American Idol Recap: Aspen

I wonder who’s bright idea it was to hold auditions in Aspen? It doesn’t make much sense when you think about it. Aspen is small. Aspen is expensive. Aspen is a destination town, not the hub of Colorado. Sounds perfect! I blame Randy.

I blame Randy for everything

To justify the Aspen location, we get LOTS of pointless shots of nature. Snow! Waterfalls! Fields! Cows! Trees! Fake snow! What?? Its like we’re at Aspen Disney on the monorail.  Thrilling…

There was a lot of padding in this episode, although they claim to have given out 31 golden tickets. I think we all would have preferred to hear a couple more of the good ones, yes?

I pick the girl with her head stuck in cardboard!

The first contestant is Jenni Schick, a music teacher from Virginia who has an unnatural hatred of recorders. Jenni spends about 5 minutes running through the halls pretending (?) someone is chasing her. She hides behind corners and pillars. Hm. Never have I been so happy that I will never have children in Virginia.

Do you want this woman around your children?

Ryan talks to Jenni and we get our first uncomfortable Steven Tyler as “sex symbol” moment. Jenni really wants to kiss Steven because he’s SOOO sexy. Its totally cool because her boyfriend said its ok! Ok, gross. Obviously the producers are going to push this sexy Steven Tyler thing this year. It makes me uncomfortable.

Hey! Hey! Dude looks like a crackhead!

And Jenni’s boyfriend wants to kiss Ryan. So of course we get our first “Ryan isn’t gay” moment of the episode. He gets scared and says “Your boyfriend isn’t here, right?” No, Ryan. No men will be kissing you. You’re straight, silly! I’m surprised he doesn’t pull out a picture of Julianne Hough to prove how straight he is. Ugh.  Oh and Jenni – two of the 3 people your boyfriend is allowed to kiss are men.  You might want to rethink your relationship.

Steven promises to kiss Jenni if she does well. Ew. She launches into “Heartbreaker” and its pretty good, but is that a good song to show off vocal skill? Don’t think so. But she’s crazy enough to get 3 yes’s and she gets to kiss Steven. Be careful Ryan, her boyfriend’s going to be coming after you!

I forgot to mention La Lopez’s ensemble! She’s wearing some sort of sci-fi shimmery top, short shorts, and tights. Her hair is hugely voluminous and her eye makeup is out of control.

Its Aspen, Jennifer.  Not pre-WWII Berlin.

Next we get a bunch of home videos of people waking up to audition. Where do these come from? I know this is Idol production at work, but how do they arrange these things? One of these morning wakey up people is Curtis Grey. He’s in a band. He’s boring. His voice is good, but a little thin in the upper register. Randy loves that he sang Boyz II Men (didn’t he produce them or something?) so he says yes. JLo’s eye makeup says yes. Steven’s lip gloss says yes.

Next we get three people put together in one package. One kid has a frighteningly deep Scotty McCreery voice. One kid is bald and looks like the Jamaican 7up dude. And the 3rd guy needs a larger shirt. They are all good and get through. Yay for Richie, Devan, and Mathenee. Maybe we’ll see you again!(?)

After 10 years of watching this show, I think we all what happens next. Yep, its sad train wreck time! Yay!!!
Oh Lord, her name is Tealana Hedgespeth. Yes, that is her name. It gets worse from there. She has a twin, who is more talented and prettier. But she’s here to prove she is talented too! She wears very odd glasses and a REALLY unfortunate yellow romper. Oh, and nylons. Its not a good look. She immediately tells Randy he can call her “dog” (dawg?). Oh, girl. Not a good way to open the audition, Tealana. She launches into Melissa Etheridge’s “Somebody Bring Me Some Water” which would be a good choice if she could sing. You guys, she can’t sing. I feel bad and uncomfortable. Randy calls her funny and Steven suggests she record herself and listen to it. Yikes. Three no’s. Finally we see her and her sister singing together and it is awful squared. I’m going to take a shower now.  She is not getting a picture – she’s been through enough.

NEXT! We can all relax because we know after that this one will be good. Phew. 18 year old Hailey Smith lives in the mountians in a log cabin. A three story kick ass log cabin but it counts! She works three jobs: a maid, a sausage maker, and something else that I missed. And she’s a veggie! A veggie sausage maker! We love her, right? It is apparent at this point that Hailey is completely high.

I can smell the patchouli from here

JLo gets a 60’s, 70’s vibe from Hailey. So does Steven. Randy doesn’t know what that means so he keeps quiet – until he hears she’s singing Rufus/Chaka Khan and he perks up. Randy, you are so predictable.
She has a really interesting voice. I think she’d be great in a band. I don’t know how “current” her voice is – which is what this whole contest is all about so we’ll see. I like her though. Stay away from her, Steven! 3 yes’s and we see her spinning around with her golden ticket. Yep, totally high.

