Well, the wildcards all tore it up. Maybe there's something to be said for the whole second chance thing. My rankings...1. Clay - holy crap, what a performance. If this white-ass cracker can tear up Motown like this, I can't wait to see the rest of his songs. Hopefuly he won't mess up and pick something else by Journey. He SHOULD win.
2. Kimberly C - I literally couldn't believe my ears. What a turnaround. I never thought that tonight's top two would both be so....white! I don't know how she managed to own the song, but she was all over it.
3. Trenyce - Excellent showing, I love her voice soooo much, but the other two just performed better. She still whomped em.
4. Charles - Very subdued, but stylistically good. He certainly did wonders with the weakest song of the night. I'm sure there will be disagreement on this, since everyone I was watching with looked at me like I was crazy when I praised the performance.
5, 6 - Julia and Rickey Smith - both solid performances, but not really super-duper. Julia was her standard fare of a good song for a soulless stick-up-her-ass. Rickey did a lot better than usual, but he just didn't shine.
7. Ruben - I really didn't like the stylings that he added. His voice is good, but his performances are way to Aaron Neville-riffic for me. And his "image" gets old fast.
8. Vanessa O. - not too bad, but not too good. It seemed like she was singing the song cold off of a karaoke machine. But she is so kooky! (sic)
9. Carmen - actually not bottom of the barrel this time, but I still think she didn't deserve to get a wildcard pull.
10. Kimberley L - a horrible song, and a nervous, lackluster performance. She really could have torn it up if she had played with the "heat wave" lines. I was sooo disappointed - she was my fave early on. She just let the life slip right out of the song. And going first may suck, but still...it wasn't good, even considering
11. Corey Clark - okay, now we know he's an idiot, and he still is far from enthralling in his performances. That falsetto was just disturbing.
12. Josh - I don't know why, but I hate him more every time I see him. You could write off the Motown performance to his whiteness, but that didn't hurt a lot of the others. It's weird, because he's never technically off, but his performances are just so...blah.
And here's hoping we never have another "celebrity judge." Gawd!