how she can adapt her unique tone to a wider variety of musical choices, but this performance was really good. She sounds like someone who should also be famous.

Rankings:

12. Blake Proehl

11. Kaibrienne "KB" Richins

(should be the two eliminated)

10. Jordan Anthony

9.  Nya

8. Hailey Mia

7. KAYKO

6. Abi Carter

5. Jayna Elise

4. Quintavious

3. McKenna Faith Breinholt

2. Julia Gagnon

1. Will Moseley

Predicted Eliminations:

Blake Proehl and Nya