The judges break for lunch and we are treated to a shot of a table of food. Steven eats blueberries. OK, do we need to know when they eat lunch? And do I need to see Steven eat blueberries? No and no. This show…

Alanna Snare is next. She’s a bartender/waitress whose place of work specializes in Rocky Mountain oysters. The judges all pretend not to know what they are so she explains that they are cow balls. I call bullshit on this scenario. The only one who wouldn’t know what they are is Randy because he doesn’t know what anything is, but the other two would. She sings “Jolene” and it suuuuuuucks. Like worse than Romper Girl. They intersperse cows mooing in with her singing. I wish Dolly would march in that room and slap everyone in there for fucking up her song. Sacrilege!

Shelby Tweten is up next. She’s from Minnesota and we are getting a backstory! (btw – what are people from Virginia and Minnesota doing in Aspen? A teacher and a young teenager? You think the producers had something to do with that?) Shelby is bi-polar and has suffered from severe depression. But American Idol has turned her life around. Looking forward to auditioning for Idol has kept her on her meds and has helped her get better. OK, I don’t want to harp on this too much because obviously it is great that the girl is doing well. But should Idol be taking credit for that? That gives me the creeps. What if she doesn’t make it on the show? Is she going to lose it and go off her meds?

Please do not let these 3 determine your mental health, Shelby!

Anyway, she’s good! She sings “Temporary Home” and JLo gets her saintly/condescending look. See, you guys JLo cares about the common people! All hail, Jennifer! She’s real! She’s from the block!

I feel you, girl.  I drive a Fiat.

Everyone yells YES!!! And I laugh because it sounds like Randy says “A big, huge ass!” Oh Randy, if only you did say that – all would be forgiven.

Bad singing time! Montage of bad singer time! Laugh at people time! One girl beat boxes “Stand By Me” and she’s awesome! Why is she in the bad singer montage? Boo!

One guy is so bad he causes an avalanche! Hee hee. Get it? Cause they’re in Aspen! Hee hee.

Must…resist…Randy…fat joke…

Jairon Jackson comes in wearing shorts. Dude, don’t you know there are avalanches out there? He is singing an original song called “So Hard”. Uh…errr…no comment. Even I have to draw the line somewhere. Jairon is good! The song is a slow jam and its pretty good too! He gets 3 yes’s and he calls all of them beautiful. He then runs out with his golden ticket, tackles someone with his pants falling off, falls down, rips his ticket in half, and breaks an overhead light. Smooth, Jairon, real smooth.

Hoping he makes it home alive

Next is self-proclaimed “vintage glitter queen” Angie Zeiderman. I’m not sure she understands what that phrase connotes. I picture RuPaul’s Drag Race when I hear that, not American Idol.

Needs more “queen”

She LOVES Gaga and wants to be besties with her. She does a Broadway number which requires her to roll around on the floor and flash the crew. I think its from The Producers? Its pretty good for what it is, but the wrong song for that room. Randy hates it and is ready to kick her to the curb, but Jenny defends her. She tells Randy to be quiet. Damn girl! Just when I’m done with you, you do something like that and I kind of like you again.

She sings Blue Bayou, which is good, but doesn’t sound very “Idol” to me. In any case she gets through. Yay?

There is now the obligatory scene of the audition room with everyone jamming to some random song. Its kinda like the “Hot Lunch Jam” scene in Fame. Except not. Where’s Coco when you need her?

THIS!

Finally we have Magic Cyclops. This final audition was so dumb, I had to do some research to find out what the hell it was all about. Apparently this guy is a comic musician who is pretty popular in the Denver area. The producers heard about him and invited him to audition, telling him he wouldn’t have to wait in line or anything. So he showed up and it, uh, happened.

He claims to be from Davenport, Iowa, has 11,000 air guitars, has a British accent because he only watched PBS as a child, declares himself a lady, and appears to be 63 years old.

Is that Billy Bob Thornton under there?

Randy is flummoxed. He says “Bring in the Krakken!” JLo tells him “Its ‘release the Krakken, dumbass’”. I’m loving the JLo smackdowns!

Magic Cyclops sings “Cracklin’ Rosie” and then “Margaritaville”. Not good or funny. Randy goes to the rest room. JLo just walks out. M.C. releases some popper thing behind his back. Oh God, who thought this was a good idea?
Magic Cyclops takes his Ikea shopping bag and wanders off into the Aspen forest.

So that was Aspen, folks! What did you think? I give it a 6 on the JLometer. Let me know what you thought!

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